Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T07:32:29.680Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Jiang Zemin's Successors: The Rise of the Fourth Generation of Leaders in the PRC*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

Extract

Shortly after Jiang Zemin and his so-called “third generation of leaders” took over power from Deng Xiaoping and other revolutionary veterans, China began to face a new round of political succession. This is no surprise because Jiang is already 72 years old, and two other top leaders, Premier Zhu Rongji and Head of People's Congress Li Peng, are also in their early 70s. The average ages of members of the Standing Committee, Politburo and Secretariat of the 15th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) elected in 1997 are 65, 63 and 63 respectively. These three pivotal, hierarchical leadership organizations all consist of similar age groups. When the next Party congress convenes, these political bodies will be occupied by people with an average age of 68 to 70. This narrow age distribution among the top leadership may cause problems for political succession in the future.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. For a detailed discussion of the age distribution of leadership bodies of the 15th Party Congress and its comparison with previous Party congresses, see Cheng, Li and White, Lynn, “The Fifteenth Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party: full-fledged technocratic leadership with partial control by Jiang Zemin,” Asian Survey, Vol. 38, No. 3 (03 1998), pp. 231264.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. Shijie ribao (World Journal), 3 03 1998, p. A1.Google Scholar

3. Yu, Xiao, “New generation aims for the top: ‘fourth generation’ leaders are taking the helm in both central and regional administrations,” South China Morning Post, 6 08 1998, p. 1Google Scholar; and “Hu Jintao: Communist Party ‘golden boy’,” Agence France Presse, 15 03 1998Google Scholar, South China Morning Post, 25 08 1998, p. 1Google Scholar; and Shijie ribao, 25 08 1998, p. A9.Google Scholar

4. China News Analysis, No. 1607 (1 04 1998), pp. 45Google Scholar; and No. 1613–14 (1–15 July 1998), pp. 18–20.

5. Yu, Xiao, “Fourth generation of leadership takes shape. Hu groomed to be next helmsman,” South China Morning Post, 7 07 1998.Google Scholar

6. Renmin ribao (People's Daily), 3 08 1998, p. 1.Google Scholar

7. China Daily, 20 06 1998, p. 1.Google Scholar

8. Gailong, Liao and Yuan, Fan (comp.), Zhongguo renming da cidian xiandai dangzhengjun Ungdaorenwujuan (Who's Who in China, the Volume on Current Party, Government, and Military Leaders), 1994 ed. (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1994)Google Scholar. For the complete list of the categories of leaders included in the volume, see pp. xi–xv. An overwhelming majority of the fourth generation of leaders are not included in the previous 1989 edition.

9. Members or alternates of the 15th Central Committee of the CCP often serve in other capacities. For example, they simultaneously serve as ministers of the central government or provincial Party secretaries.

10. Far Eastern Economic Review, 2 10 1997, p. 24.Google Scholar

11. For example, Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP”Google Scholar; and Zang, Xiaowei, “Ethnic representation in the current Chinese leadership,” The China Quarterly, No. 153 (03 1998), pp. 107127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12. One exception is Cherrington, Ruth, “Generational issues in China: a case study of the 1980s generation of young intellectuals,” British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 48, No. 2 (06 1997), pp. 302320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13. Additional biographical data come mainly from Renmin ribao, Zhonghua yingcai (China's Talents, Beijing), China News Analysis (Hong Kong), Mingbao (Hong Kong), China Directory (Tokyo), Zhonggong yanjiu (Studies of Chinese Communism, Taibei), and Shijie ribao.

14. Strauss, William and Howe, Neil, Generations: The History of America's Future 1582–2069 (New York: William Morrow and Co., 1992), p. 59.Google Scholar

15. Ibid. pp. 60–61.

16. Hamrin, Carol Lee, “Perspectives on generational change in China,” unpublished scope paper for the workshop organized by The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, 06 1993, p. 1.Google Scholar

17. Many scholars define the formative years of personal growth as between 17 and 25. See Yahuda, Michael, “Political generations in China,” The China Quarterly, No. 80 (12 1979), p, 795Google Scholar; Rintala, Marvin, “Generations: political generations,” in The International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (New York: Macmillan and Free Press, 1968)Google Scholar; and Garza, Rodolfo and Vaughan, David, “The political socialization of Chicane elites: a generational approach,” Social Science Quarterly, Vol. 65 (06 1984), pp. 290307.Google Scholar

18. Karl Mannheim uses the term “location” to refer to the concept of generation in terms of a single age group, and the term “actuality” to refer to the importance of the collective social and political experience of various age groups. See Mannheim, Karl, “Consciousness of class and consciousness of generation,” in Mannheim, Karl, Essays on Sociology of Knowledge (London: RKP, 1952)Google Scholar; and McNeill, Pat, “The changing generation gap,” New Statesman & Society, Vol. 1, No. 16, (23 09 1988), p. 30.Google Scholar

19. Cherrington, , “Generational issues in China,” p. 304.Google Scholar

20. Mannheim, , Essays on Sociology of Knowledge, p. 298.Google Scholar

21. This certainly differs from Seweryn Bialer's definition of elite generation. He argues that “elite generation is an age group whose membership is homogeneous with respect to a particular life experience at a similar point in its development.” See Stalin's Successors: Leadership, Stability, and Change in the Soviet Union (Oxford: Cambridge University Press, 1980), p. 100.Google Scholar

22. At present, the reform generation, or the fifth generation of leaders, has not emerged as a significant elite group on both the central and provincial levels, although the formative years of a handful of leaders in this study occurred during the reform era.

23. Yahuda, , “Political generations in China.”Google Scholar Also, Carol Lee Hamrin categorizes four political generations: “Revolutionary Elders” (70s and 80s) whose coming of age was most influenced by anti-imperialism and civil war in the 1920s and 1930s; “Patriotic Leaders (50s and 60s) most influenced by the anti-Japanese and anti-American wars and the adoption of the Soviet model; “Rebel Adults” (30s and 40s) shaped by the Cultural Revolution and rural exile, and seeking new ideals and values; and “Open Youth” (teens and 20s) raised with weak transitional values during the reform era. See Hamrin, , “Perspectives on generational change in China,” p. 2.Google Scholar

24. Yahuda, , “Political generations in China,” p. 795.Google Scholar

25. For studies of some members of this generation leadership, see Lampton, David M, Paths to Power: Elite Mobility in Contemporary China (Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1986)Google Scholar; and Israel, John and Klein, Donald, Rebels and Bureaucrats: China's December 9ers (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976).Google Scholar

26. Cherrington, , “Generational issues in China,” p. 304.Google Scholar

27. For the average age distribution of the 15th Central Committee of the CCP and its Politburo, see Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” pp. 252 and 254.Google Scholar

28. A discussion of the “lost generation” is found in Engelborghs-Bertels, Marthe, “The new man or a lost generation? Education in the Four Modernizations program of the PRC,” Issues and Studies, Vol. 21, No. 9 (09 1985), pp. 87118Google Scholar; Yahuda, , “Political generations in China,” pp. 802804Google Scholar; and Broaded, C. Montgomery, “The lost and found generation: cohort succession in Chinese higher education,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, No. 23, (01 1990), pp. 7795.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29. Yahuda, , “Political generations in China,” p. 802.Google Scholar

30. For a discussion of the contrasting subgroups of post-communist leadership in Russia, see Lane, David, “Transition under Eltsin: the nomenklatura and political elite circulation,” Political Studies, Vol. 45, No. 5 (12 1997), p. 874.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

31. For a detailed discussion, see Cheng, Li and White, Lynn, “The army in the succession to Deng Xiaoping: familiar fealties and technocratic trends,” Asian Survey, Vol. 33, No. 8 (08 1993), pp. 757786CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” pp. 255–56.Google Scholar

32. For the close relationship between Jiang and Chen, see Xin, Gao, Jiang Zemin de muliao (Jiang Zemin's Counsellors), 4th ed. (Hong Kong: Mingjing chubanshe, 1997), pp. 204205Google Scholar; it is also widely known in Shanghai where Jiang served as Party secretary and Chen served as his deputy in the late 1980s.

33. For earlier discussion of the origins of the CCP leaders, see Houn, Franklin W., “The Eighth Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party: a study of elite,” American Political Science Review, Vol. 51 (06 1957)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Domes, Jurgen, “The Ninth CCP Central Committee in statistical perspective,” Current Scene (Hong Kong), Vol. 9, No. 2 (1969)Google Scholar; Scalapino, Robert (ed.), Elites in the People's Republic of China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1972)Google Scholar; and Wong, Paul, China's Higher Leadership in the Socialist Transition (New York: The Free Press, 1976), pp. 190203.Google Scholar

34. See Li, and White, , “The army in the succession to Deng Xiaoping,” pp. 766–67Google Scholar; Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” pp. 246–47.Google Scholar

35. China News Analysis, Nos. 1615–16 (1–15 08 1998), pp. 1519.Google Scholar

36. China News Analysis, No. 1607 (1 04 1998), pp. 46.Google Scholar

37. See Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” pp. 246–47Google Scholar; and Xiaowei, Zang, “The Fourteenth Central Committee of the CCP: technocracy or political technocracy,” Asian Survey, Vol. 33, No. 8 (08 1993), p. 795.Google Scholar

38. Kau, Ying-mao, “The urban bureaucratic elites in Communist China: a case study of Wuhan, 1949–1965,” in Barnett, A. Doak (ed.), Communist Chinese Politics in Action (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1972), p. 227.Google Scholar

39. Li, Cheng and Bachman, David, “Localism, elitism and immobilism: elite formation and social change in post-Mao China,” World Politics, Vol. 42, No. 1 (10 1989), pp. 6494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

40. China News Analysis, Nos. 1613–14 (1–15 07 1998), p. 15.Google Scholar

41. For a discussion of the conflict between the central authorities and Cantonese officials regarding the selection of Guangdong's top leaders, see Shijie ribao, 17 09 1997, p. 2Google Scholar; and Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” p. 247.Google Scholar

42. For an overview of the rise of technocrats in post-Mao China, see Li, Cheng, Chinese Technocrats: Their Social Origins, Ideological Attributes, and Political Behavior (forthcoming).Google Scholar

43. For a discussion of the Chinese students in the West, see Hao, Jia, “Dui dangqian woguo liuxue renyuan zhuangkuang de fenxi he jidian jianyi” (“Analysis of Chinese study abroad and some recommendations”), Shehui kexue (Social Science), No. 6 (1997), pp. 5862.Google Scholar

44. Mingbao, 11 09 1998, p. 1Google Scholar; and Shijie ribao, 11 02 1998, p. A12.Google Scholar

45. Li, and Bachman, , “Localism, elitism and immobilism,” p. 69.Google Scholar

46. Most studies of technocrats in Latin America and Asia have identified those trained economists as technocrats. See, for example, Silva, Patricio, “Technocrats and politics in Chile: from the Chicago Boys to the CIEPLAN Monks,” Journal ofLalin American Studies, Vol. 23, No. 2 (05 1991), pp. 385410Google Scholar; Dimock, Marshall Edward, The Japanese Technocracy: Management and Government in Japan (New York: Walker/Weatherhill, 1968)Google Scholar; Stifel, Laurence D., “Technocrats and modernization in Thailand,” Asian Survey, 12 1976, pp. 1184–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Smith, Peter, “Leadership and change, intellectuals and technocrats in Mexico,” in Camp, Roderic (ed.), Mexico's Political Stability: The Next Ten Years (Boulder: Westview Press, 1986), pp. 101117.Google Scholar

47. Lieberthal, Kenneth, Governing China: From Revolution Through Reform (New York: W. W. Norton, 1995), p. 236Google Scholar; and Lee, Hong Yung, From Revolutionary Cadres to Party Technocrats: The Changing Cadre System in Socialist China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), p. 268.Google Scholar

48. Lee, Hong Yung, “China's 12th Central Committee: rehabilitated cadres and technocrats,” Asian Survey, Vol. 23, No. 6 (06 1983), pp. 673691CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Baum, Richard, Burying Mao: Chinese Politics in the Age of Deng Xiaoping (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 365.Google Scholar

49. Steinfeld, Edward S., “The Asian financial crisis: Beijing's year of reckoning,” The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 3 (Summer 1998), p. 44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

50. As C. Montgomery Broaded pointed out, three primary factors were taken into account in college admission: class background, the individual's own political performance and measures of academic achievement. Because only about 1–2% of college-age young people could attend higher education institutions during the first few decades of the PRC, applicants with political influence, especially children of high-ranking officials, might “actively intervene in the process to ensure a favorable outcome.” See Broaded, , “The lost and found generation,” p. 80.Google Scholar

51. Ibid. p. 77.

52. In 1998, five vice-governors were actually nominated by delegates of the provincial People's Congress and they defeated candidates appointed by the Party. Renmin ribao, 3 08 1998, p. 1.Google Scholar

53. Ibid.

54. Echholm, Erik, “Chinese book on political reform stirs hopes for more debate,” The New York Times, 25 08 1998, p. 3.Google Scholar

55. For example, Li, and Bachman, , “Localism, elitism and immobilism,” pp. 7779Google Scholar; and Li, and White, , “The army in the succession to Deng Xiaoping,” pp. 774–75.Google Scholar

56. For a discussion of the role of mishu, see Li, Wei and Pye, Lucian W., “The ubiquitous role of the mishu in Chinese politics,” The China Quarterly, No. 132 (12 1992), pp. 913936.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57. Compared to the study of Chinese mayors, the percentage of those who have had experience in economic planning declined 14.1% to 4.0%. Li, and Bachman, , “Localism, elitism and immobilism,” p. 78.Google Scholar

58. Walder, Andrew G., “Career mobility and the communist political order,” American Sociological Review, Vol. 60, No. 3 (06 1995), pp. 309328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

59. Ibid. p. 312.

60. For a discussion of school ties of military elites, especially the role of the National Defence University, see Zhan, Shu et al. , “Guofang daxue, jiangjun de yaolan” (“The National Defence University: the cradle of generals”), Zhonghuayingcai, No. 171 (08 1997), pp. 4042Google Scholar. Since its founding in 1985, the NDU has graduated a total of 5,000 military officers. They have occupied some of the most important leadership positions in the PLA; also see Li, and White, , “The army in the succession to Deng Xiaoping,” pp. 782–84.Google Scholar

61. For a discussion on the Qinghua network, see Li, Cheng, “University networks and the rise of Qinghua graduates in China's leadership,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, No. 32 (07 1994), pp. 132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

62. Shijie ribao, 19 03 1998, p. A8.Google Scholar

63. When Jiang Nanxiang was first appointed executive vice-president of the Central Party School (CPS) under Wang Zhen, Jiang brought a few Qinghua cadres with him. These Qinghua graduates occupied many top administrative posts at the CPS such as provost and deputy Party secretaries of the school. In the early 1980s, the CPS admitted about 800 young and middle-aged cadres to its post-graduate programme. After two years of study, almost all of them were assigned by central authorities to provincial-ministerial leadership positions. See: Qinghua daxue Jiang Nanxiang jinian wenji bianji xiaozu (Editorial group for the commemorative collection of Jiang Nanxiang at Qinghua University), Jiang Nanxiang jinian wenji (A Commemorative Collection of Jiang Nanxiang) (Beijing: Qinghua University Press, 1990), pp. 398421Google Scholar. Many leaders in this study pool, such as Li Haifeng, vice-governor of Hebei province, were graduates of this programme.

64. For a detailed discussion of Jiang's idea of the “red engineers,” see Xin qinghua (New Qinghua), 30 04 1989, p. 4Google Scholar; Zhongguo gaodeng jiaoyu xuehui and qinghua daxue (comp.), Jiang Nanxiang wenji (Collected Work of Jiang Nanxiang) (Beijing: Qinghua University Press, 1998)Google Scholar; and Renmin ribao, 7 05 1998, p. 11.Google Scholar

65. According to Teng Teng, then a mid-level cadre at Qinghua and vice-chair of China's State Education Commission in the late 1980s, Jiang himself examined the profile of each candidate and made the final decisions. The first meeting of political counsellors was even held at Jiang's home. A Commemorative Collection of Jiang Nanxiang, pp. 148–49.Google Scholar

66. For a full discussion of the Qinghua network under Jiang, see Li, Cheng, “University networks and the rise of Qinghua graduates in China's leadership.”Google Scholar

67. A Commemorative Collection of Jiang Nanxiang, pp. 148151.Google Scholar

68. “Hu Jintao: Communist Party ‘golden boy’,” Agence France Presse, 15 03 1998.Google Scholar

69. Li, Cheng, “University networks and the rise of Qinghua graduates in China's leadership,” pp. 130.Google Scholar

70. See Qinghua Shanghai xiaoyou tongxun lu (Address Book of Qinghua Alumni in Shanghai) (1986)Google Scholar, and Qinghua daxue Guangzhou diqu xiaoyou tongxun lu (Address Book of Qinghua Alumni in the Guangzhou Area (04 1988).Google Scholar

71. On the Internet at the following address: http://www.tsinghua.edu.cn/.

72. They were Zhu Rongji (mayor and Party secretary), Huang Ju (executive vice-mayor and deputy Party secretary), Wu Bangguo (deputy Party secretary), and Yi Tianzeng (vice-mayor).

73. Wenhui bao (Wenhui Daily), 8 09 1998, p. 1.Google Scholar

74. For example, Chung, Jae-Ho, “The politics of prerogatives in socialism: the case of Taizidang in China,” Studies in Comparative Communism, Vol. 24, No. 1 (03 1991), pp. 5876.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

75. For a discussion of the opposition to nepotism in the selection of the 15th CC members, see Li, and White, , “The 15th Central Committee of the CCP,” pp. 258262.Google Scholar

76. Lam, Willy Wo-Lap, “All the president's men,” South China Morning Post, 18 03 1998, p. 1Google Scholar; Chan, Vivien Pik-Kwan, “Strong opposition as Jiang man gets top law job,” South China Morning Post, 18 03 1998, p. 1Google Scholar; and Shijie ribao, 20 03 1998, p. A9.Google Scholar

77. Cheng, Li and White, Lynn, “The Thirteenth Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party: from mobilizers to managers,” Asian Survey, Vol. 28, No. 4 (04 1988), pp. 371399.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

78. For a discussion of the Long March and its legacy, see Snow, Edgar, Red Star Over China (New York: Grove, 1961)Google Scholar; Salisbury, Harrison E., The Long March: The Untold Story (London: Macmillan, 1985)Google Scholar; and Wright, Daniel, “A walk into the past: hiking the Long March,” The ICWA Letters, 07 1998.Google Scholar

79. Cherrington, , “Generational issues in China,” p. 303.Google Scholar

80. Private savings of Shanghai residents, for example, increased from 3 billion yuan in 1980 to 237 billion in 1998, a 79-fold increase in 18 years. Nation-wide, the figure totalled 5.1 trillion renminbi (about US $615 billion). Shanghai tongji gongbao (Shanghai statistics report), 02 1999.Google Scholar

81. Bialer, , Stalin's Successors, p. 101.Google Scholar

82. Mosca, Gaetano, The Ruling Class (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1939), p. 65.Google Scholar

83. For a full discussion of functional need of elites in a society, see Lee, Fred Chwan Hong's dissertation, “The recruitment of elites in the Republic of China: a case study in the social utility of education,” University of Oregon, 1983, pp. 12.Google Scholar