China’s leaders intensify grip on army, society

As China implements the 12th five year plan (2011-2015), higher echelons of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) leadership are according top priority to ‘social management’ — the euphemistic term for maintenance of internal security and social stability. Party cadres and security forces are being geared to tackle discontent and widespread protests. New measures to pre-empt protests and demonstrations, and maintain social stability are being introduced. For the first time, there are public indications that the party’s sword arm, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), might not be immune to symptoms of disaffection.

China’s president, party chief and chairperson of the Central Military Commission Hu Jintao, speaking to PLA deputies this March, especially emphasised the need to ‘abidingly uphold’ the CCP’s ‘absolute leadership of the armed forces and be unswerving in following the party’s command’. Describing Jintao’s speech this year as ‘different’, Chinese military commentators explained that it was made in the backdrop of ‘complicated disputes in the arena of domestic ideologies’. They said the ‘Jasmine Revolutions’ in some countries and ‘street protests in certain inland cities’ necessitate that the PLA’s top leadership ensures ‘resolute politics and stable thinking among the troops’. In an unusually candid elaboration, they acknowledged that since over 70 per cent of PLA personnel had college education, the political viewpoints of ‘non-party affiliation and depoliticisation of the military’ and ‘nationalisation of the military’ could well have an impact on them. Both viewpoints have separately been criticised as being spread by ‘hostile foreign forces’ and intended to weaken the CCP and China by divesting the party of control over its armed forces.

The impact of reforms, migration of millions of labourers from rural to urban areas, the rising Consumer Price Index, corruption and worker discontent are among the factors contributing to growing popular discontent. A recent confidential Tsinghua University survey estimated that last year 180,000 disturbances occurred across China, while a report from Hong Kong claimed that half of China’s police force was deployed last year to tackle major protests. It said China would have to allocate at least 600 billion yuan (Rs4,15,800 crore) to maintain social stability in 2011. The advent of ‘new media’, which facilitates coordination among protesters, has complicated matters. A commentary in the party mouthpiece People’s Daily warned that internet manipulation ‘spreads viruses of public opinion to stir up public sentiment’.

More recently, the prestigious Beijing-based Chinese Academy of Social Sciences issued a Blue Paper stating that people are losing confidence in the ‘government’s capabilities and integrity’. It said that ‘masses in urban areas believe real estate is a racket overseen by governments in collusion with real estate developers. People also have no trust in food and medicine safety’ and other commodities of daily use.

In a frank admission of laxity in societal controls in recent years, China’s security czar, Zhou Yongkang, recently proposed creation of a centralised national population database built on the identity card information of every adult Chinese citizen. Writing in Qiu Shi, the authoritative magazine of the Central Party School, Yongkang asserted that ‘social management’ was a top priority and would be an important criteria for promotions of officials at all levels.

Weeks earlier, it was disclosed that 13 million individuals had been ‘overlooked’ by the ubiquitous hukou, or compulsory household registration system which constitutes the basis for employment, travel and movement of all Chinese citizens. This can be attributed to the considerably increased mobility of citizens and weakening of the strength and influence of party grassroots organisations since the 1980s.

Hinting at future tougher measures, Yongkang  forecast that ‘changes in people’s ideologies, value systems and moral standards, a growing awareness of fairness, democracy, rights and the rule of law, and an increasingly strong desire to pursue their own interests and seek to benefit from the mainland’s economic miracle’, pose new challenges. President Hu Jintao and vice-president Xi Jinping have since February similarly emphasised the enhanced importance of ‘social management’.

China’s leadership is prepared for an increase in protests across the country as the modernisation process accelerates. Chinese premier Wen Jiabao had anticipated in his speech to the National People’s Congress that ‘social conflicts in some localities will be another factor hindering the country’s economic development’. The 12th five year plan has provided for this and, for the first time, devoted a separate section to ‘social management’.