Readers may recall that an essay by Yu Keping (俞可平), a key theorist in Hu Jintao’s circle, created waves back in late 2006. Yu’s essay, “Democracy is a Good Thing,” argued that democracy was indispensable if China wanted to build a strong and modern socialist society. Today, just weeks before the all-important 17th National Congress, Yu Keping spoke out once again in the pages of Beijing Daily, in an article praising Hu Jintao and linking the president’s notion of “liberation of thought” (解放思想) – a phrase first used at the 1978 congress, when Deng Xiaoping introduced the Four Modernizations – to such issues as “human rights” and “constitutionalism.”

[Screenshot of Yu Keping essay as it appeared on xinhuanet.com.cn today]

We have no way of knowing whether Yu’s article represents the reform hopes of China’s top leader (whether Yu, in other words, is airing out Hu’s ideas to gauge public and party response), or whether the theorist is out on his own limb. But the essay should, at any rate, be the subject of lively debate leading up to next month’s congress.
The following are (hasty) excerpts of Yu’s essay as it appeared on Xinhua News Agency’s website:

Since reform and opening, many new concepts like “constitutionalism” (法治), “human rights” (人权) and “people as the foundation” (以人为本) have entered the political and social spheres in our country and been a force pushing progress on democratic politics in China (中国民主政治).
Hu Jintao pointed out in his June 25 speech that “liberation of thought (解放思想) is the basic requirement and character of our party’s course and thinking, a talisman with which we can meet new situations and new problems on the road ahead.” We can say that liberation of thought and the renewal of ideology are a key impetus behind social and political progress. As Comrade Deng Xiaoping said, changes in ideas and concepts are the preconditions of reform work. He said: “If we do not break through rigidness of ideas, there is no hope for the Four Modernizations.” More than 20 years of reform in China have shown thoroughly that conceptual changes have an extremely close connection with social and political progress …
[Brief history of concept of “people as the foundation” in China since 1949]
Just as with “people as the foundation”, so too has the concept of human rights been spurned [in China] as bourgeois ideology and criticized politically. Criticism of the idea of human rights has brought, in the realm of experience, the neglect of citizens’ human rights, the most terrifying example being the ten-year trampling on human rights that was the Cultural Revolution. After the mid-1980s some theorists began talking about human rights and looking with greater interest at Marxism’s views on human rights as well as introducing Western ideas about human rights. But these efforts were seriously impeded by the forces of traditional theory, to the extent that some proponents of Marxist human rights theory were branded “bourgeois free intellectuals” (资产阶级自由化分子) … At the turn of the millennium, the concept of human rights began to enter the language of the party and government, and at the end of 2003 the Central Party formally wrote the phrase “protection of citizens’ human rights” into the national constitution, a move unanimously approved by people’s congress representatives in March 2004 …
China is a country with a more than 2,000-year history of autocratic rule, and one of the toughest lessons of the ten-year Cultural Revolution was the need to move from autocracy to constitutionalism. After opening and reform, the party and government began to emphasize a legal system (法制) and rule by law (依法治国) . . . After the 1980s, some theorists began promoting “rule of law” (法治/以法治国) … From the beginning the idea of rule of law was given a strong priority by party and government leaders. In the mid-1980’s some party leaders pointed out that as China’s only ruling party, the CCP must act within the framework of the law and that party organizations or and individual leaders did not have special rights allowing them to act above the law. In the 1990s, “rule of law” made its formal entry into party and government documents. The political report to the 15th National Congress was the first to clearly state the objective of “building a socialist country [operating under] rule of law” (建立社会主义法治国家). Before long, this objective was written into our country’s constitution, making the transition from a political goal of the CCP to a political goal of the nation.

For more on “liberation of thought” and Hu Jintao’s political report to the 17th Congress, stay tuned for the fourth article in Qian Gang’s “The Insight Track” series, which will appear Wednesday, September 19.
[Posted by David Bandurski, September 17, 2007, 4:20pm]

The last five years have marked the transition of power in China from Jiang Zemin to Hu Jintao. One obvious question for pundits now is whether or not Hu has stepped out of his predecessor’s shadow. Has Hu’s power grown or diminished? And what do we make of Jiang Zemin’s influence now? At CMP we answer questions like these by tracking the movement of important political keywords.
In China all top leaders have their own sets of slogans, including core keywords. These slogans define leaders, identify their agendas and bolster their legacies. For top Chinese leaders, the creation of buzzwords is an act of crucial political brand-building. Here are three of China’s biggest leadership brands:

Deng Xiaoping: Deng Xiaoping Theory
Jiang Zemin: The Three Represents
Hu Jintao: Harmonious Society

By analyzing core keywords and how they play out in the Chinese media over time we get a fairly reliable indication of the relative strength of political brands – and this can tell us how leaders and/or their legacies are fairing.
Searching core leadership keywords in the WiseNews Chinese language database, which includes more than 300 Chinese newspapers, we come up with the following results (for the number of articles using a particular keyword over time):

[Please CLICK on graph for a clearer image]

Deng Xiaoping Theory and the Three Represents are both relatively strong terms in the Chinese media. But right now Hu Jintao’s “Harmonious Society” has surpassed them both.
Another of Hu Jintao’s core keywords is “scientific view of development.” Under Hu’s leadership, the Central Party now operates with a slogan combining both buzzwords: “Developing in a scientific manner, building harmony together” (科学发展，共建和谐). Hu Jintao and his circle have branded this formulation as an “innovation of party theory” (党的创新理论).
During the 16th National Congress in 2002 Jiang Zemin’s core keyword, “Three Represents,” was written into the Party Constitution. A key question as we approach the 17th Congress is whether or not any of Hu’s signature phrases – “innovative party theory,” “scientific development view” or “harmonious society” – will make it into the Party Constitution.
In March this year, an article by scholar Dong Degang (董德刚) in the official journal Scientific Socialism (科学社会主义) offered a glimpse of the debate over political legacies and amendment of the Party Consitution. Dong’s article said a number of cadres, “including high-level officials and old comrades”, were wary of attempts to modify the party’s constitution at each CCP session, and urged a cautious approach to adding President Hu’s theories to the document. [Click HERE for CMP coverage]. [Click HERE for Chinese coverage]. “We need to be careful,” wrote Dong, “about building [theoretical] systems too quickly and too excessively” (要警惕过急、过高、过分追求体系化的倾向).
Dong’s views, so openly expressed, make it clear that while Hu Jintao has power over major issues in China, he is by no means a paramount leader who can accomplish his objectives with a wave of his wand. As China transitions further toward a post-totalitarian society (后极权社会), we can expect to see the power of its top leaders continue to weaken.
(Qian Gang, September 17, 2007)
[Translated by David Bandurski]

Whenever party congresses roll around, pundits focus on the background of key officials and their connections to power centers inside the CCP. Potential picks to enter the succession group are often dissected in terms of the “Youth League faction” and the “princelings” — what we call in Chinese the tuanpai (团派) and the taizidang (太子党).
On the surface, it seems to make sense to label Chinese leaders along these lines.
For example, a good number of provincial and ministerial-level leaders have had prior positions with the Communist Youth League at either the central or provincial level. These include: Li Keqiang (李克强), Liu Yandong (刘延东), Li Yuanchao (李源潮), Ling Jihuai (令计划), Zhang Baoshun (张宝顺), Liu Qibao (刘奇葆), Qian Yunlu (钱运录), Zhou Qiang (周强), Huang Huahua (黄华华), Qiang Wei (强卫), Yu Youjun (于幼军), and Meng Xuenong (孟学农).
Pundits have referred to the above-listed leaders as the “Youth League faction.”
Other leaders, from top CCP families — including Zeng Qinghong (曾庆红), Yu Zhengsheng (俞正声), Bo Xilai (薄熙来), Wang Qishan (王岐山), Xi Jinping (习近平), and Bai Keming (白克明) — have sometimes been lumped together as “princelings.”
Among the names I have listed, some are sure to enter the succession teams during either the 17th or the 18th Party Congresses. So it’s no surprise journalists and commentators are rushing to guess how these “princelings” or supposed “Youth League faction” members figure in the big picture.
But compartmentalizing China’s leaders can be misleading. Using this simple framework to look at politics in China will yield warped results.
The term “Youth League faction” was already in use by the 1980s. Hu Yaobang, who had served as first secretary of the Chinese Communist Youth League, elevated Hu Qili (胡启立), Xiang Nan (项南) and other youth league members to key positions, giving rise to the term. But a closer look at politics in China at that time suggests this “faction” did not really exist.
Take, for example, former politburo standing committee member Li Ruihuan (李瑞环). While Li once held an important position with the youth league, it would have been wrong to associate him with the so-called “Youth League group.” Then there is Wang Zhaoguo (王兆国), who served formerly as first secretary of the youth league. No one associates Wang with the “Youth League faction.”
Even though he grew up within the Communist Youth League, Shanghai Mayor Han Zheng (韩正) is generally regarded as a member of the “Shanghai faction.”
Is Liu Yandong youth league, or is she a “princeling.” She has a deep history with the youth league. But she is also the daughter of Liu Ruilong (刘瑞龙), a high-ranking People’s Liberation Army general.
Then there is Wang Yang (汪洋), party secretary of Chongqing. Wang is an up and coming young official associated with neither the “Youth League faction” nor the “princelings.”
Summing up, speculation concerning backgrounds and factions is a worthy exercise, but it is not by any means a reliable ruler with which to measure China’s complicated political scene.
(Qian Gang, September 14, 2007)
[Translated by David Bandurski]
[ABOUT THE COMMUNIST YOUTH LEAGUE]
The Chinese Communist Youth League (中国共产主义青年团) — in short, gong qing tuan (共青团) — is generally recognized as an organization separate from the CCP and playing a supporting role (后备力量) [Click HERE for more information on the organization in Chinese].
The organizational structure of the youth league mirrors that of the CCP in consisting of a central committee (中央委员会), central secretariat (中央书记处), central propaganda department (中央宣传部) and central organizing department (中央组织部). The league’s International Liaison Department (国际联络部) handles its international initiatives.
While the Communist Youth League is firmly controlled by the CCP, the organization has been fairly active in its own respect since the PRC’s founding. In the 1950s, the league’s newspaper, China Youth Daily, was home to a number of more free thinking journalists, including Liu Binyan (who was later branded a Rightist).
As economic reforms took root in the 1980s, the youth league mustered together yet another group of more open thinkers, and China Youth Daily became an important staging ground in the reform effort.
Following the violent crackdown on June 4, 1989,China Youth Daily was brought to heel. But the paper’s independent streak re-emerged in 1995 with the launch of the Freezing Point (冰点) supplement. The purge of top editors at Freezing Point in 2006 was an attempt by the Central Propaganda Department and top officials in the Communist Youth League to keep the supplement’s influence in check.
The Communist Youth League is also an important testing ground for officials. Former Chinese foreign minister Wu Xueqian (吴学谦) served earlier on as head of the league’s International Liaison Department. Liu Binjie (柳斌杰), current director of the General Administration of Press and Publications (GAPP), served formerly as head of the youth league’s central propaganda department. Liu Peng (刘鹏), current executive chairman of the Beijing Olympic Committee, served earlier on as head of the league’s secretariat.
[ADDITIONAL ENGLISH LINKS]
A Bolder Hu Tests Power at China Communist Congress, Reuters, September 5, 2007
Hatchet man to henchman, China’s Zeng bends to times, Reuters, September 5, 2007
CMP Tip Sheet
Here are some questions to ask:
1. Has there been any change in power for the Communist Youth League network (Liu Yandong, Li Yuanchao, etc.)?
2. Has there been any change in power for the so-called “princelings”? (Yu Zhengsheng, Bo Xilai, Wang Qishan, Xi Jinping, etc.)?
3. What is the current standing of the original Jiang Zemin system (Zeng Qinghong, Zhang Dejiang)?

There has been a great deal of speculation in media outside China lately that Li Keqiang (李克强), who is currently serving as party secretary in the northern province of Liaoning, will be pegged as Hu Jintao’s successor, or “crown prince” at the upcoming 17th National Congress. Without a doubt, Li Keqiang is one of the key figures to watch over the next few weeks. But as a note of caution, it would be careless to focus one’s attention entirely on Li. First, a bit of background. [Photo of Li Keqiang, from China.org.cn]

[Li Keqiang is featured on the front page of Henan’s Dahe Daily after taking a tour of the site of a mining disaster]

The so-called “crown prince”, or top leader, was simply referred to as the successor, or jiebanren, during the Mao Zedong era. After the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949, Mao Zedong was both chairman of the party and the country’s top leader. Ten years later, in 1959, Mao relinquished his title as chairman of the People Republic and was succeeded by Liu Shaoqi (刘少奇). Liu Shaoqi’s vice-chairmanship was generally understood to be his successor.
The onset of the Cultural Revolution in 1966 brought the ouster of Liu Shaoqi. Lin Biao (林彪) became Mao’s designated successor, an arrangement formalized with an amendment to the Party Constitution.
When Wang Hongwen became vice-chairman at the 10th National Congress in 1973, it seemed certain he would become the successor, but Mao instead entrusted matters on the front line to Deng Xiaoping . Deng Xiaoping was later ousted amidst opposition from the Gang of Four, so that Hua Guofeng emerged for a time as Mao’s anointed successor.
After the onset of economic reforms, championed by Deng Xiaoping who had outmaneuvered and ousted Hua Guofeng by 1981, Hu Yaobang (胡耀邦) and Zhao Ziyang (赵紫阳) served in succession as China’s top leaders. But Deng Xiaoping remained in control. Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang were still mere “successors,” and jiebanren. Eventually, both Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang were forced to resign (January 1987 and June 1989 respectively), and Jiang Zemin became Deng Xiaoping’s successor.
What lessons does this messy process have for next month’s congress?
People now believe Hu Jintao has selected Li Keqiang as his successor, that Li will be elevated to the inner circle, serving as a member of the politburo standing committee and as vice-chairman of the PRC. He will have the important task of handling appointments within the party, and will perhaps serve concurrently as head of the Central Party School.
With all the speculation flying in his favor, would we really be ill-advised to place our bets on Li Keqiang? Yes. For the simple reason that Hu Jintao is not Deng Xiaoping.
Deng Xiaoping was a formidable leader with a virtually unassailable position — a qiang ren, as we say in Chinese). Hu Jintao is, by contrast, is a chang ren, an “ordinary leader”. In China, the politics of the powerful, or qiang ren zhengzhi (强人政治), have already given way to the politics of ordinary players, chang ren zhengzhi (常人政治). Top leaders in China today do not have sufficient power to designate their own successors. In the next generation of top leaders, the force of the individual politician will further weaken, and in its place will come more collective leadership.
Given this changing political climate, we must look more broadly at whole “succession groups.”, rather than focus narrowly on possible “successors,”  We must look, for example, at the possible configuration of the entire inner circle for the 18th National Congress five years down the road. Li Keqiang will of course be one of these leaders, so it is important to watch him closely.
(Qian Gang, September 12, 2007)
[Translated by David Bandurski]
[ADDITIONAL ENGLISH LINKS]
Hong Kong’s Ming Pao reports on Li Keqiang and succession teams, September 19, 2007
Li Keqiang in Who’s Who in China’s Leadership, China.org.cn
Li Keqiang bio at ChinaVitae
The Next Hu?, Newsweek International, December 25, 2006
“Tiananmen, 15 Years On: Where Are Some of the Most Wanted Participants Today?“, Human Rights Watch, 2004
The Party Congress Peg, China Digital Times, July 20, 2007Li Keqiang elected Party chief of NE China’s Liaoning Province, People’s Daily Online, October 27, 2006
“Beijing prepares for battle“, Newsweek‘s The Bulletin, October 3, 2006
CMP Tip Sheet
Some things to take particular note of regarding Li Keqiang:
*The assessment made of Li Keqiang by his former Peking University classmate Wang Juntao , a political activist. [Link to Wang quote here].
*As an interesting detail, many within China’s media have a favorable impression of Li Keqiang. One veteran journalist at China Youth Daily recalls that Li was pretty familiar with journalists at the paper, and when the reporter in question attended a meeting in Henan Province, then-governor Li Keqiang went right up to him and greeted him warmly.

Beginning Wednesday, September 12, the China Media Project will run a series of articles by CMP director and former Southern Weekend managing editor Qian Gang. The series, “The Insight Track: 17th Party Congress”, will reflect on a range of issues key to coverage of the upcoming congress, from power cliques and key political personalities to valuable sources and analysis of party reports past. Stay tuned!

Sure, there are four months left on the calendar. But it’s probably not premature to declare 2007 the “Year of the Fakes” in China – not least in Chinese journalism. The year kicked off with the tragic beating death of “fake journalist” (假记者) Lan Chengzhang. Unflagging cases of “fake news” culminated in June with the infamous cardboard bun hoax. Most recently, a regional Chinese newspaper was awarded a top photojournalism prize for a feature page that never was. And behind all of this looms a control system geared toward public opinion “guidance” that is itself a most insidious form of state-sponsored fakery.
It’s only appropriate, then, that the editors at popular web portal QQ.com should apply their skills this week to a special section devoted to fake journalists, gathering together all major related news in the last two years.

As CMP noted with QQ’s recent Jinan flood page, the layout is innovative, incorporating a variety of news reports (about news extortion cases, the nature of press cards, etc.), photos and online forums.
The most recent story, run across the top of the feature page, is about the arrest of nine “fake reporters” in Shanxi Province on August 28, which followed a separate sting on August 4 bringing in 19 “fake reporters.”
Another major story featured on the page is the corruption case of Meng Huaihu (孟怀虎), former Zhejiang bureau chief for China Commercial Times. A sidebar shows an image of Meng’s extravagant home in Zhejiang.
Once again, though, it is the opportunity for reader participation that makes the page most interesting. Web users, for example, can participate in QQ’s online survey by ticking their preferred answers to questions like the following:

[Why do you think there is an inundation of fake reporters?]
*Because real reporters have special privileges
*Because mine owners and government offices have shortcomings and bend easily
*The root of the problem is the fact that the media are half official and half commercial
*Because management is too lax, and some journalists have poor morals

CMP would have ticked the third box, and gives kudos to QQ for opening, even if just a crack, the door to the root cause of bad journalism in China.
And of course web users could click the “participate in the discussion” link from any portion of the feature page, joining in on the comments forum. The limited sample of comments, or gentie, available (close to 300 by Tuesday morning) suggests a profession facing a crisis of public confidence. Here are just a few:

It’s already become impossible to apply ordinary logic to this society of ours. If a small-time thief steals a few thousand yuan from a corrupt official he’s beaten within and inch of his life, but you tell me, who is the real crook here? Basically, the whole society is rotten already, so what good is it talking about those little problems on the branches and leaves?
——-
There’s no such thing as true news here in China. There are many things the state controls and doesn’t let the people know about, so press cards are issued by the state. If they were given out to the public, the state is afraid people will say whatever they want. So if you watch the news in China, you’d better approach it as entertainment.
——
How much of the news right now is real? Real journalists, fake journalists, they’re all tarred with the same brush!
——-
Say it, can you possibly ferret out how much money these newspaper groups make behind the scenes!!!!!! Journalists get money when they report good stuff, and its only when they don’t get payoffs that they report bad stuff … There aren’t many journalists with a good conscience!!!!!! It’s a problem with the system (是体制问题啊)!!!!!!
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The journalists working for this website [QQ] are pretty good! I feel like aside from stuff on the web that’s worth looking at, there’s really not much else.
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Right now journalists are the blackest of the black.
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We should recognize that most journalists are of good quality and good conscience, and it’s only the bad behavior of a few that’s damaged the image of everyone. It’s terrible!
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Why are officials afraid of journalists? Why are corporate bosses afraid of journalists? Because they’re afraid their crimes will be exposed!

[Posted by David Bandurski, September 4, 2007, 1:17pm]