Central–Provincial Relations at the CCP Central Committees: Institutions, Measurement and Empirical Trends, 1978–2002

What is the nature of central-provincial relations in China? How have they evolved during the era of reform and opening? How can we begin to measure and assess the dynamic changes empirically and consistently? This article tackles these questions by examining year-to-year changes in aggregate trends of provincial presence at the Communist Party Central Committee from 1978 to 2002. After first sketching its formal workings, it highlights how the centre is institutionally empow ered to exert political leverage over the provinces at the Central Committee. Drawing upon a new dataset that differentiates among three types of Central Committee membership, it shows evidence of declining provincial shares in full Central Com mittee membership, a conventionally used indicator of provincial clout at the centre, but rising shares in its alternate membership and Politburo full membership. It concludes, on balance, that central political strength remains resilient in this period. The evolving central-provincial relations in the post-reform era have long preoccupied students of contemporary China.1 While it seems safe to argue that decentralization has often economically empowered the local governments, efforts to gauge changes in the political ties bonding Beijing and the provinces are more contentious. One school stresses how transfers of economic, especially fiscal, powers downward undermined the capacity of the central state.2 The already weakened central bargain ing power vis-?-vis the localities can be further vitiated by Communist Party institutions enfranchising local leaders during national-level succes sions.3 Hence, central-provincial relations in this period seem best char acterized as the gradual "rise" of the provinces at the expense of Beijing. ? The China Quarterly, 2005 * For helpful discussions and suggestions, I thank Mary Cooper, Bruce Dickson, Yasheng Huang, Pierre Fran?ois Landry, Hugh Morley, Pu Xingzu, Susan Rose-Ackerman, Frances Rosenbluth, Hongying Wang, Shiru Wang and Ming Xia. Pierre Fran?ois Landry introduced me to many of the Chinese written sources. Financial support from the Yale East Asian Studies Council, the Globalization and Self-Determination Project, the Leitner Political Economy Program and the Yale Graduate School, and assistance from the Universities Service Centre and Jean Hung are gratefully acknowledged. All errors are mine alone. 1. For an excellent review of this literature, see Jae Ho Chung, "Studies of central-provincial relations in the People's Republic of China: a mid-term appraisal," The China Quarterly, No. 142 (1995), pp. 487-508. For the purposes of this study, the centre broadly refers to the top national Party leadership embodied by the Politburo, its Standing Committee (except Politburo members who serve in the provinces) and Central Committee members who serve at the central government/Party organs. I am indebted to a reviewer for demanding a definition. 2. The exemplary works are Jia Hao and Lin Zhimin (eds.), Changing Central-Local Relations in China: Reform and State Capacity (Boulder: Westview, 1994); Shaoguang Wang, "The rise of the regions: fiscal reform and the decline of central state capacity in China," in Andrew G. Walder (ed.), The Waning of the Communist State: Economic Origins of Political Decline in China and Hungary (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), pp. 87-113. 3. The seminal and elegant statement along this line is Susan L. Shirk, The Political Logic of Economic Reform in China (Los Angeles and Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993). This content downloaded from 157.55.39.17 on Thu, 01 Sep 2016 06:27:06 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Central-Provincial Relations at the CCP Central Committees 339 Other observers of Chinese politics, in contrast, tend to point to the resilience of central political prowess that inheres in a unitary political system ruled by one nationally integrated political party.4 For them, despite the devolution of economic powers, the nomenklatura system whereby the Communist Party centre manages personnel of the top provincial leadership remains an effective tool for reining in the unruly provinces.5 Indeed, central political control might have been strengthened to remedy conflicts with the provinces, often exacerbated by their grow ing economic strength.6 Thus, any fears of a political collapse due to a weakened centre amidst reform are premature and unwarranted.7 What is the nature of central-provincial relations in China? How have they evolved during the reform era? How can we begin to measure and assess these dynamic changes? This study tackles such questions through focusing upon the Communist Party Central Committee (CC) and the related institutional tools affording the Party centre political leverage over the provinces, aspects not highlighted in previous studies. It suggests that the centre dominates the selection of the CC memberships, and manage ment of the Party's daily affairs. The key to understanding the nature of central predominance lies in the centre's personnel monopoly over top provincial cadres. Drawing upon a unique dataset constructed from freshly released personnel documents covering the 11th to the 15th Central Committees, this study constitutes a first step towards shedding empirical light upon claims made in the literature about aggregate trends of local influence at the centre measured through provincial CC membership shares.8 After 4. Yasheng Huang, Inflation and Investment Controls in China: The Political Economy of Central-Local Relations During the Reform Era (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Dorothy J. Solinger, "Despite decentralization: disadvantages, dependence, and ongoing central power in the inland the case of Wuhan," The China Quarterly, No. 145 (1996), pp. 1-34. More mixed findings appear in Yi-feng Tao, "The evolution of central-provincial relations in post-Mao China, 1978-98: an event history analysis of provincial leader turnover," Issues & Studies, Vol. 37, No. 4 (2001), pp. 90-120. 5. On China's nomenklatura system, see John P. Burns, "Strengthening central CCP control of leadership selection: the 1990 nomenklatura," The China Quarterly, No. 138 (1994), pp. 458-491; John P. Burns (ed.), The Chinese Communist Party's Nomenklatura System (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1989); Melanie Manion, "The cadre management system, post-Mao: the appointment, promotion, transfer and removal of Party and state leaders," The China Quarterly, No. 102 (1985), pp. 203-233. 6. Yasheng Huang, "Political institutions and fiscal reforms in China," Problems of Post-Communism, Vol. 48, No. 1 (2001), pp. 16-26. For studies at even lower levels, see Maria Edin, "State capacity and local agent control in China: CCP cadre management from a township perspective," The China Quarterly, No. 173 (2003), pp. 35-52; Pierre F. Landry, "Controlling decentralization: the Party and local elites in post-Mao Jiangsu" (PhD dissertation, University of Michigan, 2000). 7. Yasheng Huang, "Why China will not collapse," Foreign Policy, No. 99 (1995), pp. 54-68. 8. The most comprehensive and authoritative source for 11th-15th Central Committees is Shen Xueming and Zheng Jianying (eds.), Zhonggong diyijie zhi shiwujie zhongyang weiyuan (Members of the 1st-15th Central Committees of the Chinese Communist Party) (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 2001). Most of the 2001 and 2002 data are available from the links at the following official website where an updated collection of information for all provincial primary officials and for important personnel changes exists: http://www.peopledaily.com.cn, and http://www.chinanews.com.cn. These are further This content downloaded from 157.55.39.17 on Thu, 01 Sep 2016 06:27:06 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 340 The China Quarterly meticulously tracking annual shares of provincial officials in the three different types of CC membership from 1978 to 2002, this article finds a secular decline in the provincial shares of full CC membership, indicating no clear signs of growing local bargaining clout at the centre. Rising provincial shares in the alternate CC membership and Politburo full membership found in the data are inferred as possible central attempts at co-opting and controlling the provinces. The first section of this article sketches the institution of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee, its formal selection process and its importance in Chinese politics. The next section discusses possible ways of the Party centre exerting political control over the provinces at the Central Committee. The penultimate section first addresses the problem of measuring provincial CC memberships, before tracing the empirical trends of provincial shares in three categories of membership in the 11th to 15th Central Committees. The final section concludes. China's Communist Party Central Committees The institution and its formal selection. Like political parties else where, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is organized through a territorially based hierarchy spanning the national-level Central Com mittee, provincial, down to municipal and county committees. Under the principle of "democratic centralism," the Party constitution stipulates that "the national congress and the Central Committee elected by it" be the Party's highest decision-making organs.9 Since late 1977, National Party Congresses are held every five years, more regularly than during much of the previous period of Party history.10 The 1,500-2,000 delegates to the Congresses are first chosen from some 30 units representing all the provinces, the military, and the central Party and government organs. For instance, at the 13th National Party Congress convened in 1987, altogether 33 "electoral units" (xuanju danwei) sent their delegates, including 29 provinces at the time, the People's Liberation Army, central