李世默：这个百年，这个党（10）

THE THIRD THIRTY YEARS

When it comes to China, the term “political reform” has been ideologically hijacked. It is taken to mean Western styled democratization. Any changes that are not consistent with that end, no matter how significant, cannot be honored with the term “political reform”. Such views are immature, if not outright harmful, to the world’s understanding of China.

Many segregate the party's leadership of the largest nation in the world into two thirty-year periods: the first was between 1949 and 1979 under Mao; the second was between 1979 and now, which began with Deng's reforms. Some have characterized the second thirty-year period as a departure from or even a betrayal of the first. They are wrong. Although the first and second thirty years seemed to project starkly contrasting ideological outlooks, they are also symbiotic to each other. Without the national independence and the building of basic industrial and human infrastructures of a modern nation accomplished during the first thirty years under Mao, Deng’s reforms in the second thirty years would not have been possible.

This Third Plenum, if these political reforms are carried out, will begin a third thirty-year era that will dialectically combine the first two and bring into totality a unique modern Chinese narrative -- a model of governance not driven by elections yet is competent, responsive, agile, and with effective checks and balances.

Today, crises of governance are plaguing nations around the world. From America’s paralyzing partisanship to Europe’s byzantine elitism, the developed world is steeped in stagnating malaise. In much of the developing world, from Thailand to Egypt, electoral regimes are either failing to deliver or have altogether lost legitimacy.

Although facing myriad challenges and growing pains, China stands apart in so many dimensions – economic development, poverty alleviation, and general social cohesion, to name just a few. On Mr. Xi’s watch, China will become the world’s largest economy. At the current trajectory, by the middle of this century, it will become a true great power in all aspects of its national power. This ancient civilization’s modern success could bring the world fresh perspectives and new possibilities. But that potential could not be realized without a coherent and mature system of political governance suitable to the country. The daring political reforms unleashed at The Third Plenum, if successful, will cement China’s political governance for many generations to come and pave the way for the ancient civilization to at last reclaim its place among the nations of the world. What happened last November in Beijing, then, may prove to be more consequential than most people in the world have recognized.

Eric X. Li is a venture capitalist and political scientist in Shanghai.