中国现存危机 -- The Economist
SURVEY: CHINA
A dragon out of puff

Jun 13th 2002
From The Economist print edition

With WTO membership under its belt, and a new leadership ready to take over later this year, China would seem well placed to tackle vital reforms. But expect a long wait, says James Miles

IF THE ebb and flow of China's recent history is any guide, the country is due for a period of momentous change. Every decade or so since the communists came to power in 1949 has seen a juddering shift of gear—the famine-inducing Great Leap Forward, the violent factional strife of the Cultural Revolution, the start of economic reforms and the nationwide anti-government demonstrations of 1989. And already two signposts to the next milestone have come into vIEw.

The first was the country's accession to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) last December, after a 15-year quest. In theory this should not only provide the world with unprecedented access to China's markets, it should also bind China's economic reforms with the norms of international business. Optimists say it could eventually make China's secretive, undemocratic and corrupt government more open and accountable. Pessimists fear it could exacerbate unemployment and financial instaBIlity and hasten the collapse of the Communist Party.

The second is a quinquennial party congress due late in 2002 (with no date set yet) which will launch a series of leadership changes. These could be the most wide-ranging of the past two decades and open the way to a transfer of power to a younger, perhaps politically more open-minded, generation. It is equally possible, though, that the new leadership might try to shore up its legitimacy by beating the drum of nationalism and thereby push China into confrontation with Taiwan, the United States and Japan. Rarely in recent years have there been such divergent vIEws on where the country is heading.

That China has entered a critical phase of its economic reforms is not in doubt. But the hopes (or fears) raised by WTO accession and the prospect of a new generation of leaders are probably misplaced. The way China is run is unlikely to change as a consequence, at least not for several years. What will change China in the nearer term is the handling of the final and most arduous phase of its reform. The chances of failure are likely to rise as Chinese leaders become absorbed in the fractious politics of succession. And the consequence of failure could be the very upheaval that Chinese leaders have struggled so hard to avoid since the convulsion of 1989.