The numerous political crises in leading Western countries caused an increasing demand to explore alternative ways to organize government institutions. China, in particular, has been of interest, as it introduced a new concept in 2019 called the “whole process people’s democracy” as the next stage of socialist democracy. The new concept emphasizes the importance of institutional solutions working together to strengthen the five democratic pillars of the Chinese political system: elections, consultations, decision-making, governance, and supervision. The analysis conducted by the author revealed that in practice most of the innovative changes have been related to the legislative functions of people’s congresses. Measures include involving citizens more widely in the legislation process, as well as the creation of local advisory groups, digitalization, and initiatives of “open government”. The PRC does not aim to export its model abroad, but its success challenges the dominance of the Western conception of democracy in the global discourse. Additionally, studying Chinese political institutions can serve as inspiration for developing similar mechanisms in other countries, including Russia.

ABSTRACT High judicial transparency plays a pivotal role in maintaining and enhancing the credibility of judicial authorities. This research utilises publicly available data from the China Judgments Online to describe the development of judicial transparency in China through spatial autocorrelation models, analysing its regional disparities, trends and associated influencing factors. From the perspectives of internal authority and external pressures, the research discusses the appropriate developmental path that the publication of judicial documents should adhere to in the future and verifies the synergistic characteristics between the judiciary and administration within the Chinese political system, particularly under the political and legal framework.

China has experienced a long period of rapid economic development. As a result, China has become one of the world's most important economic actors. The transformations China has experienced have made the foreign policy-making process quite complex. In the Chinese political system, leaders have always played a critical role in foreign policy making. However, the role of the leader has become more important since Xi Jinping came to power. This article mainly examines how Chinese leaders, and Xi Jinping in particular, play a role in foreign policy making. This study basically seeks to answer the question to what extent Chinese leaders have power and influence in foreign policy making. China's current economic and political structure does not allow leaders to come to power who would cause major upheavals in the overall direction of the country. This study basically argues that no matter how powerful they try to be, Chinese leaders have limited power and influence in foreign policy making. This study is based on constructivism’s analysis of the agent-structure problem.

Early-life experience and political leaders’ policy preference: Evidence from China’s Zhiqing officials

Abstract In China, the prevalence of strong political connections among a significant number of boards of directors and CEOs highlights the importance of cultivating such relationships. This is particularly relevant when considering the Chinese political system where officers holding higher political ranks wield dominant, or even absolute, power in decision‐making. Our findings reveal that the political power differential (PPD) between a board of directors and its CEO plays a pivotal role in mitigating CEO entrenchment associated with political power. Specifically, when directors possess more political power than their CEOs, they can effectively fulfil their disciplinary role, leading to the dismissal of underperforming CEOs. Our study substantiates a significantly positive relationship between PPD and the probability of a forced CEO turnover, as well as the sensitivity of CEO turnover to performance. Notably, as PPD increases by one standard deviation from its mean level, we observe an approximate 30% increase in CEO turnover‐performance sensitivity. These findings confirm a higher likelihood of replacing underperforming CEOs in firms with a politically powerful board. Our results also highlight that a higher proportion of either independent or female directors alone does not guarantee effective monitoring. The key lies in ensuring that these directors possess stronger political power than the CEO.

Methodology is the general method for people to understand and transform the world, which plays an important role in the development and progress of any discipline. The methodology of political science is the basic principle and method of political science research, the sum of the guiding ideology and scientific method of political science research, and the foundation of political science theory and practice. Starting from the relationship between methodology and political science methodology, this paper reviews the development history of Chinese political science methodology since the reform and opening up, systematically analyzes the position and role of methodology in political science research, explores the future development characteristics and direction of Chinese political science methodology, and enriches the research on Chinese political science methodology system. It is conducive to the construction of a new era political science subject system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics with Marxism as the guiding ideology.

The article analyzes the principles that determine the US policy towards the PRC in terms of ideological confrontation and struggle for the influence in the Indo-Pacific region. It is noted that such features of the Chinese political system as rule by law, autocracy and state-directed mercantilism are seen as its vulnerabilities. The U. S. competitive approach to the PRC is focused on exacerbating and exploiting them. China’s economic slowdown is expected to make the CCP uncertain of its own legitimacy and force the party to rely on authoritarian practices of social control to maintain political power. This, in its turn, will provoke social discontent and decrease support for the party among the population. Restrictions on Chinese technology companies and tightening of the counterintelligence regime against Chinese undergraduate and graduate students studying at U.S. universities are intended to impede China’s access to advanced technologies and developments. Beijing’s actions, interpreted as authoritarian practices, are used by Washington to rally allies and partners on the ideological basis and to justify sanctions. These actions include the re-education policy in Xinjiang, the Hong Kong policy, export of Chinese technological systems and internal control practices to the Indo-Pacific countries, and others. It is indicated that this approach was countered by the Washington’s right to free access to information and policy to protect Internet freedom. In the real world, it aims to undermine state control over information in countries that import Chinese practices of social control. The key role in implementing this approach is assigned to systems that will circumvent Internet traffic restrictions both in the Indo-Pacific states and in China itself. The U. S. approach to defense and security in the Indo-Pacific region focuses on the transition from a hub-and-spoke system to federated defense. It is recognized that while the federated approach initially focused on the U.S. allies, Washington is now integrating its regional partners as well. There are two stages in the implementation of this U.S. defense strategy. During the first stage, Washington creates separate elements of the future military alliance which still function as independent units. Such elements are represented by minilateral coalitions that are formed of states that have comparable or complementary capabilities in spheres that are key to China’s deterrence. These include AUKUS focused on building nuclear submarines, the upcoming trilateral alliance of Japan, South Korea, and the United States in missile defense, QUAD, and others. During the second stage, it is probably intended to unite the established coalitions under a single defense structure. It is pointed out that Washington’s choice in favor of this two-stage scheme is due to the need to refrain at the current stage from actions that would provoke the states of the region to choose a side between the United States and China, which would be inevitable in the case of creation of a full-fledged U.S. military alliance in the Indo-Pacific. It is noticed that the Biden administration effectively counters Beijing in international organizations. It has largely succeeded in frustrating China’s strategy to dominate them and in transforming them from within.

The paper makes a brief account of what H.A.R. Gibb said was the historic and decisive event in achieving consensus —the classical practice used in deciding the succession of the Prophet (×aÌrat Muhammad RasËlullah KhÉtam un NabiyyÊn Øallallahu ‘alaihi wa ‘alÉ Ólihi wa AÎÍÉbihi wa Øallam) employing the procedure of al-ShËra or deliberation or consultation in the seventh century CE, the success of democratically electing the leader of the new emerging Muslim society. The paper explores several further cases of the more institutionalized culture of deliberation among the (Sunni) Muslim society across the socio-cultural changes from the medieval centuries up to the present day world, in multi-cultural societies. Deliberation is roughly of two types—democratic and undemocratic as in the Chinese political system. The concepts used include Al-Mawardi’s Ahl ×all Wal ‘Aqd (AHWA) —first suggested in the 10th century CE and fully developed some three hundred years later. The concept emerged in connection with the mechanism of electing the chief executive officer (CEO) in state governments which needed deliberation of AHWA’s members (those who are qualified to act on behalf of the Muslim community in electing a caliph). The study is based on secondary data gathered from books and articles. The paper aims to contribute to “re-inventing democratic deliberation” in the past for better understanding the contemporary trend to move towards deliberation in democratic politics—which also gives positive impact to develop mutual respect among multi-cultural societies. The main finding of the study is that there is a significant spread of deliberation in politics and governments among Muslims societies in the countries under study. Deliberation is roughly of two types—democratic and un-democratic as in the context of Chinese political system. The concepts used include Al-Mawardi’s Ahl Hall Wal Aqd (AHWA) —developed in the 10th century or three hundred years after that. The concept is a mechanism to elect chief executive officer (CEO) in state governments which conveys the need for having capacity to deliberate of AHWA’s members. The study employs qualitative method, with secondary data gathered from books and articles, especially those that are made available electronically. The study is expected to contribute to the re-invention of the democratic deliberation in the past for better understanding of contemporary move towards deliberative turn in democratic politics—which eventually give positive impact on development of mutual respect among multi-cultural societies. The finding of the study is significant spread of the deliberation in politics and governments among Muslims societies in the cases of the countries and has impacted on customs of deliberation in a given society, including in multi-cultural societies.

Target setting (or goal setting) is a process of incremental adaptation. Prior studies have mainly focus on organization-level adaptation of performance target setting. Based on the geographical leadership mobility within the Chinese political personnel system, this study explores leader-level adaptation of their organizations’ performance target setting. Using a Chinese province-level panel data-set from 1999 to 2019, we empirically confirm that performance targets in one administrative jurisdiction where the current incumbent provincial governor previously served positively influence performance targets in their current provincial leadership position. Furthermore, if the performance targets in the provincial governor’s previous working locality were achieved successfully, the provincial governor will be more motivated to learn from past target-setting experiences. Finally, provincial governors show significantly different policy learning motivation in economic growth target setting before and after the reform of China’s cadre evaluation system in 2013. These findings show that local executives display conditional learning in their individual-level targets aspiration adaptation process.

In the top-down Chinese political system, flood management has traditionally been led by the government, with the general public playing a supporting role. Within this context, individual-level disaster prevention behaviors are strongly interacted with the government-public collaboration during the government-led flood management processes. This study aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of how government-public collaboration affects individuals’ flood mitigation responses in China. An online survey data with 550 respondents from the Yellow River Delta area was examined with regard to the individuals’ willingness to take positive mitigation actions, and ordinal logistic regression models were constructed to explore the influence of the government-public collaboration factors, which are digested into three aspects: public involvement, public awareness and political trust, that motivate individuals to take flood mitigation measures. The results demonstrate that public involvement and political trust are positively correlated with the likelihood of individuals’ adopting positive mitigation actions, while public awareness and self-reported preparedness were also positively correlated, although to a less significant degree. This study contributes to the current literature by increasing the understanding of how government-public collaboration determines individual mitigation actions in the Chinese collectivist cultural environment. The results of this study reveal that involving the public effectively and earnestly through various forms of community engagement are likely to promote individual-level disaster prevention behaviors, from this point of view, can help policymakers to guide local residents towards taking responsible flood risk management and preventative actions.

Administrative hierarchy, city characteristics and impacts of the Clean Air Act: A quasi-experimental study on PM2.5 pollution in China 2000–2020

While it is widely accepted that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) occupies a dominant position in the Chinese political system, few studies have demonstrated CCP's dominant position based on rigorous statistical analysis. Our paper presents the first such analysis using an innovative measure of regulatory transparency in the food industry across nearly 300 prefectures in China over 10 years. We show that actions by the CCP, while broadly scoped and not targeting the food industry, significantly improved regulatory transparency in the industry. In sharp contrast, food-industry-specific interventions by the State Council, which exercises direct regulatory supervision of the industry, had no impact on regulatory transparency. These results hold in various specifications and robustness checks. Our research contributes to research in China's political system by empirically and explicitly demonstrating the dominating power of the CCP.

ABSTRACT Private supplementary tutoring, also known as shadow education, has had a profound influence on Chinese education during the past twenty years. The rapid expansion of shadow education has attracted the attention and increased regulation of the Chinese government. In July 2021, the Chinese government adopted one of the most restrictive legislative constraints on shadow education: the so-called ‘double reduction’ policy. This policy aims to reduce the dual burden for students of on-campus classes and off-campus tutoring. Through analysis of China’s central and provincial double reduction policies, this study examines the policy goals, accompanying instruments, and delineated implementation strategies. Interviews with tutors from shadow education institutions in five major cities in China uncover the strategies shadow education tutors have applied to mitigate the policy constraints and offer criticism of the Chinese political system and deficiencies in the neoliberal education system.

ABSTRACT China’s 40 million party and state cadres all matriculate through an elaborate system set of more than 7000 institutions for mid-career cadre training. These mid-career training institutions have long been an integral part of the Chinese party-state but have become even more important during Xi Jinping’s tenure. Drawing on unique Chinese published sources and interviews, the article examines the history and current organization of the five separate institutional systems involved in civilian cadre training, the evolving reforms in them, and their role in sustaining CCP rule. These training school systems in China are becoming more rather than less important for these reasons. Thus, the entire training system nationwide needs to be better understood by scholars and analysts of the Chinese political system.

ABSTRACT A significant feature of corporate governance in China is the participation of party organizations, reflecting the involvement of the Chinese political party system in enterprises. Using a sample of A-share market listed central state government owned enterprises (hereinafter referred to as “CSOEs”) from 2003 to 2020, this study examines the influence of China’s political party system and state-owned assets supervision system on enterprise innovation. The empirical results show that the participation of party organizations in corporate governance can significantly promote CSOEs’ innovation, especially in the case of CSOEs with weak state-owned assets supervision. The party organization’s role in promoting innovation is mainly achieved through the board of directors and senior management, rather than through the cooperation of the board of supervisors. We also find that this role exists in both substantive and strategic innovations, but mainly exists in areas with weak market allocation resources. Our findings contribute to the literature examining the determinants of firm innovation, and have practical implications for corporate governance in developing countries.

This paper examines China's international communication strategy during the initial phase of the global COVID-19 pandemic. In the spring of 2020, Western governments and media began criticising the systematic lack of transparency and accountability in the Chinese political system in relation to the failed containment of the Wuhan outbreak. Facing an unprecedented reputational crisis, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) mobilised its foreign-language media in an attempt to influence the international discourse on COVID-19. Surveying the English and Chinese editions of the People's Daily, this study identifies CCP discourses aimed at foreign audiences and traces their evolution during the early stages of the pandemic. Overall, the study provides a comprehensive map of Chinese narratives on COVID-19 and generates fresh insights into CCP crisis communication.

Book Review| June 01 2022 Review: Knowledge, Ideology, and Civilization: An Attempt at Understanding History (Arabic Edition), by Ali Jarbawi Knowledge, Ideology, and Civilization: An Attempt at Understanding History (Arabic Edition), by Ali Jarbawi (Beirut: Arab Institute for Research and Publishing, 2021). 376 pp. US$11.90. ISBN 9786144862018 Lourdes Habash Lourdes Habash Associate Professor, and former Vice President for Community Affairs, Birzeit University, Birzeit, Palestine. Email: lhabash@birzeit.edu Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Contemporary Arab Affairs (2022) 15 (2): 103–112. https://doi.org/10.1525/caa.2022.15.2.103 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Tools Icon Tools Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Lourdes Habash; Review: Knowledge, Ideology, and Civilization: An Attempt at Understanding History (Arabic Edition), by Ali Jarbawi. Contemporary Arab Affairs 1 June 2022; 15 (2): 103–112. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/caa.2022.15.2.103 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentContemporary Arab Affairs Search Human history has witnessed an endless succession of civilizations, which has prompted researchers to probe the depths of these civilizations to determine the factors of their birth, primacy, and decline. Ibn Khaldun, Malik Bin-Nabi, Arnold J. Toynbee, Oswald Spengler, and Paul Kennedy have all presented their notions in this field. Ali Jarbawi’s Knowledge, Ideology, and Civilization: An Attempt at Understanding History also explores this topic. Shakib Arslan’s Why Muslims Lagged Behind and Others Progressed (1965), one of the most famous titles of the last century, also discusses this subject area. Jarbawi follows his example as he searches for the reasons behind Arab regression, poor performance, and a failure to keep up with leading civilizations. These questions do not overwhelm the writer with nostalgia, but rather motivate him to raise a fundamental question, one which his entire book revolves around: “What are the factors that lead to the rise... You do not currently have access to this content.

The emergence of COVID-19 in the People’s Republic of China, a one-party state, posed a severe threat to the political legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). This threat had its origins in the context of a growing rivalry between China and the United States, prompting the CCP to launch an offensive to win the battle for narratives about the nation’s role in the outbreak. Through both traditional and social media, Chinese diplomats carried out an aggressive campaign to demonstrate that China was the solution and not the cause of the pandemic. In addition, the CCP generated a discourse about the superiority of the Chinese political system in containing the pandemic, contrasting it with the response of liberal democracies. This article concludes that although the primary goal of the Chinese media campaign was to shape a favorable opinion of the CCP at home, the party was also concerned with bolstering its legitimacy abroad by courting international approval for its handling of the pandemic.

When the People’s Republic of China was excluded from US president Biden’s guest list for the virtual Summit for Democracy in December 2021, it reacted with a detailed self-depiction of the Chinese political system as a “Democracy That Works” to rebut US claims to be the world’s leading democracy. While the international media saw this as a surprise narrative, China’s “democratic” self-image has a long trajectory going back to the days of Mao Zedong and now elaborated more systematically under Xi Jinping. Based on a close reading of Chinese party-state documents, white papers, state media coverage, etc., this article analyzes the official career of the concept of “democracy” in Chinese Communist Party jargon and dissects the messages targeted at domestic and international audiences. It finds that the official self-depiction of “Chinese democracy” does not contradict, but rather complements the legitimation of Communist Party rule at home, buffering nationalist sentiments there. Despite its lack of persuasiveness vis-à-vis Western audiences, its underlying criticism of US democracy, and its subtle claims regarding China’s global leadership, the official vision might gain traction among other emerging powers and developing countries.

The article is dedicated to the issue of Song’s dynasty transformation of imperial political system. The research is based on literature review. The study was carried on the political science standpoint. The crucial element of Song dynasty rule is final formation of meritocratic bureucracy – characteristic element of traditional chinese political system.