南华早报：习近平应该为其大权独揽导致的政治形势糟糕的2019年负责——虽然2020年形势可能更糟
Xi Jinping can blame his centralisation of power for a rotten 2019 – and maybe an even worse 2020
https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3042392/xi-jinping-can-blame-his-centralisation-power-rotten-2019-and-maybe
Minxin Pei
Published: 10:00pm, 17 Dec, 2019
China’s strongman leader can’t seem to catch a break. From the trade war with the United States to the crisis in Hong Kong to international criticism of his human rights record, President Xi Jinping suffered major setbacks in 2019, and his prospects for 2020 appear even worse.
China could have ended the trade war with the US last May, thereby giving its flagging economy a significant boost. Yet, at the last minute, Chinese leaders backtracked on a number of issues that American negotiators had considered settled. With the US also incurring high costs from the trade war, President Donald Trump was furious, and took his revenge.
Beyond imposing new tariffs, Trump escalated his efforts to limit China’s access to vital technologies. Less than two weeks after the trade agreement collapsed, Trump signed an executive order barring US companies from using telecoms equipment from manufacturers that his administration deemed a national security risk. The most prominent of these is the Chinese tech giant Huawei, which Trump had already been targeting for months.
While the US and China have announced agreement on the terms of a new phase-one trade deal, the technology war – and the broader confrontation between the two powers – will continue.
This implies that Xi’s problems won’t go away, given China’s enduring economic dependence on the outside world and the importance of rising living standards to sustaining the legitimacy of one-party rule.
Further risks arise from Hong Kong, which is engulfed in its worst political crisis since its return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. It all started when Hong Kong’s China-backed chief executive proposed a bill that would make it easier to extradite criminal suspects from the city to the mainland.
Viewing this as part of a broader central-government campaign to assert tighter control over the special administrative region, people poured into the streets to protest.
The government refused to budge, so the protesters became angrier and their numbers grew. Asia’s commercial hub quickly became a battle zone, with riot police firing tear gas and rubber bullets at black-clad protesters, who responded with Molotov cocktails and bricks.
Months passed before the bill was formally withdrawn, and by then it was too late to return the genie to the bottle. Despite thousands of arrests, the protesters have shown no signs of backing down.
Beneath Xi Jinping’s vote of confidence in Carrie Lam lies a warning
In late November, after more than six months of unrest, China’s government suffered the ultimate indignity, when nearly 3 million voters turned out to hand an overwhelming victory to pro-democracy forces in local district-council elections. At this point, a crackdown reminiscent of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown would likely backfire, leaving Xi with few options.
Xi suffered another serious blow in November, when The New York Times obtained more than 400 pages of internal Chinese documents concerning the mass incarceration of ethnic minorities – particularly Muslim Uygurs – in the Xinjiang region.
Only Chinese government insiders had access to such sensitive materials, suggesting that Xi’s political enemies may have deliberately leaked them to the Western press to undermine his international standing.
Xi is also losing his grip in Taiwan.
At the end of last year, Taiwan’s ruling pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, led by President Tsai Ing-wen, was dealt a painful general election defeat. But since the protests erupted in Hong Kong, Tsai has portrayed herself as defending Taiwan from a Chinese-government stooge who would accept a “one country, two systems” model. Tsai now seems set to secure a landslide victory in next month’s presidential election.
Xi can blame only himself – or, more specifically, his excessive centralisation of power – for the challenges of the last year. Trade disputes with the US, concerns about Chinese interference in Hong Kong and ethnic tensions in Xinjiang all preceded Xi’s rise to power in late 2012.
The biggest danger to the Communist Party? Itself
But China’s collective leadership, however corrupt and indecisive, managed to limit the escalation of these crises. For example, when more than a half-million people in Hong Kong protested against a proposed national security law in 2003, the Chinese government immediately agreed to its withdrawal.
As Xi has concentrated political power in his own hands, however, decision-making has been transformed. Those hoping to influence policy must gain access to Xi himself, and they have every incentive to cherry-pick information to support his preferences.
Likewise, Xi’s colleagues on the Politburo Standing Committee, fearful of appearing disloyal, are loath to share information that may contradict his view. They know that proposing an alternate approach could be seen as a direct challenge to Xi’s authority.
Xi’s intolerance of dissent and his vulnerability to bad information have made his government much more prone to policy blunders. Making matters worse, because a strongman must maintain an image of virtual infallibility, even demonstrably ineffective or counterproductive policies are unlikely to be reversed.
For now, Xi’s grip on power is probably secure. But with decision-making dynamics at the top unlikely to change, he will become vulnerable to more challenges in the coming months. Indeed, 2020 may turn out to be Xi’s worst year yet.
Minxin Pei is a professor of government at Claremont McKenna College and a non-resident senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Copyright: Project Syndicate
https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3042392/xi-jinping-can-blame-his-centralisation-power-rotten-2019-and-maybe
- The trade war took a toll on the Chinese economy, Hong Kong revolted and the world stepped up scrutiny of Xinjiang. One-man rule and fear of Xi aggravated each of these situations, and may set China up for worse in the year to come
Minxin Pei
Published: 10:00pm, 17 Dec, 2019
China’s strongman leader can’t seem to catch a break. From the trade war with the United States to the crisis in Hong Kong to international criticism of his human rights record, President Xi Jinping suffered major setbacks in 2019, and his prospects for 2020 appear even worse.
China could have ended the trade war with the US last May, thereby giving its flagging economy a significant boost. Yet, at the last minute, Chinese leaders backtracked on a number of issues that American negotiators had considered settled. With the US also incurring high costs from the trade war, President Donald Trump was furious, and took his revenge.
Beyond imposing new tariffs, Trump escalated his efforts to limit China’s access to vital technologies. Less than two weeks after the trade agreement collapsed, Trump signed an executive order barring US companies from using telecoms equipment from manufacturers that his administration deemed a national security risk. The most prominent of these is the Chinese tech giant Huawei, which Trump had already been targeting for months.
While the US and China have announced agreement on the terms of a new phase-one trade deal, the technology war – and the broader confrontation between the two powers – will continue.
This implies that Xi’s problems won’t go away, given China’s enduring economic dependence on the outside world and the importance of rising living standards to sustaining the legitimacy of one-party rule.
Further risks arise from Hong Kong, which is engulfed in its worst political crisis since its return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. It all started when Hong Kong’s China-backed chief executive proposed a bill that would make it easier to extradite criminal suspects from the city to the mainland.
Viewing this as part of a broader central-government campaign to assert tighter control over the special administrative region, people poured into the streets to protest.
The government refused to budge, so the protesters became angrier and their numbers grew. Asia’s commercial hub quickly became a battle zone, with riot police firing tear gas and rubber bullets at black-clad protesters, who responded with Molotov cocktails and bricks.
Months passed before the bill was formally withdrawn, and by then it was too late to return the genie to the bottle. Despite thousands of arrests, the protesters have shown no signs of backing down.
Beneath Xi Jinping’s vote of confidence in Carrie Lam lies a warning
In late November, after more than six months of unrest, China’s government suffered the ultimate indignity, when nearly 3 million voters turned out to hand an overwhelming victory to pro-democracy forces in local district-council elections. At this point, a crackdown reminiscent of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown would likely backfire, leaving Xi with few options.
Xi suffered another serious blow in November, when The New York Times obtained more than 400 pages of internal Chinese documents concerning the mass incarceration of ethnic minorities – particularly Muslim Uygurs – in the Xinjiang region.
Only Chinese government insiders had access to such sensitive materials, suggesting that Xi’s political enemies may have deliberately leaked them to the Western press to undermine his international standing.
Xi is also losing his grip in Taiwan.
At the end of last year, Taiwan’s ruling pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, led by President Tsai Ing-wen, was dealt a painful general election defeat. But since the protests erupted in Hong Kong, Tsai has portrayed herself as defending Taiwan from a Chinese-government stooge who would accept a “one country, two systems” model. Tsai now seems set to secure a landslide victory in next month’s presidential election.
Xi can blame only himself – or, more specifically, his excessive centralisation of power – for the challenges of the last year. Trade disputes with the US, concerns about Chinese interference in Hong Kong and ethnic tensions in Xinjiang all preceded Xi’s rise to power in late 2012.
The biggest danger to the Communist Party? Itself
But China’s collective leadership, however corrupt and indecisive, managed to limit the escalation of these crises. For example, when more than a half-million people in Hong Kong protested against a proposed national security law in 2003, the Chinese government immediately agreed to its withdrawal.
As Xi has concentrated political power in his own hands, however, decision-making has been transformed. Those hoping to influence policy must gain access to Xi himself, and they have every incentive to cherry-pick information to support his preferences.
Likewise, Xi’s colleagues on the Politburo Standing Committee, fearful of appearing disloyal, are loath to share information that may contradict his view. They know that proposing an alternate approach could be seen as a direct challenge to Xi’s authority.
Xi’s intolerance of dissent and his vulnerability to bad information have made his government much more prone to policy blunders. Making matters worse, because a strongman must maintain an image of virtual infallibility, even demonstrably ineffective or counterproductive policies are unlikely to be reversed.
For now, Xi’s grip on power is probably secure. But with decision-making dynamics at the top unlikely to change, he will become vulnerable to more challenges in the coming months. Indeed, 2020 may turn out to be Xi’s worst year yet.
Minxin Pei is a professor of government at Claremont McKenna College and a non-resident senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Copyright: Project Syndicate
13 个评论
被拒入澳不高興要反了嗎？
沉默的广场
休假中
南华早报不是马云的吗？这是公私合营以后跳反了？
被拒入澳不高興要反了嗎？
裴敏欣被澳大利亚拒绝入境？没看到相关消息啊
另外他之前也不亲共啊，参考这篇文章：
裴敏欣：中共“一党专制”危机在逼近
https://www.hrichina.org/chs/zhong-guo-ren-quan-shuang-zhou-kan/pei-min-xin-zhong-gong-yi-dang-zhuan-zhi-wei-ji-zai-bi-jin
美国政治学者裴敏欣指出：早在2012年习近平曾承诺，中共将在即两个百年诞辰之前，即2021年和2049年前取得巨大的成功。但再高昂的民族主义姿态也不能改变这样一个事实：即自毛时代以来，中共比以往任何时候都接近垮台。
周五（9月20日），美国政治学者裴敏欣在Project Syndicate发文：
Project Syndicate原文链接：https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/crisis-of-chinese-communist-party-by-minxin-pei-2019-09
今年的10月1日，为纪念中共建政70周年，中国国家主席习近平将发表演讲，高调庆祝自1949年以来中共的“功绩”。尽管习近平颇有信心和乐观，但中共的官僚们信越来越有理由担心中共政权的未来前景。
2012年习近平接管中国共产党时，他承诺，中国共产党将在即将到来的两个百年诞辰之前努力取得巨大的成功，这是指中共1921年成立和中共1949年建政。但是持续的经济放缓和与美国的紧张关系不断加剧，很可能让中共2021年百年庆祝活动扫兴。甚至2049年中共一党专制政以可能不复存在。
尽管专政在技术层面没有时间限制，但中共正在逼近一党专政的寿终正寝前沿。墨西哥的革命制度党维持了71年的权力（1929-2000）；苏联共产党统治了74年（1917年至1991年）；台湾国民党则为73年统治期（大陆从1927年至1949年，台湾从1949年至2000年）。北朝鲜已统治了71年的王朝家族，是当今中国唯一的专制竞争对手。
但是历史模式并不是中共担心的唯一理由。使中共从毛时代灾难中恢复过来并在过去40年中“繁荣发展”的外部条件，已经被某种意义上更具敌意的环境所取代。
对中党长期生存的最大威胁是与美国不断加剧的冷战。在后毛泽东时代的大部分时间里，中国领导人在国际舞台上保持低调，在建立国内实力的同时尽量避免冲突。但是从2010年起，中国已成为经济强国，奉行日趋强大的外交政策。这引起了美国的愤怒，美国开始逐渐从参与政策转向如今显而易见的对抗方式。
凭借其卓越的军事能力，技术，经济效率和联盟网络（尽管唐纳德·特朗普有着破坏性的领导力，但这些网络仍然保持强劲），在中美冷战中，美国比中国更有可能取得胜利。尽管美国的胜利可能是惨胜（意即付出高昂代价的皮洛士胜利），但它很有可能会印证中国共产党的命运。
中国共产党也面临着巨大的经济阻力。所谓的中国奇迹是由庞大而年轻的劳动力，快速城市化，大规模的基础设施投资，市场自由化和全球化推动的，所有这些因素已经减少或消失。
激进的改革，尤其是效率低下的国企（SOE）私有化以及新重商主义贸易（一种极端贸易保护）的结束，都可以维持增长。但是尽管中国共产党为进一步的市场改革做出口头承诺，但它一直不愿实施这些改革，而是坚持奉行有利于国有企业的政策，却以牺牲私人企业家为代价。
由于国有部门是一党专政的经济基础，所以中国共产党领导人突然接受激进的经济改革的前景很渺茫。
国内政治趋势同样令人担忧。在习近平的领导下，中国共产党放弃了在过富有成效的实用主义，灵活的意识形态和集体领导。随着中共转向新毛泽东主义，包括严格的意识形态整合，严格的组织纪律和基于专权的强人统治，灾难性政策失误的风险正在增加。
可以肯定的是，中国共产党将面临“不战而胜”。随着它对权力的控制减弱，它可能会试图在其支持者中煽动民族主义，同时加剧对对手的镇压。
但是，这一战略无法挽救中国的一党专制政权。尽管民族主义可能会在短期内增加对中国共产党的支持，但它的力量最终会消散，特别是如果该党未能持续改善民众生活水平。依靠胁迫和暴力的政权将现经济活动低迷、民众抵抗增加、安全成本上升和国际孤立，并为此付出高昂的代价。
这绝不是习近平将在10月1日给中国民众带来的振奋人心的景象。但是，再高昂的民族主义的姿态也不能改变这样一个事实，即自毛泽东时代以来，中国共产党的统治逼迫瓦解或垮台。
独夫独妇，没什么好结局。
两面人又开始不安分了
听说南华早报是曾庆红的媒体，是真的吗？
裴敏欣被澳大利亚拒绝入境？没看到相关消息啊另外他之前也不亲共啊，参考这篇文章：裴敏欣：中共“一党专制...
Oh, sorry, 不是澳洲，是澳門，香港旁邊那個直轄市。
另外作者不親共是一回事，只是想不到紅底的 SCMP 的編輯會允許刊登這篇文
馬雲又在搞鬼。是在報復被下崗嗎？
@庆丰大帝 批评的武器能不能代替武器的批判？？
主要是破坏了法制，现在没有执法权的“中央纪委”简直想搞死谁就搞死谁，欺凌于最高法甚至是人大之上，纪委非法组织不被清除，就法制不彰，中国永远那么黑暗下去。不过话说回来，共匪99%贪污腐败分子，剩下一个不贪的李克强又是个怂包，也只有纪委那种非法极端组织可以治治它们。
Oh, sorry, 不是澳洲，是澳門，香港旁邊那個直轄市。另外作者不親共是一回事，只是想不到紅底的...
根据Wikipedia：
2015年12月11日，阿里巴巴集团宣布收购《南华早报》。此次收购的是南华早报集团旗下的媒体资产，包括《南华早报》的纸质和网络版，杂志和户外媒体等业务，代价为20.606亿港元。阿里巴巴集团执行副主席蔡崇信透露，未来将完全免费开放《南华早报》的网络付费内容，他还表示将保证编辑的独立性。当时有分析人士认为此举会使《南华早报》的报道风格可能将渐渐倾向大陆，而失去独立的立场，但英语版《南华早报》的选题和内容未发生明显变化。
该报支持香港全面普选和取消立法会功能界别，不反对北京政府，但对北京政府的政策多有批评，支持和平改良与和平改革。反对中国大陆神化过往领袖毛泽东的运动，支持香港工人提高待遇运动。该报评论中对泛民派和建制派均有批评。另外对日本民族主义持批评态度。
2016年3月8日前后，陆续有媒体消息指，南早中文网的微博被删除，以及其英文官网www.scmp.com和中文官网www.nanzao.com被大陆屏蔽。此事件惹来港台媒体及外媒纷纷猜测，因此事发生在中国共产党中央委员会总书记习近平强调“媒体姓党”后，而各种猜测都集中于此。据一名于该段时间频繁浏览南早中文网的大陆网友透露，南早独家报道了此前《南方都市报》头版“媒体姓党，魂归大海”的排版错误等事情，并吸引到外媒的传播，南早的中英文网站当天同时开始被屏蔽，因而猜测这是本次屏蔽事件的直接原因。
2016年4月21日，《南华早报》在报道中共总书记兼军委主席习近平新增“中央军委联合作战指挥中心总指挥”头衔时，在文尾出现“while Xi died last year”（习去年已死），而实际上最后一句应是讲述前军委副主席郭伯雄和徐才厚的下场，编辑原本要说徐才厚（Xu）已死，误打了习（Xi）。
中国民营企业家自然不喜欢习近平 习近平搞国进民退 马云自然不爽 可能就是中南海里的反习势力通过南早放风打击习近平 美国贸易谈判代表也说中南海里有派系斗争改革派和强硬派