Socialism with Chinese Characteristics Enters a New Era

Section 4: Establish and improve the institutional mechanism for the party’s comprehensive leadership

The party’s overall leadership is concrete and must be embodied in all aspects of governing the country and in the design, arrangement, and operation of the institutions, systems, and systems of state power. Establishing and improving scientific and effective systems and mechanisms is the key to implementing the party’s comprehensive leadership.

1. Adhere to the Party’s position as the core of leadership in controlling the overall situation and coordinating all parties

Adhering to the party’s position as the core of leadership in controlling the overall situation and coordinating all parties is a prominent feature of the superiority of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics.

Comrade Xi Jinping stressed that “the Party Central Committee is the brain and center, and the Party Central Committee must have the authority to set a statue and hammer the final word.“1 The Central Committee, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, and the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the CPC Central Committee are the core of the Party’s leadership and decision-making; the decisions and arrangements made by the Party Central Committee must be resolutely implemented by the Party’s discipline inspection organs and organizational, propaganda, united front, political and legal departments, the Party organizations of the state’s legislative, judicial, administrative, and supervisory organs, and the Party organizations of enterprises, institutions, and people’s organizations. Local Party organizations must ensure that the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee are implemented as soon as orders are made and stopped when prohibited. In the big chess game of the national governance system, the Party Central Committee is the “handsome” who sits in the military tent in the town, and the horses and cannons each show their strengths, and the overall situation is clearly defined, so that only in governing the country can there be direction, rules, and strength.

Strengthen the leadership position of Party committees (Party groups) in organizations at the same level. Straighten out the relationship between party organizations and other organizations, and better play the role of overseeing the overall situation and coordinating all parties. Party committees (leading Party groups) established in state organs, public institutions, mass organizations, social organizations, enterprises and other organizations shall accept the unified leadership of the Party committees approved for their establishment, report regularly on their work, and ensure that the Party’s principles, policies and decision-making arrangements are implemented in organizations at the same level. Party committees at all levels should concentrate their energies on setting the direction, grasping major matters, coming up with ideas, and managing cadres. Party committees at all levels should give overall consideration to the overall work, plan as a whole, and form a working mechanism for comprehensive advancement. It is necessary to rationally divide the work levels, properly handle the relationship between key tasks, clarify which work is personally grasped by the party committee, which is promoted by the party committee, and which is supported by the party committee, and form a working mechanism for categorical promotion; within the party committee, it is necessary to give play to the collective role of the leading body, and at the same time ensure that the members of the leading body each shoulder their own responsibilities and carry out their work in unison.

Enhance the organizational strength and leadership of the Party’s grassroots organizations. Persist in focusing on improving organizational strength, highlight political functions, and build the party’s grassroots organizations into strong fighting fortresses for publicizing the party’s propositions, implementing the party’s decisions, leading grassroots governance, uniting and mobilizing the masses, and promoting reform and development. Strengthen the building of grass-roots party organizations in enterprises, rural areas, organs, institutions, and communities, strengthen the work of grass-roots party building of social organizations, explore the building of grass-roots party organizations in the fields of new business formats and the Internet, strengthen the standardization and standardization of branches, and realize that all the party’s work goes to the branches. Party organizations in villages and communities should comprehensively lead all kinds of organizations and all work subordinate to their own villages and communities.

Continue to promote the institutionalization of the party’s comprehensive leadership and the rule of law. Study and formulate inner-party laws and regulations on the party’s leadership of important economic and social work, and implement the party’s comprehensive leadership in the entire process and in all aspects of comprehensively governing the country according to law; implement the provisions of the Constitution, formulate and revise relevant laws and regulations, and clearly stipulate the legal status of work related to party leadership; enshrine the requirements for upholding the party’s comprehensive leadership in the organic laws of people’s congresses, governments, courts, and procuratorates, and enshrine the people’s consultative conference, democratic parties, the Federation of Industry and Commerce, people’s organizations, state-owned enterprises, schools of higher learning, and The charters of social organizations are to improve the Party’s system for exercising leadership over these organizations, ensuring that they are always active, independent, responsible, and coordinated under the leadership of the Party.

2. Strictly implement the system of requesting instructions and reporting from the Party Central Committee

The system of requesting instructions and reporting is an important system of the Communist Party of China, which fundamentally guarantees the authority and centralized and unified leadership of the Party Central Committee. As early as 1948, Comrade Mao Zedong drafted the “Intra-Party Directive on the Establishment of the Reporting System” for the Party Central Committee, and then the Party Central Committee issued the “Supplementary Instructions on the Establishment of the Reporting System.” This has played an important role in the political construction of the Party. Timely reporting of major issues and important matters by party-member cadres is a political discipline and political rule that must be observed. Comrade Xi Jinping stressed: “Party organizations in all fields should be responsible to the party committee and report their work to the party committee. Some comrades are accustomed to treating the work in charge as their own forbidden, feeling that since they are in charge, there is no need to report, and they do not want others to come and ask questions, and some do not even want the party committee to ask questions, otherwise there is no separation between the party and the government. This thinking is incorrect. “1 The Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee detailed the system of requesting instructions and reports on major issues, stipulating that the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the State Council, the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the Supreme People’s Court, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, all departments of the central and state organs, all people’s organizations, and all provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the Central Government must regularly report their work to the Party Central Committee.

In February 2019, the CPC Central Committee issued the Regulations of the Communist Party of China on Requesting Instructions and Reports on Major Matters, further improving the relevant work system. In accordance with the Party Constitution and internal Party regulations, all members of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee report their duties in writing to the Party Central Committee and the General Secretary every year; the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee and the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the leading party groups of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the leading party groups of the State Council, the leading party groups of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the leading party groups of the Supreme People’s Court, and the leading party groups of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate report annually to the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau and the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee; and the party committees (leading party groups) of all regions and departments have strengthened their reporting to the party Central Committee. When studying major matters involving the overall situation or making major decisions, it is necessary to promptly request instructions and report to the Party Central Committee, and special reports should be made on the implementation of important decisions of the Party Central Committee. In case of sudden major problems and major problems in work, it is necessary to promptly ask for instructions and report to the Party Central Committee, and if the situation is urgent and must be dealt with immediately, it is necessary to do a good job in their duties and report quickly.

3. Coordinate the reform of party and state institutions

The functional system of the party and state institutions is an important guarantee for the CPC’s governance of the country, and an important support for ensuring that the party always controls the overall situation and coordinates all parties. In order to smoothly advance the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era, the party must give full play to the party’s leadership, which is the greatest institutional advantage, from the organizational structure, implement the party’s leadership in all fields and links of the party and state organs in comprehensively and correctly performing their duties, and ensure the party’s long-term ruling power and the country’s long-term peace and stability in terms of system.

The Third Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee focused on improving and developing the socialist system with Chinese characteristics, promoting the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity, strengthening the party’s long-term ruling capacity, and promoting the comprehensive and strict management of the party, and made strategic arrangements for deepening the reform of party and state institutions. The goal of the reform is very clear, that is, to promote the optimization of the functions of the party and state institutions as the focus of efforts, to form a leadership system that oversees the overall situation and coordinates all parties, a government governance system with clear responsibilities and administration according to law, a world-class armed forces system with Chinese characteristics, a mass work system with extensive contacts and serving the masses, and to promote the coordinated actions of people’s congresses, governments, CPPCC, supervisory organs, judicial organs, procuratorial organs, people’s organizations, enterprises and institutions, social organizations, etc. under the unified leadership of the party. Strengthen synergy and comprehensively improve national governance capacity and governance level.

To deepen the reform of the Party and state institutions, the first thing is to establish and improve the Party’s leadership system and mechanism for major work, and improve the institutional arrangements to ensure the Party’s overall leadership;

Strengthen the party’s centralized and unified leadership over major work involving the overall cause of the party and the country, and enhance the party’s ability and determination to set the direction, seek the overall situation, formulate policies, and promote reform. At the central level, it is to optimize the decision-making and deliberation coordination organs of the Party Central Committee, and then strengthen and optimize the Party’s leadership over deepening reform, governing the country according to law, economy, agriculture and rural areas, discipline inspection and supervision, organization, propaganda, ideology and culture, national security, political and legal affairs, united front, ethnic and religious affairs, education, science and technology, Internet information, diplomacy, auditing, etc. The Third Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee decided to set up the Central Committee for Comprehensive Rule of Law, the Central Audit Commission, and the Central Leading Group for Education Work, and at the same time renamed the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reform, the Central Leading Group for Cybersecurity and Informatization, the Central Leading Group for Finance and Economics, and the Central Leading Group for Foreign Affairs to the Committee, and adjusted and optimized the leadership system of the Central Institutional Establishment Committee. These institutions, as the decision-making and deliberation coordination bodies of the Party Central Committee, work under the leadership of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and its Standing Committee, and are responsible for the top-level design, overall layout, overall coordination and overall promotion of major work in related fields, further ensuring the effective implementation of the Party’s leadership. The functional departments of the Party are the political organs of the Party exercising political, ideological and organizational leadership, and the executive organs that implement the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee and local Party committees at all levels, implement the Party’s leadership, strengthen Party building, and promote the Party’s cause. To coordinate the reform of party and state institutions and uphold and strengthen the party’s overall leadership, it is necessary to optimize the functional allocation of the party’s organization, propaganda, united front, political and legal affairs, party building in organs, education and training, strengthen the coordination function, and coordinate the work of the system and its own field. At the same time, it is also necessary to optimize the establishment of various party committee offices, and the matters that can be undertaken by functional departments are undertaken by functional departments; optimize and standardize the establishment of party dispatched organs, strengthen leadership over relevant fields, industries, and system work; and set up institutions directly under party committees at all levels in accordance with the principle of lean and efficient. The relevant organs of the Party may be set up in an overall manner with other departments with similar functions and close ties, and implement the merger and establishment or joint office to prevent overlapping of institutions, functions and work, and then integrate and optimize forces and resources to bring into play comprehensive benefits.

Top-level planning and overall design of the reform of party and state institutions is an important embodiment of the party’s leadership. Deepening the reform of party and state institutions, covering the institutional reform of the Party Central Committee, the National People’s Congress, the State Council, the CPPCC National Committee, the administrative law enforcement system, the cross- military reform, the mass organization reform, and the local institutional reform, is a systematic, holistic and reconstructive major change. After the gradual advancement from the central to the local level since the Third Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee, a functional system of party and state institutions that is compatible with upholding and strengthening the party’s leadership is taking shape.

4. Improve the specific system for strictly implementing democratic centralism Democratic centralism is the fundamental organizational principle and fundamental leadership system of the Party. It regulates the relations between Party members and Party members, Party members and organizations, subordinate organizations and higher-level organizations, and the whole Party and the Central Committee, and standardizes the relations between Party and State organs of power, administrative organs, supervisory organs, judicial organs and people’s organizations. Over the past some time now, quite a few problems have arisen in some party organizations in the process of implementing democratic centralism: In some localities, “laissez- faire democracy” has appeared, and “the number one” does not take responsibility, and the leading body is weak and loose; in some localities, the number one leader “acts arbitrarily, inner-party democracy is undermined, and the party’s leadership has become individual leadership; in some localities, the party-government relationship is not coordinated, and the so-called separation of the party and the government is carried out without paying attention to preconditions, or the party committee directly interferes in government work without any detail, resulting in tension between the party and the government; in some places, the party and government are divided and departments are hampered. Fights up and down, fragmentation of local governance; and so on. These problems greatly restrict the role of the party’s leadership as the core, and ultimately affect the comprehensive economic and social development of a locality.

To uphold and strengthen the party’s comprehensive leadership, it is necessary to improve and implement various specific systems of democratic centralism and institutionalize, standardize, and scientificize relations between the party and all quarters. In particular, it is necessary to improve the system of the party leading organs of state power, administrative organs, supervisory organs, judicial organs, and people’s organizations, improve the work system and code of conduct of party committees (leading party groups) at all levels; strictly implement the “Several Guidelines for Inner- Party Political Life in the New Situation,” improve the rules for deliberation and decision-making of party committees at all levels, improve the specific system for correctly handling the working relations between party organizations at higher and lower levels, and ensure that the whole party is highly consistent ideologically, politically, and in action. Safeguarding the authority of the Party Central Committee and centralized and unified leadership are unified with promoting inner-Party democracy. Comrade Xi Jinping pointed out, “Adhering to the authority of the Party Central Committee and centralized and unified leadership does not mean that there is no need for democratic centralism, do not promote inner-party democracy, and it is wrong to oppose the two.“1 Democratic centralism organically combines the full development of inner-party democracy with the correct practice of centralism; it can not only stimulate the creative vitality of the whole party to the maximum, but also unify the thinking and actions of the whole party, and effectively prevent and overcome decentralism in which deliberation is not decided and decision is not done, and it is a scientific, rational, and efficient system.

Democratic centralism includes two aspects, democracy and centralization, which are mutually conditional, complementary and opposite. It is necessary to organically unify democracy and centralism, and truly turn the advantages of democratic centralism into the party’s political, organizational, systemic, and work advantages.