China: it is time to reform. Policies
interview with Francesco Sisci by Cecilia Toso The election of the new President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jimping, opens a season of political reforms that will affect their economic reforms. An inevitable and controlled transformation of Chinese global power.
In his closing speech of the eighteenth congress of the Communist Party, the future President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jimping, said that if China needs to know more about the world, the world needs to know more about China. Francesco Sisci, journalist and sinologist, has confirmed this to Oxygen: “The Chinese are much more informed on matters abroad than foreigners are on China. Very few in the West know what China is now.” In fact, while the whole world watched the fate of the U.S. elections, few have perceived that China – with the end of the congress and the appointment of Xi Jimping as President and Li Keqiang as Premier – was simultaneously experiencing a very significant step because it is one that is different from all the previous changes. “The last 30 years have brought about economic reform, while the next 30 years will be about political reform,” continues Sisci. “Xi Jimping confirmed this and, with a highly unofficial signal, on January 1st, the Chinese central television announced that China will have to implement political reforms that can lead the political system to be like that of other countries, certainly over time and with gradual steps and great prudence.” There
will thus be a slow transition to democracy: “The strategy is clear, the tactics less so. But that is how you win all the wars and that is what makes China the country that it is. Instead, policies are failing in those nations which live on tactics but are unaware of the strategies to be applied.” It is hard to say for sure when the effect of these reforms will begin to be felt: “The impact and scope of the economic reforms were initially minimal. Launched in ‘78, their effects began to be felt only in the early Nineties. And this is likely to happen with the political reforms, whose impact will be felt only in a few years.” But some changes are already visible: “In the last 10 years, we have witnessed a gradual freedom of information on the Internet and this has been granted by the government precisely to announce a future of freedom in the most absolute sense.” It is more risky, however, to make predictions about what will change in terms of governance and foreign and domestic policy. For now, “we only know that there will be a major reorganization of the government which, for example, will dramatically reduce the number of ministries, from the current 40-44 to around 23-27.”
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