China's New Rulers: The Secret Files by Andrew J. Nathan (Editor), Bruce Gilley (Editor), Bruce Gilley

From the Publisher

At the Chinese Communist Party's 16th Congress in November 2002, a group of new leaders took over the world's most populous country. Their accession as the "Fourth Generation" of rulers of the People's Republic--following the generations of Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, and Jiang Zemin--signaled the end of a long, complex struggle for power.

Yet little has been known outside high Party circles about either that struggle or the men who emerged victorious from it. China's New Rulers, based on confidential Party files leaked to a Chinese writer abroad, offers an unprecedented glimpse into the most orderly succession in the turbulent history of the People's Republic. At its center are detailed descriptions of the nine men who will rule China for the next five years--their backgrounds, their characters, and their visions for the future. Among the challenges they will face are economic reform and China's integration into a global economy, pressures for political liberalization and human rights, ethnic unrest in Tibet and Xinjiang, the status of Taiwan, and relations with the US.

China's New Rulers is an extraordinary account of a high-level political drama that has largely taken place in secret. It portrays many key figures in the Party, government, and military, and provides new information on Jiang Zemin's thirteen years in office. Most importantly, it contains the first insights into matters of great importance to the West: who will lead China, what changes they may bring to their country, and how they may act as international partners and competitors.

The Waashington Post

Because Chinese policy still rests heavily on the views and predispositions of individual personalities, as the Chinese themselves are the first to point out, these portraits are an important contribution to the political literature of China. The book's predictions about the final lineup, made before last November, are nearly correct. (Li Ruihuan did not survive the leadership change, and the Standing Committee ended up with nine rather than seven members; one presumes that an update will be added for the paperback edition.) The book is required reading for anyone who deals with the Chinese Politburo, or who simply seeks to understand who's Hu. — Judith Shapiro

Foreign Affairs

Nathan has become the mail drop for secret documents out of China; first it was the Tiananmen Papers and now it is a manuscript, Disidai (The fourth generation) written by Zong Hairen, a pseudonym. That manuscript purports to contain secret files on the next (or fourth) generation of Beijing's leaders as well as reports on the secret deliberations over succession held last summer by the current leaders. Nathan and Gilley, basing their work on Zong's longer manuscript, describe a remarkably smooth transition process, which contradicts last summer's rumors in Beijing of infighting among old leaders grudgingly giving up power. When the new Standing Committee of the Politburo was announced in November, Zong's report proved accurate for all but one appointment. Yet China's New Rulers has more enduring value because of its vivid picture of the party's procedures in selecting new leaders who also turn out to display outstanding qualities. The book portrays the party as a tightly knit establishment in which younger cadres rise like cream to the top on the basis of a combination of merit and luck in their patronage ties. The dossiers also record the candidates' judgments, opinions, and their private lives. This elite is confident that there will be a smooth transition to an impressive fourth generation of leaders boasting technocratic skills, a keen appreciation of China's problems, and a realistic understanding of what needs to be done, including some political reforms. The new leaders are quoted as expressing political thoughts and policy options that verge on democratic. The picture we are left with seems a bit too good to be true.

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