China's Domestic Politics and U.S.-Taiwan-China Relations: An Assessment in the Aftermath of the CCP's 16th National Congress

The 16th National Congress of the Chinese Communist party (CCP) was held only months ago. Among other things, the issue of the CCP leadership transition had assumed foremost priority on the agenda before the party congress. Accordingly, various forecasts of the outcome of the leadership lineup, which hinged chiefly on Jiang Zemin’s retirement, gained currency.1 Although I will not attempt in this article to ratiocinate or develop scenarios or trace factors bearing on the power succession, I will make two observations that may shed light on the direction in which the dynamics of China’s elite politics will evolve in the near future. First, it is conceivable that concentrating on Jiang’s retirement as the pivotal issue of disagreement and bargaining among key actors involved in the transition might have facilitated the handling of other issues on which it would otherwise have been much harder to reach commonly accepted resolutions. Two examples were the composition of the new Politburo Standing Committee (PBSC) and the incorporation of Jiang’s “three represents” guideline into the party constitution. Focusing on Jiang’s staying or leaving is crucial for comprehending what all the giveand-take initiatives and responses of those key actors were really aimed at.2 Second, given the intrinsic need for testing and trying all the arrangements that mark the new generation’s accession to leadership, the top leadership after the congress will have to confront the uncertainties involved in adapting the dynamics used by the top leadership to make decisions. Such uncertainties and adaptations, especially with respect to the distribution of the key leaders’ influence over policymaking and patterns of political alignment, will exert a greater impact on China’s domestic and foreign affairs than the results of the personnel reshuffling effected at the congress. In other words, the unpredictable effects of politics on policymaking are just now beginning to become apparent to the CCP’s top elites in the wake of the congress. Furthermore, the accelerating transformation in China’s domestic macropolitical, economic, and social contexts since the 15th Party Congress is producing a new mix of dynamics that will likely shape the regime’s interests, goals, and policy tools for both internal and external national policies in the years to come. Against the backdrop of the changing macroenvironment, this article will attempt to assess the possible effects of China’s domestic politics on U.S.–Taiwan–China relations in the aftermath of the 16th CCP Congress.