EAI academic Lance Gore says that the Communist Party of China is reenacting the “great leader model” and reviving many practices of the Mao era. These include tightening control over information flow and restricting freedom of speech, enhancing propaganda and ideological and political indoctrination, emphasising obedience and absolute loyalty, advancing the ideal of the party acting for the government, among others. He says these anti-modernisation tactics need to be addressed as China attempts to modernise its governance and build institutions with soul.
Politics
Politics
China has put a lot of effort into modernising its governance system over the decades, but it still seems to miss the mark or to have even regressed in some areas. EAI academic Lance Gore puts this down to a muddled understanding of what true modernisation entails. Cult of personality, formalism, and conformity still permeate the system to a large degree, such that decision-makers live in a bubble thinking that all is well.
Politics
China has faced reversals of fortune numerous times in history, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. After enjoying decades of upward ascent since its economic reform and opening up, some says China’s fate is about to be reversed again with the coronavirus pandemic, a mammoth disruption that kicked off the 2020s. Lance Gore argues that such massive shock to its political and economic system exposes chinks in its armour but does not necessarily unravel a big country with the world’s most comprehensive industrial structure.
Politics
Mao said that “the Chinese people have stood up” when he proclaimed the People’s Republic of China in 1949. Lance Gore from the East Asian Institute says, more than 70 years later, if a Chinese person cannot speak his mind without fear of recrimination, one can hardly profess that the Chinese people have truly stood up.
Politics
Lance Gore, senior research fellow of the East Asian Institute, warns that a new cold war awaits China and the US if they continue to talk over each other. How can the two giants see each other in a better light? How can China improve its rule of law and governance practices?
Politics
Lance Gore from the East Asian Institute says that the shape and form of widespread protests around the world show how states are fast losing their authority to govern. Systems in liberal democracies give protesters the space to air their views, but not necessarily the solutions they are looking for. In this regard, China’s brand of authoritarianism coupled with good governance may surprisingly be the tack to take.
Society
Lance Gore opines that what is at stake in Hong Kong is really the Hong Kongers’ immediate interests, and the future of the Pearl of the Orient. He spoke to protesters on the ground and found out that not only do they not identify in the least with mainland China, they overflow with resistance; not only do they feel no shame about Hong Kong’s colonial past, they are actually very proud of it. Wherein lies its future then?
Politics
China has made efforts to be accepted on the international stage. These efforts are not always well-received.