ON Nov 15, soon after the Third Plenum of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee had completed deliberation on its massive document “Resolution concerning some major issues in comprehensively deepening reforms” (the Resolution), it published an impressive 22,000-worded blueprint of decisions for social and economic change over the next decade, unpromisingly entitled “Decision on major issues concerning comprehensively deepening reforms” (the Decision): its mission is to return the state to the golden era of wealth and power (fuqiang). Indeed, it attempts to resolve an ongoing contradiction: advance both power of the state and freedom of the individual. Hints of this direction in reform were already made known in the “383 plan” of China’s official think-tank (Development Research Centre of the State Council, i.e. China’s Cabinet). The symbol “383” reflects the plan’s contents: viz interaction among the nation’s three economic drivers – government, market and business; the eight major areas of reform-competition, governance, finance, fiscal, urban-rural divide, state-owned enterprises (SOEs), liberalisation and innovation; and finally, the inter-play of three inter-related objectives – inclusiveness, domestic-external balance, and eradication of inequality and corruption. True to its billing, the Decision pledged wide-ranging reforms.
Now for the action
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