The elevation of prominent scientists to the 20th CPC Politburo has been an active response to Beijing’s overall concern regarding China’s difficulties in achieving scientific self-reliance in the context of a deteriorating geopolitical environment, including deepening rivalry with the US, and a slowing Chinese economy.
The appointment of Ma, Li, Yuan, Chen and Zhang also underscores Xi Jinping’s preference for senior party technocrats or cadres with a combination of long-term political loyalty, strong professional experience and a track record of successful delivery of his political priorities. All five, judging from their careers so far, seem to fit this model well. But what is yet to be seen is the extent to which these scientists can draw on their past expertise to advance China’s desired breakthrough in science and technology.
It is undeniable that these scientists reached high office within China’s political establishment because of their excellence in managing scientific and innovation programmes in the past. However, to engineer genuine innovation across the Chinese economy is an entirely different matter. As policymakers in Beijing well understand, vast expenditure on a domestic semiconductor programme in the past decade has not yet been able to close the development gap in the industry between China and the US.
Achieving the innovation necessary to fulfil Xi’s ambition of self-reliance in science and technology will demand not just the ‘infrastructure’ afforded by financial resources and a policy toolbox, but equally importantly the ‘space’ that comes from allowing critical thinking, less political intervention, greater individual freedom and general acceptance of challenges to the status quo. Ensuring all these factors are in place could attract a steady inflow of talent both within China and from abroad. Homegrown innovation cannot be achieved only by appointing scientists to the Politburo, or by creating a new central science commission directly controlled by the party.
The appointment of this group of scientists to the Politburo also sheds some light on the next generation of Chinese leaders likely to follow Xi. China’s president is reinforcing the shaping of China in his image. He has picked both loyalists and scientists to engineer and deliver the fruits of what he calls ‘a pathway to Chinese modernization’. Their task now is vast, requiring the country to sustain a high level of economic prosperity, reach global technology supremacy and retain ideological purity, ever more independent of Western capitalism.
It can be expected that many of the new Politburo members will be among the candidates for the future leadership, given their past and current professional experience and their accumulated political capital of trust from Xi. The five scientists featured in this paper have far less deeply entrenched political and social networks than the longer-serving members who have risen from traditional local bureaucracy or from the People’s Liberation Army with vested interest groups behind them. So far, it is unclear whether any existing or future rivalries among the 24 Politburo members could disrupt policymaking, particularly on key questions such as Taiwan and the trajectory of the Chinese economy, and ultimately a leadership transition plan.
Xi has left no doubt as to the importance of China’s self-reliance in science and technology, and has called for a ‘whole-nation approach’ to dealing with technological chokepoints including the semiconductor industry. But the country’s recent technological advances have been made through connectivity and globalization. All five of the new scientist members of the Politburo have studied and/or worked in advanced economies for a substantial period of time, and have benefited from frequent exchanges with the expert community internationally. It is reasonable to wonder how far the pursuit of self-reliance can go in the absence of continued opportunities for such exchanges with foreign peers. Achieving self-reliance, moreover, is not only dependent on China’s own willingness and resources. It will also be determined by other countries’ shifts in policy direction towards China – particularly on the part of the US and its allies.
Some in the West might think that China’s scientists-turned-politicians may be easier to work with than traditional bureaucrats, given their overseas experience and their ease in dealing with their counterparts overseas. Others might hope that at least a temporary diplomatic reset with advanced economies might be on the way.
However, both at home and abroad, the real influence of the new scientists will be judged on their results. In President Xi’s third term, he has appointed technocrats in the Politburo to find ways of attracting and retaining talent to ensure scientific self-reliance and build a digital economy and society in line with CPC principles, and to promote China’s domestic norms and practices internationally.
Despite and also because of an even more precarious geopolitical environment, Beijing’s ambitions to achieve technological self-reliance remain undented. China’s leadership has vowed to double down on its policy instruments to accelerate indigenous innovation, yet the financial resources earmarked for science will most certainly fall short as the post-pandemic economic rebound requires public finance to be channelled to other sectors. Innovation takes time to bear fruit, and is a risky business that will require the party leadership to loosen some control. This is yet another ‘principal contradiction’ that Xi and the CPC must now work to resolve.
