China’s Rural Cooperative Medical Care System: Miles to go

On May 30, 2011 while talking about China’s Rural Cooperative Medical Care System (RCMCS), Yao Lan, professor with the School of Medicine, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan remarked that “China has established a basic medical care system that nearly covers the whole nation in only five years. It took Germany a hundred years and the Republic of Korea 12 years to achieve the goal. China has created a record.” Yao’s statement is a bit exaggerated, as there is no comparison between the medical care systems of China and other developed economies. However, a system has been evolving in China, which is not uniform as different provinces have evolved their own medical care system, yet China can boast that the system has already covered 1.26 billion residents, or 90 percent of the total population.

Generally speaking, China has done well compared with other countries at the same stage of economic development. People are living longer and healthier lives now than sixty years ago. The average life expectancy has reached 74 years, and from 1970 to 2010, the infant mortality rate fell from 61 to 23. However, there is regional disparity and the rural health care system has raised some serious questions. China experimented its first RCMCS on August 10, 1966 from Hubei Province. The experimental health care required the peasants to pay 1 yuan per year; meanwhile, 5 jiao or ½ yuan per person was paid from the village collective public fund towards medical care. By 1968 such system was implemented throughout China. By late 1970s it is reported that 95% of the rural population benefited from cooperative health care (RDI 2006: 32).

However, after the initiation of economic reforms in 1978, and more so after the implementation of Household Responsibility System (HRS), the RCMCS was weakened with the weakening of the community organizations. This resulted in a decreased supply of rural health workers, increased burden of illnesses, disintegration of the three tier medical system, reduced primary health care, and an increased demand for hospital medical services. Since then, China is struggling to find an equitable, efficient and sustainable way of financing and organizing its rural health services.

In 2003, China started to carry out a new-type of RCMCS based on “major illness health insurance coverage” (yi dabing tongchou weizhu 以大病统筹为主). Under such a system, each farmer pays 10 yuan to a medical fund every year, with the central and local governments each contributing 10 yuan to the pool too. When a farmer receives medical treatment, he could have a certain proportion of the medical expenses refunded. By September 2005, the system had spread to 671 counties covering 233 million rural dwellers accounting 26.30% of rural population, and a total of 6.49 billion yuan had been paid in to 82.66 million farmers (RDI, 2006:33). By the end of September 2006, the system had been extended to 1,433 counties, which accounted for 50.1 percent of the China’s total.  A survey report carried out on People’s Daily online edition on January 24, 2007 showed that the rural families were reimbursed 25.7 percent of their total medical expenses, with an average refund of 731 yuan (about 91 U.S. dollars). The survey polled 19,195 rural families in 32 counties of 17 provinces. The survey also showed that 90 percent of families who participated in the system were willing to stay in the system. From 2007 onward, the Chinese government has decided to double government allowances of 20 yuan (2.5 U.S. dollars) this year for each farmer participating in the RCMCS. In addition, China plans to extend the scope of current trials to 1,145, or 40 percent of its counties in 2007. The Chinese government has pledged to invest more than 30 billion yuan (3.85 billion U.S. dollars) to improve its rural medical care network during the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006- 2010).

From the government policies towards RCMCS, it could be discerned that the system has following main characteristics. One, the government intends to build a three tier medical care network involving the counties, towns and villages. The purpose behind such a system is realizing the goal of “curing minor ailments at village level, serious ailments at town level, and chronic ailments at county level” (xiaobing buchu cun, dabing buchu xiang, zhongbing buchu xian 小病不出村，大病不出乡，重病不出县). Two, the RCMCS is based on “major illness health insurance coverage” implying that the more serious the disease, more reimbursements you expect. Three, as regards the policy, the RCMCS is inclined towards curing illness at town and township level health centers or hospitals. The policy stipulates that the rural people who treat themselves for ailments in township and town hospitals, the reimbursement would be greater than those curing aliments in county hospitals. Four, the cooperative medical care fund would be set up with the funds originating from individual peasants, local and central governments.

Luochuan County in Shanxi Province was one of the counties that implemented the RCMCS early on. By the end of 2004, 80% peasants had participated in the RCMCS. In 2005 the provincial government decided to reduce the amount of self payment by peasants for township, county and beyond hospitalization to 100 yuan, 300 yuan and 600 yuan respectively. If the amount exceeds this bottom line, the peasants would be reimbursed 60% if the treatment is carried at township; 50% if it is at county level and 40% above county level. Even though a certain percentage gets reimbursed from the RCMCS Fund, but it has been found during my field investigations in China that to see a doctor, it is still a nightmarish experience for any peasant. Dujiangyan City in Sichuan Province has evolved its own system since it initiated the pilot RCMCS in 2003. Peasants joining the RCMCS hold a “Family Outpatient Account” FOA (jiating menzhen zhanghu 家庭门诊账户). Peasants joining the RCMCS have to pay 10 yuan, but 15 yuan would be entered in their FOA. While seeing a doctor, the peasant only needs to show his FOA and can even get a treatment for minor disease. A family of three would have a 45 yuan FOA that would enable them to see a doctor at township and town level from 4 to 5 times.

The scholars at Rural Development Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing are of the view that the RCMCS so far has not been able to resolve the basic issue of peasants difficulty in seeing or consulting a doctor. The major problem of the RCMCS is that guarantee levels are very low, for the amount paid by the peasants towards their ailment is still very large and it would be difficult for many to pay the amount. Therefore, many in the countryside would still be forced to “drag on with minor disease and wait death with chronic disease” (xiaobing kangzhe, dabing dengsi 小病扛着，大病等死), for the RCMCS is purely based on “major illness health insurance coverage.” According to a recent report some 3.7 million Chinese people (85% of all deaths) die each year before the age of 60 due to chronic diseases. Many peasants have expressed that since serious diseases are developed from minor diseases, why not to nip the problem in the bud? At this point the government not extending the coverage for all diseases has been attributed to the paucity of funds. The officials agree that there is a scope to make the RCMCS relevant to all sorts of ailments, but that could be possible with the increase of rural income and raising more funds for the purpose.

According to a report published by Xinhua on July 11, 2008, a total of 804 million rural residents had joined the system as of the end of March 2008, accounting for 91.05 percent of the rural population. Quoting Mao Qun’an, spokesman of the Ministry of Health, the report says that RCMCS has expanded to 2,679 counties, county-level cities and city districts, covering approximately 98.17 percent of the country’s rural areas. The government is hopeful that the system would cover all rural areas by the end of 2008. As regards the pool funds, at present, it has been raised to 100 yuan, with a split of 20 yuan from the participant and 80 yuan from the governments. However, provinces in the middle and western parts of China failed to meet the standard, mainly because individuals in poverty-stricken areas hadn’t increased their participation. Lack of government investments has long been the major cause for the country’s poor medical care system.

As China’s economic juggernaut continues to roll on, it has been able to pump more money to the medical care system. According to wang Jun, Vice Minister of Finance, China invested 1.13 trillion yuan in improving the medical care system during 2009-2011, 284.2 billion yuan more than the original budget. It also raised the ratio of the medical care spending in fiscal expenditure to 5.35 percent in 2011, up from 4.57 percent in 2008. However, irrespective of the fast economic development, China still has a long way to go to establish a high-standard medical care system. There is still huge gap between the rural and urban medical care systems. During the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) period, China is aiming to reduce individual’s shares of total medical expenditures to less than 30 percent, and perfect the medical care system by the year 2020, till then we will have to wait and watch.

References:

RDI (Rural Development Institute) of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, comp. (2006) 农村经济绿皮书2005-2006年：中国农村经济形势分析与预测 (Green Book of Chin’s Rural Economy 2005-2006: Analysis and Forecast on China’s Rural Economy). Social Sciences Academic Press, Beijing.

Asia’s Race in Africa: What it holds for India?

As India and China establish themselves as the two poles of world economic growth, they have started to influence the growth patterns in many countries, and the African continent is no exception. Interestingly, there are strong possibilities that Africa will emerge as yet another pole of world economic growth given the size of its huge market and natural resources. This has also lead the Asian giants to scramble for markets in the African continent, billionairefinancier George Soros has even pronounced these countries as "Africa's new colonialists" who he said were "exploiting the world's poorest continent in the same way as its old European masters." This may be an exaggeration, however, the Asian race in Africa is for real, and has been reflected in the so called India-Africa and China-Africa summits. This also demonstrates that India and China would like to forge partnership with Africa and handle this partnership with utmost care owing to latter’s huge economic and political capital. The probability of a successful partnership especially for India appears possible as African countries have many things in common with India. It is here that India can play a vital role in ‘capacity building’ as pronounced by the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during the second India-Africa Forum Summit on May 24, 2011 in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital. The first Summit was held in April 2008in New Delhi.

In Addis Ababa, the Indian Prime Minister announced that "India will continue to support efforts at infrastructure development, regional integration, capacity building and human resources development in Africa." To this effect India promised 5 billion US dollars for the next three years for Africa’s infrastructure development and 700 million US dollars to establish institutions and training programs. Many experts view these summits as a move to catch up with China’s influence in that region and answering India’s impending quest for energy security. It may be recalled that China initiated similar summits with Africa since 2006 in Beijing; the second China-Africa summit was held in 2009 in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. During the summit China pledged 10 billion dollars in aid to the African countries and canceled an accumulated 2.8 billion US dollars of debt for 35 African countries. The Chinese investment in Africa is estimated to be around 10 billion US dollars.

India has a historical relationship with Africa, especially during the post-colonial period. The very concept of non-cooperation and civil disobedience by Mahatma Gandhi was experimented in Africa itself during the late 19th century. However, the relationship swung from a period of great emotional and political solidarity in the 1950s and 1960s to selective engagement in the 1970s and 1980s. If we carefully analyze the Delhi Declaration issued at the close of April 2008 Summit, it is clear that India has diversified and fine-tuned its policies in political, security related, economic, science and technology, human resource development, social, cultural and other areas of mutual interest. This is a strategic partnership that would be based on the fundamental principles of equality and mutual respect. This is evident from the establishment of the 3 Africa Divisions since 2003 by the Ministry of External Affairs, India.

As regards Africa’s place in world economy, India firmly believes that like India and China, Africa is yet another "engine of world economic growth". If we talk about Africa’s integration into the global economy, it obviously includes various aspects of the globalization process, such as trade, industrialization, FDI and capital flows. A resource rich Africa is already having 108 billion dollar trade with China and 45 billion dollar with India and over 50 billion with the ASEAN. Both India and China have heavily invested in Africa’s energy resources, infrastructure development, telecommunications and mining.

In 2007, India invested $13.6 billion abroad, of which 2.3 billion has gone into Africa. The trade and investment from two of the world’s fastest growing economies going to Africa could significantly facilitate Africa’s integration into the global economy and must be translated into greater growth in Africa. If we look at the Asia- Africa trade, Africa’s primary commodity exports to Asia account for 86% of its total exports to Asia. Its processed imports, including manufactured products and food products, account for 80% of its total imports from Asia. In other words Africa provides natural comparative advantage on raw materials and resource-based products.

Since the first India-Africa summit in New Delhi in 2008, trade between the two partners has increased substantially. As regards India’s quest for energy security, yes, energy security is an essential and very important component of India-Africa partnership, for the African light crude oil, and gas account for 12% and 8% of the global oil and gas reserves. Presently 30 percent of India‘s energy needs are met by oil, with 70 percent of oil supply being imported. Much of the remaining 70 percent of energy demand is met by domestic coal reserves. If the reports of the International Energy Agency are to be believed, it is estimated that in order to maintain and sustain its current growth trajectory of 8% per annum, India will have to increase its energy consumption by at least by 3.6 percent annually, implying that if India’s energy demand would be doubled by 2025 and it would import 90 percent of its petroleum supply. Seen in this light, the India-Africa energy security becomes an important component of India-Africa relations.

As far as rules of engagements in Africa are concerned India and China have adopted equally divergent strategies. If China has adopted the model of ‘vertical integration’, India had gone for ‘horizontal integration’ with the African economies. It is true that by relying on government backing and economic strength, Chinese companies are often able to outbid competitors for procuring contracts from local governments. However, most of the Indian firms in Africa are either privately owned or under mixed private-public ownership. They are less vertically integrated, and engage in far more sales to private African enterprises.

The Indian government is also actively supporting Indian businesses in Africa through various government institutionssuch as the Export-Import Bank of India, FICCI, CII; it has been providing soft loans, cheap generic drugs and market access to goods from Least Developed African countries into India on nominal tariff rates. The case of Indian pharmaceutical companies doing business in Africa is such an example. Ranbaxy, has provided reasonably priced medicines, particularly Antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, to several African countries including Nigeria, Kenya and Zambia. Cipla  another Indian pharmaceutical giant, provides HIV/AIDS drugs to 1 in 3 patients in Africa.

The ‘horizontal integration’ model may not have won many projects for the Indian companies,but has certainly earned enormous goodwill for India in Africa. There are asymmetries in the economic relations between Asia and Africa. For example,  though the African export to Asia account for 25% of its global exports, it accounts only 1.6% of its global trade. Secondly, Africa’s FDI in Asia is abysmal; thirdly, African textile and apparel industry is competing with the extremely competitive Chinese and Indian textile industries globally. Therefore, it becomes imperative that the South-South economic relationship address asymmetries. Some of the measures could be reduction in tariffs on Africa’s leading exports; helping Africa in strengthening its basic market institutions, and governance; Sectoral capacity building is vital. For example, Africa’s large imports of diamonds from India could be processed in Africa itself by inviting Indian investment in this sector instead of importing processed diamonds from India. Also, Africa needs to be integrated with the global value-chain.
For example, cotton exports from Africa are increasingly being complemented by intermediate materials, say fabrics supplied by the Asean countries to apparel producers in Africa.Politically too, Africa is equally relevant to India as sub-Saharan Africa holds over 50 seats in the UN Security Council. Both have reiterated that there is need for urgent and comprehensive reform of the United Nations, in particular, the expansion of the UN Security Council, in both permanent and non-permanent categories of membership. India would also like to bolster diplomatic and security presence in Africa. The anti-piracy patrols in the key shipping routes of the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean since 2008 are pointers in this direction. The routine India-Africa summits will definitely make this relationship healthier and stronger, equally important for India is to engage individual African countries at various levels and forge even closer ties with them.

Taiwan’s Flexible Diplomacy: A New Approach to Cross-Strait and International Relations

In a video conferencing with the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) on May 12, 2011, President Ma Ying-jeou of the Republic of China (ROC) Taiwan outlined three important national strategies for Taiwan: one,  institutionalizing cross-strait rapprochement with mainland China; two, enhancing Taiwan’s contributions to international development; and three, aligning Taiwan’s defense and diplomacy. These could be termed as the three pillars or the ‘defense lines’ as president Ma call them of Taiwanese new foreign policy ever since he took office in 2008. Why has Taiwan initiated such a policy?

At the outset between the year 2000 and 2008, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) under the presidency of Chen Shuibian advocated stronger Taiwan identity, vociferously advocated Taiwan’s Independence, and sought Taiwan’s membership to various United Nation organizations. In turn, China adopted Anti-Secession Law in 2005; enhanced and strengthened its military deployment against Taiwan; and unequivocally reiterated the use of force against the renegade province. In the process, it enhanced the precision strike capability of hundreds of missiles of the Second Artillery Force (SAF) that has been assigned to attack strategic targets inside Taiwan.

The period under Chen could be categorized as the period of confrontation with the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and of extending doles to various African and Latin American countries for maintaining their affiliation to the ROC. The policy won ROC three diplomatic allies, but lost 9 including Costa Rica to the PRC; the ‘cheque diplomacy’ proved disastrous, and the first thing Ma Ying-jeou did after resuming office was to abandon this policy and initiate a policy of readjustment introducing the ‘flexible diplomacy’ or the so called huoyue waijiao, which calls for political reconciliations. 

Under ‘flexible diplomacy’ Taiwan sought diplomatic truce and opportunities to participate in international organizations and events. The truce called for consolidation of ties with its 23 diplomatic allies across Pacific, Europe and Africa, while the latter offered it opportunities to participate in rehabilitation work in Ache and Haidi etc. earthquakes; it also secured the observer’s status in World Health Assembly (WHA) of the WHO since 2009.  In fact the “three-no’s” policy toward cross-strait relations: “no unification, no independence, and no use of force” could be regarded as an important ingredient of the ‘diplomatic truce’ under ‘flexible diplomacy.’ this approach of handling the cross-strait affairs in Ma’s words would create a “virtuous cycle.” It has indeed created a “virtuous cycle” in terms of increased trade and investment with the PRC, expanded educational and cultural exchange, and eased visa regimes across the straits. Between 2008 and 2011 Taiwan and mainland China have concluded 15 agreements including the landmark Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA). The flexible diplomacy was the need of the hour, which enabled Taiwan to avoid trade and economic marginalization; criticism from the domestic public opinion, as well as further jettisoning of the cross-strait relations.  According to President Ma, the arrival of nearly 3million mainland Chinese has created a tourism boom in Taiwan.  There are at present over 5000 mainland Chinese students studying in Taiwan universities. The increase in cross-strait trade also boosted Taiwan’s total trade volume to a record high of $526 billion in 2010.

As far as Taiwan’s foreign aid policy is concerned, it was changed substantially, and the May 2009 White Paper on Foreign Aid Policy is a pointer in this direction.  The so-called ‘cheque diplomacy’ paved way for a foreign aid policy that is in line with the international standards. With an aim to promote partnership, Taiwan has committed to be a responsible stakeholder in the international community by supporting humanitarianism and safeguarding human security. It has contributed to disaster relief efforts around the world and is the largest donor so far to Japan’s Tohoku earthquake relief effort. Taiwan has also diversified the modes of aid and cooperation in to the GIS, hospital management, environmental protection, as well as renewable energy etc. fields. President Ma is of the view that such efforts will help Taiwan reach a higher moral ground in international politics.

The third strategy that President Ma pronounced during the video conferencing is ‘to align defense with diplomacy.’ In this respect he said that Taiwan must build credibility and trust with its allies but also be able to defend itself. Rebuilding of mutual trust especially with its strongest ally, the US has remained on top of President Ma’s priorities for it almost touched the nadir during Chen Shuibian’s time. DPP’s irritating PRC tactics and Chen seeking transit opportunities in the US and other countries for his foreign visits irritated Washington, which ill afforded any trouble with the PRC in AF-Pak region. The US has expressed its happiness over the ‘flexible diplomacy’ and has announced arms sales  worth  6.4 billion US dollars to Taiwan albeit the delivery is still awaited. Furthermore, Taiwanese request for F-16C/D has been received positively by the US but so far has been stalled due to obvious pressure from the mainland. Nevertheless, the US is going to act in accordance with the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) and is obligated to provide defensive weapon systems to Taiwan, for it is aware of the fact that a weaker Taiwan will damage the stability in Asia Pacific; increase undue pressure on Taiwan and its allies. It is in this context that president Ma has asked the United States to help “level the playing field” by providing weaponry to keep Taiwan’s aerial and naval integrity intact.

There is yet another dimension to the flexible diplomacy of Taiwan, which Present Ma did not pronounce in his interview to the CSIS - the people to people and cultural diplomacy. The policy has provided Taiwanese citizen and NGOs various opportunities to participate in international affairs and exchange ideas with foreign civil societies. Under the aegis of this policy, Taiwan has initiated various programs such as national development seminars for youths, international youth ambassador program, Taiwan scholarships and fellowship, Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Huayu Enrichment Program and Taiwan Study Camps, International Cooperation and Development Fund’s (ICDF) Mandarin Scholarship etc. programs. All these initiatives have helped Taiwan to boost its image internationally and enabled international community to have a better understanding of Taiwan, its culture customs and values.

The flexible diplomacy has worked well for all the stakeholders so far. Low profile, gentle giant Ma will add another feather to his cap if he is successful in concluding confidence building measures (CBMs) and cross-strait peace agreements. President Ma has repeatedly called on the PRC to dismantle over a thousand missiles that have been targeted on Taiwan's cities, and we have heard Xu Caihou, Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission, PRC saying that it is possible if a peace agreement is signed between the two sides.

Osama bin Laden, Pakistan and China

The most-wanted fugitive and dreaded terrorist, Osama bin Laden was killed on the 2^nd May  2011 by the elite US Navy SEALs in Abbottabad, a stone’s throw from the Pakistan Military Academy, and over 100 kilometers away from Pakistani capital city Islamabad. The very presence of bin Laden in the heart and most secured place in Pakistan has greatly strained its ties with the United States; the latter has lost some if not all the trust it has reposed on Pakistan in fight against global terrorism. In an interview to CBS's  “60 Minutes” a week after bin Laden’s killing, the US president Barrack Obama said, “We think that there had to be some sort of support network for bin Laden inside of Pakistan. But we don't know who or what that support network was.”  Furthermore, he said “We don't know whether there might have been some people inside of government, people outside of government, and that's something that we have to investigate, and more importantly, the Pakistani government has to investigate.” Fingers are being pointed out to the Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), which is known for its contacts with various terror outfits including the al Qaeda and Haqqani network. Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, Husain Haqqani, has admitted in ABC's “This Week” program that Pakistan had “many Jihadi has-beens from the 1980s who are still alive and well and kicking, and some of them could have been helping them, but they are not in the state or government of Pakistan today.” Congressman Dana Rohrabacher even introduced the “Defund US Assistance to Pakistan Act of 2011” in the House of Representative and said that the US “can no longer afford this foolishness….The time has come for us to stop subsidizing those who actively oppose us. Pakistan has shown itself not to be America's ally.”

Pakistan has turned to China in every crisis, and this time again Pakistani Prime Minister Gilani will also rush to China next week on a four-day visit starting from 17^th May. China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) spokeswoman Jiang Yu confirmed this and described China and Pakistan as “good neighbors, friends, partners and brothers.” On 9^th May 2011 during an address to the Pakistan parliament, Gilani hailed China as Pakistan’s “all weather friend” and also absolved the ISI from sheltering the al Qaeda fugitive. He praised China as a “source of inspiration” and warned the United States that Pakistan reserves the right to “retaliate with full force” in case of a similar US operation in the future.  China is perhaps the only country that has supported the Pakistani ignorance about the whereabouts of bin Laden albeit hailed the Laden killing as a “major event and a positive development in the international struggle against terrorism.” Jiang Yu further said that “Pakistan stands at the forefront of the international struggle against terrorism….Pakistani government’s determination to fight terrorism are staunch and its actions have been vigorous. Pakistan has made important contributions to the international struggle against terror.” She also said that China will continue to support Pakistan staunchly in developing and implementing its own anti-terror strategy based on its own national conditions. Experts of international relations in China also toed the government line as usual. Guo Xiangang, vice president of the China Institute of International Studies stated that Laden's death and any rift between the United States and Pakistan will not affect Beijing's policies toward Islamabad. And why not, when Pakistan has been secretly sharing some of the advanced military technology to China, be it the 1998 transfer of an unexploded American Tomahawk missile or the F-16s. It has been reported that China has once again shown interest in the debris of the crashed SEAL helicopter in Abbottabad raid.

Not only the Chinese government has rendered support to the Pakistan in the aftermath of bin Laden’s killing but the netizens across China has also toed the government line. Shen Weihuang quoted a survey in an article published in the Global Times on May 10, 2011 which revealed that 60% of the 500,000 people who took an online survey conducted by Hong Kong based Phoenix television, agreed with the statement that bin Laden's death was a sad event because “he was an anti-US warrior.” More than 75% of the 17,000 respondents thought the US would get tougher on China after Bin Laden’s death.  Global Times wrote on May 5, 2011 in one of the commentaries that “the counter-terrorism war, mainly in the Arab world, has served to prevent the US from ‘disturbing’ China during the past decade…. In the near future, the US may pour more money and resources in handling the rise of China.” Some netizens in various forums also expressed their views on Laden issue. To quote a few from sina.com posted in Chinese: “We believe that there is some support within the United States for bin Laden network, though we do not know who is supporting the network, we do not know if any US government official is supporting the network or not, otherwise 9.11 would not have happened at all.” Another wrote, “Pakistan helped the US in counter-terrorism, but after finishing the task, it has been blaming Pakistan for sheltering [terrorists], disgusting! Yet another wrote, “The US sending forces inside Pakistan territory to kill people is an act of a terrorist, gangster and a thug combined!” American logic is the logic of a gangster, Pakistan! You hold on, China is behind you. It is useless to shed tears in international arena, there is no justice to talk of, national interests are supreme, and if you do not wield power you have no right to speech” wrote another. “The US politics of power and hegemony demonstrates that in order to serve its own interests, the US will achieve these by hook or crook showing utter disregards for others” announced another. There are others who expressed their fears about Pakistan being used by the US for battering China. “Pakistan has allowed the foreign troops to operate in its own territory freely; this is surrendering one’s sovereign rights under humiliating terms! China must be vigilant, or else one day, the U.S. forces in Pakistan could attack China as well without the knowledge of Pakistan, it would be a grave problem” jotted another netizen.

As far as India is concerned, India has always maintained that like bin Laden, other dreaded terrorists have also found sanctuary in Pakistan. Some of the most wanted terrorist such the mastermind of the 26.11 Mumbai attack and LeT founder Hafiz Saeed, Zaki ur Rehman Lakhvi, Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar, the principal accused in the 2001 Parliament attack who was released in exchange of hostages in the Kandahar hijack episode in 1999, and the underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, responsible for the 1991 Bombay bomb blasts have all found shelter in Pakistan. These have been used by Pakistan as assets against India and have rendered them protection. When asked if China would ask Pakistan to transfer the killers involved in Mumbai attack by a reporter to Jiang Yu, she said, “We uphold principles of non-interference in other's internal affairs. Chinese government will continue to support Pakistan in formulating and implementing anti-terrorist activities based on its national conditions.” We have seen that how the Chinese press absolved Pakistan from 26.11 Mumbai attacks and blamed it on some Hindu fundamentalists as Kasab and others were supporting the Hindu sacred thread on their wrists. If we analyze the Chinese news for domestic consumption, we would see that it has always supported the stand of Pakistan irrespective of its brazen involvement whether it was the reportage of the Kargil, attack on the Indian parliament or the Mumbai attacks in Chinese media.

This is primarily because China does not recognize the thesis of cross-border terrorism, especially in south Asian context.  China must not forget that it has equally diverse nationalities that account for 8.49% of the population and inhabit 64% of the total land area of China, particularly, Xinjiang that borders 8 countries including India. The stability in the region according to the Chinese government has been endangered by the forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism as well as narcotic smuggling. China is aware of the Trans border nationalism and its effects in Xinjiang. According to Chinese sources, there are over 50 East Turkestan separatist organizations in Xinjiang; and between 1990 and 2001 there have been 360 terror incidents causing 162 causalities and injuring over 440 people. The activities of Eastern Turkestan Movement before and after the Olympics are well known, especially the July 5^th 2009 Urmuqi violence that rendered 197 dead and 1700 injured. As far as extremism or religious fundamentalism is concerned, China so far has blamed the pan Islamic religious fundamentalism emanating from Uzbekistan, Kirghizstan, and Tajikistan for armed smuggling, supporting East Turkestan Liberation Organization and creating instability and extremism in Xinjiang. It is mum on Pakistan albeit has admitted since 2001 that al Qaeda was in hand and glove with the Xinjiang ‘terrorists’. The recent wikiLeaks Gitmo files also show that China’s “all whether friend” indeed provided training grounds to Uighur separatists. Amongst the hundreds of Taliban, there were 22 Uighurs detainees at Guantanamo, many of whom were captured in Pakistan. Hasan Mahsum, the founder of “East Turkistan Islamic Movement” was killed in Pakistan in 2003. It was reported in Pakistani press recently that a few weeks before Osama’s death, al Qaida appointed a new commander of its Pakistan forces and training camps, Abdul Shakoor Turkistani, the chief of the Turkistani Islamic Party created in 2008 with an aim to carry out Jihad in Xinjiang. Another problem that China has faced in Xinjiang is that of narcotic smuggling from Afghanistan. In 2004 during the “The Struggle for Banning Narcotics in the Silk Route Countries” conference, a UN official revealed that almost 60%-70% of the Afghanistan narcotics are exported and transported through the Silk route countries, and Xinjiang was one of the very important transit points.  It has been revealed by China that between 2000 and 2005 China captured 6284 Xinjiang drug peddlers from Beijing, Shanghai, Yunnan, Guangdong etc. 13 provinces and cities.

Therefore, China must stop looking terrorism with Pakistani prism not only inside Pakistan and Afghanistan, but also must be cautious in supporting Pakistan playing a dominant role in Afghanistan in the wake of prospective hasty American withdrawal from this war ravaged country after bin laden’s death, for it is obvious that Pakistan’s intelligence agencies have been blamed for encouraging and funding the extremism in India as well as in Afghanistan.  No one denies Pakistan’s stakes in Afghanistan, but so has India, China and many other countries. All the stakeholders have vested interests in Afghanistan's stability, not to encircle Pakistan. Instability both in Pakistan and Afghanistan will have disastrous effects not only in South Asia, but also in China, especially Xinjiang. Therefore, it is pertinent that we have a regional approach to Afghanistan involving all the stakeholders such as China, Russia, Iran, India and Pakistan as well as the Central Asian countries. Moreover, it is for Afghanistan to decide what sort of alignment it would like to have in place, so as the stability is maintained and guaranteed. 

China’s Rural Land Grabs: Endangering Social Stability

Last month Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the top think tank in China released the findings of a rural survey, in which 60 percent of the farmers in 1,564 surveyed villages in 17 provinces and autonomous regions revealed that their land has been confiscated, and that they were unsatisfied with the compensation they received. The report was silent on the number of illegal confiscations, however, reported that “Illegal land confiscation has become the biggest threat to Chinese farmers' land rights and conflicts related to land have become a threat to the stability of China's rural society.” In response to the report, a recent circular published on the Chinese government's website (www.gov.cn) has warned the provincial governments over the evictions of farmers from their lands.

China has lost millions of hectares of arable land since the reforms. In recent years, in order to regain some of the lost land, the Chinese government has initiated reforms in some of the selected rural areas that encourage the rural people to move from their old homes into new residential buildings while the houses would be demolished and land cultivated into farmland. The move is designed to add farmland while improving farmers' living conditions, albeit has suffered criticism from top agriculture scientist such as Lin Yifu, Lin observes that it would be catastrophic to destroy the natural villages and construct mini cities (xiuzhen chengshi) in the villages. The Ministry of Land and Resources admitted recently that the provincial governments in more than 20 provinces have been found to have forced farmers to abandon their homes and to move into apartment buildings. The provincial governments, in order to boost their political image and local revenues and GDP, sell the right of land use to developers. The forced evictions has been a cause of concern for the central government, as the resentment has resulted into various modes of protests, petitions, demonstrations, sit-ins and even confrontation with the local government machinery. What are the reasons behind such forced evictions? The most important that the Chinese government has been grappling with is the land use policy.

The land in rural China belongs to collective organizations according to Land Contracting Law (tudi chengbaofa) LCL. The collectives in turn contract the land to peasants through the Household Responsibility System (HRS) that was implemented during the 1980s. However, there is another law called Land Management Law (tudi guanlifa) LML, that makes it mandatory for the peasants to vacate arable land for urbanization and industrialization. Both the Laws have been used by the central as well local governments to their own advantage and have forced various villagers in the city suburbs and rural areas to vacate their land at the issuance of a single eviction notice. Secondly, along with the HRS came the system of land readjustment meant to provide for egalitarian distribution of land (which anyhow is a thing of the past now) but created problems. From its extensive fieldwork in China’s 17 provinces since 1987, the Rural Development Institute (RDI) of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences where this author was a visiting fellow during 2006-07 found out that it was the readjustment of land that made peasantry apprehensive about further inputs and investment in their land on account of adjustments and the transfer of land right. 

In the light of these problems, since 1988 based on its fieldwork findings, the RDI recommended to the Chinese policymakers that there was an urgent need to bring in additional laws and policies to increase the tenure security and well-being of China’s rural population. Government responded positively to these recommendations and brought in a 30-year land use rights policy as a legal requirement in a new land management law in 1998. In August 2002, the Standing Committee of the National Peoples’ Committee adopted Rural Land Contracting Law (RLCL) which offered substantial additional assurance of farmers’ 30-year rights, narrowing any possible remaining grounds for readjustments, detailing what is to be in the written contract, explicit equal land right for women and setting forth a comprehensive range of remedies for farmers whose land rights are violated. The RLCL spells out, for the first time, farmers’ rights to carry out transactions with their land rights, including not only lease, but assignment of the full 30-year right.

In order to implement the RLCL and other related policies, the Chinese government brought in other regulations such as the “Contractual management right transfer method of rural land” which was approved by the 2nd standing meeting of the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) on January 7, 2005, and went into effect on March 1, 2005. The new regulation allowed the peasants to transfer their contracted land to other parties and stipulated that the income originating from such transfers should go to the contractor alone. The grantee could subcontract the land but has to acquire the accent of former contractor. According to the 2006 white paper of the MOA, 5% of the contracted land area was voluntarily subcontracted, transferred, hired and mutually exchanged by the contractor in 2005. Furthermore, in order to settle the disputes originating from such transfers, the MOA is working on arbitration for land conflict management. 

Perhaps because of growing pressure to increase land for non-agricultural uses especially the lucrative real estate developments, local governments, who monopolize the sale of land-use rights, are making huge profits by buying land from farmers at low prices, and selling it to developers at higher prices. Such profits have become a “secondary source of revenue” in some localities, resulting in rampant corruption. The move of the local governments has forced peasants to voice their frustration and discontent in various ways throughout China. The protests have forced the government to readjust its land policy and bring the farmland under strict control and promote the reform of the government’s land requisition and land management systems. Li Jianqin, Director of the Law Enforcement and Supervision Bureau under the Ministry of Land and Resources, revealed that there were a total of 53,000 cases of illegal land use across the country in 2010,  involving 27,866 hectares of land including 10,933 hectares  of farmland (China Daily January 21, 2011). Rampant illegal land expropriation has prompted the Ministry of Land and Resources and the National Development and Reform Commission to promulgate two catalogues in 2006, which banned the construction of large commercial and entertainment facilities, building material markets, and theme parks using arable land.

China’s economic growth has been driven by heavy investment in infrastructural and real estate development. Since investment requires land, China witnessed three “land enclosure rushes” (quandire). The first was during mid 1980s when cities expanded, town and township enterprises mushroomed and peasants started to build new houses. In 1985 alone China lost some 15 million mu (one mu equals 1/15 of a hectare) arable land. From 1978 to 1986, arable land in China shrank by 6 million mu per year. The second ‘land enclosure rush’ was witnessed between 1992 and 1993 in the form of land speculation. Haikou in Hainan and Beihai in Guangxi are the examples where huge arable land was seized for constructing commercial houses (shangpin fang). The third land enclosures took place between 2002 and 2004 when the government invited and sold land to developers at a very low price. Between 1998 and 2005 China lost around 10 million hectares of arable land. The fourth appears to be driven by government’s resolve to convert rural population into non rural by building ‘mini cities’ in the rural areas.

It is widely believed by many Chinese scholars that the reform of rural land management is crux to resolve the “Three rural” (widely used for agriculture, countryside and peasants) problems. Since land does not belong to the peasants, they do not have bargaining rights in the course of land acquisition by central or local governments. As a result peasants only get a part of the added value of land; the lion’s share is taken away by the government and the market intermediaries. Liu, Jihong from the Department of Agricultural Economic Management, of MOA is more vocal in his approach when he says that the land acquisition system is highly discriminatory against farmers. According to Liu, ever since the economic reforms started, some 100 million mu of land was used for urbanization and industrialization. Even if there exists a profit margin of 20000 RMB per mu, the amount reaches a whopping 200 billion RMB. In the process millions of Chinese peasants lost their land through naked exploitation and in violation of peasants’ rights. Pointing to land acquired for construction, Liu points out that at present some 2.5 million to 3 million mu of agricultural land is used for construction every year. Even if we calculate an average per capita loss of 1 mu, some 2.5 million to 3 million peasants are rendered landless every year. Adding peasants who lost their land during the last 20 years or so, it is estimated that in coming 30 years some 100 million peasants would be turned into non agricultural population. With a note of warning, Liu posits that if these people are not rehabilitated properly, millions would be reduced to poverty and social stability would be endangered. Therefore, Liu advocates that as long as permanent land rights are denied to peasants more and more peasants would be rendered landless and homeless, and would cause instability in society. In light of these facts, the present HRS is not conducive to stabilization of land rights as well as deals negotiated by the market forces. Therefore, China needs a second land revolution.     

On Wen Jiabao’s Government Work Report 2011

At the outset, Wen Jiabao’s Government Work Report of 2011 is different from other government reports presented hereunto by the Chinese Premiers. Instead of starting with the summary of the achievements of the past one year, this time Wen summarized the work done by his government in the last five years i.e. during the 11^th Five Year Plan (2006-2010); he then sets major targets to be achieved in the next five years, during the 12^th Five Year Plan (2011-2015), and finally elaborates what are his immediate priorities for the year 2011.

As regards the achievements in the last five years, the Chinese government compliments the leadership and the countrymen for a wonderful job of maintaining the high economic growth trajectory, especially in the face of world economic meltdown that severely hit the exports in China and rendered millions jobless. And also in the face of unprecedented natural calamities such as Wenchuan and Yushu earthquakes, China seems to have kept its overall economic as well as social environment shockproof, and steered itself out of various uncertainties. The economy continued to grow at an average growth rate of over 11.2% and in specific years it even grew at 14% e.g. the year 2007. It became a 5 trillion dollar economy replacing Japan to become the 2nd largest economy of the world even though the per capita income remains around 4000 USD per annum. Therefore, in the face of very slow economic development across globe, India being an exception, one may surmise that China along with other emerging economies such as India, Brazil and Russia has contributed to the stabilization of the world economy.

It could be discerned that the ‘Three Rurals’, a term used for the agriculture, countryside and peasants remained the top priority of the Chinese government during the last 5 years. The accumulative investment for the ‘Three Rurals’ reached over 3 trillion yuan, registering 23% increase annually. The net per capita of the rural China touched 5919 yuan. However, various concerns pertaining to the inflation, job creation, income disparity etc. are obvious in the report and have been prioritized for immediate action in the year 2011. In particular, inflation remains high on the government agenda, and that’s why we hear Wen using terms such as ‘controlling commodity prices’, ‘managing inflation’, ‘maintaining overall price stability’, ‘macro economic control’, ‘supervision of prices’  etc. measures as ‘top priorities’ for the government.  Comparing India, China should not have a problem to deal with the inflation as it has registered very impressive food grain output in the last five years; the industrial production has also been superb, and moreover with over 1.3 trillion dollar foreign reserves the problem should not be too hard to handle.

Nevertheless, the most crucial issue for the Chinese government in the coming years would be the growing income disparity and the distribution of the incomes; it has to be seen how China will unfold the policies to tackle these problems. These are the issues that are very crucial for overall social stability in China. China is very nervous about any public protest, and most of the protests have been rooted in expanding social imbalances, especially the rural urban divide, official highhandedness, corruption, violation of laws, land fragmentation, land acquisition leading to forced evictions, unemployment, unnecessary cadre strength in the countryside, environmental hazards etc. issues. Reuters reported on March 5, 2011 that China's spending on "public security" has outstripped the defense budget for the first time. The planned spending on law and order items has been pegged at 624.4 billion yuan ($95.0 billion) for the year 2011.

As far as the 12^th Five Year Plan is concerned, it would be the crucial period for building a modest well off society, deepening the reforms, as well the acceleration and transformation of the economic development in China. China plans to moves away from the labor intensive industries to the higher end manufacturing and service industries. China would like to shed the image of being viewed as the ‘world factory’ and venture in becoming the R&D hub of the world. To this end, 2.2% of the GDP would be spent on R&D.  Wen has also pledged to build 36 million affordable apartments for low-income people, and creation of 9 million jobs in the year 2011, and we can expect rise in the wages and incomes of the working class. Chinese premier has projected a growth rate of 7% which is not bad or slow at all during the 12^th Five Year Plan. He has projected that by 2015 China’s GDP at 2010 prices should reach over 55 trillion yuan (over 8 trillion USD). According to a study conducted by Price Waterhouse Cooper, China will be the largest economy in the world by 2020 and will replace the US by 2030. Therefore, there will be major shifts in the world economic order by 2020 in which emerging economies will become more important thus further enhancing their economic as well as political clout at the world stage. China also intends to control its population at 1.39 billion and an urbanization level of 51.5% by the year 2015.

As regards the priorities for the year 2011, Chinese premier says that since 2011 is the opening year of the 12^th Five Year Plan, it would be extremely crucial for accomplishing the tasks of the next five years. China will increase its GDP by around 8 percent, further optimize the economic structure, keep the consumer price index increase around 4 percent, create more than 9 million jobs in urban area and keep the registered urban unemployment rate at 4.6 percent or lower, according to the report. The agriculture will continue to dominate the government proceedings in 2011 as well, as the central government’s outlay for the ‘Three Rurals’ has been proposed at 988.45 billion yuan, an increase of 130.48 billion yuan over the year 2010. Meanwhile, China would continue with the practice of food subsidies to the farmers. Carbon dioxide emission is set to be slashed by 17 percent in the five years on the basis of 2010, as part of the country's active efforts to grapple with climate change. The reduction target will move China closer to achieve its pledge to cut carbon intensity by 40 to 45 percent by 2020, relative to 2005 levels, reveals the report.

As regards the national defense, there is a single paragraph in the Government Work Report that says that Strengthening of the national defense and building of a strong people's army is an important guarantee to safeguard the national sovereignty and security. It states that a strong army is also crucial for building a moderately well off society. The report says China will build capacity to win local wars in an information age, and to respond to multiple security threats and accomplish a diverse array of military tasks. The military will resolutely carry out urgent, difficult, dangerous and daunting tasks, such as handling emergencies and relieving disasters. There is no mention of the defense budget in the report, however, China reveled before the start of the NPC session that it plans to raise its defense budget by 12.7 percent to 601 billion yuan (91.5 billion U.S. dollars) in 2011, compared to an increase of 7.5 percent last year. While answering foreign journalists questions, Li Zhaoxing, spokesman for the Fourth Session of the 11th National People's Congress said that while China's military spending amounts to about 1.4 percent of its GDP, India’s ratio was much higher than 2 percent. In his budget speech on February 28, 2011, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee announced Rs 1,64,425 crore (US$ 36 billion) for defense during the next financial year 2011-12, which over 2.5 times less than the Chinese official budget.

Finally, the Chinese premier promises to be the standard bearer of peace, development and harmony. He says China will take an active part in multilateral diplomacy, use the G20 summit and other diplomatic forums for strengthening the coordination of macroeconomic policies, and advance the reforms of the international economic and financial system such as IMF and the World Bank. The report says that China will maintain sound and steady relations with major powers. As far as relations with its neighbors are concerned, China has promised to adhere to the thesis of ‘good neighborliness and neighbors as partners.’ It also talks about promoting regional and sub regional cooperation. The last 32 years of economic reforms has brought earthshaking changes to the socio-economic fabric of China, what could be the direction of the wind in the next decade for China, well, we will have to wait and watch.

Jasmine Revolution and Social Stability in China

The ‘Jasmine Revolution’ (JR) that began in Tunisia and spread like a prairie fire to Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Algeria, Jordan and  Oman etc. middle east dictatorial regimes has also made its reverberations felt in China and made the authorities jittery and nervous. The organizers of the JR are primarily overseas Chinese inciting the Chinese people to follow the JR suit in China, and demand freedom and democracy, political reforms and an end to the one party rule. Even Ma Yingjiu, the Taiwanese president resonated during the commemoration ceremony of the February 28 Incident [1947], infamous for Kuomintang’s white terror in Taiwan that the incidents starting from the 2.28 and right up to the recent turbulent Jasmine Revolution around the world,  is a reflection of peoples struggle for the protection of their human rights and democratic freedoms. 

During the initial phase, starting from February 20, 2011, the organizers of the JR called for demonstrations in the 13 cities across China. The protests failed to take place in most of the cities except the downtowns of Beijing and Shanghai. In the second phase, they have asked their supporters to ‘go for a stroll’ in 23 second tier cities across China and express their displeasure at the lack of political reforms and rampant corruption. The government has been swift in banning the word ‘Jasmine’ over the internet, and harsh in putting down the dissent wherever there is a slight brewing. Many protesters including a Chengdu based writer and blogger, Ran Yafei has been held on charges of ‘subversion of state authority.’ Zhou Yongkang, a 9^th ranking Politburo Standing Committee member of the Communist Party of China, who has also served as the Minister of Public Security between 2002 and 2007 urged to senior officials recently that they must improve the ‘social management’ and ‘detect conflicts and problems early on.’ Ma Zhaoxu, Spokesperson of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs even went on urging Libya to restore ‘social stability’ at the earliest in a recent news briefing.

Why China has been so nervous about the JR and public protests? The findings of various researchers, western as well as Chinese, including the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the biggest government think-tank shows that China has been witnessing between 80,000 and 90,000 cases of mass protests every year since 2006, and Zhou Yongkang the then Minister of Public Security has admitted this in public. The forms of protests have been parades, demonstrations, sit-ins, petitions, and in extreme cases self immolations. The situation has been largely ameliorated thanks to the abolition of agricultural tax and levies legislation in 2006. The root cause of these protests have been expanding social imbalances, especially the rural urban divide, official highhandedness, corruption, violation of laws, land fragmentation, land acquisition leading to forced evictions, unemployment, unnecessary cadre strength in the countryside, environmental hazards etc. issues. In the last decade alone, China lost some 10 million hectares of arable land primarily owing to construction, agriculture restructuring, afforestation and natural calamities. The equitable distribution of the land among the peasants is a thing of the past, new rural population those who are already adults are landless and only option for these young people is to be the migrant laborers. Owing to the discriminatory nature of the ‘permanent residency’ regime, they are orphans in the cities and cannot enjoy and afford basic human needs such as health and education in the cities for their wards.

These have factored in various social evils of loot arson and killing as well as some other societal disorders such as a local clinic doctor, stabbing eight students to death and injuring five others in a primary school in Fujian province last year; a man barging into a kindergarten in Jiangsu province and wounded 32 students with a knife on April 29, 2010; another person killing seven children and two women in a kindergarten in Shaanxi province in the same year, and the list goes on. In view of these incidents, the government has opened various ‘stability maintenance’ offices in migrant labor community dwellings in various cities. These ‘offices’ handle minor disputes and complaints, and reports greater risks of unrest to higher authorities. The ‘offices’ also provide help to the wards of migrant laborers in terms of education and day care facilities for smaller children. According to the statistics provided by the municipal government of Guangzhou, the municipality spent over 650 million dollars in maintaining ‘social stability’ in 2007, which was more than the money spent on social security in the same year.

Social stability in China not only impinges on domestic and economic stability but also on China’s foreign exchange policy. In the words of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, “if the Yuan saw a one-off large appreciation that would cause many closures of our processing enterprises and make many export orders shift to other countries and many of our workers will lose jobs.” The loss of jobs would translate into more ‘mass protests’ in China and impact on social stability. At present China is spending exorbitant amounts on public security. Forget about JR calls, any small gathering at any place across China makes China nervous.

History of the mankind reveals that social problems cannot be solved by force. The state can suppress or silence the issue for time being, but would resurface and abrupt with a greater force if left unattended. In order to ameliorate the situation, only way out to do away with some of the social imbalances is by initiating uniform permanent residency and employment system, uniform rural urban property, education and health rather social guarantee system, reasonable distribution of the financial capital in rural and urban areas etc. measures. These measures may temporarily reduce the scale of the dissent; however, will not put an end to these. Guoyu, a classic entailing earliest history of some of the Chinese states between 990BC -453BC has a following piece that is equally relevant even today. Shao Mugong, a minister of emperor Li of Zhou kingdom tries to reason it out with the emperor that he should let the people to exercise their right of freedom to speech. He tells the emperor that one cannot silence the people by terror and highhandedness, for to shut peoples’ mouth is more dangerous than clogging the waters of a river. A clogged river will break it dykes and bring misery to many a people. We harness a river by making canals so that water flows smoothly. In order to govern the people, the ruler must not interfere in their affairs, allow them to express themselves … how can you cork their mouths, and for how long? The emperor did not care much for his minister’s advice, the people rose in revolt and the emperor was forced to live in exile.

On China's White Paper on National Defense 2010

China on March 31, 2011 issued a White Paper on “China’s National Defense in 2010” The document is the seventh in series since the Chinese government issued a White Paper on defense in 1998. The entire text of the document has 28,600 Chinese characters consisting of preface, security scenario, national defense policy, the modernization of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the application of the armed forces, the building of reserve forces and defense mobilization, the military legal system, defense industry, defense spending, the establishment of military mutual trust, and arms control and disarmament etc. components.

The White Paper builds on the existing features of the earlier white papers, and has perfected and enriched the framework and basic contents of the subject matter. Compared with the previous white papers, there are nine major highlights in 2010 document. At the outset it expounds China’s interaction with the world, and intertwine the fundamental interests of the Chinese people with the common interests of the people of the world, China's development and the development of the world, China's security and the world peace, and underscores the importance of building even more intimate relationship with the world at new historical starting point. It systematically, analyses the new trends in the international balance of power, and China’s relations with traditional major powers, emerging powers, neighboring countries as well as those with the developing countries.

It deals with the profound and complex changes that have characterized the international security situation, and confirms that peace, development and cooperation remains an irreversible trend of the times. It also highlights the increased level of international strategic competition as regards the international order, comprehensive national strength, geo-politics, as well as the new contours and adjustments in the Asia-Pacific strategic architecture.

The new White Paper stresses that China's overall security environment remains favorable to it, however, the security challenges it faces have become more diverse and complex, and that while building a moderately prosperous society, the task of safeguarding national security, especially in the face of vast territory and coastal line remains heavy. It says that in the process of safeguarding national security, China will adhere to the comprehensive security, cooperative security, the concept of common security, and pursue a policy of mutual trust and benefits, equality and coordination.

The White Paper for the first time has explored the issue of establishing mechanism of cross-strait military and security mutual trust. It lauds the progress in enhancing and building political mutual trust with Taiwan through a variety of agreements such as direct transport and trade links. It admits that the forces of “Taiwan independence”, “East Turkistan independence” and “Tibet independence” have inflicted serious damage on national security and social stability. However, the paper says that the Taiwan and China may discuss political relations in the special situation, and hold contacts and exchanges on military issues at an appropriate time and talk about a military security mechanism of mutual trust.

As regards China’s defense policy, the White Paper reiterates China’s resolve to pursue a defensive policy, which it says is determined by China's development path, its fundamental aims, its foreign policy, and its historical and cultural traditions. The defensive policy is based on objective realities and historical necessity declares the paper. The road of peaceful development, adopted since 2006 in the place of peaceful rise is emphasized along with China’s strive to build a harmonious socialist society internally, and a harmonious world externally on the principles of common security and prosperity.

The White Paper also summaries the tasks and goals of China's national defense in the new era, which are stated as  1) Safeguarding national sovereignty, security and interests of national development; 2) Maintaining social harmony and stability; 3) Accelerating the modernization of national defense and the armed forces; and 4) Maintaining world peace and stability.  It is for the first time that the White Paper dedicates a special section on PLA’s modernization. It reviews the process of PLA’s modernization in the past 60 years, and says that in the process it has grown from a single service into a strong military force featuring a range of services and arms, and is now beginning to make progress towards informationization. The document separately focuses on the state and modernization of PLA Ground Force (PLAGF), Air Force (PLAAF), Navy (PLAN), and the Second Artillery Force (PLASAF) etc. It reiterates the goal of accomplishing mechanization and attaining major progress in informationization by 2020. The strategic combat capabilities that are considered necessary to win informationized warfare under integrated joint operations are tacitly pronounced as C4ISR; precision strikes; rapid deployment; and support and logistic capability. The White Paper maintains that the fighting capabilities of the armed forces in conditions of informationization have been significantly raised under joint operation systems, which is the focal point of its modernization. Furthermore, the cyber space has been included as a key national defense consideration for the first time.

It also for the first time specifies the diverse applicability of the PLA in peace time. The White Paper declares that China pursues the principles of combining peacetime needs with wartime needs, and strives to foster a military security environment featuring mutual trust and benefits. Giving an account of PLA’s foreign exchanges, the documents points out that in the last two years, senior PLA delegations have visited more than 40 countries, and defense ministers and chiefs of general staff from more than 60 countries have visited China. The visits are viewed as military confidence-building measures, which are considered necessary and effective for maintaining national security and development, as well as for safeguarding regional peace and stability. It declares that with political mutual trust as the groundwork and common security as the goal, China is promoting the establishment of equal, mutually beneficial and effective mechanisms for military confidence-building, which should be based on the principles of holding consultations on an equal footing, mutual respect for core interests and recognition of major security concerns, not targeting at any third country, and not threatening or harming other countries' security and stability. It may be noted that China has all along considered Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang as its core interests, however, have added South China Sea to the list of its core interests last year. The interpretation of South China Sea being China’s core interest has been disputed by many littoral states such as Vietnam, Malaysia, Philippines and even Taiwan.

Final section of the White Paper is dedicated to arms control and disarmament and says that China attaches importance to and takes an active part in international efforts in the field of arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation. It rests its faith in the United Nations and lauds UN role towards the same. It states that existing multilateral arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation systems should be consolidated and strengthened, that the legitimate and reasonable security concerns of all countries should be respected and accommodated, and that global strategic balance and stability should be maintained.

As far as India is concerned, it figures at eight places in the document. The reference is made in the context of joint military exercises and training; the defense and security consultations with neighboring countries; and the Confidence Building Measure agreements signed in the year 1993 and 1996. In final analysis the series of White Papers on defense demonstrates China’s economic as well as military self assurance. It is also an attempt to enhance the level of transparency as regards military spending, its defense policy and goals, and hence to showcase China as a responsible stakeholder in the global system.