China’s Communist Party takes more control in government overhaul

A plan on reforming government institutions in China released on Thursday has given the ruling Communist Party — and its leader Xi Jinping — even more direct control over key areas of policymaking, from finance and Hong Kong affairs to science and technology. The power to make policy will now rest with newly set up party committees directly under the CPC Central Committee, which is headed by Mr. Xi, and leave the government to essentially execute policy. Mr. Xi has brought back direct party control over the bureaucracy, and in the first round of reforms in 2018, created new central commissions for foreign policy, economic reforms, and other matters, including fighting corruption. The second such plan, released on Thursday, said a Central Commission for Finance will be set up “to strengthen the Central Committee’s centralised and unified leadership over financial work” which will be in charge of “top-level planning, coordination, overall advancement of financial stability and development and for supervising the work’s implementation.” Similarly, a Central Commission for Science and Technology will be tasked with “pushing forward the building of a national innovation system and structural scientific and technological reform, studying and deliberating major strategies, plans and policies for the country’s sci-tech development, and coordinating efforts to resolve major issues of strategic, guiding and fundamental significance in the sci-tech sector.” Also announced was a new Central Social Work Department, which was given a particularly broad political mandate of strengthening party work at the “grassroots” as well as “party building work in mixed-ownership and non-public enterprises”, which could mean greater party control over the private sector.