Today’s issue is a bit of a quick and dirty catchup after the CNY holiday. I am traveling back to Beijing this week and the newsletter will not return to a normal schedule until next week.
The big news this morning is the rollout (see below in the Essential Eight) of the “Four Comprehensives 四个全面”, a formulation which sounds like it may end up as Xi’s contribution to the theoretical canon on a par with Jiang’s “Three Represents” and Hu’s “Scientific Outlook on Development”. Expect to hear much more about this concept in the coming days and years.
Today’s Links:
THE ESSENTIAL EIGHT *
1. 人民日报首次权威定义习近平“四个全面”–时政–人民网 Big propaganda rollout for the “four comprehensives”–Comprehensively building a moderately prosperous society, comprehensively deepening reform, comprehensively governing the nation according to law, comprehensively strictly governing the party. So is the “Four Comprehensives” Xi’s signature theoretical contribution on a par with the Three Represents and Scientific Development? The article says that Xi’s moves in his 1st month in office were initial, planned steps in rolling out the four comprehensives… // “四个全面”——全面建成小康社会、全面深化改革、全面依法治国、全面从严治党，从去年12月在江苏调研时第一次提出后，在全国政协新年茶话会上、在党校省部级主要领导干部专题研讨班上、在中央政治局会议和集体学习中、在春节团拜会上……习近平一而再、再而三地不断强调，让“四个全面”成为备受关注的“新提法”。党报此时推出系列评论员文章，正是为了全面梳理、总结这一重要新概念，更深刻地认识“四个全面”背后的“简约不简单”…回头看，治国理政的壶奥，在最初就已经呈现。这篇评论起笔，就罗列了十八大之后一个月中，习近平四次引人关注的活动——参观《复兴之路》展览、到广东考察工作、纪念“八二宪法”颁行、制定“八项规定”。这四次活动，无疑正对应着“四个全面”。可见，运筹帷幄，从履新之际就已开始。
Related: 人民日报评论员：引领民族复兴的战略布局–观点–人民网 page 1People’s Daily on the four comprehensives “leading the way for strategic arrangement for national renewal” // 这是一个崭新的起点。2012年11月，以习近平同志为总书记的党中央接过历史的接力棒，在新中国成立以来党和人民接续奋斗的基础上，继续在中国特色社会主义道路上谋划民族复兴的伟大事业，续写这无上的光荣。国家博物馆，《复兴之路》展览中思接千载，追寻中国梦。深圳莲花山，邓小平铜像前再展宏图，激荡改革潮。纪念“八二宪法”颁行，重申依宪治国、依法执政，塑造法治魂。力行八项规定，以上率下言出必果，坚守生命线……履新第一个月，起笔落墨之际，前进航标已然确立。两年多来，从党的十八大强调“全面建成小康社会”，到党的十八届三中全会部署“全面深化改革”，再到党的十八届四中全会要求“全面依法治国”、党的群众路线教育实践活动总结大会宣示“全面从严治党”，“四个全面”战略布局清晰展现。
2. Traffic peaks as Lunar New Year holiday ends – Xinhua Traffic authorities estimated that about 9.7 million trips were made by train and some 1.4 million by plane on Tuesday, setting new records. Another 73.6 million trips were made by highway. Altogether, Chinese passengers made 8.25 million trips by air during the week-long holiday, up 7.3 percent year on year, according to the Civil Aviation Administration of China.
Related: 39 Hours Inside The Biggest Human Migration On Earth fun story by Matt Sheehan // Seating stakes are highest on long-haul routes, and the T177 is about as long as they come. This hulking vehicle will take 39 hours and 25 minutes to traverse the 1,998 miles from Beijing to Urumqi in northwestXinjiang Province.
Related: Travelers shell out worldwide – Xinhua More than 5 million Chinese expected to have traveled overseas for shopping in the past week. Spring Festival appears to be no longer a time solely for family reunions in China. More wealthy Chinese are traveling abroad, with shopping one of their most important missions during the weeklong holiday. From Japanese electronic toilet seats to Swiss luxury watches, Chinese tourists have been globe-trotting in pursuit of purchases in department stores and luxury shops. // yes, apparently there was a run on the toilet seats…and all 5 million got a chance to experience an unfettered internet too…
3. China’s Most Outspoken Real Estate Mogul Just Made Some New Enemies | Foreign Policy very interesting given Ren’s connections to the apex of power in Beijing // Seemingly conscious of how controversial his remarks might become, he took to his Weibo account later on Feb. 14, posting a full-length article in which he justified his criticism of the CCP’s campaign to vilify “Western values” and its recent move to eliminate the teaching of such values from college classrooms. Chinese state-run media moved quickly to counter Ren’s claims, casting his criticisms as bordering on a call for regime change.
Related: 任志强：什么是西方价值观？_网易财经 Ren’s comments still not deleted…perhaps even more interesting
4. In China’s Modern Economy, a Retro Push Against Women – NYTimes.com According to corporate records examined by The New York Times, fewer than 1 in 10 board members of China’s top 300 companies are women. That measure, significantly smaller than the proportion of women on corporate boards in the United States and much of Europe, is based on a review of the boards of directors of every company in the CSI 300 index, China’s equivalent to the S.&P. 500, which includes a wide swath of the economy from mining to pharmaceuticals. // but still 3x better than Japan
Related: For richer, for poorer: how China’s laws put women second | The Guardian Marriage and divorce, land and property, at work and at home – laws and customs discriminate against women and leave them at a glaring economic disadvantage
5. Q. and A.: Barnett Rubin on China’s Role in Afghanistan – NYTimes.com At the center of promoting United States-China dialogue on Afghanistan is Barnett Rubin, a veteran Afghanistan scholar who served for four and a half years as a senior adviser to the American government’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He was hired for that position in 2009 by Richard C. Holbrooke, the first special envoy, and worked with two of Mr. Holbrooke’s successors after his death in 2010. Since the summer of 2012, Mr. Rubin, who is also part of the Center on International Cooperation at New York University, has helped to organize seven meetings on Afghanistan that make up a “track two” dialogue between American and Chinese parties.
Related: Afghan reconciliation: Senior Taliban negotiator visits Pakistan – The Express Tribune “Now we have a better understanding and contacts with China on many issues. We trust China more than any other country as Chinese leaders sincerely want an end to the war in Afghanistan,” said another Talibanofficial, who requested anonymity as the Taliban do not want to comment on-the-record until things mature.
Related: Kabul arrests, hands over Chinese Uighurs to aid Taliban dialogue bid–Daily Times Pakistan Senior Afghan intelligence officials say they offered their hand in cooperation with China and in return asked them to pressure Pakistan to stop supporting Taliban
6. Making Plans: Steps in Development of China’s Crucial 13th Five Year Plan | ChinaFAQs ChinaFAQs expert Angel Hsu and her team at Yale’s Environmental Performance Measurement program have developed an interactive timeline that lays out the steps China is expected to take in developing, enacting and implementing its next Five Year Plan, which will orient the country’s economic and social policy. The 13th Five Year Plan will be announced in early 2016 and will be in place until the 14th Five Year Plan in 2021. The timeline provides details on dates, procedure, and stakeholder involvement for each stage of the process. Past plans have set targets relating to energy and carbon intensity, coal and energy consumption, energy efficiency, and clean energy development. The upcoming 13th Five Year Plan is likely to include additional measures to bend the curve of China’s greenhouse gas emissions downward, and will provide insight into how China will strive to meet its new climate targets for 2030.
7. Debt and (not much) deleveraging | McKinsey & Company China’s debt has quadrupled since 2007. Fueled by real estate and shadow banking, China’s total debt has nearly quadrupled, rising to $28 trillion by mid-2014, from $7 trillion in 2007. At 282 percent of GDP, China’s debt as a share of GDP, while manageable, is larger than that of the United States or Germany. Three developments are potentially worrisome: half of all loans are linked, directly or indirectly, to China’s overheated real-estate market; unregulated shadow banking accounts for nearly half of new lending; and the debt of many local governments is probably unsustainable. However, MGI calculates that China’s government has the capacity to bail out the financial sector should a property-related debt crisis develop. The challenge will be to contain future debt increases and reduce the risks of such a crisis, without putting the brakes on economic growth.
8. Japanese crown prince says country must not rewrite history of WW2 | World news | The Guardian In an unusual intervention in the discussion, Naruhito’s mild-mannered broadside was being interpreted in some circles as a rebuke to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a key figure in the right wing drive to minimise the institutionalised system of wartime sex slavery. “Today when memories of war are set to fade, I reckon it is important to look back (at) our past with modesty and pass down correctly the miserable experience and the historic path Japan took from the generation who know the war to the generation who don’t,” Naruhito said.
You can read the rest of today’s newsletter here.