In eye-opening detail, Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, both of whom have been correspondents in China and bureau chiefs in Asia, examine China's continuing portrayal of America as the enemy; the shifts in Beijing's perception of American might; the enormous boon to China that the takeover of Hong Kong represents; China's increase in military strength; its challenging positions on Taiwan and the South China Sea; its sale of weapons to U.S. adversaries; its concerted efforts to hijack technology; its rigorous attempts - often through American corporations profiting in China - to influence U.S. policy. We discover how our military strategists are revising their scenarios for future conflicts, and how China is conducting its espionage. We are brought face-to-face with the startling implications of the trade imbalance between the United States and China (our deficit is $40 billion and growing). We learn of the struggles within the Chinese leadership and how assertive Chinese nationalism augurs a turbulent period ahead. This book is an informed and illuminating examination of a high-stakes clash of competing ideologies and economic interests.

Virtually every analysis of Chinese politics views the Politburo as the nerve center of the system, but questions abound as to how this center governs itself and how it interacts with the system around it. Specifically, how much consultation occurs during the drafting of major Politburo documents, and who is brought into this process? How is information channeled up to this body, and what are the rules that govern the access of the Politburo members themselves to data generated by the bureaucracies? How are the political strategies of individual leaders and political factions attuned to this system of information channeling? What types of decisions are reached by the Politburo? To whom are they communicated? How rigidly must they be followed? How institutionalized is this entire decision making system, and has it become more—or less—institutionalized over the years? How has the factional legacy of the Cultural Revolution affected its mode of operations? Indeed, in the wake of the Cultural Revolution, how much in control of the system has the Politburo itself been? Central Documents in Politburo Politics in China seeks to better understand these questions by analyzing a particular stream of largely bureaucratic communications in the Chinese system: the so-called “Central Documents” (CDs). This is a series of documents through which the top Party leadership directly communicates with the rest of the political system. [1]