Toward a New Politics?

Abstract

This book has examined institutional foundations of politics in contemporary Vietnam. It has reflected on continuity and change in the character of Vietnamese authoritarianism. It has sought to better situate Vietnam within the sprawling theoretical literature on comparative politics and authoritarian regimes, in particular. And it has shed light on key tensions and contradictions that animate politics in Vietnam today. Through the contributions to this volume, we have peered into the internal dynamics of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) and the complex relations between central and local authorities in the context of market reforms and economic internationalization. We have scrutinized developments in Vietnam’sformal representative political institutions and we have probed the limits of political toleration and dissent. And we have surveyed the country’sapparatus of repression. Lastly, we have noted the development of an increasingly vibrant and autonomous associational life and indeed an incipient and a relatively unmediated public political discourse. It will now be useful to reflect on the implications of all this for our understandings of politics in contemporary Vietnam.