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Slogans as an Organizational Feature of Chinese Politics

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Abstract

Slogans (fixed or authoritative formulations, 提法) are ritually repeated elements in Chinese politics, appearing in strategic documents and main speeches. Building on new institutionalism in Political Science, this paper systematically introduces and conceptualizes the phenomenon of slogans. While slogans have been approached from the perspective of linguistics or (political or cultural) history and have often been dealt with partially or implicitly, the paper addresses a gap in studying slogans from the point of view of Political Science. I argue that they are an integral part of China’s political system, playing a role of a crucial organizational feature, whose significance goes far beyond a mere behavioural regularity, replicating a centuries-long Chinese tradition of officially orchestrated language to support a ruling regime. The paper specifically focuses on leadership (grand) slogans as the most comprehensive kind of slogans and their role in the post-Dengian period. Leadership slogans are relevant for and contribute to: 1) propaganda, 2) ideological innovations, 3) policy and strategic direction, 4) structuring politics, and 5) upholding a unity of the Communist Party of China.

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Notes

  1. Although frequently used by Mao and others, it had originally appeared in the Book of Han.

  2. While top-level design should be mainly relevant for CCP members, not wider audience, I categorize its political outreach as limited.

  3. The party constitution refers to Mao’s and Deng’s thought in general terms, Jiang’s and Hu’s contribution is acknowledged through references to their slogans (Three Represents, Scientific Development) without mentioning their names and Xi Jinping’s name is explicitly stated but connected with a particular perspective of ‘Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.’

  4. It was originally used even earlier, but Xi Jinping put more emphasis on it.

  5. Stopping leftist dissent is a theme which Jiang partly adopted and re-used following previous top-political struggles.

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Acknowledgement

I acknowledge support of the Metropolitan University Prague research project no. 68–04 ‘Centre for Security Studies’, which was conducted in 2019 under a grant from the Institutional Fund for the Long-Term Strategic Development of Research Organisations.

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    Aleš Karmazin

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Karmazin, A. Slogans as an Organizational Feature of Chinese Politics. J OF CHIN POLIT SCI 25, 411–429 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11366-019-09651-w

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