Shen Chuanliang: Adhere to the "Three More Emphasis" to Further Deepen Reform Comprehensively
The Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was an important meeting held at a critical period for advancing the great cause of building a strong country and national rejuvenation on all fronts through Chinese-path modernization. This Plenum, possessing the significance of a generational landmark, centered on the major theme of advancing Chinese-path modernization and clarified the guiding ideology, general requirements, major measures, and fundamental guarantees for further comprehensively deepening reform. The "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Advancing Chinese-path modernization" (hereinafter referred to as the Decision), deliberated and adopted at the Plenum, explicitly proposed in its guiding ideology that we must "place greater emphasis on systemic integration, place greater emphasis on highlighting priorities, and place greater emphasis on the practical results of reform." These "three greater emphases" represent a regular objective understanding derived by our Party through its determined commitment to reform. They both reflect the new experience accumulated in comprehensively deepening reform in the New Era and provide a scientific ideological and working methodology for further comprehensively deepening reform, providing a basic guideline for successfully writing a new chapter of the era in advancing Chinese-path modernization on the new journey.
1. Placing Greater Emphasis on Systemic Integration
All things in the world are universally connected. The entire world is both an interconnected whole and an interacting system. The systemic concept is a foundational ideological and working method. To observe and understand the vast universe, one must employ systemic thinking and systemic concepts. Since reform entered the "period of tackling hard-won challenges" and the "deep-water zone," [1] the comprehensive deepening of reform—launched by the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core with immense political courage and dauntless spirit—has involved fields of unprecedented breadth and touched interests of unprecedented depth. It is an extremely grand systemic project that requires the coordinated planning of all aspects, levels, and elements. Only by adhering to the systemic concept and observing reform through a lens that is universally connected, comprehensive and systemic, and characterized by development and change, can we grasp the laws of reform and advance it smoothly.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress, General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized the need to "observe things from a developmental rather than static, comprehensive rather than one-sided, systemic rather than fragmented, and universally connected rather than isolated perspective, and properly handle various major relationships." He has stressed the need to "persist in planning and advancing with a global perspective and systemic thinking, strengthen the coordination and alignment of various reform measures, promote reform measures in various fields and aspects to exert force in the same direction and form a synergy, enhance overall efficiency, and prevent or overcome the phenomenon of each going their own way and obstructing one another." It is precisely because of the personal leadership of General Secretary Xi Jinping and the scientific guidance of his series of new ideas, viewpoints, and judgments on comprehensively deepening reform that reform in the New Era has placed greater emphasis on top-level design and holistic planning, meticulously promoting the mutual coordination, promotion, and complementation of various reform measures. It is for this reason that there is a greater emphasis on firmly establishing the idea of the "whole country as a single chessboard," [2] insisting on "calculating the big accounts" and "long-term accounts" rather than "beating a small abacus" [3] or engaging in "petty cleverness," and guiding all regions and departments to integrate their work into the overall cause of the Party and the state. This has provided an inexhaustible and powerful driving force for the great achievements of the Party and the state and demonstrated the important role of reform and opening up as the "critical move." [4]
Embarking on the new journey, to further comprehensively deepen reform and advance Chinese-path modernization, we must still adhere to the systemic concept. We must correctly handle major relationships such as those between the economy and society, the government and the market, efficiency and equity, vitality and order, and development and security. We must accurately grasp the relationships between the whole and the part, the present and the long term, the macro and the micro, principal and secondary contradictions, and the particular and the general. We must continuously improve our capacity for strategic, historical, dialectical, systemic, innovative, rule-of-law, and bottom-line thinking, [5] and continuously enhance the systemic, holistic, and synergetic nature of reform.
2. Placing Greater Emphasis on Highlighting Priorities
Common sayings such as "lead the cow by its nose" or "lift the coat by its collar" [6] reflect the extreme importance of grasping the key links and priorities of a matter. Only by being adept at seizing priorities and seeking strategic breakthroughs can one drive the overall development of a situation. To promote the further comprehensive deepening of reform and implement numerous major reform measures, we must both maintain a global perspective—taking everything into account with comprehensive and systemic strategic thinking—and aim at key links with precision, highlighting the priorities.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress, General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized that "in any work, we must uphold both the 'two-point theory' and the 'priority theory.' [7] If we do not distinguish between the primary and the secondary, and instead 'grab at both the eyebrows and the beard,' [8] we will not be able to do our work well." He has stressed that "to further comprehensively deepen reform, we must grasp the principal contradiction and the principal aspect of the contradiction." In leading the comprehensive deepening of reform, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has grasped not only important fields, tasks, and pilot programs but also key subjects, links, and nodes, focusing on driving the overall situation through priorities. Most prominent among these is the deployment of reforms in all areas centered strictly around development as the "top priority," emphasizing that economic structural reform is the focus of comprehensively deepening reform, and that the core issue of economic structural reform is handling the relationship between the government and the market. Therefore, we not only proposed at the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee to let the market play the "decisive role" in resource allocation, but further proposed at the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee to "give full play" to the market's decisive role. We have achieved dual breakthroughs in theory and practice regarding economic structural reform, enabling the "invisible hand" and the "visible hand" to exert force in concert. This has pushed for substantive progress in building a high-level socialist market economy and ensured that the cause of the Party and the state develops solidly and makes progress while maintaining stability. The Decision highlights structural and institutional reform, highlights strategic and holistic major reforms, and highlights the leading role of economic structural reform, clarifying the priority tasks and the main direction of attack for further comprehensively deepening reform and advancing Chinese-path modernization.
Embarking on the new journey, further comprehensively deepening reform and advancing Chinese-path modernization requires focusing closely on the priority of economic structural reform. We must center our efforts on building a high-level socialist market economy, give full play to the decisive role of the market in resource allocation, better leverage the role of the government, and uphold and improve the basic socialist economic system. We must advance high-level self-reliance and strength in science and technology, promote high-level opening up to the outside world, build a modernized economic system, accelerate the construction of the new development pattern, and promote high-quality development. Meanwhile, promoting economic structural reform must proceed from practical needs and start with the most urgent matters, deepening theoretical innovation and promoting institutional innovation while solving practical problems. Under the lead of economic structural reform, reforms in other fields—such as politics, culture, society, ecological civilization, and Party building—must also focus on holistic and strategic issues to plan reform measures, ensuring that "once the headrope of the net is pulled, all the meshes open out." [9]
3. Placing Greater Emphasis on the Practical Results of Reform
The mountains and rivers are the people, and the people are the mountains and rivers. [10] As the Communist Party of China wins and maintains its power, it is winning and maintaining the support of the people. Reform is meaningful only if it is for the people; reform has momentum only if it relies on the people. In contemporary China, all reforms promoted by our Party are, in the final analysis, intended to continuously meet the people’s aspirations for a better life and ensure they lead better lives. Emphasizing the practical results of reform means, in short, ensuring that the common people share the dividends of reform and more greatly identify with and support reform through vigorous implementation.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress, General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized that "our Party comes from the people, is born for the people, and prospers because of the people," and that "taking the people's heart as our heart, [11] breathing the same air, sharing the same fate, and being heart-to-heart with the people is the Party's original aspiration and its enduring mission." He has stressed the need to respect the people's principal position and their pioneering spirit, ensuring that reform responds to the people’s calls. He has emphasized that reform must focus and concentrate energy on implementation, ensuring it is "tighter than tight, finer than fine, and as solid as can be." It is precisely due to the recognition of the simple yet profound truth that the people are the creators of history that our Party has always taken the promotion of the people's well-being as the starting point and ultimate goal in the process of comprehensively deepening reform. For over a decade, we have persisted over the long term in comprehensively deepening reform. Obvious results have been achieved in improving and developing the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics and advancing the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity. This has provided more refined institutional protection for the people to lead better lives, and the people's sense of gain, happiness, and security has been continuously enhanced.
Embarking on the new journey, further comprehensively deepening reform and advancing Chinese-path modernization requires firmly adhering to the people-centered development philosophy. We must always take the people's voice as the primary signal, the people's needs as the primary choice, and the people's interests as the primary principle. We must combine a problem-oriented approach with a goal-oriented approach, taking the resolution of the urgent, difficult, anxious, and hopeful problems of the masses as the breakthrough point for reform, thereby completing the general tasks and achieving the general goals of reform. We must implement reform with the "nail-driving spirit," [12] seizing the key points, exerting force precisely, and following through repeatedly. In particular, leading officials should strive to be promoters and men of action for reform. They should both "take command" and "go into battle," leading everyone to set the plan, clarify the path, and prescribe the right remedy, while personally deploying important tasks, personally checking key links, and personally supervising implementation. They must have the courage to shoulder the heaviest burdens and "gnaw on the hardest bones." [13]
The history of China's reform and opening up over nearly half a century has already shown that only reform and opening up can rally the hearts and minds of the people and gather strength; only reform and opening up can break through brambles and thorns and strive upward for strength. Embarking on the new journey of building a modernized socialist country in all respects, and facing a grim and complex international situation as well as arduous and heavy domestic tasks for reform, development, and stability, only by further comprehensively deepening reform and expanding opening up can we successfully stimulate the majestic power of hundreds of millions of people and unite as one to overcome various difficulties, risks, and challenges, thereby realizing the historical cause of building a strong country and national rejuvenation as scheduled.
(The author is a researcher at the Xi Jinping House of Research on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, Central Party School [National Academy of Governance])