International Communist Movement Department Holds Exchange Seminar on Studying "Xi Jinping: The Governance of China" (Volume IV)
On September 29, 2022, the Department of International Communist Movement organized a study and exchange session on the fourth volume of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China. The meeting was chaired by Professor Pan Jin’e, Director of the Department of International Communist Movement. Scholars from the Research Office of Contemporary Capitalism, including Professor Liu Haixia, Professor Tan Xiaojun, and Associate Professor Li Kaixuan, delivered successive presentations. The participating scholars from the Department engaged in a heated discussion in a harmonious atmosphere, yielding fruitful results.
Professor Liu Haixia focused her introduction on General Secretary Xi Jinping’s speeches: "Building a Strong Public Health System," "Expanding New Horizons for Social Development Through Joint Contribution, Co-governance, and Shared Benefits," and "Promoting the High-quality Development and Sustainable Development of China’s Social Security System." She analyzed and shared insights regarding the achievements and existing problems in China's public health system and social security undertakings mentioned therein. In the historical process of achieving the "Two Centenary Goals" [1], the development of health and hygiene has always maintained a foundational status, closely linking with the overall national strategy and playing a vital supportive role. The struggle against the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated that China’s systems for public health services, medical services, medical insurance, medicine supply, and major epidemic prevention, control, and emergency management are, on the whole, effective.
Drawing on the collective research findings of the Research Office of Contemporary Capitalism—The COVID-19 Pandemic: A Prism for Viewing the Defects of Neoliberalism—Professor Liu pointed out that the public health systems of many Western countries neared collapse under the impact of the pandemic. This was primarily because neoliberalism, as the mainstream ideology of international monopoly capitalism, has long promoted the principles of "small government" and "large markets," worshipped the primacy of profit, and supported finance capital in exploiting the working classes. These factors caused the ineffective pandemic response in the West, the decline of public health systems, the intensification of inequality, and the crisis of government governance. At present, China’s social structure is undergoing profound changes: the internet is deeply altering human interaction, and social concepts, social psychology, and social behaviors are undergoing profound shifts. This places higher demands on perfecting a universal and sustainable social security system, strengthening public health and disease control systems, and promoting long-term balanced population development.
Professor Tan Xiaojun noted during the discussion that the COVID-19 pandemic since 2020 served as a comprehensive and thorough test of the public health systems of all countries. The sharp contrast over the past three years between "governance in China" and "chaos in the West" [2] has once again proven that China’s public health system construction has made significant progress. Although Japan is a developed capitalist country, it has been unable to effectively control the epidemic and has already experienced seven waves of infection. General Secretary Xi Jinping discussed eight specific issues regarding China’s public health system; these issues are highly instructive for further improving the efficacy of our system and responding to major epidemics. Of particular note are the assertions that "a treatment system dominated by the government, by public welfare, and by public hospitals is an important guarantee for responding to major epidemics" and the need to "leverage the role of Traditional Chinese Medicine in the prevention and treatment of major epidemics." Consequently, Professor Tan pointed out that the key to our Party’s ability to lead China toward continuous success lies in its consistent ability to summarize experiences objectively, dialectically, and by seeking truth from facts—affirming achievements, correcting errors, and promptly improving upon deficiencies.
Associate Professor Li Kaixuan, referencing the speech "Promoting the High-quality Development and Sustainable Development of China’s Social Security System," provided a concise introduction to the construction achievements and challenges facing China’s social security undertakings, while also analyzing the content, institutional types, and reform trends of social security systems in Western Europe. Social security is the basic institutional guarantee for ensuring and improving people’s livelihoods, maintaining social fairness, and enhancing the people’s well-being. It is an important institutional arrangement for promoting economic and social development and ensuring the masses share the fruits of reform and development. It functions as a safety net for people's livelihoods, a regulator for income distribution, and a shock absorber for economic operations—remaining a major issue for the governance and stability of the state. China has basically completed a fully functional social security system with social insurance as the mainstay, supplemented by social assistance, social welfare, and special care for veterans and their families. Basic medical insurance covers 1.36 billion people, and basic pension insurance covers nearly 1 billion people, making it the largest social security system in the world.
While fully affirming these achievements, one must also recognize that as the principal contradiction in Chinese society [3] has changed, and as urbanization, population aging, and the diversification of employment accelerate, deficiencies remain in the social security system. As General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out, over the next 5 to 15 years, our country must increase redistribution efforts, strengthen mutual assistance functions, and bring more people into the social security system.
On this basis, Associate Professor Li Kaixuan provided a brief analysis of Western European social security systems, which primarily include medical, industrial injury, pension, and unemployment insurance. With the intensification of population aging, some countries have begun establishing long-term care insurance. So-called "welfare capitalism" in Western Europe is generally divided into the conservative-corporatist model, the liberal model, and the social-democratic model based on performance differences. Since the late 1990s, the European Union has adopted the concept of "social investment," driving various models of the "welfare state" to converge toward the "competition state."
The participating scholars engaged in a lively discussion around the three speakers' specialized explanations, focusing on themes such as the institutional perfection of China’s social security under the Great Changes Unseen in a Century [4], "pauperization" in capitalist societies, and the developmental level of social security in Latin American countries. Professor Pan Jin’e, Director of the Department of International Communist Movement, fully affirmed the reports, noting that the three scholars spoke from the perspectives of basic theory and both domestic and foreign institutional developments. The content was vivid, rich, and highly illuminating.