In early March China held its Two Sessions – the annual gathering of the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) – where delegates discussed plans for China’s development in 2025 and attended events held by President Xi Jinping and other Politburo members. Premier Li Qiang’s Government Work Report outlined economic targets and high-level policies focused on boosting consumption and innovation to reverse China’s sluggish economic growth and achieve technological superiority over the United States. There was also a significant emphasis in Li’s report on guarding against ‘global shocks’ and ‘defusing’ risks in key domestic areas, including by stockpiling food and energy and reducing supply-chain vulnerabilities. These ambitions may be undermined by two major challenges, however, that China’s senior leadership has identified a need to mitigate: the central government’s struggle to obtain accurate and timely information on key sectors, and officials’ deep-seated risk aversion and consequent unwillingness to implement reforms and innovate policy solutions. Despite the development of plans to address them, these challenges are likely to continue to undermine the progress of China’s economic, social, political and military reforms. Elsewhere, the Two Sessions demonstrated the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) continuing interest in promoting cross-strait economic integration with Taiwan, while Li’s report also voiced concerns about corruption and the pace of ‘informatisation’ across the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), and called for more military theories with Chinese characteristics, per ‘Xi Jinping Thought on Strengthening the Military’.
China’s Two Sessions, China’s two challenges (Erik Green, Meia Nouwens – IISS)
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