2024-07-02
6 分钟Hello, this is Alice Su, co-host of Drum Tower, our weekly podcast on China.
We've chosen an unmissable article from the latest edition of The Economist.
Please do have a listen.
Will the Communist Party save China's storm-blown economy?
That is the question on the minds of investors,
analysts and business folk as well as ordinary Chinese.
It is being asked with increasing urgency as the sectors that powered the country's long economic boom look ever more vulnerable.
Doubts are growing whether China's rulers are willing to design and execute an effective response.
When the party's 376-member Central Committee convenes on July 15th,
it will be a chance for China's leaders to ease such concerns.
It seems as likely, though,
that the meeting will only highlight the gap between the party's lofty rhetoric and its disappointing actions.
The meeting in July will have all the same trappings of past party conclaves.
Amid red carpets and party standards, men in drab suits,
over 90% of the committee is male,
will honour the latest party speak about high-quality development and new productive forces.
The outcome will then be summarised in a cryptic communique that will be poured over by analysts and party apparatchiks.
But this meeting is special, not only because the situation in China demands action.
It will be the committee's third plenary session
since its members were selected for a five-year term in 2022.