WTO will change the face of China

By Willy Wo-Lap Lam
Senior China Analyst

HONG KONG, China -- Chinese government institutions -- the way the country is run -- could be changed beyond recognition a few years or so after China's accession to the World Trade Organization.

A key reason why reformist-oriented cadres such as Premier Zhu Rongji decided in early 1999 to jump-start the WTO application process was that Beijing wanted pressure from outside to speed up restructuring of the lumbering state-owned enterprises.

However, Zhu and his colleagues also want a number of Chinese institutions such as the legal system to benefit from learning from international norms.

Firstly, the role of the Chinese Communist Party -- the ultimate arbiter in Chinese life -- may be curtailed.

After all, it is against the WTO's market-first regulations for political organizations such as parties to play a sizeable role in a country's economy.

For the past year, central and regional administrations have gone about abolishing so-called "documents with red letterheads" -- a reference to edicts from party and government units.

Indeed, the adminstration of President Jiang Zemin last year ordered a special study of what institutions and government procedures needed to be retooled post-WTO.

The first government units that have revised laws and operations in accordance with global practice are those dealing with economic matters such as trade and the stock market.

Legal challenges

For example, the watchdog China Securities Regulatory Commission is drafting an ambitious slate of regulations largely based on those in Western countries and Hong Kong.

Zhu and other leaders are also keen to modernize the judicial and law-enforcement establishment.

"With more interaction with the world after WTO, it will be more difficult for judicial authorities at least in the large cities to continue with black-box operations," said noted political scientist Liu Junning.

"More Chinese laws -- and judicial practices -- will be challenged by Western companies," he said.

Liu, who is doing research at Harvard University, said legal and judicial reforms would gradually spread from economic to other areas.

In a press statement last Wednesday, the Ministry of Public Security said it would boost multilateral cooperation with law-and- order departments around the world.

"The Chinese police are gradually realizing the goal of dovetailing with world [norms]," the statement said.

Professor X L Ding of Hong Kong's University of Science and Technology said although it was unlikely WTO accession would have a direct impact on the political system, various cities would compete among themselves to modernize the administrative structure.

"More officials are realizing that global competition means in many ways a competition of systems," said Ding.

"Chinese cities and companies are not just competing with foreigners but also among themselves," he added.

"Officials know they can attract more funds and talents to their cities if the latter are run along international norms."

Immediately after accession, party and government authorities are expected to adopt tough measures to rein in dissent as well as the dissemination of "anti-socialist" material in the media.

However, diplomats and academics in Beijing said in the wake of forthcoming changes in the way China is run, there will at least be a higher level of pluralism - and less direct governmental control - in Chinese society.