Title:
The Politics of the Military in China: The CCP and PLA
The Politics of the Military in China: The CCP and PLA
Author(s)
Bulanov, Alex
Fatykhova, Amelia
Gouhl, Anika
Detzler, Benjamin
Dykstra, Emily
Durrani, Faris
Brown, Geoffrey
Feroz, Mariam
Chandanala, Prabhath
Cai, Runyu
Fatykhova, Amelia
Gouhl, Anika
Detzler, Benjamin
Dykstra, Emily
Durrani, Faris
Brown, Geoffrey
Feroz, Mariam
Chandanala, Prabhath
Cai, Runyu
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Abstract
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is and has always been a crucial part to help the Party and Republic to advance its goals, from helping Mao to establish his communist state to the current endeavor into the controversial South China Sea. From the Qing Dynasty, the chaotic struggle of power between the Guomindang, the Communist Party, and Imperial Japan of the mainland provided ample space for the former Red Army to grow from a period of near defeat to the dominant force in the mainland, a key to the establishment of the modern PRC under Mao Zedong. In line with Mao’s infamous line “The party must always control the gun, the gun must never control the party,” Mao sought to ensure the PLA keeps under his iron fist control, promoting the lack of clear distinctions between military and civil leadership, and creating the only armed forces that do not swear loyalty to its nation but rather to the Party. The Party today continues to utilize the PLA to consolidate its ruling status, protect China’s sovereignty and advance its interests, whilst strategically subjugating its power to ensure it will always be under the regime’s control. Historically a symbiotic relationship, relations between the Party and PLA have evolved into one that is more “institutionalized” where the Party attempts to assert greater control through civil-military bifurcation efforts, forced divestiture from commercial activities, and systematic penetration by a network of commissars in the ranks of the PLA. Besides leadership, the PLA plays an important role in the Chinese public through military training, disaster relief, communist propaganda, and even the production of films and children’s toys. The PLA exists because of the Party and serves for the Party; it is the sole body which represents the PRC’s military interests from its physical expansionist efforts to nuclear arsenals.
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Date Issued
2019-12-12
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Text
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Paper