Published October 28th, 2007 by Future Atlas
The generation that changes China?
A Newsweek article last week places a date on potential political change in China: 2022.
The driver? A generation of Communist Party leaders now in their 40s could come to power around that time, and bring with them a “worldlier, more traveled and less doctrinaire” perspective than their predecessors. “These younger officials will have liberal thinking and open minds. They’ll see an era of change,” Renmin University professor Mao Shoulong told Newsweek.
The so-called Sixth Generation has a broader educational background as well — all nine of the current Politburo Standing Committee’s members are engineers by training, while this new generation studied diverse subjects.
They have negative baggage as well: they are said to be “nationalistic, even arrogant.”
The Sixth Generation’s accession to power is not inevitable: the article notes that the “formalized system of generational politics” within the party “may be headed for a breakdown,” making old patterns less probable.