ABSTRACT
Although the pace and drama of political change at the pinnacle of the Chinese political system have gradually faded, the “centre”, consisting at its core of the half dozen or so Han Chinese males who constitute the Politburo Standing Committee, remains the pivotal actor in Chinese politics, the “principal” of which all other organs are “agents”. Despite the modification of nomenklatura rules, the advent of local rural multiple-candidate elections, and other facets of decentralization and devolution that have coincided with the reforms, the central Party-state has taken care to preserve its leading role. This is particularly so since Tiananmen and the collapse of European communism, which provided what the elite considered an object lesson in the dangers of excessive, precipitate liberalization.
