ABSTRACT

Deng Xiaoping was as usual very practical, whereas Zhao Ziyang committed a tactical error. The beating he and his young theorists took on the subject of the "new authoritarianism" was a major factor that led to his self-isolation and his eventual downfall. As for Deng Xiaoping, his authoritarianism, which did not employ the qualifier "new," was born at the end of China's war with Vietnam in March 1979. Zhao Ziyang's passion for theory reemerged on the occasion of the student demonstrations of late 1986 and Hu Yaobang's subsequent fall from power. Two great developments occurred after the Thirteenth Congress that rapidly intensified the conflicts among the various cliques in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP): the aborted price reform and the alliance between Li Peng and the Chen Yun clique. The tradition in the CCP is that the Party directly guides the military and the military is dependent on the power of the Party.