The Traditional Party and State Leadership System

Abstract

The traditional Party and state leadership system refers to the highly centralized Party and state leadership system which was created after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949 and was eventually established after the completion of the socialist transformation of private ownership of the means of production and the collectivization of the agricultural sector, as well as the establishment of a highly centralized planned economic system in the mid-1950s. The traditional Party and state leadership system is the source and foundation of the current Party and state leadership system. Though the centralized leadership with party control all enjoys some advantages, this kind of leadership system weakened the state and society, made party organizations bureaucratic and party cadres a special group with privileges. Mao Zedong tried to use the logic and method of revolution to improve this kind of leadership system but failed. This shows that the logic of revolution was unable to solve the drawbacks of traditional party and state leadership system under the ruling condition.