Rejuvenating Communism: Youth Organizations and Elite Renewal in Post-Mao China(China Understandings Today)

Working for the administration remains one of the most coveted career paths for young Chinese. Rejuvenating Communism: Youth Organizations and Elite Renewal in Post-Mao China seeks to understand what motivates young and educated Chinese to commit to a long-term career in the party-state and how this question is central to the Chinese regime’s ability to maintain its cohesion and survive. Jérôme Doyon draws upon extensive fieldwork and statistical analysis in order to illuminate the undogmatic commitment recruitment techniques and other methods the state has taken to develop a diffuse allegiance to the party-state in the post-Mao era. He then analyzes recruitment and political professionalization in the Communist Party’s youth organizations and shows how experiences in the Chinese Communist Youth League transform recruits and feed their political commitment as they are gradually inducted into the world of officials. As the first in-depth study of the Communist Youth League’s role in recruitment, this book challenges the assumption that merit is the main criteria for advancement within the party-state, an argument with deep implications for understanding Chinese politics today.

Table of Contents:
List of Figures List of Tables Acknowledgments Chapter 1: Introduction Overview of the Argument Political Youth Organizations in Contemporary China Seeing like a Young Cadre Chapter 2: Becoming a Student Cadre Student cadres at the center of the student-management apparatus Commitment is rewarded Chapter 3: Student Leaders as a Rogue Minority Student leaders’ narrowing social circles Cultivating their Party Spirit The “bureaucratization” of student cadres Chapter 4: Sponsorship Networks in Elite Universities Clientelism at Peking University Chains of sponsorship ties in elite universities An elite within the elite: the political career of student leaders from Peking University and Tsinghua University Chapter 5: Starting a Political Career on Campus The Counselor System Counselors as officials in training Starting a political career outside the university Chapter 6: Youth League Officials as Future Party-state Leaders The perfect reserve cadres Cultivating a role as leaders-to-be Chapter 7: Towards a Diffuse Allegiance to the Party-State Each posting entails diverse personal ties Turnover and the multiplication of personal networks Conclusion: Commitment and Allegiance Appendix Bibliography

About the Author :
Jérôme Doyon is a China Public Policy Postdoctoral Fellow at the Ash Center of Harvard Kennedy School.

Review :
"Doyon has produced a first-rate study that not only offers a persuasive conceptual framework on how the Party renews itself through a complex system of youth recruitment and retention, but also raises thought-provoking questions on some of the key contentious issues in Chinese elite politics." "Doyon convincingly demonstrates the continuing importance of instrumental interpersonal relationships and sponsored mobility in elite Chinese politics. Rejuvenating Communism is an astutely argued and insightful study treating some of the keystones contributing to the organizational survival and internal unity of the party-state in the post-Mao period." "Drawing from an impressive range of contemporary sources (including interviews, participant observations, and CCP and CYL documents), this book recentres the agency of Chinese youth in the political cultivation-commitment process and makes a key contribution to understanding the CYL's role in political recruitment, while increasing our knowledge of the sources of Party-state elite cohesion and resilience."