{"id":80056,"date":"2023-04-13T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-04-13T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/china-science-and-technology-under-communist-party-control\/"},"modified":"2024-10-31T11:26:09","modified_gmt":"2024-10-31T10:26:09","slug":"chine-la-science-et-la-technologie-sous-la-surveillance-du-parti-communiste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/chine-la-science-et-la-technologie-sous-la-surveillance-du-parti-communiste\/","title":{"rendered":"China: Science and Technology under Communist Party Control"},"content":{"rendered":"
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For several decades, science and technology have been among China\u2019s political priorities: they are considered by the political authorities to make up one of the \u201cfour modernisations\u201d deemed essential for the country, as advocated by Deng Xiaoping in 1978 (the other three being agriculture, industry, and defence). The twentieth Communist Party Congress, held in October 2022, reaffirmed the need to maintain this focus on science and technology.[1]<\/a><\/sup><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

In the wake of this Communist Party Congress, and in a context of stiff competition on the international stage (particularly from the United States in strategic areas such as semi-conductors and artificial intelligence), the National People\u2019s Congress, at its session held in March 2023, examined the current arrangements for implementing the country\u2019s policies for research and technological development. This led to the adoption of a major plan to reform their organisation.[2]<\/a><\/sup> For a number of years, the Ministry of Science and Technology had been responsible for coordinating the activities of research organisations, and in particular those of its funding body, the National Natural Science Foundation of China. It also had virtual control over the Chinese Academy of Sciences, whose many institutes constitute the central pillar of basic research in the country. Following the reforms, the Ministry\u2019s role has been refocused on enhancing efforts in key sectors to achieve the objectives of the major national priorities. However, the greatest reform consists in the creation, within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), of a \u201cCentral Commission for Science and Technology\u201d, mandated to strengthen the contribution of government agencies to national policy objectives, as well as improving their consistency and accountability in this respect.<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div>\n

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The Global Times<\/em> \u2014 a Chinese daily newspaper published in Chinese and English, and which follows the editorial line set by the official newspaper of the CCP, the People\u2019s Daily<\/em> \u2014 commented on this decision by stressing that the new Commission should focus on \u201cdiscussing strategies, plans, and policies for the country\u2019s scientific and technological development, and coordinating efforts to resolve major strategic issues\u201d. In other words, it would effectively control the activities of the Ministry of Science and Technology. Among the priorities for Chinese research and development (R&D), the Global Times<\/em> mentioned new energies, new materials, artificial intelligence, and the production of semi-conductors. The newspaper also pointed out that this reform had been made necessary by the existence of external efforts aimed at hindering China\u2019s technological development: China needed to respond to the \u201cscientific blockade enacted by Western countries\u201d. Quoting Chinese experts, it added: \u201cThe Biden administration is imposing strong and increasing sanctions on China\u2019s science and technology sector; China must therefore strengthen countermeasures at the highest level [\u2026] in order to help its high-tech companies operating in international markets [\u2026]. China must also join forces with other developing countries to oppose this misguided hegemony.\u201d[3]<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n

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\n Voir aussi<\/span>\n
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\n \n \"\"<\/a>\n <\/span>\n \n Les m\u00e9tropoles mondiales de recherche : un duo sino-am\u00e9ricain ?<\/a>\n \n \n \n <\/use>\n<\/svg>\n <\/a>\n <\/span>\n
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3 December 2020<\/div>\n PAPON Pierre<\/a>\n
\n 7 min.\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n
\n \n \n <\/use>\n<\/svg>\n\n Note de veille\n <\/a>\n \u00c9conomie<\/a>\n Science et technique<\/a>\n Soci\u00e9t\u00e9<\/a>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Although the comments in this newspaper are not official statements, they nonetheless represent the thinking behind this reform, which results in greater political control of Chinese research. It remains to be seen how this will play out in practice for basic research, particularly in sensitive sectors with high stakes for society, such as the social sciences and life sciences (science was also placed under political control in the Soviet Union, but not without damaging progress in areas such as biology and genetics). China\u2019s total spending on R&D (including companies, many of which are state-owned) has been rising steadily for several decades, and the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics has estimated it as reaching US$456 billion in 2022 (a year-on-year growth of 8%, adjusted for inflation). This figure amounts to almost 2.5% of GDP (compared with 2.25% for France). Although basic research accounts for only 6.5% of spending on science and technology, this did not prevent China from becoming the world\u2019s leading \u201cproducer\u201d of scientific publications in 2018, ahead of the United States, and in many fields (physics, chemistry, and artificial intelligence in particular) its research ranks among the best in the world, according to the French Observatoire des sciences et techniques<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is highly likely that the overall R&D effort will increase. But in a political context of fierce hostility between China and the West, there are doubts surrounding the future of the project of \u201cChinese-style modernisation\u201d, especially since Chinese science and technology have benefited in the past from their active cooperation with a network of Western countries (particularly the US, but also the United Kingdom, Germany, France, and Japan, as shown by indicators in the journal Nature<\/em><\/a>)[4]<\/a><\/sup>. It is true that, since 2020, scientific cooperation with the US has fallen sharply, whereas cooperation with Russia has risen sharply (out of all the articles published by Russians with foreign partners, the share of those co-authored with Chinese researchers has risen by 50% since 2017).[5]<\/a><\/sup> Who will China\u2019s research partners be in the future? And will China remain open to global science? In the current and future international context, which is likely to be marked by an exacerbation of Sino-American tensions, what might be the role of Europe? These questions remain open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article has been translated from French by Sam Ferguson.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n

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  1. \n

    Chimits<\/span> Fran\u00e7ois, \u201cLe mod\u00e8le \u00e9conomique chinois: Entre lois du march\u00e9 et dirigisme \u00e9tatique<\/a>\u201d, Futuribles<\/em>, no. 452, January-February 2023, p. 9. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  2. \n

    Normile<\/span> Dennis, \u201cChina Rolls Out \u2018Radical\u2019 Change to its Research Enterprise<\/a>\u201d, Science<\/em>, vol. 379, no. 6638, March 2023. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  3. \n

    \u201cChina Ramps Up Sci-Tech Self-Reliance Drive with Establishment of New Central Commission<\/a>\u201d, Global Times, <\/em>17 March 2023. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  4. \n

    Vermander<\/span>Beno\u00eet, \u201cLa modernisation \u00e0 la chinoise<\/a>\u201d, Futuribles<\/em>, no. 455, July-August 2023, p. 75. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  5. \n

    Van Noordden<\/span> Richard, \u201cData Hint at Russia\u2019s Shifting Science Collaborations after Year of War<\/a>\u201d, Nature<\/em>, vol. 615, February 2023, pp. 199-200. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    For several decades, science and technology have been among China\u2019s political priorities: they are considered by the political authorities to make up one of the \u201cfour modernisations\u201d deemed essential for the country, as advocated by Deng Xiaoping in 1978 (the other three being agriculture, industry, and defence). The twentieth Communist Party Congress, held in October … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":70231,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_titles_title":"%%post_title%%","_seopress_titles_desc":"Science and technology are one of the priorities of China's political power ... one of the \"four modernisations\" essential to the country.","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"both","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":301,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[140],"tags":[203,210],"keyword":[],"class_list":["post-80056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newswatch","tag-geopolitique-en","tag-science-et-technique-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80056"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80056\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":99167,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80056\/revisions\/99167"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80056"},{"taxonomy":"keyword","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/keyword?post=80056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}