Two Sessions – How the Chinese Government Gets Feedback, and Much More, Week 9 Update

Understanding China's whole-process people's democracy at Two Sessions (CGTN)

In the coming days, nearly 3,000 National People's Congress (NPC) deputies and around 2,000 members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) will gather in Beijing to perform their duties, which include deliberating on various legislative items and reviewing a series of work reports to find common ground and converge the interests of the Chinese people. …

In China, deputies to county and township-level people's congresses are directly elected by voters, while deputies to congresses above the county level are elected by deputies at the next lower level.

Till last June, over 1 billion voters had cast their ballots on a one-person-one-vote basis in elections of over 2.6 million deputies to people's congresses at the township and county levels, according to the General Office of the Standing Committee of the NPC.

Deputies to the NPC are elected by people's congresses of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government. The armed forces elect their own deputies.

Zhao Yanjing on Bailing out Local Government Debt (Reading the China Dream)

In a nutshell, China’s real estate market is enormous, plays a huge role in China’s (and thus to some extent, the world’s) prosperity, and—according to many analysts—is on the brink of a collapse that would burst China’s economic bubble and spark a global economic downturn.  The market has been booming for decades, as residential property serves as the major investment vehicle for most Chinese, and the boom has of course fueled speculation, which naturally encouragers developers to borrow ever more money to build ever more houses to keep up with demand.  
In Zhao’s telling, the cause of the current crisis is the central government’s clumsy, populist efforts to control housing costs through price controls and other measures, all of which means that developers cannot make their money and pay their debts.  If companies like Evergrande, the one that makes the most headlines, fail or declare bankruptcy, banks and lenders throughout the world will start to call in their debts sector-wide, and the economy will crash, affecting developers, lenders, homeowners, the construction industry, the home renovation industry, the home furnishing industry

Zhao Yanjing on High Tech Tit-for-Tat (Reading the China Dream)

The text translated here has to do with China’s response to efforts of the American government to prevent technology transfer to China, especially in the high tech field.  Zhao essentially argues that if the U.S. is no longer going to play by the rules, then there is no point in China doing so either, and he proposes a series of measures having to do with patents, innovation, and attracting talent to China—citing examples of similar American behavior at various points in history.  What struck me in reading Zhao’s piece was that he does not waste time condemning American policy—even if it is clear that he does not approve of it.  Instead, his attitude is pragmatic, trying to find ways for China to remain competitive in a changing environment.  

Xi Jinping on China's major economic issues (gingerriver.com)

In today's issue, we present an article on major issues pertaining to the country's current economic work by Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The article was published in the Qiushi Journal, a flagship magazine of the CPC Central Committee, on Feb. 16. It was part of Xi's speech in the annual Central Economic Work Conference was held in Beijing on Dec. 15, 2022. Xinhua News agency released an official readout of the speech and key points of the conference in December.