Introduction: Leadership in a Changing China

Abstract

Change is probably the most operative word in political science. Indeed it can be argued that political science studies center around differences or variance (to use a social science jargon). Two major questions concerning political and social changes are how and when they will occur. Over 20 years ago Valerie Bunce published a provocative book entitled Do New Leaders Make a Difference? Executive Succession and Public Policy under Capitalism and Socialism. In the book she studied the impact of leadership succession on changes in public policies through a comparison of the United States and former Soviet bloc countries. Bunce found remarkable similarities between the two systems with regard to policy changes resulting from leadership changes. Bunce argued that

In both systems succession involves ambition, conflict, the airing of issues, the eventual victory of one candidate over another, and policy change once the honeymoon interacts with the campaign experience. The essence of the process—its impact and its logic—would seem to be very similar, East and West.¹