China party: a stale old party

That China has leaped forward is plain. Communist poverty has been replaced by capitalist ambition. The world is acquiring a second superpower. Yet politically little has changed. The Communist Party remains the same. And in this mix of extraordinary economic vigour and political stasis lies danger. The five-yearly Congress of the Communist Party, now being held in Beijing, is demonstrating that stasis all too well. The men in grey suits yawn their way through speeches about greater democracy a...