Reference to the general chart of government organization (see p. [330]) shows the intricate pre-democratic system of government now applied. Consideration of the sources of policy in such a structure have, therefore, to appraise not merely two agencies—executive and legislative, with only a glance at the judiciary—as in America, but to examine a whole hierarchy of Party, general governmental, military-governmental, and autonomous policy-making agencies. Were it not for the thousands of miles, the unrelatedness in cultures, the complexities of language, and the inescapable awareness of race, Americans might long since have looked to China as the decisive, fresh political experiment of our times.
One further trait of the Chinese, which in Japan has been carried to the point of a national mania, is the respect for the constitutional (or Imperial) system as a symbol of purity and order. Western governments are like machines in common use; they operate for the general convenience and subject to the criticism of their members. Even dictatorships try to seem practical. The Confucian traditions of government by indoctrination, and particularly that of government indoctrinating through conspicuous example, motivated heavy ceremonialization of state functions. This often led a Chinese Emperor to become more and more majestic and aloof, to strive for archetypal perfection, until he became so much a model that he disappeared from public sight altogether, swilling and carousing himself to death in the gardens of the Forbidden City; his successors, if they came from the people, would seem practical and workable for a few generations, until they too succumbed to their own majesty. Some atrophy through majesty occurs even in the relatively new Chinese National Government, arrested but not eradicated by war-time vigor.
The Supreme National Defense Council
The highest political agency in China is the Supreme National Defense Council (Kuo-fang Tsui-kao Wei-yüan-hui).[5] This is not a part of the government, de jure, since it is the war-time replacement of the Kuomintang Central Political Council (Chung-yang Chêng-chih Wei-yüan-hui), the high Party organ charged with exercise of the Party's sovereign powers in government. The liberalization of the policy-framing agencies in war-time cannot be better illustrated than by the fact that this new Supreme National Defense Council reportedly includes non-Party members, and acts in fact as a central board or council of government, superseding not only the Kuomintang Central Political Council but its governmental counterpart, the Council of State (Kuo-min Chêng-fu Wei-yüan-hui) as well. Reference to the chart below will clarify the relationship of these agencies:
The KUOMINTANG, as a Party,
exercises sovereign powers through
[The CENTRAL POLITICAL COUNCIL, superseded in war-time by]
The SUPREME NATIONAL DEFENSE COUNCIL,
which transmits commands
to
The COUNCIL OF STATE, highest governmental agency, which transforms these commands into government orders applicable
to
NATIONAL, PROVINCIAL, or LOCAL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES,
in the form of
ORDERS, ORDINANCES, and LAWS
The power of the Kuomintang is exercised by its Chief [Tsung-ts'ai] and its Central Executive Committee, Central Committee, and their respective Standing Committees (discussed below, p. [125] ff.).
Secretiveness in a nation's highest policy-making organ is somewhat unusual in the modern world. In most states the invisible government of practical acquaintance and association between leaders provides a meeting ground, and traditions require a formal, open exercise of public authority. As a matter of fact, a few generally accepted data concerning the Supreme National Defense Council are readily apparent to the observer in Chungking. In the first place, it is what its title implies—the highest agency of political control. Its meetings are the constant source of new policy and tangible control. Secondly, one finds a universal belief that the Generalissimo, who attends these meetings in the multiple capacity of Chairman of the Council, Party Chief of the Kuomintang, President of the Executive Yüan, Chairman of the People's Political Council, Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Navy, and Air Forces, etc., faithfully employs Council meetings for very real debate and discussion of government and Party policy, and for the conduct of the war. He is not believed to take any important step arbitrarily, without consulting the Council. (In the past, he has been known to act with dramatic and concealed swiftness, opening his mind to no one before the crucial consummation of his plans, but at the present time this has apparently disappeared.[6])
Third, the Council, while extending beyond the men who are primarily Party leaders and including military and political figures who (irrespective of nominal Party membership) are independent, has transformed the arcanum of Party power into a body more representative of the entire nation. Fourth, significant in connection with the Japanese charge of Chungking Bolshevization, the Communists and other Leftists, while fairly represented in advisory and even in military bodies, are presumed to have no representation whatever on the Supreme National Defense Council, nor is such representation regarded as probable in the near future. Chiang K'ai-shek has at hand a counselling and co-governing body whose fundamental purposes are completely one with his own.
A nice consistency would demand that the Supreme National Defense Council (as a Party agency) should transmit its commands to the Council of State (its government counterpart) for transformation into law. This is actually done, whenever possible, but the frequency of crises and of needs for immediate action have—in the period of hostilities—led to the occasional issuance of commands direct to the Ministry or other governmental organ concerned.[7] To the degree that the Supreme National Defense Council does so, it becomes a directly governing authority, and instead of perpetuating Party authority over government, it is itself government.