As Vietnam Booms, Communit Party Struggles To Keep Up

From Reuters and Alliance Defense Fund:

As Vietnam booms, Communist Party struggles to keep up




Special Report: Vietnam capitalist roaders follow China's trail

Thu, Jan 13 2011Related TopicsWorld »



A policeman stands guard in front of a poster painted with a communist logo outside the National Convention Center, the venue for the 11th National Party Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam, in Hanoi January 15, 2011. Vietnam's ruling communists opened an eight-day party congress on January 12 with a candid admission the fast-growing economy had become unstable, as delegates began the process of reshuffling leaders and charting new policies.

Credit: Reuters/Kham

By John Ruwitch



HANOI
Mon Jan 17, 2011 1:32am EST



HANOI (Reuters) - Vietnam's ruling Communists are replenishing their aging ranks with younger, better-educated policymakers and entrepreneurs as the 81-year-old party founded by Marxist revolutionary Ho Chi Minh struggles to stay relevant.



The party will select a new policy-making Central Committee on Monday that is likely to be stacked with younger faces, and they vote this week on a test scheme to admit entrepreneurs into the country's stodgy socialist bureaucracy.



The measures -- part of the five-yearly Communist Party congress meeting in the capital Hanoi until Wednesday -- are a recognition that Vietnam's leadership needs a makeover to revitalise itself as the economy slips out of direct state control and fewer leaders carry strong revolutionary credentials.



With its leadership dominated by grey-haired bureaucrats, the party faces a challenge to attract talent. Gone are the days when membership was the sole path out of poverty.



"In the past, nine out of 10 university graduates would go into the bureaucracy and want to join the party. Now, it's the reverse. Nine out of 10 want to go into the private sector," said Le Dang Doanh, a former official and government advisor.



For today's youth, he said, "there's no need now to join the party".



Still, for those in government agencies and state-owned enterprises, not belonging to the party can put a glass ceiling on careers. Privately, some people admit to joining because they have no real choice.



Party membership can also be valuable in a country where connections are key to conducting business, and bureaucratic red tape is one of the biggest obstacles to success.



"If you are career-minded and/or business-minded it makes sense. Others will stay away, not wanting the hassle and the endless meetings," said Martin Gainsborough, a Vietnam specialist at the University of Bristol.



SCREAMING TEENAGE GIRLS



Anecdotally, enthusiasm for party membership and activities, including a recently ended four-year campaign to study and learn from Ho Chi Minh's "moral example" is waning.



A new generation of younger, globally savvy Vietnamese prefer rock concerts to communist youth union meetings, and are more likely to be found thumbing SMS messages to friends than memorising fiery passages from Ho Chi Minh's speeches. Sixty percent of Vietnam's 90 million people are under the age of 35.



Not far from the congress venue, at Hanoi's Foreign Language University, 19-year-old Nguyen Hong Ngoc says she and her 11 roomates never talk about joining the party.



"I want to be an interpreter for a private business, maybe in tourism," says Ngoc, whose major is English translation.



Khuong Nhu Quynh shares that view, as she applies to universities in the United States and Singapore, where she hopes to study business administration.



"Opportunities for promotion are better in the private sector. Salaries are better, too," she said.



The site of tens of thousands screaming teenagers at a South Korean boy band concert last year in Hanoi, for example, stunned a communist party member, according to venture capitalist Henry Nguyen who attended the concert with the cadre.



"He was just like 'This is incredible. I've never seen this side of Vietnam'," Nguyen recounted. "And he just kind of made this off-hand comment like 'We need to invite these guys to the youth union meetings because nobody shows up anymore'."



Such examples are now common in fast-changing Vietnam, stoking concerns over the party's future as the economy emerges from the ruins of decades of war and central planning into regional exporting dynamo with a rapidly growing middle class.



On Monday, when congress elects a new Central Committee, they will try to boost the number of young people, women, ethnic minorities and scientists, party official Nguyen Bac Son said. Results from the vote are expected on Wednesday.



It will also this week approve a plan to allow entrepreneurs into its ranks, following the lead of neighbouring China whose communist leaders opened the door to businessmen in 2002.



At Vietnam's 10th Party Congress, in 2006, the rules were changed to give party members permission to engage in private business -- something many were already doing. But conservatives rejected allowing established businessmen to join.



"I think some would be interested," said Phung Anh Tuan, a lawyer and board member of the Young Businesspeople Association of Ho Chi Minh City. It would depend for many on what role businessmen would be allowed to play, he added.



In a hole-the-wall sporting goods shop in Hanoi, salesman Vu Ngoc Duong, 20, does not see much point in joining. "I haven't felt the need yet," he said.



(Editing by Jason Szep)