The China Program at Shorenstein APARC had the privilege of hosting Jude Blanchette, the Freeman Chair in China Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies​ (CSIS). The program, entitled "What’s ‘Communist’ about the Communist Party of China?," explored the goals and ideology of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as well as what they might mean for the future of China in the global community. Professor Jean Oi, William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics and director of the APARC China Program, moderated the event.

After the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, the goals of the CCP became less clear. As the country began to adopt market reforms in the 1980s and 1990s, CCP theorists were forced into contortions providing ideological justifications for policies that appeared overtly capitalist. Deng Xiaoping’s concept of “Socialism with Chinese characteristics” came to be seen as a theoretical fig leaf rather than a description of an egalitarian economic system, and by the 2000s, a consensus emerged that the CCP had completely abandoned any pretense of pursuing the Marxist vision it purported to hold. With the rise of Xi Jinping, however, the Party talks with renewed vigor about Marxism-Leninism and the goal of achieving actual, existing socialism. Has the CCP re-discovered communism?  In his talk, Blanchette discussed the abandoned and existing legacies of Mao Zedong, Marxism-Leninism, and the CCP’s vision of socialism. Watch now: 

On February 24, 2021, the China Program at Shorenstein APARC hosted Dr. Thomas Wright, director of the Center on the United States and Europe and a senior fellow in the Project on International Order and Strategy at the Brookings Institution. Professor Jean Oi, William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics and director of the APARC China Program, moderated the event.

The program, entitled "U.S.-China Relations in the Biden Era," explored the future of US-China relations based on experience from past administrations. Under former President Trump, U.S. relations with China evolved into outright rivalry. In his talk, Dr. Wright discussed whether this rivalry will continue and evolve during a Biden administration by analyzing the roots of strategic competition between the two countries and various strands of thinking within the Biden team. According to Wright, the most likely outcome is that the competition between the two countries will evolve into a clash of governance systems and the emergence of two interdependent blocs where ideological differences become a significant driver of geopolitics. Cooperation is possible but it will be significantly shaped by conditions of rivalry. Watch now:

Ukraine finally has a chance to create a strong counterintelligence service and shed the Soviet standards of the old KGB.  

The Ukrainian parliament recently passed the first reading of a bill to reform the Security Service of Ukraine, known as the SBU. This is a crucial step in efforts to remake the SBU into a modern security service guided by Western democratic standards. 

This process owes much to the US Congress. In 2019, Congress voted to condition half of American defense assistance to Ukraine on adoption of a bill on national defense that laid the groundwork for future security service reform. 

In 2021, the United States will allocate USD 250 million for the Ukrainian defense sector. If this money is conditioned on real security service reform, it can prove a game-changer, not only for domestic law enforcement, but also in Ukraine’s fight against Russia.

A modern security service for Ukraine should deal exclusively with counterintelligence, counter-terrorism, protection of state secrets, and countering subversion. The SBU should not be included in any foreign intelligence operations, since this is done by the Service of Foreign Intelligence, which reports directly to the Ukrainian president.

The question now is whether Ukrainian MPs are ready to take responsibility and vote for such a security service. Recently, Maryana Bezugla, deputy head of the Ukrainian National Security, Defense, and Intelligence Committee, reported about pressure on MPs from the SBU’s leadership not to vote for the bill.

The SBU reform bill envisions a number of major changes in Ukraine’s security services. Crucially, it will eliminate the anti-corruption and organized crime department of the SBU. Ukraine has created specific agencies to fight corruption, namely the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the State Bureau of Investigations (SBI).

In the past, the SBU has duplicated the functions of both NABU and the SBI, and has been accused of misusing its authority to protect corrupt state officials. Eliminating the SBU’s anti-corruption function would also meet a key demand of the international community. 

The current anti-crime department is regarded as one of the most corrupt wings of the SBU. It stands accused of regularly engaging in raids on businesses. Pavlo Demchyna, former head of the SBU’s Anti-Corruption and Organized Crime Department, came under criminal investigation a few years ago for precisely such actions. He could not explain how he came to own his elite property and luxury cars. 

In line with the current reform proposals, the number of SBU employees would be reduced from 27,000 to 17,000 within four years. At present, Ukraine has the largest security service in Europe. The proposed cuts would still leave the SBU far larger than many comparative services. For example, Britain’s MI5 has only 4,400 employees, even though it is recognized as one of the top security services in the world. 

Reducing the number of SBU employees over four years can be done without harming Ukraine’s national security. The reduction will provide an opportunity to retain the best officers and raise salaries while ridding the service of old Soviet functions. The SBU does not need its own kindergartens, hospitals, or sanatoriums filled with “secret nannies and doctors” in order to be an effective security service.

While these proposed changes are encouraging, the new bill on Ukraine’s security service still needs to include additional important reforms.

It is vital to eliminate the SBU’s investigative functions. As long as the SBU has investigative powers, the service will remain a law enforcement agency rather than a Western-style security service. The SBU should focus on counterintelligence and national security, not ordinary crime, which should be left to the National Police. 

Eliminating the SBU’s investigative functions would cut opportunities for corruption. The European Union Advisory Mission in Ukraine also notes that the SBU should not have authority to conduct pretrial investigations, which are the purview of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine and National Police.

All SBU employees (except covert counterintelligence officers) should submit transparent asset declarations. Reforms introduced in 2015 obliged SBU officials, along with millions of other Ukrainian state employees, to publish asset declarations. However, SBU officials have ignored this rule, claiming that all 27,000 employees (including “secret” kindergarten nannies) should be exempt due to national security requirements.

It is important to remove the loopholes that currently enable corruption within the security service. In its present state, the new bill would allow the SBU to put inappropriate pressure on private businesses. This includes the ability to access databases, documents, audio, and video files without requiring any prior court permission. Such powers are subject to widespread abuse and should be eliminated.

The selection process for SBU officers must be competitive. Officers need to be chosen on the basis of competence not nepotism. 

Given Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine, those with family ties or other links to Russia require specific scrutiny. It makes no sense, for example, to appoint someone as head of the security service whose wife holds Russian citizenship, but this has happened in the past.

Ukraine must end the SBU monopoly in wiretapping. Understandably, the SBU wants to retain that monopoly, which allows the service to control criminal investigations, even against its own officers. A few years ago, SBU officers misused this power and declassified the identities of NABU agents working on a corruption case.

The current reform drive is also an opportunity to provide public access to declassified information. The SBU tends to overprotect information. For instance, even Ukrainian MPs are currently forbidden from knowing the exact number of SBU employees.

As Ukraine reforms its security service, it is important to avoid creating any new threats to the country’s democratic system. The new bill would empower the SBU to ban, without any court decision, political parties or individual candidates from participating in elections. That provision should be removed.

At a time when Ukraine finds itself engaged in an undeclared war with Russia, the country urgently needs to abandon the Soviet standards of the KGB and adopt the best practices and standards of Western security services. Ukraine also needs to restrict or remove powers that allow the SBU to pressure business or help certain oligarchs.

The current reform process has been a long time coming. It gives Ukrainian MPs the chance to transform the SBU into a modern, Western-style counterintelligence agency that will better serve the country’s national security interests. Parliament must not pass up this opportunity.

Oleksandra Ustinova, a Ukrainian MP with the Holos party, is an alumna of Stanford's Ukrainian Emerging Leaders Program. Steven Pifer, a fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin and affiliate of the Center for International Security and Cooperation, is a former US ambassador to Ukraine (1998-2000).

Originally for Ukraine Alert

On February 10, 2021, the China Program at Shorenstein APARC hosted Professor Oriana Skylar Mastro, Center Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies​ for the virtual program "Military Competition with China: Harder to Win Than During the Cold War?" Professor Jean Oi, William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics and director of the APARC China Program, moderated the event.

As US-China competition intensifies, experts debate the degree to which the current strategic environment resembles that of the Cold War. Those that argue against the analogy often highlight how China is deeply integrated into the US-led world order. They also point out that, while tense, US-China relations have not turned overtly adversarial. But there is another, less optimistic reason the comparison is unhelpful: deterring and defeating Chinese aggression is harder now than it was against the Soviet Union. In her talk, Dr. Mastro analyzed how technology, geography, relative resources and the alliance system complicate U.S. efforts to enhance the credibility of its deterrence posture and, in a crisis, form any sort of coalition. Mastro and Oi's thought-provoking discussion ranged from the topic of why even US allies are hesitant to take a strong stance against China to whether or not Taiwan could be a catalyst for military conflict. Watch now: 

On Jan. 6, the U.S. Capitol was assaulted and occupied for the first time since 1814. Five people were killed, including a Capitol Police officer. Two Republican Representatives have introduced a bill to establish a national bipartisan commission to investigate the attack. We agree that a commission is needed. Here, we sketch the mandate, major areas of inquiry, and legislative language that we believe are needed to guide this effort.

Read the rest at Lawfare Blog