The Party Controls the Gun, but How? Institutionalization as a Trend in Chinese Civil-Military Relations

Originally characterized by a tightly intertwined relationship based in informal manners of control, the relationship between the Chinese army, party, and state has evolved over the past few decades. Instigated by the reforms of Deng Xiaoping, which changed Chinese politics, economics, and society, the party and the army’s relationship is no longer based in the "interlocking directorate," which characterized the party-army hierarchies of the past. Changes to the army, the party, and the state have contributed to an evolution of Chinese civil-military relations which can be characterized as “institutionalized.”