Changing of the guard—but then again, perhaps not

THE sign above the door at Cong Caphe, a hip coffee shop in downtown Hanoi, the Vietnamese capital, bears a bright-red communist star. Inside, the brick walls are covered in memorabilia from the era of the Vietnam war: rusty canteens, an old transistor radio and snapshots of Viet Cong soldiers trudging off to fight the Americans. Yet the aesthetic is not so much patriotic as a cheeky send-up of communist ideology. The 20- and 30-something Vietnamese who drink here, spending the fruits of an increasingly capitalist economy, feel far removed from the hardships suffered by their parents and grandparents, while they applaud ever-closer ties with America.

With its scooter-driving young and an economy growing at nearly 7% a year, Vietnam seems like a country in a hurry. In many ways, the ruling Communist Party is trying to keep up. Not far from the coffee shop, windows the size of a cathedral’s illuminate the new building housing the National Assembly, Vietnam’s parliament. Sunbeams pour from skylights into the marble foyer. In a one-party state where symbols matter, the building’s airiness suggests that the rulers are trying to project an image of modernity and transparency. Yet as Nguyen Vu Nam, a manager at Cong Caphe, points out, young Vietnamese do not pay much heed to who runs the party. Personnel changes among a generally grey and faceless collective leadership have never seemed to matter much.

This month party bigwigs will make a fresh bid for relevance. On January 20th they convene for a five-yearly congress, the highlight of Vietnam’s political calendar. More than half of the 16-member Politburo, the party’s ruling council, are meant to retire, to be replaced by younger officials. The country’s three most senior jobs—of state president, prime minister and party general secretary—are all up for grabs. That so much remains mysterious so close to the event suggests that this year’s negotiations are unusually tense.

The man to watch is Nguyen Tan Dung, Vietnam’s prime minister for ten years and probably its shrewdest and least uncharismatic politician. At 66, Mr Dung is past the party’s usual retirement age. But he is said to want to remain in high office by taking the role of party secretary, while perhaps relinquishing his current office to an ally. Mr Dung would doubtless reinvigorate a job which has lately begun to look dusty. He may wish to carve out an authority that begins to approach the dominance enjoyed by Xi Jinping in China. But such a move would be unusual. It would rattle a political system which, until now, has discouraged domineering personalities and has valued consensus.

Mr Dung’s backers say that Vietnam’s present challenges call for strong and consistent leadership. The economy is much mended after bad debts from cosseted state enterprises threatened the banking system. The country stands to gain from a sheaf of trade agreements negotiated in 2015, including the American-led Trans-Pacific Partnership. Yet progress towards many essential reforms, including the privatisation of state firms, has been slow. The economy is overdependent on commodities, especially coffee and rice, as well as on foreign investors. It will be essential to broaden and deepen Vietnam’s economy before its biggest present advantage, a young and cheap workforce, is spent.

As for politics, managing the country’s tricky relations with China is the biggest challenge. Vietnam is economically dependent on its northern neighbour, with which it has a big and growing trade deficit. At the same time, China’s assertive claims to islands and underwater resources in contested parts of the South China Sea have outraged even moderate Vietnamese. Those born since the country ditched its planned economy in the 1980s are growing more outspoken, for example on social media. Vietnam cannot afford to have bad relations with China, but at the same time its leaders must be seen to be defending Vietnamese territory.

Fighting ferrets

Most intellectuals paying attention to the party congress would like to see Mr Dung retain some authority, since he has been the strongest voice against Chinese bullying. He is also the clear choice among local and foreign business folk, though for different reasons. They see Mr Dung as behind the flurry of trade deals and recent efforts to lift caps on foreign ownership. They say he is unusually knowledgeable about industry, well-advised by Western-educated staff and knows what investors want to hear.

Yet whiffs of cronyism taint the prime minister as much as they do other comrades. His son’s political career has seen suspiciously swift advancement, while a flashy Vietnamese-American son-in-law owns the country’s McDonald’s franchise. Scandals have sprouted at state enterprises that Mr Dung had championed. Nor do civil libertarians think that he is more inclined than other leaders to unshackle the censored press or end the thuggish treatment of dissidents.

As the party congress approaches, its outcome appears ever less certain. Mr Dung was once thought a shoo-in for party leader. Yet a loose-knit faction opposed to him may even manage to oust him entirely from the leadership.

The fighting springs partly from competing networks of patronage, and partly from modest ideological differences between conservatives and the prime minister’s relatively reformist pals. Some officials worry that Vietnam’s growing chumminess with America will only make China more confrontational. A handful of them even seem to fret that Mr Dung’s liberalising instincts could end up threatening the party’s hold on power. But that would be conjecture. For all the light streaming into the new parliament building, Vietnam’s Communist Party remains a dark sack full of ferrets.