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After an eventful year, China has cleared the decks for a wholesale change of leadership amid a particularly challenging set of circumstances. Turbo-powered growth has left the last major state ruled by a communist party facing a string of political, economic and social questions. The five-yearly party congress on 8 November, which will appoint the new leaders to steer the country through the rest of this decade, is, therefore, as important in its way as the US presidential poll two days earlier.

Whatever the faults of the US system, the contrast between the competitive election across the Pacific, held after months of open policy discussion, and the closed-door transition of power in China is striking. For all the praise from foreign commentators about the way China...