Yikes: Chen Kuiyuan (陈奎元)

A vice-chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and dean of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Chen Kuiyuan is strongly associated with China’s hardline left, and his presence in the official news photo from Xinhua is for media insiders in China a tangible sign — a flesh-and-blood cautionary note about the need for media to fall into line in 2011.

It was this same Chen Kuiyuan who wrote an influential essay in the People’s Daily in August 2004 arguing that the greatest legacy left by Deng Xiaoping (邓小平), the architect of China’s opening and reform policy, was not reform itself but the so-called “Four Basic Principles, or si xiang jiben yuanze (四项基本原则). A favored political buzzword of China’s conservative left, the Four Basic Principles — sometimes referred to as the “Four Cardinal Principles” — are as follows:

1. We must cleave to the road of socialism
2. We must uphold the dictatorship of the proletariat
3. We must uphold the leadership of the Communist Party
4. We must uphold Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought

And it looks as if he'll be severely restricting media freedom.