Little impact seen from Party leadership's reform push as interest groups dig in

It is supposed to be a multi-pronged reform attack. At last year's Communist Party plenum, the leadership said it would cut government interference in the market and the judiciary as well as improve public services. The deadline for "decisive progress" on the agenda was 2020.

While it's too early to judge the success of the overall programme, some analysts say the steps already taken have been trivial and incapable of kick-starting real change.

That's because the leaders have struggled to dismantle entrenched interest groups, despite President and party General Secretary Xi Jinping consolidating his grip on power through high-profile anti-corruption campaigns and control of various powerful government bodies.

"One of the biggest challenges for Xi and Premier Li Keqiang is how to get their reform policies enacted outside Zhongnanhai, the headquarters of the central government," said Oliver Meng Rui, a professor at the China Europe International Business School.

"Local officials … are worried that their experiment could go wrong and they'll be punished if no one takes political responsibility. It is not surprising for local officials to take a wait-and-see attitude when they sense that there is still a power struggle higher up."

But many of Xi's reforms have had only a minor impact. For example, the decades-old distinction between urban and rural dwellers in the household registration system, or hukou, has been removed but the gap in entitlements between the two groups of people will largely stay the same for years to come.