Observers see this week's endorsement of flamboyant Chongqing boss Bo Xilai's red culture campaign by the party mouthpiece People's Daily as part of a balancing act by some top leaders in Beijing keen to win favour from resurgent 'new leftists'.
They also said Tuesday's main front-page story heaping praise on the southwestern municipality's controversial campaign could be seen as further confirming Bo as a rising political star in the run-up to next year's top-level leadership reshuffle.
The People's Daily story, which spilled to an inside page, praised Chongqing as a model and hub of the country's cultural construction.
'It is an endorsement of Bo Xilai's red culture campaign and it is worth noting as the article came just a few days before the party's ruling elites are to meet to discuss cultural development matters,' said Professor Hu Xingdou, a Beijing Institute of Technology economist.
'Cultural reform' is the sole agenda item for the sixth plenary session of the 17th Party Congress, which will begin tomorrow in Beijing. Bo, currently a Politburo member, is a frontrunner for promotion to the more senior Politburo Standing Committee, the pinnacle of the party's decision-making hierarchy, as part of a once-a-decade leadership transition at the 18th Party Congress next autumn.
Other contenders for promotion to the Politburo Standing Committee include Guangdong party chief Wang Yang and his Shanghai counterpart Yu Zhengsheng .
