The Conscience of the Party: Hu Yaobang, China's Communist Reformer, by Robert L. Suettinger, is more than just a biography of a fallen reform leader in the People's Republic of China in the 1980s. It is also a study of the little-understood subject of elite politics within the Communist Party of China. By elucidating the political actors, processes, structures, mores, controversies and coverups of that era, the author will shine a light on today's Zhongnanhai (CCP headquarters), and the succession difficulties facing General Secretary Xi Jinping.
Robert L. Suettinger is a historian of contemporary politics in the People’s Republic of China, whose most recent work—The Conscience of the Party: Hu Yaobang, China’s Communist Reformer—was published in October 2024 by Harvard University Press. A former intelligence officer, he retired in 1998 and subsequently worked for several think tanks and consulting companies, including The Brookings Institution, RAND, Centra Technology and the Stimson Center. In his US Government career, Suettinger spent 24 years with the Central Intelligence Agency. He also worked in State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the National Intelligence Council, and the National Security Council, where he assisted National Security Advisors Anthony Lake and Samuel R. Berger in the development of American policy toward East Asia. Suettinger holds an M.A. from Columbia University and a B.A. from Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin. He served in the U.S. Army in the then Republic of Vietnam in 1969-70.