In China, the more things change8230;

In reality, of course, China8217;s one-party system still owes more to Lenin than to Jefferson. It convenes congresses every five years to ratify leadership decisions on policy and personnel. The message is not change, but continuity.

After months of secretive negotiations, the nine members of the new Politburo Standing Committee, the country8217;s top ruling body, were presented to the public for the first time on Monday morning. Their appointment was fait accompli, and the stiff, scripted ceremony to introduce them, which lasted barely 10 minutes, resembled a Communist coronation.

The Communist Party has run China for 58 years. Despite the dynamic, even reckless expansion that has become the norm for the country8217;s frothy economy, the party has become more entrenched, more predictable and more enamored of its rituals.

Decisions are made collectively by a small, often invisible elite. They tussle over the spoils of one-party rule. But they agree on the big issues facing the country. They want fast growth, a nonaligned foreign policy and political stability. If they are about to try something new, their secret is safe.

8220;China has a tyranny of the middle,8221; said Frederick C Teiwes, an expert on Chinese politics at the University of Sydney in Australia. 8220;From the perspective of the leadership, things are going pretty well. They all want stability.8221;

In his first five years as China8217;s No 1 leader, Hu argued repeatedly that the growth-above-all philosophy that began under Deng Xiaoping in the 1980s had side effects. Too many workers and peasants had failed to benefit from the long-lasting economic boom. The party should redistribute more to the least well off by providing better state-financed pensions, health care and education.

Hu has tried to rein in provincial authorities who pay lip service to central government directives while managing local affairs their own way. He pushed to recentralise some decision making, reduce wasteful state investment and slow the rampant expansion of polluting industries.

Some progress has been made. Agricultural taxes were eliminated. Tough directives to fight pollution and improve energy efficiency have been issued, if not fully put into use. His theory of governance, labeled 8220;scientific view of development,8221; was enshrined in the party8217;s constitution on Sunday.

Yet most of those changes are incremental, enacted only after the full leadership reached a consensus. Far from distancing himself from his predecessors, Hu has repeatedly pledged to follow the dictums of Deng and Jiang Zemin, presenting his own ideas as evolutionary.

Hu put his stamp more clearly on the ranks of the regular Politburo, the Central Committee and leadership positions in the provinces. That suggests his authority could increase over time and even, like Jiang8217;s, follow him into retirement.

But for those who hoped for a faster pace of internal change or a taste of genuine democracy, it is unlikely that Hu is now either inclined 8212; or perhaps able 8212; to deliver.