This year’s session of the National People’s Congress takes on added significance with the impending anointment of the next generation of senior leaders. China would seem to have many reasons to be self-satisfied given the strong prospects for a “soft landing”, a mountain of foreign assets that Europe is eager to tap, and an expanding regional presence that the US has had to take notice of.

Yet the leadership recognises that the country faces daunting economic, social and environmental challenges including vulnerabilities created by past excessive credit expansion. Wen Jiabao, China’s premier, warned on Monday that growth is set to slow this year. It is aiming for a 7.5 per cent rise in gross domestic product, the first time since 2004 that the annual target has dropped below 8 per cent.

But these are likely to be seen as technicalities among those gathered in Beijing. Far more worrisome for the political elite is the question of how to deal with rising social unrest. This was underscored by the global attention given to the Wukan village land-related protests that pushed provincial leaders to support more open local elections. Other disturbances such as last year’s strikes by truck drivers in Shanghai and recent unrest by migrant workers at Foxconn reflect the tensions stemming from decades of widening social inequality that seems out of place for a regime that originated from egalitarian ideals.