You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘ccp’ tag.
Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow yesterday for the start of a three-day state visit, his first trip overseas since securing his unprecedented third-five year term as head of the party and president of the country. Yesterday’s meeting was heavy with symbolism — the two leaders exchanged greetings and expression of friendship seated together intimately in front of a fireplace — but devoid of substance. The first solid indication of the substantive direction their talks are taking will happen in a few hours during a press event scheduled to take place prior to their formal dinner. That direction will be further mapped out at the conclusion of the state visit tomorrow immediately prior to the departure from Moscow of Xi Jinping and his delegation.
These meetings are being closely watched because they will reveal which of three starkly different paths the two leaders will choose.
Behind Door Number 1 is the possibility that Xi will show determination to be the peace-broker he postured as with the release of his PRC Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis 12-point plan late last month. This would mean exerting real pressure to overcome the mutually-incompatible public positions of Russia (i.e., that no negotiations are possible until Ukraine formally cedes those territories in eastern Ukraine which Russia currently occupies) and of Ukraine (i.e., that no negotiations are possible until Russia completely relinquishes all territories it has occupied since Russia’s 2022 invasion and possibly also the Crimean territories seized in 2014 though there is not clarity on that latter point). There is no question that Xi has the means to move Putin in this direction if he should choose to. It would suffice for Xi to threaten to drastically reduce purchase of Russian oil, to limit export of Chinese microchips and other vital but non-lethal supplies which prop up Putin’s war effort, and to distance himself from Putin on the world stage. The reason this door will stay closed, though, is two-fold. First, Xi has no means available to bring Kyiv along in this direction. Xi’s platitudes about the cessation of hostilities and entering into talks is an absolute non-starter for Zelensky and his committed backers in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere. It would simply freeze Russian gains in place and allow Moscow’s forces time to regroup. Nor does Xi have any realistic standing to leverage world opinion to pressure Zelensky to move in a direction he’s dead-set against. Even for Brazil, Hungary, India, Indonesia and the other influential fence-sitters, what Beijing has been doing over the past year (supporting Russia in myriad ways right up to the red-line of supplying lethal equipment) outweighs what it has recently been saying about weighing in as a mediator and potential peace-broker. Beijing had not yet even opened up a channel of communication with Kyiv until a few days ago and that only at the Foreign Minister level. Yes, the U.S. and its allies have been loudly supportive of Xi reaching out to Zelensky but that is not because they see that as a step toward a PRC-brokered ceasefire. They’re advocating this because they know how passionately persuasive Zelensky can be about Ukraine’s position on the right side of history and hope that direct communication with Zelensky would give Xi further pause in any consideration of supplying Russia with lethal armaments.
Behind Door Number 2 is the possibility that Xi and Putin will use their time behind closed doors to hammer out an agreement through which China bolsters Moscow’s faltering war effort with a meaningful level, either quantitatively or qualitatively, of lethal munitions. This represents the ‘red line’ which SecState Blinken has been publicly warning Xi to back off from in recent weeks. It would represent a watershed development for two reasons. First, it would prove beyond argument the hollowness of Beijing’s posture of neutrality. Short of such military supply, Beijing has already deployed all the tools at its disposal to help Moscow — using its manufacturing strength to supply the Russian military with dual-use technologies, using its economy to shore up the vital Russian energy sector, using its currency to help prop up the ruble, using its propaganda organs to parrot Moscow’s line on the causes of the war and even its Special Military Operation terminology, using its diplomacy to provide Putin (fresh from the International Criminal Court in the Hague issuing an arrest warrant for him) with ‘diplomatic cover.’ Second, Russia’s supply of military-use drones, ammunition, and artillery has the potential to significantly change the battlefield. Perhaps not to the degree to allow the poorly-performing Russian military to realize its maximalist territorial objectives; but definitely enough to prolong the military see-saw and reenergize Putin’s strategy of outlasting the fractious democracies supporting Ukraine. Should Xi accede to this course of action behind closed doors, it would not remain a secret for any length of time. Beyond the ability of the U.S. intelligence community to pick up on this new move through monitoring communications — both PRC internal communications and government-to-industry communications — the appearance of Chinese armaments on the battlefield would be instantly recognized and highlighted by the Ukrainian military. The consequences would be immediate and disastrous for China’s wobbly economic recovery. Sanctions from the U.S. and Europe — China’s two largest trading markets — could conceivably be enough to knock 1-2% off China’s economic growth in 2023. Under that scenario, China’s GDP growth would fall to 3% or under for three of the last four years. Such a prolonged period of low growth could well mean that China never manages the leap which Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan have previously managed from being a manufacturing labor-led economy to being an innovation-led developed economy. Being consigned to this so-called “middle income trap” while simultaneously being trapped in demographic collapse would, quite simply, mean the end of Xi’s vision of national rejuvenation. More precariously for Xi, it would mean an end to the 100 Years Long March which Xi’s predecessors and compatriots in the Chinese Communist Party have been journeying on since 1949 (and even before). Xi understands this and Door 2 will not be flung open.
That leaves Door 3. This is the path of steady-as-she-goes with all of its inherent contradictions and all of its incremental pluses-and-minuses. Xi is determined to strike certain poses on the world stage and those may now be spotlighted and amplified: the posture of exaggerated friendship and increasing fraternization with a former Communist super-power is essential to the realization of the ‘Big Power’ role which Xi has set for China in his third term as well as for the ballast which it provides Xi in projecting himself as leader of an alternative to the liberal, U.S.-led, post-WW2 order. At a symbolic level, Xi can continue to ratchet up this image for a global audience, as he is doing currently with this visit to Moscow. At the level of practice, however, Xi cannot afford to risk further blows to China’s economy. He will refrain from taking any decisive step towards arming Moscow. In so doing, he will doubtless look for additional ways to support Putin’s war effort at the margins while forestalling any large-scale economic retaliation from the U.S. and other global Ukraine coalition countries.. This symbolism-heavy, practical-action-light approach follows the game-plan which Xi successfully ran with the militarization of the islands and reefs in the South and East China Seas. Taking a series of small steps, each of which was just below the threshold of triggering a forceful reaction from the U.S. and its allies, but which cumulatively over time secured the strategic objective he was seeking. The “boil a frog slowly’ strategy. Just as importantly, it is strongly in Xi’s interest that Russia not suffer sudden defeat and “disappear” from the global stage. Xi’s interest is for Russia’s to remain on stage but moving gradually away from center-stage to make room for China’s more prominent presence there. This shift is already well underway as China, on a daily basis, gains increasing control over Russia’s energy market, its financial sector, its diplomacy and its geopolitical positioning vis-a-vis Siberia and the Russian East.
My prediction for what will unfold later today and tomorrow — and then subsequently in the aftermath of Xi’s visit — is the gradual opening of Door Number Three. That is not to say that Xi could not ultimately surprise us. He has proven himself to be a risk-taker — and has gotten off lightly — with both the South & East China Seas militarization and with the Basic Security Law takeover of Hong Kong. Could he open Door Number 2? Yes, possibly. Alternatively, he possibly has something up his sleeve to entice Zelensky into talks with. Is Door Number 1 locked, bolted and sealed shut? No. But there’s no reason to believe that Xi wants to put in the hard work to open that door. Whatever ultimately transpires, though, the prize for Xi lies behind Door Number 3. He is shrewd enough to know that and act on it.
Less than twenty-four hours ago, Xi Jinping was officially confirmed for his third term as President of the People’s Republic of China at the Two Sessions meetings in Beijing. This ribbon-tying exercise completes a package of norm-shattering consolidation of power put in place last fall at the 22nd National People’s Congress. At each iteration, the NPC shuffles and updates the power structure within the China Communist Party and, a half-year later, the Two Sessions then translates those positions of power into the State Council and other organs of national administration. The CCP controls the “goods” of authority and power, the State Council just “delivers” them.
In the week leading up to Xi’s securing a historic third term as President at this year’s Two Sessions, there was a war of words between China and the U.S. about the future of the U.S.-China relationship and, by extension, the world. Over the next week, I will peel back a couple of layers of that particular onion including my thoughts on the role being played by Qin Gang, Xi’s newly-appointed Foreign Minister fresh from his most recent assignment as Ambassador to the United States.
As for today, the focus is on highly-encoded pronouncements…
Politically, the Chinese Communist Party has a well-established practice of formulating, and telegraphing, its most-determined policy directions in Five Year Plans and in periodic, quite abstruse revisions to the pantheon of CCP ideology (such as the replacement of Deng Xiaoping’s “great international circulation” theory by Xi’s “dual circulation” theory in 2020). Although highly-revealing of PRC political intentions, this is head-spinning stuff and requires both facility with the Chinese language and a questing spirit to enter the labyrinth of PRC ideological discourse.
There is a simpler, pithier way to read the tea-leaves, however. Culturally, the Chinese language has a genius for encoding highly complex thinking in short bursts of characters, as illustrated most commonly by the pervasive use of 成语 four-character expressions. This predisposition to distill complexity into concise character sets shows itself in occasional 24-character sets of instruction delivered by China’s top leaders. Very occasional, highly formulaic, deeply revealing.
Until this year’s Two Sessions, the last of these had been delivered by Deng Xiaoping in 1990, following the convulsion of Tiananmen and in the lead-up to his recommitment to capitalism with Chinese characteristics during his Southern Tour. That 24 character edit read:
冷静观察 Observe calmly
稳住阵脚 secure our position
沉着应付 cope with affairs calmly
韬 光养晦 hide our capacities and bide our time
善于守拙 be good at maintaining a low profile
决不当头 never claim leadership
During the past week’s Two Sessions, Xi Jinping provided his oracular update to Deng Xiaoping’s pronouncement (and, in so doing, continued his program of positioning himself center-stage with Mao and relegating Deng to the wings). Xi’s version reads:
沉着冷静 Be calm
保持定力 keep determined
稳中求进 seek progress & stability
积极作为 be proactive & achieve things
团结一致 unite (under the banner of the party)
敢于斗争 dare to fight
As with Chinese four character expressions, a few words can speak volumes. Xi’s words — and his insertions of change within a decades-old formula of continuity — speak for themselves.
P.S. I am indebted to Moritz Rudolf for his translation of these two 24-character auguries. His translation is better than mine would have been.
In my network, there’s a lot of interest in — and considerable disagreement over — the meaningfulness of the PRC statement of principles toward resolving the Ukraine crisis released on Friday. I gave my on-the-spot personal view in the post 1% Words, 99% Work on the day of the statement’s release but, since then, I have been fielding comments and questions from a number of friends and associates.
I am going to share here one of those conversations. The questions were posed to me by another college classmate, in this case a person with a lifetime of deep and wide professional experience in China. I hope that these questions and answers might prompt readers of Assessing China to continue to think about this issue in a curiosity-forward and thoughtful way.
Here is the Q&A exchange:
What factual inaccuracies do you find in it (the official PRC Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis)?
- It’s important to note at the outset that this is a position paper (clarifying the PRC’s own position) rather than a peace proposal (aimed at bringing the two warring sides together). With that in mind, the PRC is perfectly entitled to set out their position in any 12 — or any 120 — points which they chose. However, it is also clear that they are using this position paper in order to position themselves to be seen as a potential mediator between the two warring parties. Whether they pull off that positioning exercise depends both on whether the PRC proves ready, willing and able to play that role and whether key parties to the conflict support them playing that role.
- Factual problems are only one dimension of what can be problematic in a document like this. On the factual inaccuracy front, I will limit myself to the very first point. Since 1945, there has been no definition of sovereignity which squares with Russia’s invasion. To this day, China has backed Putin’s language (a special military operation, not a war or invasion) and its worldview (revanchism and restoration by force of past empire are legit). If you can’t get past the first principle, it’s hard to take the rest of the document seriously. For the rest …
- Point 2: A dig at the U.S. An assertion with no real substance.
- Point 3: The question is how and under whose terms: 21st c. norms of forward-looking sovereignity protecting the rights of citizenry developed over the past 75+ years or the Putin/Xi aggrieved, backward-looking version all in the mind of an individual leader with the power to enforce conformity to his — it’s usually a man — viewpoint
- Point 4: We can all hope for peace talks but neither of the warring party appears ready to consider these. They each hope to establish a position of strength before entering into them. Temporary stalemate.
- Point 5: There’s a lot China could do unilaterally on this point. Words are cheap. The U.S and the West have demonstrably done a lot already. China?
- Points 6, 7, 8 & 9: Who has been the responsible party for these specific problems? Hardly a gray area to my mind. Russian summary execution of captured soldiers and civilians in Bukha and other villages they invaded and occupied. Russian forcible evacuations of children to camps in Russia. Russian sustained artillery assaults on the nuclear plant at Zaporizhzhia (not to mention indiscriminate attacks on civilian infrastructure). Russian interdiction of Ukrainian grain exports at ports and railways. What are the comparables from the Ukrainian side? I personally don’t think there are many but, in any case, law always gives special consideration to the responder rather than the initiator, the defender rather than the attacker.
- Point 10: Equivalent to stripping Ukraine of one of the ways which the world community has provided to help them defend themselves.
- Points 11 & 12: We can all agree that these would be desirable
And what’s your view on why U.S hegemony has been good for the world for the last 70 years, despite some of the bad that we did?
- I’ll just offer two points of response
- Providing the world with a longer period of sustained peace — not perfect of course but far better than anything that preceded it — and also more measurable human advancement (educational, health, wealth, human rights) than previously achieved at any point in history
- Providing China with the opportunity, tools and resources to help raise 800 million of their citizens out of poverty
If “U.S. hegemony” is just part of China’s ideology, isn’t “democracy vs. autocracy” part of our ideology?
- I quite agree with you about the “U.S. hegemony” as contrasted with the “autocracy vs democracy” point. There are levels to that though and I focus on the third level:
- Level 1: both terms are established political science terms and describe real things in international behavior
- Level 2: as is their right, both Beijing and Washington choose to amplify the political concept that best suits their purpose
- Level 3: I come down against ceding there is equivalency between the two for two reasons:
- Focus on ‘hegemony’ is rooted in a sense of historical grievance and doesn’t offer the world much unless other players share that grievance and all agree to do something about it. ‘Authoritarianism vs democracy’ draws a clear distinction between two different systems and encourages everyone to think about, and ultimately choose, their preference. Xi is at liberty to assert China offers a superior form of democracy to Western liberal democracy. Not many governments or people around the world seem to buy into that. The U.S. has over 65 formal allies based on shared values rooted in liberal democracy and the post-WWII order. China has one — North Korea — and is working hard at adding Russia and Iran to the list
- There’s no inherent accountability to Xi’s and China’s use of the term hegemon in describing the U.S. Top-down and echoed throughout a propaganda apparatus which can’t be questioned because, as Marxist-Leninist doctrine holds, it definitionally represents what is best for the people. In the Biden Administration’s amplifying of “authoritarianism vs democracy” however, it can be questioned and jettisoned come January 2025 if that is the will of the majority of Americans.
Washington had been urging China since the beginning of Russia’s war to play some role in peace negotiations, and now it has offered to do so, outlining the basic principles. I think that’s a good thing. The U.S. cannot be an honest broker, nor can any country in NATO. Perhaps China could pay a useful role in stopping the fighting.
- I think what the U.S. has been urging China is (1) aspirationally, to encourage China to come down from fence-sitting and use its suasion with Moscow to promote post-WWII norms of sovereignity (versus might makes right) but (2) more importantly not to aid and abet the instigator in this war of choice with sanctions-cushioning actions and (c) definitely, definitely not with sanctions-evading support and supply of lethal munitions. China has chosen to completely reject (1) and (2) and, as for (3), is in advanced negotiation with Russia to set pricing and scale of supply for offensive drones and ammunition, possibly also artillery.
- The U.S. and NATO don’t offer themselves or pretend to be honest brokers. They have clearly taken the side and will continue to take the side of Ukraine since Feb 24, 2022. The fundamental problem is that China is trying to have its cake and eat it too — on the one hand, giving consistent, significant and now increasing levels of support for Russia over the past twelve months while also now posturing with this position paper as a potential honest broker. I share your hopes and think its good that Zelinsky will meet with Xi. I just don’t expect that, in the final analysis, much will come of it for the reasons outlined above.
My concluding comment: I commend this interlocutor for asking thoughtful and useful questions. Many of the exchanges I had were with people who wanted to convince me that their interpretation of the situation was the correct one. One of the common denominators of those perspectives seems rooted in fear … fear of the Ukraine crisis spilling over into nuclear strikes, fear of the U.S. government missing a chance to work with China to resolve the situation, fear of the U.S. finding itself on the wrong side of history as Brazil, Hungary, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, South Africa, India and Indonesia gravitate into a Chinese orbit. I personally do not share those fears. In fact, I believe that the surest way of avoiding any of those scenarios becoming even plausible is for us to lose the clear-sightedness and the bedrock values which have guided our reaction to Russia and China since February 24, 2021.
I received an email yesterday from a college friend who is bright, informed and engaged with world events. She is not a China specialist but over the last few years we have had an on-going exchange of views about China, both privately and in a public forum.
Her message from yesterday read,”Terry: Yikes. Do you have access to Le Monde? I can’t read the rest of the article, but the first half is alarming. R.” The article she hyperlinked is from Le Monde and that article in turn hyperlinks to a strategy document which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has just released in conjunction with the visit by Wang Yi, Xi Jinping’s principal foreign policy advisor, to Munich for the 59th Munich Security Conference with NATO member countries and then on to Russia for meetings with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and yesterday with Putin himself. The document is titled “American hegemony and its dangers.” As headlined — accurately, I might add — in the Le Monde article, the focus of Xi’s Foreign Ministry is now on “‘direct confrontation with the United States.”
Today’s brief post is both my response to her and a way of brushing off the cobwebs after a long holiday vacation — lasting from Thanksgiving through Chinese New Year — I have taken from Assessing China.
To keep it simple, there are two main reasons that this newly overt stance of direct confrontation with the U.S. comes as no surprise from Xi’s PRC in 2023.
The first goes back as far as 1921 with the founding of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Shanghai. Inspired by the Bolsheviks’ gains in the October Revolution, Chen Duxiu and other founding leaders of the CCP made Leninist ideology (soon to become Leninist-Stalinist ideology after Stalin’s rise to power in 1924) the central tent-pole of the party. According to that ideology, the bases of CCP power were the Three P’s — the Party, the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) and propaganda. Since seizing the mainland and ousting Chiang Kaishek’s rival Kuomintang Party in 1949, the centrality of this ideology has only been tested twice. The first was the slow-boil Sino-Soviet split which began in 1956 and culminated in 1972 when China turned its back on its Big Brother in Communist ideology and welcomed Richard Nixon. The second came with the introduction of Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms which started experimentally in 1978 and were formally adopted in 1982.
The effect of these reforms was monumental. For the first time since 1921, decision-making within the CCP was to be based on a predictable economic logic and not on malleable political ideology. It ushered in a 30-year period of economic growth which according to the World Bank has lifted 800 million people out of poverty. Western observers, myself included, tended to assume that this three decade burst of wealth creation under the post-WWII Pax Americana would be enough to make PRC leadership want to become a permanent “stakeholder” in this global order. In hindsight, we underestimated the strength of the CCP’s ideological ‘muscle memory,’ of its basic political motivation and of China’s civilizational pride (and resentments). What is a seventy-five year Post-WWII order measured against a four thousand year civilizational record in which the Peoples’ Republic of China is, in cultural terms, its latest dynasty. And, as Orville Schell has masterfully made the case in Wealth and Power, not even Deng Xiaoping probably ever saw wealth-creation for China in a Washington-led world order as an end in itself, but rather as a step toward global power that would enable China to challenge that world order in due course. For Xi Jinping, a true ideologue inspired by his father’s revolutionary experience, that time is now.
Secondly, the path that China has been taking to overt confrontation with the West has been revealing itself in planned and increasingly obvious stages ever since 2008. 2008 was the year of the Global Financial Crisis, which China weathered with less turmoil and damage than the advanced economies in the West and Asia. That is the year that CCP leadership started taking stock of what it had gained in capital accumulation and talent acquisition and began thinking about striking out on its own different path. There was still a need to access Western consumer and financial markets and to promote inflow of management expertise along with inbound investment but the critical need was technology. In 2008, China was in no position to compete with the West and Western-aligned countries like Japan, Taiwan and South Korea in advanced technology. For that reason, over the next fifteen years, CCP ambitions were always partially cloaked but increasingly revealed with each Five Year Plan cycle. (See Xi’s Ascension to the CCP Pantheon for a more detailed mapping of that 15-year course). In 2012, the CCP selected Xi Jinping as the horse they would ride on this epochal journey. He would break the mold which Deng Xiaoping had set limiting Chinese leaders to two five-year terms. And he would use his longer leash to bring Hong Kong and Taiwan to heel before stepping down. To usher in the next Five Year cycle of the Politburo in 2017, Xi gave a triumphalist speech telling the world what to expect in the years ahead. Now, fresh from securing an unprecedented third term of formal power last year, Xi is moving to make those stated intentions a reality. The pandemic and Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Biden’s CHIPS Act were not part of the plan. But Xi and the CCP are ‘unswerving’ in pushing forward with this plan. It has been fifteen years in the making and, for much of it, the U.S. and its allies have been distracted in the Middle East and Ukraine. With its population now in decline, Xi knows the window is closing for him to reshape the global order to his and the CCP’s liking.
With ‘ideology in command’ and riding fifteen years of planning momentum, China’s direction under Xi is now clear for all to see. Xi’s strategic accommodation with junior partner (and client-state energy supplier) Russia last February was simply another way-station on its path. The path to open confrontation with the leaders of the post-WWII order, and the scramble for influence with less tightly aligned global players like Brazil, Hungary, Turkey, South Africa, India and Indonesia, is afoot.
Autocracy vs Democracy. Game on.
It has been a long journey to reach this moment …
- In 1972, Nixon traveled to China
- In 1973, the Philadelphia Orchestra became the first international orchestra to perform in China
- In 1974, I began to study Mandarin at college
- In 1976, Mao died (and the Cultural Revolution with him)
- In 1978, Deng and the CCP began experimenting with economic reforms
- In 1979, Carter normalized relations
- In 1980, I traveled to the mainland for the first time
- 1n 1982, at its 12th National Party Congress, China adopted economic reforms as its priority policy
Just this past week — forty years later at its 20th Party Congress — China under Xi has formally abandoned economic growth as its top priority for national development (along with the international partnerships on which that growth depended for trade, investment, access to capital markets and innovation) and prioritized instead “security” (with all the ideological baggage which that entails in Xi’s worldview).
Put simply, Xi has just crossed the Rubicon …
I wrote on Monday in Ideologues Meet Markets that I would share my considered view on the implications of the just concluded 20th National Party Congress after a few days of rumination and reflection. I am doing so now. Xi has just crossed the Rubicon. His move not only upends a forty-year trajectory of the most dynamic economic growth ever witnessed in the world, it threatens — more ominously — the foundations of the post-WWII international order and the unprecedented seventy-year run of (relative) peace the world has enjoyed at the global level.
An extremely well observed account of what this moment means is contained in the political economist Yuen Yuen Ang’s opinion piece in today’s New York Times. I reproduce below that piece in its entirety:
China’s Era of Reform Has Officially Ended
By Yuen Yuen Ang
Forty-four years ago, Deng Xiaoping kicked off the period of “reform and opening up” that transformed China from a poor, autarkic nation into an emerging global power.
President Xi Jinping officially ended that era last week. He emerged from the Chinese Communist Party’s congress in Beijing with unchallenged authority and plans for China that revolve around his obsession with control and security — even if that means harming the economy.
It’s a momentous change in outlook.
Deng Xiaoping’s strategy for China’s spectacular economic achievements had two main components. The first was a collective leadership arrangement within the Communist Party. Deng rejected Western-style democracy, but China’s tumultuous decades under Mao Zedong had taught him that one-man rule is dangerous. He and the party introduced partial checks and balances into politics at the highest level, including term limits. The second component was a single-minded pursuit of economic growth that, Deng famously declared, would be China’s “hard principle.” Officials throughout China dove headlong into promoting growth at all costs — bringing prosperity but also corruption, inequality and heavy industrial pollution.
Last week in Beijing, Mr. Xi dismantled those foundations. He ensured that he would remain paramount leader of China for a third term — if not for life — and packed the party’s leadership with loyalists while heavily prioritizing national security over the pursuit of economic growth.
In his speech to the party congress at the Great Hall of the People on Oct. 16, he mentioned “security” significantly more often than “economy,” a major break with precedent. He went further, declaring unambiguously, “National security is the bedrock of national rejuvenation, and social stability is a prerequisite for building a strong and prosperous China.”
In Chinese politics, small changes in wording can herald big shifts in ideology and policy. If there were any remaining doubts about Mr. Xi’s intentions, he dispelled them by vowing that China would stick to its zero-Covid policy, “without wavering.” His government’s approach to the pandemic, a public health policy in name, is in reality the most powerful security tool devised by the Communist Party, restricting access to the country and controlling who can go where, underpinned by tracking apps that citizens and visitors must have on their smartphones.
For observers long accustomed to Deng’s growth-first ethos, Mr. Xi’s policy choice is mind-boggling. The Covid controls are angering citizens, crippling China’s economy, decimating domestic consumption, disrupting manufacturing and logistics, and repelling foreign and local investors alike.
Why is the most powerful Chinese leader in decades so obsessed with security and domestic control that he would sacrifice the economy? The answer lies in an array of domestic and foreign challenges, some worsened by Mr. Xi’s own policy choices.
Politically, he probably fears the proverbial knife in the back after making enemies through a decade-long anti-corruption campaign in which thousands of officials — possibly including potential political rivals — were punished and is doubling down on repression out of his instinct for self-preservation.
On the economic front, he faces smoldering crises, including an economy that is slowing sharply, a property sector meltdown and record-breaking youth unemployment. These problems have been exacerbated by the Covid controls and by Mr. Xi’s “common prosperity” campaign — a strategy for narrowing inequality and addressing monopolistic behavior by big tech firms and other private companies, which was punctuated by an abrupt and sweeping regulatory crackdown last year that has alarmed investors. The market backlash was intense: Within months, more than a trillion dollars in value at many of China’s most innovative companies evaporated.
On foreign policy, Mr. Xi has projected an ambition to challenge American primacy. The Trump administration’s chaotic handling of the pandemic prompted Mr. Xi to boast that “the East is rising and the West is declining.” But his triumphalism was premature. China is far from an even match with the United States in economic, military or technological power. And while American democracy is in crisis, the United States remains strong, a true superpower and a free country able to criticize and renew itself. Mr. Xi criticizes the West for seeking to contain China, but his hubris and aggressive approach helped bring about this threat.
To be sure, Mr. Xi does not intend to completely abandon the capitalist success that rejuvenated China and brought global respect and influence. And to his credit, he has confronted serious problems that his predecessors swept under the rug, particularly corruption and economic inequality. His vision of a powerful China, respected on the global stage, is warranted given his country’s size and economic clout.
But addressing China’s myriad problems will require measured steps that Mr. Xi seems disinclined to take. Putting out fires in China’s economy must begin with relaxing Covid restrictions and importing more effective vaccines, something that his government has prevented. These won’t be miracle cures, but they are necessary first steps that will go a long way toward alleviating stress on China’s people and reassuring investors that his leadership team has not lost all sense.
Mr. Xi has plunged China into a vicious cycle: A hubristic and authoritarian leader, unaccountable to society and unchallenged even by his own advisers, makes poor policy choices, which add to his problems, exacerbating his fears of a revolt and leading to more repression.
The consequences of his decision to emphasize security over economic vibrancy will be global. China is the world’s second-largest economy and the biggest trading partner of dozens of countries. A prolonged economic slowdown in China will increase the risk of a global recession, with many countries sharing the pain. In the long run, there may be winners as China’s waning competitiveness hastens a shift in global supply chains to other emerging economies. But if China turns inward, it will lose. Chinese tech companies are already expanding overseas to compensate for a restrictive home environment.
China’s great capitalist revolution under Deng and his successors is now history. So is Mr. Xi’s first 10 years in office, when there was at least a minimal layer of checks on his power from moderate, non-loyalist officials. China under Mao and the former Soviet Union proved that absolute dictatorships fail miserably at making nations prosperous and strong. They bring only impoverishment and false security. Mr. Xi is likely to relearn those lessons in the coming years.
Yuen Yuen Ang (@yuenyuenang) is a political economist and the author of “Chinaʼs Gilded Age” and “How China Escaped the Poverty Trap.”
I’ll give my wrap on the conclusion of the 20th Party Congress in Beijing later in the week after some further digestion and rumination.
Meanwhile, here’s a graphic putting today’s market reaction to Xi’s consolidation of power into some context. Entirely different timelines and denouements but same implacable forces at work …
As we await Sunday’s introduction of the official lineup for the 25-person Politburo, the 7-person Standing Committee, and the putative Premier and the President for the next five years, what has already become clear is that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has gone all in on Xi Jinping. While the field might possibly look somewhat different at the next Party Congress, the broad contours for the global picture for the coming five years are becoming clear. The bold brushstrokes were drawn by Xi during his nearly two-hour speech delivered last Sunday. Since then, there have been ample signs of what’s to come. The team being assembled around Xi will be made up of apprentices filling in with finer brush strokes for Xi, not near-peers willing to argue for painting a different landscape.
So what are the big takeaways from the Congress so far for the global community to consider?
- “The great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” is the goal for the CCP and Xi alike. There’s no daylight between Xi Jinping and the Party on this point. China wants back at the center of the world.
- Zero-COVID policy can only change marginally. It bears the weight of Xi’s claim that “Chinese-style democracy” is superior to traditional Western-style democracy. Look, fewer people died, right?
- Whatever the economic headwinds, the ship of state will stay “secure” and on-course as long as Xi is at the helm. (Translation: state security and ideology to be prioritized over Deng’s economic reforms)
- Taiwan’s incorporation into China — which, post-Hong Kong, is now only feasible by outright coercion or military force — is the sine qua non of the full achievement of China’s great rejuvenation
And what are some key things that we’ll be watching in this this space in the weeks and months ahead to gauge Xi’s and the CCP’s success in making progress toward this vision:
- Fall-out from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (neither of which were mentioned once in Xi’s speech)
- Performance of China’s economy in light of Covid lockdowns, real estate sector implosion, regulatory crackdown on tech firms, and the drag of Belt & Road Initiative debt burdens
- Push-back from the U.S. and Europe, from non-aligned nations and the developing world, and from China’s own citizens as Xi pushes dictatorship with Chinese characteristics as his “new choice for humanity.”
- And, most crucially from my individual perspective, the “tech-tonic” shocks upending global economies as competition over microchip innovation, production and supply continues to ramp up
The Fat Lady won’t be singing in Beijing until Sunday but we know who’s in the lead after three innings. In the deciding game of this once-every-five year series, the Emperor For Life team currently holds a three-to-nothing lead over the Court of Rivals team.
Who scored? As reported by Josh Chin in today’s Wall Street Journal (see below), Ding Xuexiang, Xi’s Chief of Staff, and Li Qiang, party boss in Shanghai, are both being widely mooted in Beijing as favorites to land Standing Committee appointments. Both are “Xi’s men.” Given the nature of the National Congress process, a candidate whose name is being touted loudly at this stage of the process is almost guaranteed to be formally anointed come Sunday. Additionally, the fact that Li Qiang’s name is being advanced as the likely Premier to replace Li Keqiang means another run based on the scoring system set up in my Chutes and Ladders post last Friday. So, after three innings, score three for the Emperor For LIfe team.
The third name being picked in today’s reporting by Josh Chin is Li Xi, the top party official in Guangdong Province. This player is harder to score in the sense that Guangdong is the province most committed to international trade and investment and Xi has been actively narrowing that space. For instance, during his nearly two hour speech during the opening of the Congress on Sunday, Xi mentioned “security” (read, “surveillance”, “lack of consumer data protection” and “insecurity for private investors”) more than sixty time while giving lip-service to market forces only three ties. Of course, Xi may be bringing Li Xi on board precisely to keep Guangdong on a tight leash but there’s at least some possibility that Li Xi could represent a balancing perspective representing power blocs more committed to maintenance of international trade linkages, if not economic liberalization. We’ll score Li Xi as a Court of Rivals batter who was stranded on second without scoring. After three innings, no runs in for Court of Rivals team.
Final comment: The score may only be 3-0, but the game is shaping up as a total rout by Team Emperor For Life.
Stay tuned for further updates as we get to the later innings. For now, take a look at Josh Chin’s fine reporting below from today’s Wall Street Journal.
China’s Xi Jinping Likely to Pack Party Leadership With Allies in Show of Strength
Shanghai party chief is a front-runner for premier, people close to party leaders say, despite outrage over Covid-19 lockdown
Chinese leader Xi Jinping is preparing to name loyalists to top positions in the Communist Party hierarchy, according to people close to party leaders, in a move that would strengthen his hand as he confronts mounting challenges at home and abroad—from a sluggish domestic economy to Western resistance to Beijing’s ambitions on the world stage.
One of the allies Mr. Xi aims to promote is Li Qiang, currently the top party official in Shanghai, the people said. Earlier this year, Mr. Li shouldered blame for a weekslong Covid-19 lockdown during which tens of millions of residents in the country’s financial center struggled to access food and medical care.
Mr. Li is likely to be elevated to the Politburo Standing Committee, the party’s top decision-making body, according to the people, who say the 63-year-old is also considered a leading contender to be named premier at China’s annual legislative gathering next spring.
China’s premier has traditionally assumed responsibility for the country’s economy, which has been battered in recent months by Mr. Xi’s zero-tolerance approach to Covid-19, a dramatic downturn in the property market and a regulatory crackdown that has created uncertainty for business.
China’s National Bureau of Statistics postponed the release of third-quarter gross-domestic-product data on Monday, a day before it was set to be published. An official at the statistics bureau cited unspecified work arrangements as the reason for the delay.
Others likely to join the Standing Committee include Mr. Xi’s chief of staff, Ding Xuexiang, and the top party official in Guangdong province, Li Xi, who once worked as a secretary to a veteran of the Communist revolution with close ties to Mr. Xi’s family.
The people close to party leaders cautioned that final deliberations on the makeup of the Standing Committee won’t be revealed until Sunday when the party elite is due to complete the membership of its top decision-making bodies for the next term.
China’s State Council Information Office didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The makeup of the next Standing Committee and the identity of the next premier have been the subject of intense speculation among Chinese politics watchers ahead of this week’s twice-a-decade party congress in Beijing, where Mr. Xi is poised to break with recent precedent and claim a third term as party leader.
While Mr. Xi seems assured of securing another five years in power, growing public frustration over his management of Covid-19 and the economy has provided ammunition to potential rivals trying to check his power by ensuring his allies don’t monopolize senior appointments.
If Mr. Xi gets his way, despite the pushback, he would surround himself with like-minded officials and upend succession norms that the party had honed over recent decades to prevent a return to Mao-style dictatorship. This might make it easier for Mr. Xi to pursue his priorities, but it also raises the stakes should that agenda fail, political analysts said.
“The risk of things going wrong and him getting the blame is much greater,” said Ryan Manuel, managing director of Bilby, a Hong Kong-based artificial intelligence firm that analyzes Chinese government documents.
With more allies holding key positions, Mr. Xi, who turns 70 next year, may start to delegate some of his authority to his trusted lieutenants as he gets more advanced in age, some of the people said. He has fewer political opponents to worry about, having neutralized many of them with anticorruption purges and cut off retired party elders from meddling in politics, they said.
A promotion for Li Qiang would mark a surprising political comeback. He appeared to be given extra leeway in handling a local Covid-19 outbreak in Shanghai in February, but infections spread out of control. A wave of online anger over the ensuing lockdown spilled over into physical clashes with officials, prompting several analysts to predict Mr. Li had lost his chance at making the Standing Committee.
China’s current premier, Li Keqiang, is due to step down next spring after completing two five-year terms—the maximum allowed under China’s constitution. He has occasionally contradicted Mr. Xi and pressured the Chinese leader to dial back policies seen as hurting growth. Political analysts nevertheless consider him one of China’s least influential premiers, whose sway over the economy dissipated as Mr. Xi centralized decision-making in his own hands.
Li Qiang, Li Xi and Li Keqiang aren’t related.
Analysts say other candidates to succeed Li Keqiang include Wang Yang, the head of China’s top government advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, and Hu Chunhua, currently the youngest among the country’s four vice premiers. In recent decades, Chinese premiers had prior experience as vice premier, a criterion that both Messrs. Wang and Hu satisfy.
Some foreign officials and academics have regarded Messrs. Wang and Hu as standard bearers for liberal-minded overhauls that favor market principles. Both are seen as being outside Mr. Xi’s orbit, having been brought along by other political patrons, though both have publicly backed the Chinese leader’s policies. The people close to party leaders said Mr. Hu may fall short of making the Standing Committee.
Among likely new members of the Standing Committee, Li Xi, Guangdong’s party chief since 2017, could step up as the next chief of the party’s top anticorruption watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the people said.
Mr. Ding, the 60-year-old aide to Mr. Xi, is positioned to be named executive vice premier early next year, according to the people.
Top party theorist Wang Huning and anticorruption czar Zhao Leji are likely to join Mr. Xi as the only members of the current Standing Committee to get another term, though both are likely to be given new responsibilities, the people said.
He Lifeng, the top official at China’s state economic-planning agency and a friend of Mr. Xi since the 1980s, is likely to assume control over economic and financial policy, The Wall Street Journal previously reported. In this role, Mr. He would succeed Vice Premier Liu He, who has been Mr. Xi’s top economic adviser and his point man in trade talks with Washington.
The people close to party leaders and political analysts say Mr. Xi isn’t expected to elevate any potential successors to the Standing Committee, as doing so would undermine his own authority as paramount leader.
Both Li Qiang and Li Xi are too close to Mr. Xi in age to be considered viable successors. While Mr. Ding is younger, he has never served as a regional party boss—an experience long considered an unwritten prerequisite for candidates seeking China’s top political office.
Many in the business community see Li Qiang as a relatively liberal party leader who prefers discussing commercial deals to politics. In the early 2000s, he served as the top commerce official in the coastal province of Zhejiang, home to what would become major private companies including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. He was later promoted to party secretary of Wenzhou, a city in Zhejiang that became a thriving entrepreneurial hub after China opened up its economy in the late 1970s.
After Mr. Xi became party leader in 2012, Mr. Li took top jobs in the relatively affluent regions of Zhejiang and Jiangsu, before he was elevated to Shanghai party boss in 2017.
If Mr. Xi can make Li Qiang premier, he would be able to consolidate control over the formulation of economic and social policy, said Chen Gang, a senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore’s East Asian Institute. “China’s reform and opening will continue, but the pace will slow down. Zero-Covid policy will continue, and Li may rely on stimulus policies to boost the economy,” he predicted.
Write to Josh Chin at Josh.Chin@wsj.com
Kevin Rudd, global president of the Asia Society and former Prime Minister of Australia, knows China well. He wrote in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal that:”The 20th Congress, which gets under way Oct. 16th will be different (from other Congresses since the opening of the 1982 reform era). There’s only one appointment that matters now: Xi Jinping, China’s Chairman of Everything. The delegates will reappoint Mr. Xi to a third five-year term as general secretary by a vote of 2,296 to 0.”
I don’t disagree with the main point that Kevin Rudd is making here but there is also a more nuanced view that is important to bring to bear. Wednesday’s post set the table for this more nuanced view. That perspective involves understanding the seven appointments which will be announced on Sunday to the Standing Committee under Xi. The crux of the issue is whether those seven appointments represents a line-up of Xi loyalists — in which case Rudd’s take is spot on — or whether there are appointments enfranchising power-bases at odds with Xi’s direction and indicating that the Party wants some checks on Xi’s untrammeled authority.
Here’s my cheat-sheet to reading next week’s Standing Committee appointments in light of this question:
Chutes & Ladders: 20th CPP National Congress Edition
So what to watch for?
(Scenario 1) Signs that the CCP is totally bought into Xi being Chairman of Everything
— Premier Li Keqiang (aged 67 and therefore normatively eligible for another term) is gone
— No one in their early 50s joins the Standing Committee (showing Xi doesn’t want heir apparent)
— Chen Min’er, a Xi loyalist and champion of Xi’s war on poverty, is appointed
— Ding Xuexiang, a Xi loyalist and Xi policy enforcer, is appointed
(Scenario 2) Signs that the CCP wants some checks on Xi’s untrammeled exercise of power
— He Lifeng, an internationally-friendly protégé of retiring economic czar Liu He, is appointed
— Hu Chunhua, who like Xi had a stellar early career but hasn’t been close with him since, is appointed
— Li Hongzhong, party boss of Tianjin and not “a dyed-in-the-wool” Xi man, is appointed
— Li Xi, party boss of independently minded Guangdong province, is appointed
Finally, keep an eye on Chen Quanguo, party boss of Xinjiang in charge of Uyghur “reeducation,” and Liu Jieyi, head of the Taiwan Affairs Office and the political dimension of the Taiwan reunification project. Whether their stars shine brightly or dim will also give an indication of the degree of CCP support for Xi’s hardline policies on these two fronts.
So that’s the scorecard I recommend you follow. We’ll circle back next week and tally up the score after the Standing Committee line-up has been brought out, in rank order, onto the main stage of the 20th National Party Congress.
______Assessing China / The TEA Collaborative______ 