Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

Reassessing Collective Leadership

Cheng Li

• Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9780815726920
• eBook ISBN: 9780815726937
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Asian Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Chinese politics are at a crossroads as President Xi Jinping amasses personal power and tests the constraints of collective leadership.
In the years since he became general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012, Xi Jinping has surprised many people in China and around the world with his bold anti-corruption campaign and his aggressive consolidation of power.
Given these new developments, we must rethink how we analyze Chinese politics—an urgent task as China now has more influence on the global economy and regional security than at any other time in modern history.
Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era examines how the structure and dynamics of party leadership have evolved since the late 1990s and argues that ""inner-party democracy""—the concept of collective leadership that emphasizes deal making based on accepted rules and norms—may pave the way for greater transformation within China's political system. Xi's legacy will largely depend on whether he encourages or obstructs this trend of political institutionalization in the governance of the world's most populous and increasingly pluralistic country.
Cheng Li also addresses the recruitment and composition of the political elite, a central concern in Chinese politics. China analysts will benefit from the meticulously detailed biographical information of the 376 members of the 18th Central Committee, including tables and charts detailing their family background, education, occupation, career patterns, and mentor-patron ties.

CHAPTER 1

Governance

Collective Leadership Revisited

Things don’t have to be or look identical in order to be balanced or equal.

—MAYA LIN 林璎

This book examines how the structure and dynamics of the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) have evolved in response to the challenges the party has confronted since the late 1990s. This study pays special attention to the issue of leadership selection and composition, which is a perpetual concern in Chinese politics. Using both quantitative and qualitative analyses, this volume assesses the changing nature of elite recruitment, the generational attributes of the leadership, the checks and balances between competing political coalitions or factions, the behavioral patterns and institutional constraints of heavyweight politicians in the collective leadership, and the interplay between elite politics and broad changes in Chinese society. This study also links new trends in elite politics to emerging currents within the Chinese intellectual discourse on the tension between strongman politics and collective leadership and its implications for political reforms. A systematic analysis of these developments—and some seeming contradictions—will help shed valuable light on how the world’s most populous country will be governed in the remaining years of the Xi Jinping era and beyond.

This study argues that the survival of the CCP regime in the wake of major political crises such as the Bo Xilai episode and rampant official corruption is not due to “authoritarian resilience”—the capacity of the Chinese communist system to resist political and institutional changes—as some foreign China analysts have theorized. Rather, China’s leadership has survived and thrived over the past three decades because it has continually sought new mechanisms, institutional regulations, policy measures, and political norms to resolve its inherent deficiencies and inadequacies. Whether foreign analysts like them or not, some of these institutional developments are actually much more extensive and even more “democratic” (at least at the intraparty level) than the outside world has generally recognized or appreciated. By keeping abreast of changes—especially those resulting from the development of new, dynamic forces in Chinese society—and adapting accordingly, the CCP has maintained its grip on one-party rule.

XI’S CONSOLIDATION OF POWER: REVERSING THE TREND OF COLLECTIVE LEADERSHIP?

Over the past two decades, China has undergone a major transition in leadership structure and governance. The shift has often been characterized as a move from an era shaped by the arbitrary authority of an all-powerful strongman—first Mao, and then Deng—to a new era of collective leadership. This change means that the composition of the Politburo Standing Committee (PSC) is more important than ever before. Of particular significance are the idiosyncrasies of the body’s members, its group dynamics, and the balance of power between its factions. Over the past two periods of leadership, the party’s chief, beginning with Jiang Zemin of the third generation, and then Hu Jintao of the fourth generation, was merely seen as the “first among equals” in the collective leadership of the PSC.1 In contrast to the eras of Mao and Deng, China’s political structure, the rules and norms that govern its elite politics, and associated decisionmaking processes appear to have changed dramatically.

Five Main Areas of Change under Xi’s New Leadership

With the arrival of Xi Jinping in 2012 to 2013, the existing trend toward collective leadership has become less apparent, or possibly even reversed. Some observers argue that Xi’s leadership represents the “end of collective leadership” and the “reemergence of strongman politics.”2 In the first three years of his tenure as top leader, Xi Jinping surprised many China analysts with his bold and effective political moves and policy undertakings. To date, the initiatives that have stood out in Xi’s administration fall on five main fronts.

First, Xi quickly and skillfully concluded the Bo Xilai trial, which both the Chinese and international media called China’s “trial of the century.”3 The Bo Xilai case represented the greatest challenge to the party’s legitimacy since the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident and was widely perceived to be a “no-win” situation for the CCP leadership. The scandal exposed the decadent lifestyles of some high-ranking party leaders, including involvement with sex, drugs, money laundering, and even murder. Xi and his colleagues handled the case wisely. Prosecutors focused on Bo’s official corruption, not on his other unlawful or immoral behavior, thus avoiding a broader exposure of the Chinese political system’s flaws. They used social media to disseminate details of the courtroom proceedings, thereby undermining potential criticism of lack of openness. Bo’s verdict of life imprisonment seemed appropriate—neither too severe nor too lenient.

Second, with the support of his principal political ally in the PSC, “anticorruption tsar” Wang Qishan, Xi launched a remarkably tough national antigraft campaign. In 2013, for example, the Wang-led Central Commission for Discipline Inspection along with the Ministry of Supervision handled 172,000 corruption cases and investigated 182,000 officials—the highest annual number of cases in thirty years.4 By May 2016, the Xi leadership had purged a total of about 160 leaders at the vice-ministerial and provincial levels (副省部级, fushengbuji) on corruption charges, including twenty members of the 18th Central Committee of the CCP and one member of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.5 The twenty recently purged members of the 18th Central Committee are Ling Jihua (full member and former director of the United Front Work Department), Zhou Benshun (full member and former party secretary of Hebei), Yang Dongliang (full member and former director of the State Administration of Work Safety), Su Shulin (full member and former governor of Fujian), Li Dongsheng (full member and former executive vice-minister of Public Security), Jiang Jiemin (full member and former minister of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission), Yang Jinshan (full member and former vice-commander of the Chengdu Military Region), Wang Min (full member and former party secretary of Liaoning), Li Chuncheng (alternate member and former deputy party secretary of Sichuan), Wang Yongchun (alternate member and former vice president of the China National Petroleum Corporation), Wan Qingliang (alternate member and former party secretary of Guangzhou), Chen Chuanping (alternate member and former party secretary of Taiyuan), Pan Yiyang (alternate member and former executive vice-governor of Neimenggu), Zhu Mingguo (alternate member and former chair of the Guangdong People’s Political Consultative Conference), Fan Changmi (alternate member and former deputy political commissar of the Lanzhou Military Region), Wang Min (alternate member and former party secretary of Jinan), Yang Weize (alternate member and former party secretary of Nanjing), Qiu He (alternate member and former deputy party secretary of Yunnan), Yu Yuanhui (alternate member and former party secretary of Nanning City), and Lu Xiwen (alternate member and former deputy party secretary of Beijing). Seven of these forme...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures and Tables
• Acknowledgments
• Prologue. Leadership: A Central Issue in Chinese Politics
• 1. Governance: Collective Leadership Revisited
• 2. Structure: China’s Party-State System
• 3. Elites: Composition and Representation on the 18th Central Committee
• 4. Education: Advanced Degrees, Part-Time Training, and Study Abroad
• 5. Occupations: From Rule by Technocrats to a More Diverse Leadership
• 6. Mishu: Favoritism and Corruption in Elite Politics
• 7. Factions: One Party, Two Coalitions?
• 8. Protégés: Xi’s Inner Circle
• 9. Trajectory: The 19th National Party Congress and Changing Dynamics in Chinese Society
• List of Abbreviations
• Notes
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index