Burying Deng: Xi Jinping and the Abnormalization of Chinese Politics
If Xi Jinping has accomplished nothing else in his tenure, he has succeeded in methodically bending or breaking the norms that have bounded Chinese politics in the post-Mao era – burying Deng’s political legacy, one clump of dirt at a time. Although the press often characterizes Xi as the most powerful leader since Deng or even Mao, Xi has renovated the system for control rather than revolution or reformation. Xi’s most recent disruption of the norms of Chinese politics occurred at the end of 2023, when he derailed the political calendar by postponing the Party’s Third Plenum well into 2024 while instead convening a Foreign Affairs Work Conference (FAWC), which, prior to Xi’s tenure, was a relatively rare, epochal event. Over the course of his tenure, Xi has not only broken the old rules of the game of Chinese politics but has done so with impunity – and he has been rewarded for his risks. The edifice – or rather the façade – of “institutionalization” of the leadership has always been weaker than it appeared from the outside, and some of Deng’s reforms were likely doomed from the outset because of the paradoxes created by personalized power in PRC politics.
Even if Xi Jinping has achieved little else during his tenure, he has succeeded in methodically bending or breaking the norms that bounded Chinese politics in the post-Mao era – burying Deng’s political legacy one clump of dirt at a time. By the time of his death, Deng had left in place an inchoate – and admittedly imperfect – edifice of norms and a small handful of written rules that at the very least introduced a measure of predictability into the vicissitudes of Chinese elite politics during the post-Deng era. Deng’s tenure, of course, saw a wide range of reforms, but those that were most germane to the problem of constraining politicking at the top included:
Establishing a regular, if flexible, political calendar for the Party leadership;
Implementation of retirement norms;
Beginning to establish norms for succession;
Adopting a tacit “gentleman’s agreement” not to go after top officials (i.e., Politburo Standing Committee [PBSC] or Central Military Commission [CMC] members) for corruption
Today, none of these norms remains fully intact, and some have been utterly obliterated by Xi. Xi’s political demolition derby has been all the more remarkable when one considers that some saw initially Xi’s concurrent ascent to the top three positions of the Chinese system – chairman of the CMC, general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and president of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) – as the apotheosis of the “institutionalization” of Chinese politics. After all, before Xi’s assumption of power at the 18th Party Congress in 2012, the PRC had only pulled off one successful planned leadership transition – from Jiang Zemin to Hu Jintao in 2001–4. But even that succession was protracted and contentious, with Jiang hanging on as CMC chair until it became politically untenable. Prior to that transition, anointment as the heir-apparent – even in Deng’s time – was in fact a kind of “kiss of death”: all of Hu Jintao’s predecessors as heir-apparent ended up dead, purged, ousted, or marginalized. In hindsight, however, the transition to Xi was in fact the high-watermark for Deng’s political reforms.
Scrambling the Political Calendar
Xi’s most recent disruption of the norms of Chinese politics occurred at the end of 2023, when he derailed the political calendar by postponing the Party’s Third Plenum well into 2024., Outside China watchers for months had been preoccupied with the parlor game of guessing when the plenum might occur – and for good substantive reasons.[1] Given the scope of China’s economic troubles, observers were keen to know what measures Xi and the leadership might deploy to remedy these maladies. However, what was less remarked upon at the time was how remarkable this shift in the political calendar was, which should not have been underestimated. Xi’s postponement was akin to an American patriarch insisting that his family convene for a Thanksgiving turkey dinner over July 4th weekend rather than during the traditional anointed day. Since 1988 the Party had convened for the Third Plenum every five years with metronomic regularity –until Xi broke the cycle in 2023.[2]
Establishing a regular cadence of Party convocations is in and of itself one of the major renovations Deng made to the political system when he returned to power in the late 1970s. During the Mao years, Party congresses occurred sporadically, at one point going into abeyance for more than a decade. Indeed, of all the political reforms instituted in the Deng era, the prescribed political calendar is one of the few inscribed in the Party charter. Since 1982, the Party charter has mandated that the Central Committee should convene at least once every year and that the Party should convene a full Party congress every five years.[3] By postponing the Third Plenum in 2023, Xi bent rather than broke Deng’s rule. After all, the Central Committee – in keeping with precedent and the Party charter – had convened its Second Plenum in February to finalize the leadership transition begun at the 2022 Party congress, ensuring adherence to the letter of the CCP charter by meeting at least once during the calendar year of 2023.[4]
Notably, Xi not only postponed the Third Plenum in fall 2023 but during the period when the Third Plenum should have been held he instead convened a Foreign Affairs Work Conference (FAWC).[5] Prior to Xi’s tenure, FAWCs were relatively rare, epochal events. Mao convened the first such conference in 1971 prior to the opening to the United States.[6] Jiang hosted the second FAWC in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union.[7] Hu held the third in 2006.[8] Whereas Xi’s predecessors held three FAWCs during the entirety of PRC history, Xi has already convened three during his tenure – once in each of his terms (2014, 2018, and 2023) – thereby establishing these conferences as an irregular feature of the political calendar.[9] The most recent convocation can and should be seen as a reflection of Xi’s priorities going into 2024 – namely, that he was more concerned about foreign policy issues than China’s domestic economic problems. Such an assessment may seem somewhat extraordinary given China’s economic problems, but Xi’s restrained approach to stimulating the economy during the past year suggests that he and the top political leadership – rightly or wrongly – see China’s economic challenges as manageable. By contrast, the political calendar in 2024 presented to Xi and his colleagues the confluence of two foreseeable events poised to impact China’s foreign relations – first, Taiwan’s presidential election in January, and second, the U.S. presidential election in November. Indeed, in the run-up to Xi’s meeting with President Biden on the margins of the APEC Summit in November 2023, China shifted toward a policy aimed at mollifying Washington by restoring cooperation on issues of importance to the United States – such as counter-narcotics – and the resumption of military-to-military dialogues, suggesting that Xi may in fact have been using the FAWC to lay out PRC’s foreign policy approach for the coming year – and ahead of the potential for a disruptive return of Donald Trump to the White House.[10]
In the meantime, Xi’s postponement of the Third Plenum has disrupted the regular rhythm of Central Committee meetings. In the fall of 2024 the Central Committee should have convened for a Fourth Plenum, which typically should focus on governance issues.[11] But unlike last year, the China-watching commentariat this year has not even speculated on when this major Party meeting might occur, perhaps because its import is less salient to foreign audiences. Xi might very well restore the cadence of the political calendar by convening two plenums in a single year, but if he chooses to omit a plenum from the cycle it would be another telling data point about just how much Xi has reshaped political life in Beijing.
President for Life
This was not the first time that Xi has warped the political calendar to fit his priorities. The last time was in 2018 – just after he began his second term as general secretary in the prior October. Notably, in that instance Xi shoehorned in an atypical plenum in January 2018 on “PRC constitutional amendments” – just before the PRC’s top state body abolished presidential term limits when it met that March.[12] In a highly unusual stutter step, the full Central Committee reconvened just a month later for a plenum focusing on personnel changes and Party-state reforms. [13] Remarkably, the Central Committee during that cycle completely bypassed a plenum focused on economic issues, breaking with precedent but allowing the political calendar to return to normal for the remainder of Xi’s second term.[14]
The big story, of course, at the time was the move Xi queued up after that unusual Second Plenum – namely abolishing presidential term limits just as he was about to start his second term as president. In this instance Xi did not merely bend an informal norm but he altogether erased a written rule that had been in place since ratification of the 1982 PRC constitution.[15] Many observers overstated the significance of this move,[16] in some instances wrongly mapping Western assumptions about the significance of the presidency onto China’s Leninist system. In fact, the position of president is the least consequential of the three titles that Xi holds as head of the state, Party, and the military. Indeed, the investiture of these three positions in a single official is largely an artefact of the Tiananmen crackdown – and Deng’s efforts to prop up his third chosen successor, Jiang Zemin, after his first two choices were toppled (with Deng’s complicity and assistance).[17] The figures who served as president prior to Jiang are remote from the memories of even the most erudite China watchers, underscoring the institutional insignificance of the role.[18]
The relative insignificance of the presidency in China’s system raises the question of why Xi went through such an effort to secure the position in perpetuity. One can argue that there were good substantive reasons for doing so. From a protocol perspective, holding onto the presidency would have allowed Xi to engage foreign heads of state. But Deng never held the presidency and the absence of that honorific never prevented him from engaging world leaders, most notably during his famous 1979 trip to the United States to meet with President Carter to finalize normalization of ties between the two countries.[19] Alternatively, Xi could have made the move to drive home the point to foreign and domestic audiences that he had no intention of handing over power any time soon. But Xi’s intention would have – or should have – already been clear to the cognoscenti in Beijing at the 19th Party Congress held just several months earlier. Xi had already deprived any possible successor with the honorifics that would have granted de facto status as heir-apparent.
Despite the arguably limited marginal utility of abolishing term limits, the most plausible hypothesis seems to be that Xi did this in order to demonstrate that he could do it – and to explicitly and unambiguously break the fragile succession model that, ironically, had provided the path for Xi’s own ascent to the top.[20] For a leader like Xi, power exists in its exercise – and the ability to abolish a written rule put in place by Deng and his peers to constrain future leaders demonstrated that power quickly and palpably rather early during Xi’s second term.
Heir Not Apparent
During his first term Xi had already taken the first step to dismantle the informal system of succession put in place by his predecessors. For both Xi and Hu Jintao, the position of vice president had buttressed their status as the heir-apparent.[21] But Xi in his first term evicted the position of vice president from the PBSC, transforming what had once been a stepping stone to the top position into a sinecure for easing out top leaders.[22] The move provided a face-saving way for Xi to neutralize a potential rival –the dapper and deft politico Li Yuanchao.[23] In the wake of the Bo Xilai scandal, Li was one of the few Politburo members from Xi’s generation with the political pedigree and chops to pose a potential threat to Xi in the future.[24] Unlike most figures from his generational cohort, Li likely enjoyed ties to both Hu Jintao and Jiang Zemin – the two main power centers at the time. Li had served in the Communist Youth League leadership,[25] and also probably had ties to Jiang Zemin since they both had deep roots in Shanghai;[26] Li’s father had been the first vice mayor of Shanghai after the establishment of the PRC in 1949.[27] Li’s installment as vice president – without a concurrent seat on the PBSC – in effect ended his once promising political career.
During his second term, Xi declined to follow the precedent followed by Hu and even Jiang of naming another civilian as a vice chairman of the CMC. The CMC vice chairman was another Deng improvisation that had taken hold as a traditional way to groom a successor.[28] A position on the CMC is crucial for an heir-apparent, arguably more so even than the general secretary position. Deng knew this during his own reign as paramount leader – while Deng never held the position of general secretary after returning to power in the late 1970s, he did hold the position of CMC chairman from 1980 until after the Tiananmen crackdown in 1989.[29] Deng, however, learned the hard way from the downfall of Hu Yaobang in 1987 that any heir-apparent was doomed to fail without the opportunity to build support from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Despite Hu’s service in the revolution, the PLA famously scoffed at the prospect of him becoming CMC chairman.[30] Therefore, Deng, in his second attempt to designate an heir-apparent, installed Zhao Ziyang as CMC vice chairman – though the title did nothing to save Zhao from disgrace during the Tiananmen crackdown.[31] Remarkably, today no civilian has served as CMC vice chairman in the over a dozen years since Xi relinquished the role in 2012.[32] Prior to Xi’s tenure, the longest vacancy since Jiang’s elevation was seven years – from 2004, when Hu was finally promoted from vice chairman to chairman of the CMC, until 2010, when Xi became CMC vice chairman– a move that definitively gave Xi the edge over Li Keqiang in the contest to replace Hu.[33] Moreover, at the last two Party congresses Xi has declined to tap a representative of the next generational cohort – those born in the 1960s, in this instance – for a position on the PBSC, as Xi and Li Keqiang had been tapped as representatives of the fifth generation of leaders in 2007.[34]
Tearing Down “7 Up, 8 Down”
Xi has not only rewritten the formal retirement rules in his own favor but also has steadily chipped away at the informal rules that had been a feature of Chinese politics since 1997, when every Politburo and CMC member (except for Jiang Zemin) was forced to retire at age 70.[35] This rule was revised downward to 68 again at the 16th Party Congress in 2002– when the leadership informally instituted the “7 Up, 8 Down Rule”: if a leader was 67 or younger at the time of a Party congress, he could remain in place; if he was 68 or older, he had to retire.[36] Yet again, Xi has broken this rule – albeit selectively – to keep in place his closest associates, most notably CMC Vice Chairman Zhang Youxia, a fellow princeling whose father served with Xi’s father in the 4th Field Army in Northwest China at the end of the Chinese Civil War.[37] Similarly, Xi retained Wang Yi as foreign minister past the retirement age of 65 before ultimately elevating him to the Politburo at the October 2022 20th Party Congress .[38]
Despite breaking these rules, Xi does not seem inclined to allow his colleagues to serve into perpetuity at his side. Instead, he seems intent on becoming a gerontocracy of one. Indeed, Xi has not only chipped away at “7 Up, 8 Down” by letting his more elderly allies hang on to their positions longer, but he has also forced some of his colleagues into early retirement.[39] The two most conspicuous examples of this are former premier Li Keqiang and PBSC member Wang Yang, both of whom were eligible to serve a third term alongside Xi.[40] It was not only Hu Jintao who was hustled off the stage at the 20th Party Congress but also the rump remnant of Hu’s own political network and Hu’s own efforts to institutionalize the leadership that were the casualties.[41] Li himself had at one time been a contender as heir-apparent but not only lost out to Xi but then was marginalized by Xi when Xi established the Central Leading Group on Deepening Reform that encroached upon the responsibilities of the State Council under Li Keqiang’s leadership.[42] Xi’s move here seemed almost gratuitous – why remove Li when Xi had already marginalized him? Again, the answer is that Xi believes that power exists in its exercise. The question in Xi’s mind more likely would have been why he should let them stay, when removing them would demonstrate Xi’s authority and allow Xi to install even more of his own cronies on the PBSC.
Breaking the “Gentleman’s Agreement”
Xi’s ability to bend and break the various “rules of the game” outlined above raises deeper questions about why and how Xi has been able to do this – and to do this with impunity. The answer goes back to the most consequential – and vaguest – rule of post-Mao politics that Xi broke early in his tenure. Namely, he violated the informal and perhaps tacit “gentlemen’s agreement” opposed to pursuing corruption charges against current or former members of the PBSC or CMC, the evidence for which is admittedly observational and circumstantial – namely. that in the Deng and post-Deng eras, no such charges had in fact ever been pursued against leaders at this top level.[43] This norm is especially vague since even Politburo members did not enjoy such immunity. Indeed, one can argue that taking down a sitting Politburo member had become almost a rite of passage for the top leader. After all, Jiang Zemin toppled the powerful Party secretary of Beijing, Chen Xitong.[44] Even the otherwise politically timid Hu Jintao mustered the temerity to take down Shanghai Party secretary Chen Liangyu for corruption after the latter audaciously publicly defied the Party center.[45]
Of course, the corruption case that inaugurated this new era of anti-corruption campaigns was the dismissal of Politburo member Bo Xilai in 2012 following a scandal so lurid as to seem otherwise improbable, in which Bo’s wife murdered a British citizen, setting off a series of events that ultimately led to the cinematic flight of Bo’s own chief of police to the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu, and ultimately leading to Bo’s purge and imprisonment in 2013.[46] Even though the Bo scandal occurred under Hu’s auspices, it set the stage for Xi’s own anti-corruption campaign – and provided Xi with an opening to become a strongman. Unlike the Chen Liangyu and Chen Xitong scandals, Bo’s removal was the initial – rather than the culminating – event.[47] Events played into Xi’s hand even further when the son of Hu’s closest aide, Politburo member Ling Jihua, crashed a Ferrari in Beijing, killing himself and two young women – an event that led to the political demise of yet another Politburo member.[48]
As dramatic as both these cases were, they were still within the informal code of honor that prohibited the pursuit of charges against the top echelon leaders. A longstanding concern had been that further revelations tarnish the Party’s image with the public, and even prompt infighting among senior leaders that would undo the endurance of leadership cohesion that ensured Party dominance since the Tiananmen crackdown. A more timorous leader could have let these cases be the last word in corruption for some time. But instead of reining in the corruption campaign, Xi intensified it in a remarkable way by storming the most powerful bastions of Party rule – namely the security services and military, and he did so very boldly and early in his tenure.[49] The fact that Xi went after retired Party and military leaders muddied whether Xi was really breaking the old gentlemen’s agreement. Indeed, going after figures who were now retired could seem almost gratuitous – after all, they were already retired and out of the game of politics. Why attack and disgrace them publicly at the end of their service to the Party when theoretically Xi could have neutralized them quietly behind closed doors, perhaps by sharing the findings of the Central Discipline Inspection Commission (CDIC) with select top officials and depriving them with the perquisites traditionally bestowed on Party elders?
But Xi’s targets were not accidental. Their seniority and gravitas were arguably what made them such appealing targets – beyond the merit of their cases. By going after retired top officials, Xi sent shockwaves to every lower-level official who had ever benefited from a favor by these officials. Xi was now pursuing the godfathers of some of the biggest political empires inside the Party. Party insiders would have clearly understood that Xi had turned the old paradigm of “killing the monkeys to scare the chickens” upside down. The political logic for going after what Xi dubbed “tigers” was especially pronounced in the case of Xu Caihou – because Xu, as the military’s top political commissar (2007–12) and the former head of the General Political Department (2002–4), would likely have been involved in the promotion of every general officer during those years.[50] By disgracing Xu, Xi effectively was securing leverage over the rest of the high command.[51]
Xi’s approach was a calculated high-risk, high-reward gamble. Real corruption surely pervaded the security services and especially the military, but Xi did not necessarily target these facets of the system because they were the most corrupt – but rather because they were precisely the most powerful institutions.[52] His efforts to strike early at these power centers also inverted the political dynamics that had defined Hu Jintao and even Jiang Zemin – neither of whom had gone after even corrupt Politburo members from the provinces until consolidating a certain measure of power. By contrast, Xi likely realized that if he could bring to heel China’s equivalent of what the Russians call the “power ministries” early in his tenure, it would secure his power and ability to root out rivals unopposed. Furthermore, in the process he could bend or break whatever rules that needed to be broken in order to further solidify his power. That has very much been the story of Xi’s tenure.
Post-Mortem to Political “Reforms”
Xi has not only broken these old rules of the game. He has done so with impunity, and he has been rewarded rather than reprimanded for his risky moves with more honorifics, more friends in higher places, and greater power than his two immediate predecessors even aspired to obtain – demonstrating the fragility of those norms.
In fairness, the “rules” – such as they were – did shape and channel elite politics for a time. One of the marked shifts during Xi’s rule is that Xi no longer pretends that he is changing the rules for the good of the Party as a whole, unlike Jiang Zemin who used Deng’s rules and norms as a cloak for the daggers he aimed at his rivals – such as when he lowered the retirement age at the 14th Party Congress and then again at the 15th Party Congress.[53] These moves ostensibly ensured “rejuvenation” of the leadership, but in fact they provided Jiang with a pretext to remove his rivals and install friendly figures.[54] One of the stickiest norms in Chinese politics came about by accident of circumstance rather than by deliberate design. Indeed, Jiang himself tripped over the age limit he had formulated, a mere five years earlier to oust Li Ruihuan, as the new age limit precluded Jiang’s long-time consiglieri Zeng Qinghong from remaining on the PBSC.[55]
Meanwhile, Hu Jintao never made any such moves, respectfully abiding by the rules he inherited them from his elders and deferring to the collective leadership of his peers on the PBSC – including when it came to selecting his own successor. The limited innovations Hu may have pursued – such as possible introduction of “inner Party democracy” for selecting the new Politburo before the 17th Party Congress – would have undermined rather than abetted the institutionalization project.[56] The reason is that any kind of polling among the Party elite would have favored the informal networks of Party elders like Jiang Zemin or of princelings like Xi Jinping – who were the primary beneficiaries of the 17th Party Congress.[57] Hu’s efforts would have also damaged the chances for his meritocratic minion Li Keqiang to become his heir.[58] In a painful irony for the earnest Hu, the net result of his self-abnegation was not that he left the institutions of the CCP leadership stronger but instead left himself weaker – and ill-equipped to cope with the malfeasance and corruption of his colleagues. The problems that festered due in part to Hu’s obeisance to the rules of the games underscore the limitations and the internal contradictions of those rules.
Over the longer arc of CCP history, it is now clear that the Jiang and Hu eras were aberrations in CCP politics. The reality is that the edifice – or rather the façade – of leadership “institutionalization” was always weaker than it appeared from the outside. Indeed, few, if any, of the most meaningful institutional changes were ever inscribed into the Party charter, even though that ostensibly foundational document is subject to revision at each quinquennial Party congress. Remarkably, the Party charter has never prescribed the size and composition of the Party’s top decision-making bodies, leaving it entirely subject to informal politicking.[59] Similarly, Xi’s abolition of presidential term limits is less remarkable than was supposed because no written rule has ever proscribed Xi – or any of his predecessors – from holding on to the more consequential positions as head of the Party and the military for as long as some alchemy of their own cunning and Party tradition would permit. Indeed, this is precisely what Jiang Zemin did after stepping down as general secretary in 2002 and president in 2003.[60] Some observers mistakenly see this as evidence of a staggered transition, overlooking the messiness of simultaneously having two figures at the top.[61] Jiang’s successor Hu Jintao, meanwhile, seemed to lack either the acumen or the appetite to retain even the CMC chairmanship when handing over power to Xi. The dynamic was idiosyncratic rather than institutional.[62]
Moreover, some of Deng’s reforms were likely doomed from the outset because of the paradoxes created by the personalized power of PRC politics. Most notably, Deng’s well-intentioned efforts to force his colleagues into retirement led to the creation of a group of influential Party elders who retained considerable informal clout untethered from any institution – and in the process this undermined the process of institutionalization.[63] Such a phenomenon persisted well after the demise of Deng’s revolutionary cadres, with Jiang’s own influence lingering beyond Hu’s tenure and into Xi’s tenure.[64] Indeed, throughout Hu’s tenure, the official Chinese media ranked Jiang second in the Party hierarchy – Jiang was not ranked behind the sitting PBSC members until after Xi took power.[65] The existence and enduring power of elders like Jiang contributed to the centrifugal forces that Hu struggled to manage. This dissipation of central power in turn provided a strong incentive for Xi to eradicate the influence of the Party elders, as evinced by the near-total eviction of members of Jiang’s and Hu’s political networks from the current leadership lineup – which, as outlined above, has paved the way for the return of strongman rule.[66] Moreover, the highly personalized nature of power in CCP politics means that Xi’s cronies might very well have influence with him even after they retire, to say nothing of Xi’s own enduring influence if ever he does decide to retire, thereby recreating the cycle. The alternative, of course, is for Xi to rule for life just as Mao did. Either way, Deng’s retirement reforms are likely to end in a cul-de-sac.
Ironically, the emphasis on “collective leadership” and consensus decision-making further exacerbates the problem by suppressing rather than eliminating factional infighting. Making the PBSC a collection of rough equals did create something akin to institutional checks and balances, but even that model assumed that each titular head of the core components of the Party-state apparatus would engage in intense informal politicking to guard his/her respective turf from any encroachment by political rivals.[67] The result would reinforce stove piping and dysfunction rather than produce a happy marriage of institutional form and function. Indeed, that is exactly what happened during the Hu era – with the net result that many of Hu’s and Wen’s reform efforts were largely stymied and stalled by their rivals on the PBSC.[68] A similar dynamic played out on the CMC during the Hu era. The elevation of the service chiefs to the CMC in 2004 created a façade that appeared to be similar the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff.[69] In fact, the elevation of these service chiefs made them just as powerful as the bodies designed to oversee PLA operations, for instance, the General Staff Department.[70] The result, again, was greater stove piping and fragmented decision-making rather than a more functional and coherent institution. The close conceptual cousin of collective leadership – consensus decision-making – compounded the problem. The leadership’s emphasis on consensus did blunt the hard edges of factionalism, but it also turned the Party leadership into a “good old boys’ club,” in which factionalism was suppressed and channeled into a sordid give-and-take rather than eliminated.[71]
There is also an irony at the center of the rules and norms Deng and his successors tried to put in place. Namely, the least important rules – such as the setting of the political calendar – were the most explicit. By contrast, the most important norms – such as the unwritten taboo from pursuing corruption charges against PBSC and CMC members – were only tacit and contingent, largely the byproduct of circumstance rather than intent. This was also the most damaging to the project of institutionalization. To be sure, this unwritten “gentleman’s agreement” probably helped ensure leadership consensus and cohesion during the post-Tiananmen era while also preserving the Party’s image with the public. But, at the same time, this norm allowed egregious corruption to fester for decades – as demonstrated by the revelations when Xi took the unprecedented step of weaponizing the CDIC against his rivals. One can argue that it was not Xi but these Party elders who broke the rules of PRC politics by engaging in such egregious corruption, but the scope and scale of the corruption suggests that corruption had become a feature not a bug of the CCP leadership system. In such an environment, the pervasiveness of corruption among top leaders would make each of them vulnerable to a form of “mutually assured destruction” if they were to try to go after one of their rivals for corruption and would have the counterintuitive effect of stabilizing the leadership and maintaining an uneasy equilibrium – as in fact occurred during most of the post-Deng era. Indeed, truly “clean” cadres probably would have been more likely to arouse suspicion than approbation.
Now that Xi has largely dismantled Deng’s program, it raises uncomfortable questions about how we understand the political system today and where it goes next. At this point, it is utterly untenable to characterize elite politics as a “collective leadership” ensuring greater institutionalization and regularity in Chinese politics. The prospects of reviving that model of leadership appear dim indeed. As noted in the political science literature, norms are fragile, and once they have been vitiated, the chances of successfully putting Humpty Dumpty back together again are startingly slim.[72] That is especially the case in China since one can argue that during his tenure Deng, as paramount leader, tried to restore at least a modicum of the regular order, such as it was, of the pre–Cultural Revolution era. Indeed, Carl Minzer aptly characterizes Xi’s program as a counter-reformation of sorts.[73]
But focusing on what Xi has undone defines the situation in negative terms – largely saying what it is not rather than what it is. While the press often characterizes Xi as China’s most powerful leader since Deng or even Mao – and there is some merit in the comparison – one would be quite hard-pressed to argue that politics at the top of the system are as volatile as they were in the Mao or even the Deng eras. Perhaps more importantly, the policy outcomes are not as extravagant and perilous as they were in the Mao era nor do they oscillate between fang (放) and shou (收) as widely as they did in the Deng era.[74] In part, this may be because Xi – himself a survivor the traumas of the Cultural Revolution – has renovated the system for the purpose of control rather than for revolution or reformation, eschewing the mass mobilization politics that defined the Mao era or the reforms of the Deng era. He is steadily recrafting the system in his own image. Xi is neither Mao nor Deng. He is Xi Jinping – and he should be understood on his own terms. That in and of itself may be Xi’s boldest ambition yet.
About the Contributor
Jonathan A. Czin is Michael H. Armacost Chair in Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution’s John L. Thornton China Center. He is a former member of the Senior Analytic Service at the CIA and was director for China at the National Security Council from 2021 to 2023.
Notes
[1] Alexander Davey, “The ‘Missing’ Third Plenum Suggests Xi Is Sticking to His Plan,” MERICS, March 5, 2024, https://merics.org/en/comment/missing-third-plenum-suggests-xi-sticking-his-plan; Bill Bishop, “Politburo Meeting; No Date for Third Plenum; More Party in Foreign Affairs Work; Support for Private Enterprises; Myanmar-PRC Border;蛋炒饭,” Sinocism (blog), December 27, 2023, https://sinocism.com/p/politburo-meeting-no-date-for-third; Carl Minzner, “Delay in China’s Annual Fall Party Plenum Meeting: A Sign of Deepening Institutional Erosion?” Council on Foreign Relations, November 27, 2023, https://www.cfr.org/blog/delay-chinas-annual-fall-party-plenum-meeting-sign-deepening-institutional-erosion; Logan Wright, “Beijing’s Silence Is Deafening,” Rhodium Group, February 2, 2024, https://rhg.com/research/beijings-silence-is-deafening/.
[2] “中共十一届三中全会（1978年),” 新华网, November 15, 2012. Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20121115222418/http://news.xinhuanet.com/ziliao/2003-01/20/content_697755.htm; “精品新闻：历届三中全会给中国带来什么?,” 新华网, October 13, 2003. Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20111002235112/http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2003-10/13/content_1119584.htm.
[3] “中国共产党章程（1982年9月6日十二大通过),” 共产党员网, September 27, 2012, https://fuwu.12371.cn/2012/09/27/ARTI1348715767823434.shtml; Richard Baum, Burying Mao: Chinese Politics in the Age of Deng Xiaoping (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 149–150; “中国共产党章程(全文),” 共产党员网, October 22, 2022, https://www.12371.cn/special/zggcdzc/zggcdzcqw/.
[4] “中国共产党第二十届中央委员会第二次全体会议公报_滚动新闻,” 中华人民共和国中央人民政府, February 28, 2023, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2023-02/28/content_5743717.htm.
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[11] Kenneth Lieberthal, Governing China: From Revolution through Reform, 2nd ed. (New York: W. W. Norton, 2004), 152; Jacques deLisle, “The Rule of Law with Xi-Era Characteristics: Law for Economic Reform, Anticorruption, and Illiberal Politics,” Asia Policy, no. 20 (2015), 23, https://www.jstor.org/stable/24905067.
[12] “中国共产党第十九届中央委员会第二次全体会议公报,” 中华人民共和国中央人民政府, January 19, 2018, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2018-01/19/content_5258601.htm; “中华人民共和国宪法修正案,” 中华人民共和国中央人民政府, March 11, 2018, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2018-03/11/content_5273222.htm.
[13] “中国共产党第十九届中央委员会第三次全体会议公报,” 中华人民共和国中央人民政府, February 28, 2018, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2018-02/28/content_5269534.htm.
[14] Barry Naughton, “After the Third Plenum: Economic Reform Revival Moves Toward Implementation,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 43 (March 14, 2014), 23, https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/CLM43BN.pdf ; Neil Thomas and Jing Qian, “Politics First: The Key to Understanding China’s Third Plenum,” Asia Society Policy Institute, July 10, 2024, https://asiasociety.org/policy-institute/politics-first-key-understanding-chinas-third-plenum.
[15] “中国共产党章程（1982年9月6日十二大通过),” 共产党员网, September 27, 2012, https://fuwu.12371.cn/2012/09/27/ARTI1348715767823434.shtml.
[16] Jeffrey A. Bader, “7 Things You Need to Know about Lifting Term Limits for Xi Jinping,” Brookings, February 27, 2018, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/7-things-you-need-to-know-about-lifting-term-limits-for-xi-jinping/; Anthony Kuhn, “Why Abolishing China’s Presidential Term Limits Is Such A Big Deal,” NPR, March 14, 2018, https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2018/03/14/593155818/why-abolishing-chinas-presidential-term-limits-is-such-a-big-deal; Chris Buckley and Adam Wu, “Ending Term Limits for China’s Xi Is a Big Deal. Here’s Why,” The New York Times, March 11, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/10/world/asia/china-xi-jinping-term-limit-explainer.html.
[17] Lieberthal, Governing China, 154; Joseph Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2021), 65–67.
[18] After a 13-year gap in the post-Mao era, the role of president role was reinstated in 1982. During this time, Li Xiannian served as president from 1983 to 1988, and Yang Shangkun served as president from 1988 to 1993, followed by Jiang from 1993 to 2003.
[19] “The Establishment of Sino-U.S. Diplomatic Relations and Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping’s Visit to the United States,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, https://www.mfa.gov.cn/mfa_eng/zy/wjls/3604_665547/202405/t20240531_11367534.html.
[20] Milan W. Svolik, The Politics of Authoritarian Rule (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 87.
[21] Cheng Li, “Governance: Collective Leadership Revisited,” in Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era: Reassessing Collective Leadership (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2016), 18; “胡锦涛当选中华人民共和国主席习近平当选副主席,” 中央政府门户网站, March 15, 2008, https://www.gov.cn/2008lh/content_921004.htm.
[22] Alice L. Miller, “The Succession of Hu Jintao,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 1, part 2, (January 2002), 4, https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/clm2_LM.pdf.
[23] Cheng Li, “Factions: One Party, Two Coalitions?” in Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era, 298.
[24] Bo Zhiyue, “China’s Fifth-Generation Leaders: Characteristics of the New Elite and Pathways to Leadership,” in China in the Era of Xi Jinping: Domestic and Foreign Policy Challenges, ed. Robert S. Ross and Jo Inge Bekkevold (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2016), 3–31.
[25] Cheng Li, “China’s Fifth Generation: Is Diversity a Source of Strength or Weakness?” Asia Policy, no. 6 (2008), 77–78.
[26] Bo, “China’s Fifth-Generation Leaders,” 13; 蔡慎坤, “话说李源潮,” 万维读者网, July 7, 2024, https://news.creaders.net/china/2024/07/07/2749809.html.
[27] 网易, “他是李源潮之父，抗战革命英雄，曾担任上海市副市长,” 郁小姐读历史,
April 20, 2024, https://www.163.com/dy/article/J071GLJR0553833L.html.
[28] Baum, Burying Mao, 300–317; Miller, “The Succession of Hu Jintao,” 4.
[29] 石文忠, “第三代领导集体，走进新时代,” 环球人物, no. 31 (2012), http://paper.people.com.cn/hqrw/html/2012-11/26/content_1148168.htm?div=-1; Baum, Burying Mao, 300–301.
[30] Baum, Burying Mao, 187 –188; June Teufel Dreyer, “Deng Xiaoping: The Soldier,” The China Quarterly, no. 135 (1993), 549.
[31] Baum, Burying Mao, 217, 258.
[32] James Mulvenon, “The Best Laid Plans: Xi Jinping and the CMC Vice-Chairmanship That Didn’t Happen,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 30 (November 19, 2009), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/CLM30JM.pdf.
[33] “全国人大常委会表决决定习近平为国家军委副主席,” 中央政府门户网站, October 28 2010, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2010-10/28/content_2609307.htm; Tania Branigan, “Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping Appointed to Key Military Post,” The Guardian, October 18, 2010, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/oct/18/china-xi-jinping-military-commission.
[34] Charlie Campbell, “China’s Xi Jinping Sets Groundwork for Long Reign,” TIME, October 25, 2017, https://time.com/4996357/china-xi-jinping-politburo-successor/; Guoguang Wu, “Politics, Norms in Leadership Reorganization toward the 20th Party Congress: Preliminary Observation,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 71 (Spring 2022), https://www.prcleader.org/post/politics-norms-in-leadership-reorganization-toward-the-20th-party-congress-preliminary-observation; Cheng Li, “China’s Leadership, Fifth Generation,” Brookings, December 25, 2007, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/chinas-leadership-fifth-generation/.
[35] Alice Miller, “Projecting the Next Politburo Standing Committee,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 49 (March 1, 2016), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/clm49am.pdf; Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 86–87.
[36] Miller, “Projecting the Next Politburo Standing Committee.”
[37] 任贵祥, “习仲勋对中共中央转战陕北的重要贡献,” 中共中央党史和献研究院, September 29, 2020, https://www.dswxyjy.org.cn/n1/2020/0929/c219021-31879824.html; 孙聚成, “习仲勋的青年时代,” 人民网, May 26, 2015, http://dangjian.people.com.cn/n/2015/0526/c117092-27059342-4.html.
[38] Yukio Tajima, “China’s Wang Yi Picks up Third Job with Return as Foreign Minister,” Nikkei Asia, July 28, 2023, https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/China-s-Wang-Yi-picks-up-third-job-with-return-as-foreign-minister.
[39] Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 87.
[40] Chun Han Wong and Keith Zhai, “China’s Xi Jinping Moves to Extend Rule as Top Communist Party Rivals Retire,” Wall Street Journal, October 22, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-xi-jinping-moves-to-extend-rule-as-top-communist-party-rivals-retire-11666418847; Guoguang Wu, “New Faces, New Factional Dynamics: CCP Leadership Politics Following the 20th Party Congress,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 74 (Winter 2022), https://www.prcleader.org/post/new-faces-new-factional-dynamics-ccp-leadership-politics-following-the-20th-party-congress.
[41] Reuters, “Hu Jintao Escorted out of Party Congress,” October 22, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/china/former-chinese-president-hu-jintao-escorted-out-party-congress-2022-10-22/; Wu, “New Faces, New Factional Dynamics.”
[42] Cheng Li, “Governance: Collective Leadership Revisited,” in Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era, 12.
[43] Baum, Burying Mao, 174–177; Carl Minzner, End of an Era: How China’s Authoritarian Revival Is Undermining Its Rise (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 28.
[44] Bruce Gilley, Tiger on the Brink: Jiang Zemin and China’s New Elite (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 239–246; Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 82.
[45] Ibid., 102.
[46] “盘点大老虎的夫人们以夫之名都干了什么,” 新华网, March 17, 2015, http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2015-03/17/c_127587441.htm； “薄熙来受贿、贪污、滥用职权案庭审纪实,” 中华人民共和国中央人民政府, August 27, 2013, https://www.gov.cn/jrzg/2013-08/27/content_2475352.htm; Keith B. Richburg, “Police Chief at Center of Scandal Stands Trial,” Washington Post, September 18, 2012, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/wang-lijun-police-chief-at-center-of-bo-xilai-scandal-stands-trial/2012/09/18/b0f4495a-018b-11e2-bbf0-e33b4ee2f0e8_story.html.
[47] Christopher Carothers, “Xi’s Anti-Corruption Campaign: An All-Purpose Governing,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 67 (Spring 2021), https://www.prcleader.org/post/xi-s-anti-corruption-campaign-an-all-purpose-governing-tool.
[48] “令计划一审被判处无期徒刑 – 人事信息,” 中国政府网, July 4, 2016, https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2016-07/04/content_5088075.htm; Jonathan Ansfield, “How Crash Cover-Up Altered China’s Succession,” The New York Times, December 5, 2012, https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/05/world/asia/how-crash-cover-up-altered-chinas-succession.html.
[49] Carothers, “Xi’s Anti-Corruption Campaign.”
[50] 田亮, 李静涛 and 朱东君, “军中‘打虎,’” 环球人物, no. 3 (2015), http://paper.people.com.cn/hqrw/html/2015-01/26/content_1556421.htm; “徐才厚落马再次表明位高不是贪腐的特权,” 人民网, July 1, 2014, http://cpc.people.com.cn/pinglun/n/2014/0701/c241220-25225376.html; Joel Wuthnow and Phillip C Saunders, “Chinese Military Reforms in the Age of Xi Jinping: Drivers, Challenges, and Implications,” China Strategic Perspectives (National Defense University), no. 10 (March 2017), 32, https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documents/stratperspective/china/ChinaPerspectives-10.pdf?ver=2017-03-21-152018-430; Bo Zhiyue, “The Rise and Fall of Xu Caihou, China’s Corrupt General,” The Diplomat, March 18, 2015, https://thediplomat.com/2015/03/the-rise-and-fall-of-xu-caihou-chinas-corrupt-general/.
[51] Ibid, 41.
[52] Ibid, 41.
[53] Chun Han Wong, “For China’s Leaders, Age Cap Is But a Moving Number,” Wall Street Journal, November 1, 2016, http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2016/11/01/for-chinas-leaders-age-cap-is-but-a-moving-number/; Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 86.
[54] Ibid.
[55] James Mulvenon, “The King Is Dead! Long Live the King! The CMC Leadership Transition from Jiang to Hu,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 13 (January 30, 2005), https://www.hoover.org/research/king-dead-long-live-king-cmc-leadership-transition-jiang-hu; Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 103.
[56] Ibid.,158; Joseph Fewsmith, “Inner-Party Democracy: Development and Limitations,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 31 (February 15, 2010), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/CLM31JF.pdf.
[57] Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 158–159.
[58] Cheng Li, “China’s Two Li’s: Frontrunners in the Race to Succeed Hu Jintao,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 22 (October 5, 2007), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/CLM22CL.pdf.
[59] “中国共产党章程(全文),” 共产党员网首页, October 22, 2022, https://www.12371.cn/special/zggcdzc/zggcdzcqw/.
[60] “中国共产党历次全国代表大会数据库,” 人民网, November 8, 2002, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64162/64168/64569/65412/4429178.html； “胡锦涛主席的讲话,” 国务院公报, no. 11 (2003), https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2003/content_62006.htm; Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 88, 98–100.
[61] Alice Miller, “The Case of Xi Jinping and the Mysterious Succession,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 30 (November 19, 2009), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/CLM30AM.pdf.
[62] James Mulvenon, “The New Central Military Commission,” China Leadership Monitor, no. 40 (January 14, 2013), https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/CLM40JM.pdf.
[63] Baum, Burying Mao, 144–145, 368.
[64] Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 134–136.
[65] Chris Buckley, “Former Chinese Leader Steps Back, Fueling Speculation,” The New York Times, January 23, 2013, https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/24/world/asia/jiang-zemin-ex-china-leader-steps-back-fueling-speculation.html; “EX-Leader Requests to Move Down Protocol Order,” China Daily, January 23, 2013, https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2013-01/23/content_16166637.htm.
[66] Joseph Fewsmith, “Balances, Norms and Institutions: Why Elite Politics in the CCP Have Not Institutionalized,” The China Quarterly, no. 248, S1 (November 2021), 279, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741021000783; Wu, “New Faces, New Factional Dynamics.”
[67] Svolik, The Politics of Authoritarian Rule, 87.
[68] Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics,100–103.
Ian Johnson, “China’s Lost Decade,” ChinaFile, September 27, 2012, https://www.chinafile.com/library/nyrb-china-archive/chinas-lost-decade.
[69] Mulvenon, “The King Is Dead!” ; “中国共产党第十六届中央委员会第四次全体会议公报,” 中国共产党历次全国代表大会数据库 , September 19, 2004, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64162/64168/64569/65412/4429181.html; “中国共产党第十六届中央委员会,” 共产党员网, June 14, 2012, https://fuwu.12371.cn/2012/06/11/ARTI1339385669270817.shtml.
[70] Joel Wuthnow and Phillip C. Saunders, “Introduction Appendix: Central Military Commission Reforms,” in Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA (Washington DC: National Defense University Press, 2019), 26.
[71] Fewsmith, Rethinking Chinese Politics, 115.
[72] Svolik, The Politics of Authoritarian Rule, 63.
[73] Carl Minzner, “China’s Age of Counterreform,” Journal of Democracy 35, no. 4 (2024), 5–19.
[74] Baum, Burying Mao, 5–9.
Photo credit: By China News Service, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=157438163
