Back to the Future with Xi

It’s doubtful China’s President Xi Jinping has seen the film ‘Back to the Future. After all, “Xi Jinping thought” doesn’t hold with American decadence and frippery. Innovative scientists questioning enshrined thinking, and cheeky youngsters questioning authority, is not his thing, just ask the youth of Hong Kong. Nevertheless, that’s where he’s heading. Back to the 1950s and a political climate in which Mao Zedong could get away with cementing his grand titles: Great Leader, Great Teacher, Great Helmsman.

This week’s 20^th Communist Party Congress, held in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, crowns Xi President for a third five-year term. It wasn’t mean to be like this. After the murderous brutality and ravages of Mao’s long reign the Congress gradually moved to constrain the power of a single leader. Xi’s two predecessors, Hu Jintao, and Jiang Zemin, each stood down after serving two five-year terms which was legally the limit of time in office. But 69-year-old Xi has changed the rules and will now be General Secretary of the Chinese Communist party (CCP) for at least another five years, possibly much longer.

The General Secretary of the Communist Party is the de-facto leader of the country because the party is the state and the state is the party, but Xi is moving towards ‘L’etat, c’est moi’ with Chinese characteristics. He holds two other key positions – President of the People’s Republic of China, which means he is head of state, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission so he controls the military. In theory the Central Committee of the Congress is now busy choosing which candidates are appointed to the most senior positions, in reality Xi’s grip of the levers of government means he chooses.

There are 2,300 delegates representing the party hierarchy in 34 regions of the country. They appoint 200 members to the Central Committee, and the committee then votes, from within its ranks who will be in the 25-member Politburo and the elite of the elite – the seven-member Politburo Standing Committee. Another theory is that those aged 68 or over should stand down, that age limit may not be applied this time. The fix is in, the choices are made, we just have to find out who they are.

Of one thing we can be sure – they will all be men. The only woman in the Politburo, 72-year-old Sun Chunlan, is expected to retire, and no women have ever served on the Standing Committee.

The Prime Minister, Li Keqiang, is stepping down from his position but may remain on the Standing Committee. When the congress ends on Sunday Xi will walk out on stage with almost absolute power, and will be followed by the elite. Whoever is immediately behind him will probably be the new Prime Minister. China experts will then pick apart exactly who comes out in what order, and then examine Xi’s backroom team to see who he is surrounding himself with.  How many ‘yes men’ are there, how many technocrats, and how many military hawks.

The challenges they face are greater than for many years, some can be blamed on Xi, and little that has been said this week gives confidence that China’s structural problems can be overcome in the near future. When he took power in 2012 the economy was growing at 7.8 per cent a year. Growth in the first half of this year is 2.5 per cent and the IMF forecast for the full year is 3.2 per cent. Policies to rapidly boost the internal market have backfired, as seen by the dynamiting of rows of new high rise apartment blocks left empty because people cannot afford to buy them. Youth unemployment is at about 20 per cent in many cities. His insistence on a zero-Covid policy has disrupted thousands of businesses, big and small, and tens of millions of citizens remain under full or partial lockdown amid the “people’s war to stop the virus”.

The country’s demographic time bomb continues to tick. Next year the population will begin to decline with a subsequent year-on-year increase in budget requirements to take care of the elderly but with fewer people of working age to fund it. Exhortations to have more babies following the relaxation of the one-child policy have not worked.

The Belt and Road Initiative has stalled with investments and loans given to unstable companies around the world having to be written off. The Chinese subsidized rail link across central Asia and into Europe, dubbed the New Eurasian Land Bridge, has been hit by sanctions against Russia after its invasion of Ukraine. The route is now longer as it has skirt south of Russia and this has raised costs. The invasion has also severely dented the ‘unlimited friendship’ declared between Xi and Putin in early February. China is more interested in unlimited exports and this month showed its anger at the destabilising of the world economy when it abstained from a UN vote condemning Russia for annexing parts of Ukraine. Real ‘friends’ would have joined Belarus, Nicaragua, North Korea, and Syria in voting against the motion.

Russia’s abject military performance in Ukraine may give Xi pause for thought when it comes to invading Taiwan. Perhaps his untested military has similar corruption problems as does Russia’s. He’s seen the unprecedented sanctions levelled against Russia and how effective American weapons are. During his 2-hour speech to Congress Xi said China refuses to “renounce the use of force”. That made headlines, but more surprising would be a declaration of the opposite, and his words do not move China’s position on the issue.

What is different is that Xi now appears to have full control of China’s political, economic and military institutions. He has spent ten years eroding the concept of ‘first among equals’ in the Central Standing Committee and his coronation this week removes any checks and balances against the sort of catastrophic decision Putin made in February. He has dragged the Communist Party back to the untrammelled power and cult of personality seen under Mao.

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