Is Xi Jinping losing his grip on power?
New signs the Communist Party
May be getting fed up with him
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There is rampant political infighting within the highest levels of the Chinese Communist Party.
And signs of the war are spilling over into Chinese propaganda.
Is this a sign that certain segments of the Party are turning against
Chinese leader Xi Jinping? I think it’s time for another
episode of everyone’s favorite Chinese Communist soap opera, General Hostility.
Previously on General Hostility... Life or death! The war between Xi Jinping and a political faction
tied to former Chinese leader and sausage toad Jiang Zemin is coming to a head. A major meeting
of the Communist Party is less than a year away. Will Xi Jinping manage to hold onto power and be
declared Chairman for life? Or will his ambitions end in ruins at the hands of his greatest foe?
At the end of 2022, China will hold the 20th Party Congress.
Everyone expects Xi Jinping to use the event to extend his rule indefinitely.
He’s been laying the groundwork for that.
A few months ago, he remade the Communist Party’s history in his image…
using what’s called a “historical resolution.” We did a full episode about that,
so check it out for some background. But basically, Xi rewrote himself
as the savior of the Chinese Communist Party. Here’s the story, from his perspective.
Mao was like overall pretty great, even though he screwed things up during the Cultural Revolution.
Deng Xiaoping, who came after Mao, got things back
on track with his initiative called reform and opening up.
But now reform and opening is over and it’s Xi Jinping who will achieve true greatness
for China—what with his bold vision of the Party’s “Comprehensive Leadership”
and his exciting “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era”.
Ever since Xi put out his historical resolution,
state-run People’s Daily has been running a propaganda series promoting it.
But a lot of people were surprised when this piece came out on December 9.
It talks about all the great things that happened under “reform and opening up”
under former leaders Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao.
But in the 4,000 characters long essay,
it doesn’t once mention Xi Jinping, Xi Jinping Thought, or his “new era.”
Oh, and it was written by a propaganda writer who worked
mainly under prominent members of the Jiang faction
Is this a sign that people in the Communist Party are getting fed up with Xi Jinping?
Is this the beginning of the end for him? More after the break.
Welcome back.
So this article, that makes no mention of Xi Jinping,
was written by Qu Qingshan .
According to SinoInsider , “[Qu] served in the Jiang faction-influenced propaganda apparatus
and worked under several Jiang faction provincial Party bosses
during the Jiang faction’s era of dominance.”
Is that a sign there's discontent within the Party about Xi Jinping’s rule? On the surface it
definitely could be seen that way. And certainly a lot of China analysts are taking it that way.
But there could be more going on.
For context, you have to look at this piece that came out a few days later.
It’s another in the series of propaganda articles about Xi’s historical resolutions.
And the key point is Comprehensive Leadership.
That’s very different from the “Collective Leadership” the Party used to talk about. The idea
behind collective leadership was that all of the Politburo Standing Committee would collectively
make decisions. The Jiang faction loved this when they dominated the Standing Committee.
But now they’re talking about *Comprehensive* Leadership—where
Xi Jinping is the Comprehensive Leader.
I’m singling out this piece because it’s basically the inverse of the first one I showed you.
It only mentions Xi.
And doesn’t mention Deng Xiaoping,
Jiang Zemin,
or Hu Jintao at all.
And that's by design.
These two propaganda pieces work together to form Xi Jinping’s latest assault on the Jiang faction.
The second article says, under reform and opening up, which was great by the way,
there was deviation in the content and method of the Party’s leadership,
the effects of which were not really eliminated until after the 18th Party Congress.”
The 18th Party Congress? Why, that’s when Xi came to power!
The article talks about all the corruption in the Party before Xi. But thankfully,
Xi did that whole anti-corruption campaign, which purged more than a million officials.
All of whom were definitely corrupt and totally not victims of political infighting.
So basically, the historical narrative that’s being put out in Chinese propaganda
is that Mao screwed up, reform and opening up was an attempt to correct
that, but it failed—until Xi Jinping came and saved the Party.
So why the first article? The one written by someone who used to work under Jiang’s people?
Well, Xi has been working “to marginalize Deng’s “reform and opening up” policy
and distance himself from the political legacy of his predecessors.”
Why?
He doesn’t want to be living under Deng’s shadow.
He wants his policies—especially his policy of going global—“to be viewed
as a ‘historic achievement’ or ‘historic change’ in its own right, and not the result
of his adherence to Deng’s ‘reform and opening up’ like Jiang and Hu.”
So it makes sense that the first article, all about reform and opening up, doesn’t mention Xi.
Then another article comes out only talking about Xi,
and how reform and opening up didn’t work. It took Xi Jinping to save Communism.
But what about the writer Qu Qingshan’s connections to the Jiang faction?
Easy enough to explain. He worked under big name Jiang people, but he never moved up the ranks. He
was basically stuck in the backwater province of Qinghai, working as a low level propaganda stooge.
People actually close to Jiang tended to shoot up the ranks.
Qu wasn’t promoted till 2018, essentially by Xi.
So Xi Jinping , with his historical resolution, is creating a propaganda
narrative that says his political enemies ruined China. And it was only thanks to Xi
that things were saved in the nick of time.
So why not make him president for life?
Getting the news out about the Chinese Communist Party isn’t
easy. That’s why we rely on your support to keep the show going.
And that’s why I’m going to answer a question from a member of the China Uncensored 50 Cent Army,
fans who support the show with a dollar or more on the crowdfunding websites Patreon and Locals.
McDeltaJG asks on Locals, How can the CCP End? Is war inevitable? Or are there peaceful ways
China can get rid of the CCP and transition to a free democracy? How?
That really is the million dollar question.
I definitely don’t think war is inevitable. The Chinese Commiunist Party is super corrupt.
The economy is constantly teetering on the brink of collapse.
But I’ve heard that the seeds of the Soviet Union’s
ultimate economic collapse began in the 1950’s. So these things can take time.
From our sources inside China, we know people there are more critical than ever of the Party.
Once upon a time, people would be terrified of even whispering something bad about the Party.
That's changed tremendously.
When Chinese people—especially among the powerful elite or the military—are
finally fed up with the Communist Party, it will collapse.
But it reminds me, we’ve interviewed Chinese activist Yang Jianli . He set up the Foundation
for China in the 21st Century, a foundation specifically geared toward examining what happens
after the CCP falls. Check out our interview with him on the China Unscripted podcast.
I’ll put a link below.
Thanks for your question and your support McDeltaJG.
And as always thank you to everyone of you who watches China Uncensored.
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Once again I’m Chris Chappell, see you next time.