Under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), Beijing’s system of governance has two main principles: the consolidation of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) primacy and the consolidation of Xi as its “core” leader.
After the most recent restructuring of the Chinese government, two points stand out.
First is the CCP’s ambition. While the governance model established after the party’s 19th National Congress in 2017 was based on the joint leadership of the Chinese State Council and “leading small groups” under the CCP Central Committee, it has since last year’s congress solely been dominated by the Central Committee.
With the CCP leadership as the dominant policy decisionmakers, the State Council has assumed a subordinate role. The party’s goals of “ensuring full coverage of party leadership” and “ensuring strong and powerful party leadership” have largely been realized.
However, how can the State Council, as well as subordinate units in the CCP, be synchronized with the party leadership?
The flexibility of the CCP leadership, the enthusiasm of the State Council and its ministries, and the activity of local governments are key to the success of efforts to restructure the Chinese government.
In the past few years, inaction among low-ranking officials has been a major concern for the CCP leadership.
One reason is that as senior officials try to amass power, their subordinates increasingly try to avoid making mistakes by making fewer decisions on their own.
This is similar to problems that emerged during the Qing Dynasty. Even though Qing emperors Jiaqing (嘉慶) and Daoguang (道光) were responsible and competent hands-on leaders who were known for “industry and thriftiness,” they were unable to boost the empire’s fortunes when it was faced with overlapping internal and external crises, as well as an economic downturn.
The two emperors centralized power in their own hands and adopted top-down approaches, with officials reporting problems to their superiors instead of working toward solving them.
As a result, although the emperors were overworked, their administrative efficiency was low.
Second is the sustainability of China’s governance system. Developments over the past decade have been tailored to Xi’s role as the core leader. In addition to leading the CCP, the state and the military under a “trinity system,” he has been serving as the head of at least 16 leading small groups and committees.
The power dynamics of the CCP leadership has shifted from a collective model adopted under former Chinese presidents Jiang Zemin (江澤民) and Hu Jintao (胡錦濤), when each of the seven CCP Politburo Standing Committee members was responsible for a respective policy sector, to a model similar to Russia’s “super-presidential system.”
Due to Xi’s supremacy within the CCP, no one is able to challenge him.
However, even the most powerful leaders cannot resist the laws of nature. If Xi’s strength falls short of his ambitions, he might need to relinquish control, and if the CCP starts planning his succession, a power vacuum might emerge that cannot immediately be filled.
In such a scenario, with low and middle-ranking officials remaining idle, similar to those of the Qing Dynasty, who can stabilize the CCP leadership if the party loses its core?
Hong Chi-chang is a former chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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