There is a great danger that China’s head of state and party leader will undo the impressive achievements of the past. The reason for this is his increasingly idiosyncratic policy, which knows no gradual but only radical changes.
Xi Jinping wants to outshine everyone: China’s strongman has more powers than many of his predecessors.
Anyone who wants to get from the airport to the city center in Hangzhou has to drive for almost an hour through futuristic high-rise canyons: glittering skyscrapers form a backdrop that is reminiscent of Shanghai, Singapore or New York. Chinese technology companies have their headquarters in some of the towers. The tech group Alibaba was founded in Hangzhou, and the well-known portal Netease also comes from here. There are a total of around 10,000 tech companies in Hangzhou; last year, the industry generated sales of 1.6 trillion yuan (222 billion francs).
One of the fathers of Hangzhou’s success is Xi Jinping. The metropolis with twelve million inhabitants is the capital of the province of Zhejiang in eastern China. Xi served as party secretary here from 2002 to 2007, driving the city’s rise with his pro-business policies. “Xi Jinping is a doer,” said then US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson after meeting Xi in Hangzhou in 2006.
Today, a separate book commemorates Xi’s years in Zhejiang. Shortly before the start of the 20th Communist Party Congress, twenty copies of the work are in the shop window of the state-owned bookstore “Xinhua” (“New China”) in the city center, located between a hot-pot restaurant and a bank branch.
Huge improvements in education
Hangzhou is an example of the great progress that the entire country has made since the reform and opening-up policy began more than forty years ago. The tremendous improvements in education have produced a generation of creative, sophisticated and ambitious Chinese people. These have contributed, for example, to the fact that Chinese electric cars are among the best in the world today and that China is a global leader in artificial intelligence and technologies for renewable energies. The rapid economic development has also brought hundreds of millions of people a strong increase in prosperity.
But all of that is in danger, and the reason for it has a name: Xi Jinping. The man who was instrumental in Zhejiang’s progress is about to undo China’s gains. Xi has been Secretary General of the CP since autumn 2012 and President since 2013. At the 20th party congress, which begins this Sunday in Beijing, he wants to be elected CP chief for a third five-year term. The March 2023 session of the National People’s Congress is expected to confirm Xi as president for the third time. In 2018, Xi repealed the statutory two-term limit.
Xi correctly identified grievances
In doing so, Xi correctly identified a number of grievances. However, the answers are not convincing. It is true that Chinese tech companies abused their market power by only allowing retailers onto their platforms on the condition that they would not be listed on any other platform. But to put an entire industry on the chain with draconian conditions, which ultimately led to numerous bankruptcies, is disproportionate.
It is also true that the many educational portals that offer online lessons, for example in English, to China’s youngsters operate largely outside of a regulatory framework. It is also true that less affluent families cannot afford such offers. But why did Xi shut down the many successful companies instead of curbing the uncontrolled growth with moderate measures? The radical step has cost millions of Chinese their jobs. Xi’s weapon is too often the saber and too rarely the foil. This applies not only to economic issues, but also to political ones.
Of course, there have been several terrorist attacks in China in the past, the perpetrators of which came from the Uyghur province of Xinjiang. But locking more than a million Uyghurs and members of other minorities in camps and trying to “re-educate” them with methods that sometimes seem medieval will only lead to an even greater division between Muslim regions and the rest of the country in the long term. Above all, however, the procedure damages the reputation of a country that wants to be perceived internationally as a modern and cosmopolitan superpower, and ultimately drives China into isolation. It would be better to ensure more equal opportunities between Uyghurs and Han Chinese.
The procedure in Hong Kong is similar. As protests escalated in 2019, Xi decided to calm down the former British colony with the radical move of introducing a national security law. In doing so, he took away from Hong Kong what has always characterized the city: freedom in education, an independent press, a lively cultural scene and an independent judiciary. The damage is enormous. More and more Hong Kong citizens and expats are turning their backs on the city. Overseas firms are relocating activities to other Asian cities, particularly Singapore, where possible.
Xi gambles high
Probably the most serious is Xi’s permanent “shock and awe” policy in the fight against the pandemic. It is now clear that the zero-Covid policy will probably remain in place for years to come. A possible exit strategy, especially a reasonable vaccination campaign, is not discussed in public. The strategy essentially consists of mass testing and lockdowns. The economic damage to the country is enormous.
Xi always gambles high. That was the case when he took office in 2012. When he took over as party secretary, influential party circles reportedly signaled to him that, like his predecessor Hu Jintao, he would have to share power. Xi is said to have replied that he would not take the job under the circumstances and is said to have gone into hiding for two weeks. Eventually, the critics apparently agreed to grant Xi wide-ranging powers that neither Hu nor his predecessor, Jiang Zemin, had.
In the years that followed, Xi dealt with rampant corruption across the country, brought the army, which had a life of its own, back under Party control, and made the bureaucracy work instead of spending time on expensive and lengthy lunches spend. There were undeniable abuses that threatened the party and the country to its very foundations.
removed from reality
But now, with his ideology-driven policies, Xi seems to be increasingly escaping the harsh reality. The economy is faltering, attempts to cool down the overheated real estate market have failed miserably, and Xi has trapped the country with his zero-Covid policy. But China’s sole ruler is not showing signs of corrections. With the third term in office, this trend is likely to intensify.
Some Chinese turn away in horror. As Xi, accompanied by constant state propaganda, spreads the narrative that China is finally aspiring to its rightful place at the center of the world stage, growing numbers of urban elites are trying, exhausted by the zero-Covid policy and ever-narrowing political spaces – the jump abroad.
At the same time, however, many ordinary citizens in the country, but also large parts of the party organization are behind China’s strong man. China’s left, marginalized in the years before Xi took power, is now jubilant. It is therefore not impossible that Xi will lead the country beyond 2027 and make himself the “leader for life” like Mao Zedong was.
China needs reforms
This doesn’t bode well for China’s future. The country actually urgently needs market economy and institutional reforms that strengthen the private sector and provide more freedom, so that the many creative minds in China dare to do something again. Careers like that of Alibaba founder Jack Ma would no longer be possible today.
China will certainly not perish. The country is now much too important economically and politically for that. But Xi’s political course, coupled with structural problems such as an aging population and an unsustainable growth model that still relies on public investment in infrastructure, could see China gradually lose importance and influence. The People’s Republic would then become a middle power instead of replacing America as the number one world power.