Xi Jinping

From Sent-Down Youth to Paramount Leader

Xi Jinping was born in 1953 in Beijing, the son of Xi Zhongxun, a veteran revolutionary and senior official who was later purged during the Cultural Revolution. As a teenager, Xi was sent to Liangjiahe, a village in the loess plateau of Shaanxi, as part of the "sent-down youth" programme. He spent seven years there, an experience he has repeatedly invoked as formative. He joined the Party in 1974 and studied chemical engineering at Tsinghua. He rose through provincial administration in Hebei, Fujian, Zhejiang, and Shanghai before being elevated to the Politburo Standing Committee in 2007. At the 18th Party Congress in November 2012, he became General Secretary and CMC Chairman.

Anti-Corruption and Consolidation

Xi Jinping's first and most consequential act as leader was the launch of a sweeping anti-corruption campaign that, by 2023, had investigated over 4.7 million officials at all levels. While framed as a clean-government initiative, the campaign also served as a tool for eliminating political rivals and factional opponents — bringing down senior figures including Zhou Yongkang (former security chief), Bo Xilai (already purged), Xu Caihou and Guo Boxiong (former CMC vice chairmen), and later Sun Zhengcai (a potential successor). By the end of his first term, Xi had accumulated more personal power than any Chinese leader since Mao Zedong.

Ideology and Centralisation

Xi Jinping reversed the trend toward technocratic, consensus-based governance that had characterised the Hu Jintao era. He reinstated ideology as a central instrument of governance — "Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era" was written into both the Party constitution (2017) and the state constitution (2018). Presidential term limits were removed from the state constitution in 2018, clearing the path for indefinite rule. Internet censorship intensified, civil society was suppressed, independent lawyers were detained in the "709 crackdown" (2015), and the media was brought under tighter Party control.

China Under Xi

Under Xi Jinping, China has pursued increasingly assertive foreign policies: island-building in the South China Sea, the Belt and Road Initiative, economic and military pressure on Taiwan, and confrontation with the United States on trade and technology. Domestically, the Xinjiang internment programme, the 2020 National Security Law imposed on Hong Kong, and zero-COVID policies (2020–22) represented the most coercive exercises of state power since the Cultural Revolution. Xi entered his third term as General Secretary at the 20th Party Congress in October 2022, with no designated successor and no visible constraint on his authority.