Continuity or change? China’s sweeping reforms under Xi Jinping

There is a widespread belief that the Western democracies’ engagement policy with China has failed. Instead of introducing deep political reforms, President Xi Jinping has reset the relationship between the market and government by re-emphasizing the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) central role in the Chinese economy and steered China back toward its founding socialist principles. As part of this “third revolution,”¹ the government has implemented a slew of policy reforms and restrictions, from crackdowns on Internet platforms and regulatory squeezes on the tech industries to strict regulation of the real estate market and more.

It is clear that this notion of the “failure of engagement” has played a major part in shaping the current foreign policy of many Western democracies today. As U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared in his July 23, Pompeo, 2020 speech, the West must face up to the “hard truth” that the era of engagement with China is over.² The U.S. national security strategy is now defined as countering China’s growing influence in the areas of technology, economics, politics, military, intelligence, and global governance by aligning with a network of allies and partners.³

Nevertheless, whether and why the West’s engagement policy with China has been a failure is yet to be meticulously studied in the academic realm. A decade has passed since Xi Jinping took over as the paramount leader of the CCP in 2012, and there is no denying that China’s domestic and foreign affairs have undergone some dramatic changes since then. On the diplomatic front, President Xi has advanced the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), making poverty alleviation, the digital BRI, and the green BRI key policy priorities. On the domestic front, he is pushing forward with structural reforms to achieve “common prosperity” throughout China. These sweeping reforms have all had a profound impact on Chinese politics, its society, and the international community. When and why did these dramatic changes in China’s policy direction come about? To put it another way, is Sino-U.S. competition simply an inevitable consequence of China’s current domestic and foreign policy orientation?

This special issue explores the continuity and change in China’s political development and aims to answer the following questions:

1. Why has the regime of Xi Jinping advanced these reforms? Is it because they correspond to Xi’s own political preferences, or are they an inevitable result of China’s political system?

2. When did the Chinese government start introducing these reforms? Were they part of a new policy in the “new era” of Xi Jinping, or did the state begin to introduce them under Hu Jintao or even Jiang Zemin?

3. What impact have these massive policy changes had on China’s domestic politics, its society, and the international community?

The common view expressed within this special issue is that Xi Jinping’s administration inherited many of the fundamental political and ideological challenges of its predecessor, but addressed them in a way that was very specific to Xi Jinping.

President Xi has been described as the “Chairman of Everything.” Nonetheless, looking at two of the newly established central leading groups set up under Xi – the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms and the Central Commission for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms – Professor Norihiko Sasaki of Japan’s Defense Academy argues that these bodies have not been designed to cement Xi’s personal power. Rather, their aim is to advance the reforms first begun under the administration of Hu Jintao.

On the other hand, most of the authors in this special issue argue that an essential feature of all the various reforms is that they revolve around Xi’s attempts to consolidate his personal power through the personalization of Party organizations. Thus, as the article by Professor Jaehwan Lim of Aoyama University explains, these reforms may not in the end lead to any significant changes in the nature of China’s political structure, such as the relationship between the Party and the military.

In this sense, the current setback to China’s political democratization can be attributed in large part to the personality and governing style of the country’s top leader, Xi Jinping. As made evident in the article by Madoka Fukuda from Hosei University, China’s Taiwan policy-making process has changed significantly due to Xi Jinping’s emphasis on centralizing power at the highest level.

In addition, a number of articles in the special issue indicate that the current policy direction, accelerated by the tense conflict between China and the U.S., has been determined in response to the domestic context. According to Professor Naoko Eto at Gakushuin University, the competition with the West for “international discourse power” was formed in conjunction with the domestic propaganda campaign for “Xi Jinping thought.”

The consequences of Xi’s reforms are hugely significant. While the 40 years of reform and opening up first begun under Deng Xiaoping in 1978 have not brought about political democracy in China, they have undeniably introduced an irreversible plurality of opinion in Chinese society. A series of centralized reforms and crackdowns under Xi Jinping have met with enormous resistance from society. On the other hand, Xi’s authoritarian regime has consolidated its power through the rule of law, as demonstrated in the article by Hsin Hsien Wang and Shan Yun Shi from National Chengchi University: under Xi Jinping, the number of bills has multiplied, the speed of consideration has increased, and the body responsible for drafting them has also changed. In the process, power has gradually shifted to the Party’s central government, which has consequently been able to strengthen its control over society.

Globally, competition between China and the United States may be inevitable because there is a deep-seated distrust of U.S. security embedded in the Chinese political system and hence at the heart of China’s foreign policy. As Professor Rumi Aoyama of　Waseda University argues, China has expanded its global influence in dual-use cutting-edge technologies by restructuring its decision-making process under Xi Jinping and adopting a state-led national strategy to use Beidou domestically while expanding its global reach through a market-driven approach. The article also suggests that a containment policy to curb China’s influence through Beidou’s dual-use technologies may not be feasible.

The two factors identified in this special issue as influencing the trajectory of China’s domestic and foreign policy – Xi Jinping’s personal preferences and China’s political economic system – lead to a mixed response when it comes to the question of how best to engage with China. If it is only personal factors related to Xi Jinping that are driving the current Chinese domestic and foreign policy, then it is too early to say that the engagement policy with China has failed. On the other hand, if China’s political system is the key factor motivating the confrontation between the U.S. and China, then the policy of engagement is fatally flawed. The success of the engagement policy depends on its ability to weaken the Chinese political system, and the research presented in this special issue represents a first step in investigating the extent to which this has been achieved.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

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Notes on contributors

Rumi Aoyama

Rumi Aoyama is Professor at the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies at Waseda University, and director of Waseda Institute of Contemporary Chinese Studies. She specialises in China’s contemporary foreign policy. Her book, Contemporary China's Foreign Policy (Gendai chuugoku no gaikou) was honored with the 24th Masayoshi Ohira Foundation Memorial Prize. Her other publications include Decoding the Rise of China (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018); A Diplomatic History of the People’s Republic of China (University of Tokyo Press, 2017); China and the Future of International Order (University of Tokyo Press, 2015); China’s Asia Policy in the Post-cold War Era, (University of Tokyo Press, 2013); China’s Global Strategy (Akashi Press, 2011); China’s Public Diplomacy Strategy (The Japan Foundation, 2009).

Notes

^1. Economy, The Third Revolution.

^2. Pompeo, Remarks at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum.

^3. National Security Strategy, October2022.