It is never easy to determine exactly what is happening at the highest levels of China’s Communist Party. The decision-making of the organisation that rules the world’s most populous country is opaque at the best of times, and even more so under the increasingly personalised rule of the current paramount leader Xi Jinping. Occasionally, however, some news breaks through the clutter, like the recent announcement that Mr Xi will be known as the “core leader”. The phrase has a portentous history. Most recently, Deng Xiaoping used it to prop up his chosen successor Jiang Zemin after the Tiananmen Square protests and the subsequent crackdown had divided the highest levels of the party. It was never used to describe Mr Jiang’s successor Hu Jintao. Since the announcement last week, the Communist Party has stepped up efforts to burnish the considerable cult of Mr Xi.
The implications of Mr Xi’s new status are considerable. For one, it formalises the impression that he is more powerful than any Chinese leader in decades. However, unlike Deng, who could wear his power lightly, Mr Xi clearly views his power as needing the emphasis provided by a title. Many worry that this does not just indicate his power but also his increasing sense of siege. Certainly, his challenges are considerable: A slowing economy, one that is stubbornly resistant to reform; a confrontation with neighbours and the US over the South China Sea that appears to have no face-saving exit; an increasing number of dissenters, some even more nationalist than the Party, on social media; and an anti-corruption campaign that has escaped its restraints and now has a life of its own, harming investment and political stability. Worryingly, Mr Xi’s response to these multiple threats has now become clear: Rather than setting up the sort of institutional strength that would allow the People’s Republic of China to respond to diverse challenges, he believes that increasing his personal authority and decision-making, including over the intellectual class, the military and state-owned enterprises, is the only reasonable solution.
From India’s point of view, the declaration provides food for thought regarding the future. Mr Xi is due at the next Party Congress to name a successor, as has been the tradition for decades. There is a concern now, however, that the logical end-point of this concentration of power is that Mr Xi chooses to stay as paramount leader for longer than the customary 10 years. If so, India will have to reckon with the fact that the more muscular approach to its neighbours that Mr Xi has pioneered may be here to stay. In addition, there were hopes in New Delhi that Chinese financing of the Pakistani establishment through its One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative might not last a change of command in Beijing since OBOR is very much Mr Xi’s personal initiative. However, if Mr Xi stays around for longer than previously expected, then there is little hope that the uneconomic projects under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor will be slowly defunded. In other words, it will be even more difficult for India to exert pressure on the Pakistani military establishment that benefits from these projects.
