How Xi Jinping became emperor. And how everyone missed it.

When Xi became General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, no one assumed he would take up that position for life. But when Presidential term limits were abolished in 2018, it was widely understood that Xi had made himself supreme leader, and would remain head of the state, party, and military for life. But how did Xi manage to pull this off, and how did everyone seemingly miss the signs? According to some sources, Xi made a swift powergrab, sweeping over party consensus and using guile and manipulation to crush his foes. The truth, however, may be a lot less exciting. Analysis suggest Xi not only went through tried and true boring procedures to gain his position, but that he did so with the explicit support of his fellow party members.

Chapters
(00:00) Introduction
(04:29) Background on Xi
(11:40) Predicitons about Xi's leadership
(19:50) The state of China in 2012
(34:50) Xi will be a weak leader
(40:30) How Xi managed to turn the tide
(47:45) The consensus of the Party as deciding factor
(54:15) Conclusions

[Crabby]

Really interesting analysis, as always. So it was kind of an organic development? I wonder how much influence the millennia of imperial rule had on his ascension? It'll be really interesting to see what happens when he dies - is he already grooming anyone, family members etc?

[MegaCavatina]

For me, as an amateur historian, it’s kind of interesting to a point. What I mean is that it’s really still looking at China from the outside. It’s a much more educated take than the real babble that we are subjected to every day. Maybe this should be called “Educated Babble”? 😊
My interest is in how did China get to where it is now and I’m just getting started. So far, there haven’t been any extremely insightful analyses. How did China pull itself up by the bootstraps to become the world’s second largest economy? The results are talked about - like, 800 million pulled out of poverty - but HOW was it done, WHAT did the Chinese leadership do? The results are everywhere for everyone to see: high speed rail, fantastic n no metro networks, farmers using drones, a space station, etc etc - but what was done to get things so right as to advance so far so quickly?
Thank you for your hard work! 👍

[horridohobbies]

No economy can sustain high GDP growth indefinitely. Once an economy grows large enough and mature enough, growth must slow down. This was the case in the 2010s. Remember, China became the world's largest economy by purchasing power parity in 2014. China's economy was HUGE.

So GDP growth slowed to 8%, 7%, 6% and now 5%. It behooves us to keep in mind that 5% GDP growth is still phenomenal. America's GDP growth this year is expected to be 2.6%, and 1.9% next year.

[sireyoursistermodernworld]

Extremely informative; you are fast becoming one of my primary sources on China. Keep up the good work. I am looking forward to your next episode.

[gunnarschaadt]

Not boring at all! Marvelously done and thoroughly explained and enjoyed

[lemokemo]

Super Interesting Topic, pumped for this one.

[philj]

Excellent delivery with factual content and consistent opions. Great work. Peace

[ansa]

To this so-called Chinese expert, what is CCP?

[victorn]

Nice to see a foreigner well knowledged in Chinese politics

很高兴遇见对中国政治的外国人

[theterriblechildren]

Great podcast! Very informative and well done

[horridohobbies]

China understands that its economic success, its national security, its social stability, are reliant on having a strong, central government. Western countries like America, Canada, Britain, France, and Germany have very weak governments and weak leadership. We've seen the consequences in recent years (Germany's deindustrialization, Britain's collapsing economy, the war in Ukraine, etc.).

[edwardsnowden]

By your very own definition, most African countries (which are all multi ethnic by the way) with a dictator, has an emperor that dominates an empire where no one can criticize them. Cameron, Iran, Morocco, sudan, Chad, etc are empire's with an emperor but USA with more than 800 military bases around the world is not. Australia, new Zealand, Canada etc that eliminated the natives of thier captured lands are not empires😂. lolol. i have never laughed so hard.

[horridohobbies]

0:53 For thousands of years, China has been ruled by imperial dynasties. *Some of these dynasties lasted centuries.* How can you say that whatever China tried, it hasn't ended well or lasted very long?

Will America's democratic system last for centuries? Right now, it's not looking too good. 🤣

[hendetta]

Wonderful analysis. Thx for sharing. Subbed.

[rosssmith]

Thanks for your video. I thought it provided a good perspective.

[Leoq-zkwt]

Chinese actually are not dump, sorry to remind people out there, what I'm about to say is simple, Chinese learn from their mistakes, and try to do thing better, always. But it can't be perfect because if so, things can only go worse from there, right? So, my point is if you think Xi became an emperor somehow, and nobody can stop him doing so, you are saying Chinese are dump. However, one person can be an emperer by himself, right after he took power from the last emperor, pretty much like Mao, but Mao was not a real emperor because he was not interested to be one, at least. All the real emperors in China became one when they aim to be one (failed and get killed, or successful and be one). 天子，替天行道。

[buzzlightyear]

Modi has no term limit. Singapore runs a essentially one party system. No "term limit" there. Taiwan was a one party, KMT, political system from 1946-1990(?).
There are a lot of emperors.

[cabasadefogo]

Interesting video. But I feel any talk of China's system from the west always misses the larger point. Here I will use my own background as a medical doctor to illustrate my point. A nation is like an organism, a border akin to skin for protection, and a government bureaucracy as the nervous system and the leadership as the brain. In medicine, there is a condition called neuropathy. That is when the nervous system losses the ability to detect external stimuli. This invariably leads overtime to ulcers and breakdown of the skin and underlying tissue. What I see now in the west is complete neuropathy of the organism. The government is no longer responsive to the needs and complaints of the people or the rest of the body. In China, this response system have been continuously fine tuned. One of the many examples of how the government responds to noxious stimuli is as follows. As a Chinese you can call a local number wherever you live and make a complaint about any issue. The system is not controlled by the local government so they cannot sweep it under the rug. Whenever 3 individuals make the same complaint, the complaint become officially registered. From that moment the local officials in charge are graded by how fast they respond and do they completely address the complaint. In such a system, I do believe that the overwhelming majority of Chinese at this point no longer care who is the titular man in charge. They simply care that the system works, the system draws in commoners who are tested unlike in the west, the system responds to their needs and complaints in a timely fashion with real world solutions and not the gaslighting we get in the west and a promise you can vote the incumbent out.

[michaelmarchal]

I like Xi anyway, so I don't care if he stays forever.

[fridgemagnet]

Very interesting and informative, but I don’t agree with the conclusions, why would anyone give up power to save their political party. That goes against human nature, there must have been some arm twisting in the background.
Keep up the great work!