Interesting that the leaders of two of the world's superpowers (and the two formerly communist ones at that) share such a similar journey.
I did not remark China becoming more authoritarian under his rule. I do not see indications that he may stay after 2022, his scheduled depart. What did I miss?
Hu Jintao served two terms as party secretary, but never consolidated his power base (Jiang Zemin protruded a lot into his reign), so was not very powerful, even compared to his premier (wen jiabao). Xi, on the other hand, has completely consolidated his power base and sidelined Li Keqiang. His competitors and apparent successors have been hit up on corruption (they are all corrupt, but who gets prosecuted depends on power plays).
If his successor (maybe another Hu) isn't apparent at this congress, then there will be a lot of talk of him staying passed his terms. If the successor is named, which is probable, then that talk will stop. However, he could totally pull a Jiang Zemin and retain some powerful poets (e.g. Head of the military commission) to keep more influence afterward. But in reality, all the retired leaders retain power behind the scenes, and it's just a matter of how much (him putting his protégés in power and kicking out Hu's will help a lot).
- Anti corruption campaign, restore legitimacy in party with regard to people's opinions, level some playing fields, purge the party of corruption and also strengthen ideological and political support for Xi.
- Xi has been called "The Core", this term was only ever used for Mao and Deng.
- Anti-corruption has also focused on military. Result seems to be Xi has greater control of and greater loyalty from the military.
- The PLA garrison in HK broke tradition this year to address Xi as "Chairman", instead of "Commander" --a first. Perhaps this reflects that while usually the leader also Chairs the Central Military Commission, as Xi does, Xi's power is less figurehead and more effective.
- Xi has achieved many things internationally that have not been done by China ever: first overseas military base, in Africa; taking control of disputed islands in its coastal waters in defiance of neighbours; creation of the ambitious, "One Belt One Road", infrastructure, trade and investment project, to expand China's influence along a "new silk road" Westward; and exercised tighter control over old and new media, with very effective online censorship.
- In summary, he does a lot, has made many changes, is always in the news cycle as an effective leader, and has presided over a very successful period for China both with regard to domestic growth and stability, and international standing and ambitious expansion.
Xi greatly suppressed political dissent, online and off. There was a burgeoning, very interesting online debate about democracy and governance, full of thoughtful ideas, brilliant satire, and more. AFAIK, that's mostly gone. You can read about it here:
He also arrested and otherwise suppressed many political opponents, at least in large part under the guise of an 'anti-corruption' campaign.
He's also revived Communist ideology and a Mao-ish cult of personality for himself. In contrast, Deng Xiaopeng avoided it - my understanding is that he even was cremated and had his ashes scattered at sea so there would be no shrine to him.
Finally, he has helped create an intense wave of nationalism.
(I will say, in fairness, that cults of personality and nationalism are trendy in other countries too, such as the U.S. I don't know how everyone forgot the evil that those things lead to.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xi_Jinping#Consolidation_of_po...
The entire article is a good read, it's amazing how much power he has.
Also, he gets compared to his immediate predecessor (Hu) who was was very bland and worked more on a consensus model.
Check this article out: "Xi Jinping May Be Less Powerful Than He Seems" ( https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/04/xi... )
The fact of the matter is that the outside world knows very little about the inner workings at the top of the Communist Party in China.
And speaking of influencing elections... there was this thing in the 90's called... Chinagate. [1] With millions directly found to influence an election. As well as leaked weapons and nuclear secrets as recently as >>2009<<. But I guess 6 years is forever ago and China has completely changed its ways.
p.s. And I'm NOT saying "don't talk about Russia" I'm saying, why aren't we talking about BOTH?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_United_States_campaign_fi...
Russia, on the other hand, has been regressing and getting smaller. Set aside their nuclear arsenal, and they aren’t leading in anything, and are falling behind in nearly everything (they are barely within the top 10 of countries in terms of GDP). This is quite a comedown from 30 years ago and the Russian, especially Putin’s, response has been to create havoc amongst Western democracies.
China will continue to hack into other countries’ systems to steal technology and IP etc (and the various intelligence agencies have been warning against this for over a decade) but they are not gonna try and create political havoc unlike the Russians.
This view may or not be in tune with reality, but that is the view none the less
Maybe it's just two autocrats who use cults of personality and tactics from the same playbook.
On one hand I like Xi's effort to clean up the corrupted senior officials. It was about time, but now he has the absolute power (military, justice, and executive) under the chair of the Party's control is alarming. I know a lot of Chinese natives (for what it is worth, I was born and raised in HK until I was 12) who refuse to believe in all the bad things happening in China, and refuse to recognize tragedy such as Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. They also become very emotional when it comes to Taiwan's relationship with China. But China isn't the only country in the world censoring and rewriting history. Japan tried to cover up its war crime during WW2. Other Western countries tried too. [1]
I hate the fact today we still have governments and citizens who refuse to recognize the wrongdoings in their country's history, and fail to work toward a peaceful resolution once and for all. All the fights for territories and borders, all the ethic group fighting over historical hates and war crimes (e.g. Myanmar vs Rohingya). Time to wake THE FUCK UP...
If we let go of our pasts, and our irrational prides, especially those we inherited from generations before us, then this world would finally have peace. Of course, the sad reality is we won't and will never be able to. Money prints off blood, and power is measured by the number of coffins and the fall of oppositions. Make no mistake, we can't compromise human values in exchange for stability. But this is how Xi and every leader in the world thinks of governance. Forgive, and be more compassionate. What is more important than saving lives and make people feel they are humans again, and not a war machine?
Kent state happened so long ago that most American students just don't know, or anything much that happened during Vietnam, which our history classes don't seem to have time to cover. In china, its a bit worse, as they have the siege of Changchun (the communists basically starved out a few hundred thousand civilians), or the 1938 yellow river flood, where the nationalists killed millions of civilians to thwart the Japanese. In those contexts, Tiananmen is just a blip.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1...
Saying "US military" is somewhat misleading.
The soldiers who shot and killed four students at Kent State University were part of what we call the "National Guard".[1] These are reserve military units.
National Guardsmen usually have full-time civilian jobs and are only called into service when needed. Sometimes these soldiers are called "weekend warriors". A National Guard unit is controlled by an individual state up until the time that the US government needs its services.
It would be more correct to call those soldiers "Ohio state military". At the time of the shootings, the National Guard unit involved was under the control of Governor Rhodes of the State of Ohio.[2]
There is a big distinction in the USA between "federal" (aka national US) and "state" government. This distinction isn't necessarily clear to foreigners. Granted, this distinction isn't necessarily clear to about 70% of US citizens either. But that's an entire other discussion.
Edit: the law has been updated since then, but something called the Posse Comitatus Act was in effect at the time.[3] It is against the law for the US military to act as a domestic police force:
From and after the passage of this act it shall not be lawful to employ any part of the Army of the United States, as a posse comitatus, or otherwise, for the purpose of executing the laws, except in such cases and under such circumstances as such employment of said force may be expressly authorized by the Constitution or by act of Congress
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Guard_of_the_United_S... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act
> [1]: http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v06/v06p--9_Bennett.html
I read 2/3 of that article with some interest and occasional surprise until I ran into the part where the holocaust is flat out denied and the bombing of German cities called the greatest war crime of WWII.
Judging by the fact that you share that link as if it's well-researched truth I wonder what your agenda is. Do you believe that, and I quote, "there was no plan to exterminate Jews in World War II"? If not, why do you quote that article as if it has merit?
The weird thing is that the article does not support your argument. Your argument is against nationalism, and I passionately agree with you there. The article you quote is all about, and I quote again, "the fallacious belief that multi-racial societies are viable".
> This is the classic "what breaks you only make you stronger" but in a very aggressive way.
imo This is just continuing effects from the trauma of Cultural Revolution, with fear & self preservation being the primary motivation of the China's red nobility. I remember reading that one of Deng Xiaoping's major reasons to crush the Democracy rallies was because he feared an uprising and being under house arrest again. It makes you wonder what China will be like if you have leadership who didn't experience the bad end of the Cultural Revolution firsthand
Today is tomorrow's history. Compared with yesterday, today is not that different from yesterday. But history does not simply repeat itself, either.
https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09BEIJING3128_a.html
I found this section quite interesting.
Familiarity with the West and Taiwan
------------------------------------
25. (C) Based on personal experience, the professor noted, Xi
is very familiar with the West, with a sister in Canada, an
ex-wife in England, a brother in Hong Kong, many friends
overseas, and prior travel to the United States. As far as
the professor can discern, Xi's family and friends have had a
good experience in the West. The professor contrasted Xi's
experience and attitudes toward the West with those of people
sent to the United States by their work units, such as the
nationalist and sometime anti-U.S. Tsinghua University
scholar Yan Xuetong. Xi was the only one of his immediate
family to stay behind in China, the professor noted,
speculating that Xi knew early on that he would "not be
special" outside of China.
26. (C) Xi is favorably disposed toward the United States,
the professor maintained, and would want to maintain good
relations with Washington. The professor said Xi has "no
ambition" to "confront" the United States. During Xi's visit
to Washington, D.C., in 1987, he told the professor that he
had no strong impressions of the United States. Although Xi
was not particularly impressed by the United States, he had
nothing bad to say about it either. Xi took a detached
stance, as if observing from a distance, viewing what he saw
as just a normal part of life, not strange, the professor
said.For example, Albert Speer wrote that although Adolf Hitler had a very well established reputation of being impatient and intolerant of mistakes in the public sphere, he apparently was totally opposite in private. Speer wrote that even if a civil servant's work was completely inadequate Hitler would simply send it back until it was acceptable. If this failed he'd just move the person to another role and ask someone else to complete it.
Reading the BBC and Wikileaks texts, the events fit neatly in the "Singapore experiment with a billion citizen" narrative which the PRC has been doing since Deng Xiao Ping, ethnocentrism excepted.
26. (C) Xi is favorably disposed toward the United States, the professor maintained, and would want to maintain good relations with Washington. The professor said Xi has "no ambition" to "confront" the United States. During Xi's visit to Washington, D.C., in 1987, he told the professor that he had no strong impressions of the United States. Although Xi was not particularly impressed by the United States, he had nothing bad to say about it either. Xi took a detached stance, as if observing from a distance, viewing what he saw as just a normal part of life, not strange, the professor said.
I think the best thing is to just disable pre in mobile.
:%le
Temperamentally, of course, Xi is almost the exact opposite of Trump...
Chinese source from People's Daily -
http://politics.people.com.cn/n/2012/0805/c1001-18670287.htm...
Trump just copied the idea from Hu and Xi.
I'm well and truly confused. This is not entirely unusual.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/04/06/born-red
According to the article, Xi once said,
"People who have little experience with power,
those who have been far away from it, tend
to regard these things as mysterious and
novel. But I look past the superficial
things: the power and the flowers and
the glory and the applause. I see the
detention houses, the fickleness of
human relationships. I understand politics
on a deeper level."
Humanity itself is a quite complex matter. It's true that sometimes, certain people can be quite cruel, ruthless, or even cold-blooded; but this should not be a universal trait for the overall human beings -- or otherwise, it would have been a definition for the concept of "human" many centuries ago. There is a dynamic motley of benignity and malignity in any individual -- and the concept of "benignity" or "malignity" can be relative in certain cases. It's better for us all, if we construct a system that could inspire more benignity (-- or if possible, maximize ) out of us.
But today, many dealings by the Chinese government seems to simply view its citizens as objects or even tools, with "fickling" worthiness that does not lie within themselves but is based on the external perspective of the ruling party, to perpetuate their ruling.
Perhaps that is why Xi would raise the question to Biden in 2011/2, "why does the U.S. put so much emphasis on human rights." [1]
Note: [1] see https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/04/06/born-red for the details about that episode...
I cannot help to remind you that Xi is the president of a country with 1.3 BB people. If you think he does not know this fact, you are plain ignorant.
Chinese political sphere isn't any another-world strange thing. It's just like any such things: human-dealing and power-plays... Xi knows too well how to deal with people, and how complex they are, otherwise he would not reach his currnet power at all...
> If you think he does not know this fact,
> you are plain ignorant.
I won't deny that I am indeed ignorant -- and on that, I would concur in Socrates' words, "I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance"...
> Xi knows too well how to deal with people,
> and how complex they are, otherwise he would
> not reach his currnet power at all
I think everyone knows his own way of dealing with people -- that's the social aspect of every human being...it's just that their knowledge about that matter could be very different from each other...
When I state "humanity itself is a quite complex matter", I am just stating it's complex; and I am not stating _how_ it is complex -- I feel that's a very very broad and involved matter; and on that, too, different people may have different opinion and understanding, which could be evolving and changing all the time...
For instance, you could say that half a century ago another Chinese "power" leader, Mao Zedong, understood how to deal with people -- for "otherwise he would not reach his then current power at all" -- and the manner of his dealing was to simply destroy or even annihilate those who did not agree with him; and he termed that dealing as "revolution". It's indeed a great achievement for Mao to somewhat successfully reach that goal; but this does not mean that kind of policy really benefited the average Chinese people living in those days...
Power is a great test of one's mettle and humanity, a test most fail historically - though I make no predictions about Xi.
Does anybody know an open source equivalent? Thanks.
"And money talks. When Xi visited Seattle in 2015, America’s technology giants allowed themselves to be summoned
The bosses of Apple, Microsoft, Cisco, IBM and Amazon all stood alongside Xi in the front row of a group photograph. All have since embarked on multiple partnerships with China despite its commitment to perfecting internet censorship.
Also prominent in that photo was Mark Zuckerberg, but despite a charm offensive which included inviting the Chinese Communist leader to suggest a name for his baby, and praising Xi’s book on governance, Facebook is still barred from China. Google’s founders were not even invited to be in Xi’s photo.
Xi has ambitious plans for control of the internet and that means leverage over foreign companies.
Facebook’s messaging tool Whatsapp is increasingly blocked in China and Apple has now removed from its China App Store the VPNs which once gave Chinese users access to social media tools in the West, including the YouTube channel which gave the gleeful Guo Wengui such a devastating platform to discredit Xi’s rule.
To fully control China’s cyberspace, Xi has had to take action against the world’s."