XI JINPING AND CHINA’S NEW ERA

President Xi Jinping took his place on Tiananmen Rostrum on October 1 at a grand celebration marking the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

It was there on October 1, 1949, that Mao Zedong announced the birth of New China. Over the seven decades, the socialist country has blazed an extraordinary trail, rising from a “poor and blank” state to a major country on the world stage.

Xi, the first top Chinese leader born after 1949, is at the helm in a new era, steering the country through wind and waves to a brighter future.

Into new era

Xi was elected general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee on November 15, 2012.

The world at that time was transforming. The impact of the 2008 global financial crisis still lingered. Emerging economies were rising. China, after overtaking Japan as the second largest economy, had entered a critical period in its modernization.

Two weeks later, Xi proposed the Chinese dream of national rejuvenation.

Soon after assuming the Party’s top post, Xi addressed senior cadres with a lecture spanning the history of world socialism over the past 500 years. He talked of how China had failed in its previous experiment with all other “-isms,” and directed cadres to unreservedly follow socialism with Chinese characteristics.

The Party’s authority was further emphasized in October 2017, with the establishment of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.

Xi demanded full and strict governance over the 90-million-member CPC. To this end, he has introduced an eight-point decision on how to improve conduct, rolled out stricter Party rules and regulations, and over the seven years, launched four education campaigns to strengthen the Party.

“Every day, we brush our teeth, wash our faces, clean the house and do the laundry. For Party building, we must do the same,” he said.

An unprecedented anti-corruption campaign has left no stone unturned. In the first five years of Xi’s leadership, 440 centrally administrated officials—mostly ministerial-level or above—were punished.

“Xi and his colleagues preside over the world’s largest and most successful MarxistLeninist organization, and they are determined to ensure that it remains so,” Foreign Affairs magazine said in an article.

In late 2016, Xi’s core status in the CPC Central Committee and the whole Party was established. He was reelected general secretary of the CPC Central Committee in October 2017 and Chinese president in March 2018.

During a visit to Italy this year, asked about how he felt about being Chinese president, Xi told President of the Italian Chamber of Deputies Roberto Fico that governing such a huge country requires a strong sense of responsibility and hard work.

“I am willing to be selfless and devote myself to China’s development,” Xi said. “I will not let the people down.”

Reform to the end

China aims to basically achieve socialist modernization by 2035 and build itself into a great modern socialist country by the middle of the century. Xi has said China today is closer than ever before to national rejuvenation, which is part of the Party’s founding mission.

In 2018, the Chinese economy surpassed 90 trillion yuan ($12.72 trillion), cementing its place as second in the world. Between 2013 and 2018, it grew by 7 percent on average every year compared to just 2.9 percent of the global economy.

China has the world’s most complete production chains. The output of more than 220 industrial products ranks No.1 in the world. China has laid down the longest mileage of high-speed rail tracks and sent a lunar rover to the dark side of the Moon.

For the first time, a total of 129 Chinese companies made the Fortune Global 500 list in 2019, more than any other country.

The achievements can be attributed to people’s hard work and deepened reforms. Unsurprisingly, reform and opening up, introduced by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, is regarded as a “social revolution.”

Xi is committed to seeing this through to the end. In 2012, for his first inspection as the Party’s top leader, he headed to the reform testbed of Guangdong.

Reform and opening up is a “critical measure” concerning contemporary China’s fate and there shall be no “pause” or “back-pedalling,” he said.

Reform under Xi is distinctive in its own right: It places more focus on quashing vested interests, emphasizes top-level design and underscores a systematic, holistic and coordinated approach. A far-reaching seven-year reform plan was adopted in late 2013.

Xi has presided over scores of leading group or central committee meetings on deepening overall reform. At the most recent, in September, 11 documents on reform plans and guidelines were adopted on topics ranging from private business support to plastic waste treatment.

Celebrated for his ability to connect with the people through language—xi’s often quoted maxims such as “do concrete work and take the lead,” “a state thrives on practical work but wanes on empty talk” and “grab the iron bar hard enough to leave a mark” shed some light on how China can achieve so much in such a short period.

Xi drafted market-oriented reforms for state-owned enterprises and has supported the development of the private sector. In 2018, at an unprecedented private enterprise symposium, Xi said private companies and entrepreneurs are “our own people.”

Innovation, too, has received support, with Xi once saying that vital, core technologies are something that China cannot obtain through “begging.”

Party and state institutions are now more efficient and modernized. Red tape has been cut and governments at various levels have expanded online approval and one-stop services.