Michael Dillon - China in the Age of Xi Jinping

China in the Age of Xi Jinping

This book presents a concise introduction to China in the Xi Jinping era. It is intended as a first book for those coming new to the subject, providing the essential information that most people need to know, without going into excessive detail. Its coverage includes the economy, society, politics, and international relations; Chinas history, especially the twentieth century; and Taiwan and Hong Kong, as well as the Peoples Republic of China. It will also be useful for more advanced students who need to understand developments in China outside their own primary disciplines.

The book provides an up-to-date and clear guide to the changes which have taken place in China in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, including the recent further changes which are taking place under Xi Jinpings regime. It draws on the enormous body of empirical and theoretical research that is being carried out by economists, political scientists, and sociologists on China, but is itself written in non-technical and accessible language. It does not assume any previous knowledge of China and explanations of Chinese terms are provided throughout the book. It includes a map, a chronology, a glossary of Chinese terms, biographical notes on key figures, and a guide to further reading.

Michael Dillon is Professor of History and Affiliate of the Lau China Centre at Kings College, London. He was formerly Director of the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Durham and Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University, Beijing. He is the author of Contemporary China An Introduction (Routledge 2009).

First published 2021

by Routledge

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2021 Michael Dillon

The right of Michael Dillon to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

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ISBN: 978-0-367-34301-9 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-0-367-34790-1 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-0-429-32521-2 (ebk)

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Contents

Preface Acknowledgements Chronology

PART 1
Introduction

1 Land, people, and culture

2 Chinas past in the present

PART 2
Politics

3 Government and politics of China

4 Seeking a harmonious society: fourth-generation leadership of Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao

5 Murder and corruption in the leadership: Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang

6 Rise of Xi Jinping: fifth generation or new authoritarianism?

PART 3
The economy

7 Economic growth and the changing economy

8 Rural economy

9 Urban and industrial economy

10 Banking, finance, and foreign trade

11 Tourism and transport

12 Western development

13 Belt and Road Initiative

PART 4
Society

14 Social change: rural reforms and urbanisation

15 Education and health

16 Law and human rights

17 Mass media

18 Religious and ethnic minorities

19 Gender and modernisation

20 The environment

PART 5
Chinas periphery

21 Tibet

22 Xinjiang

23 Inner Mongolia

24 Hong Kong

25 Taiwan

PART 6
International relations

26 China and the world 1: strategic relationships

27 China and the world 2: neighbours to the west

PART 7
Prospects: struggle between two new lines

28 After Xi: harmonious society or new authoritarianism?

List of abbreviations Glossary of selected Chinese terms Biographical notes Index

Preface

Into the Xi Jinping era

China does not stand still. Contemporary China an Introduction , my previous overview of the politics, economics, and society of China, was published in 2009; the information and analysis in that book were current when the manuscript was completed in the summer of 2008. In August of that year, China was host to the summer Olympics, which was deemed a success and boosted the countrys image. The international banking crisis began in 2007 with the failures of sub-prime mortgages in the United States and entered its most dangerous and dramatic phase in September 2008 with the collapse of the Lehman Brothers investment bank. Since 2008, there have been major changes in China, some of which were in response to the financial crisis which was unfolding as Contemporary China went to press. This had a significant if indirect impact on the Chinese economy and a profound effect on the confidence of the elite in the Western financial model. The most significant changes, however, some of which were entirely unexpected, result from the rise to power of Xi Jinping in 2012.

It is now a commonplace that China is a major, even dominant, international economic force and an increasingly influential actor on the international stage. An informed understanding of the rapid, and often bewildering, changes in the Chinese world is not the exotic indulgence that it was once thought to be although it never really was but a practical necessity. Chinese studies, in common with the rest of the academic world, remains fragmented in disciplinary silos, with the attendant risk of failure to see the wood for the trees. This book, like its predecessor, aspires to compensate for that risk by offering an overall picture of Chinas development, set in the context of its contemporary history.

Xi Jinping takes control

Xi Jinping became General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on 15 November 2012, and President of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) on 14 March 2013, by which time he had also assumed the role of Chairman of the twin Central Military Commissions formally answerable, respectively, to the CCP and the government. Xi has been described as the most powerful leader of China since Mao Zedong, and this position was strengthened when he was acknowledged as a core leader in October 2016. Xi rose to power on the dual platforms of alleviating poverty and combating corruption, but his administration will be remembered for authoritarianism and the intolerance of even the mildest forms of dissent. This has been accompanied by an aggressive assertion of Chinas position in the world and greater reliance on nationalist rhetoric. None of this was predictable in 2008 during the administration of General Secretary Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao.

China in the Age of Xi Jinping addresses these dramatic changes in the PRC, which celebrated its 70th anniversary in 2019, and offers a comprehensive picture of the state of that nation in as concise a form as possible. Although the book will be useful while the Xi Jinping administration remains in power, it should also have an afterlife as an account of that administration once Xi eventually stands down. It is not just an updated version of Contemporary China an Introduction , although it draws on the material from that book and some factual passages that do not require updating have been retained. All chapters have been revised to reflect the changes of the past ten years, and several are completely new. The entire text has been either completely rewritten or thoroughly updated; the opportunity has been taken to consult sources that have become available since 2008 and to incorporate material and impressions from the authors research visits to China, including Xinjiang, Shanghai, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Chongqing, and Hong Kong, and to Mongolia during the same period.

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