Xi Jinping - Early Career
Xi is the son of the late Xi Zhongxun, who was a senior official under Mao during the Chinese Communist revolution. This lineage makes Xi a member of the informal "princeling party," a group composed of the sons of party members and leading officials during the early days of the Chinese Communist revolution. Princelings are favored by party leaders because their strong connection to the Chinese Communist Party and ensuring the party remains in power. Xi used his status as a Princling to become an assistant to the defense minister who was a colleague of his father.
Xi Zhongxun was a communist guerilla leader in northwest China in the 1930s, when Mao and the CCP leaders reached Yan'an at the end of the Long March. Xi Zhongxun was one of the few local leaders to survive later purges, siding with the Mao Zedong faction and rising quickly through Party ranks to become a Vice Premier in the 1950s while still in his thirties. Xi Zhongxun was the youngest Vice Premier among the early generation of CCP leaders. Despite his association with Mao's group, Xi Zhongxun was also "good friends" with Deng Xiaoping and was actually closer to Deng than to Mao.
Despite Communist Party rhetoric regarding the creation of a "classless" society, the pre-Cultural Revolution society and leadership compounds in which Xi Jinping grew up were, ironically, the "most precisely class-based mini-society ever constructed." Everything was determined by one's "internal party class status," including the kindergarten one attended, the place where one shopped, and the type of car one could own. All of these "benefits" were determined by Party rank, such as Politburo Standing Committee member, Vice Minister, or Central Committee member. One's every action, every day, was in some way an indication of one's "class" status. The children of this revolutionary elite were told that they, too, would someday take their rightful place in the Chinese leadership. All of this came to an end in the Cultural Revolution, but consciousness of membership in an entitled, elite generation of future rulers remained among most of the members of this class.
Xi Jinping’s father Xi Zhongxun was purged by Mao in 1962, and things got worse for him and his family once the Cultural Revolution started. Xi Jinping was deeply affected by the experience of his father, a revolutionary hero who was later rehabilitated. After Xi Jinping became a government official, Xi Zhongxun told him: "No matter what your job title is, serve the people diligently, consider the interests of the people with all your heart, maintain close ties with the people, and always stay approachable to the people."
Xi Jinping, an ethnic Han and native of Fuping in Shaanxi Province, was born in June 1953. Xi was the middle child in a family of three children that included an older sister and a younger brother, all of whom were apparently from his father's second marriage. Xi's older sister, Xi An'an, at some point left China for Canada. Xi An'an's husband was in the PLA. Xi's younger brother, Xi Yuanping, moved to Hong Kong when it was under British rule. By the 1980s, at a time when Xi's father Xi Zhongxun was still Party Secretary in Guangdong province, the brother had become both obese and very wealthy, sporting "expensive jewelry and designer clothing." Unofficial biographies published in Hong Kong claim Xi had other siblings as well. Xi Jinping's first marriage was to Ke Xiaoming, the daughter of China's 1978-1983 ambassador to Great Britain, Ke Hua. Ke Xiaoming was elegant and well educated. The couple initially lived with Xi's parents in the Nanshagou housing compound, but as his father's political fortunes rose, his parents moved to a new house in "East" Beijing, near the Drum Tower and close to the houses of Deng Xiaoping and Yang Shangkun, leaving the young couple to themselves in the Nanshagou apartment. The couple fought "almost every day," and the marriage ended when Ke Xiaoming returned to England and Xi refused to go with her. Some thought Xi's "distant" quality contributed to the couple's divorce. Xi "drifted" further and further from Ke Xiaoming, until she finally left for England. There was, "of course," no way that Xi would go with her. Xi later married a famous PLA singer. Xi graduated from the School of Humanities and Social Sciences of Tsinghua University, majoring in Marxist theory and ideological education. Xi holds an LLD degree through an on-the-job postgraduate education program. Upon completing his LLD he joined the CPC in January 1974.
In an effort to follow in the footsteps of his father, Xi Jinping tried many times to join the Communist Youth League and the CPC, before finally being accepted when he was 20 years old. In the early 1970s, Xi Jinping managed to return to Beijing from the countryside. Unlike others who shared his Cultural Revolution experience in rural villages, Xi turned to serious politics upon his return to Beijing, joining the CCP in 1974 while his father was still in prison. Xi worked harder than many contemporaries to prove their allegiance to Mao as a young man, and was left with a heightened sense of how to get ahead in Chinese politics.
Xi Jinping chose to survive by becoming redder than red. Some felt "betrayed" by Xi's embrace of the CCP, but this was one way to "survive." Xi chose to "join the system" to get ahead. Although Xi never said so explicitly, he sent a message that, in China, the way forward was to not give up on the system.
Xi even went off to join a "worker-peasant-soldier revolutionary committee" (a label given provincial governing units during the Cultural Revolution). It was an "open secret" that it was through the "worker-peasant-soldier revolutionary committee" that Xi got his "bachelor's education." Xi's first degree was not a "real" university education, but instead a three-year degree in applied Marxism. From 1969-1975 Xi worked as an educated youth sent to the countryside at Liangjiahe Brigade, Wen'anyi Commune, Yanchuan County, Shaanxi Province, and served as Party branch secretary. Xi's official biography provides no information on Xi between his assignment to Yanchuan county, Shaanxi province, in 1969, and 1975, when, it states, he became a student at Tsinghua University, graduating in 1979.
Once Xi had returned from his education in the worker-soldier-peasant revolutionary committee, he carefully laid out a career plan that would maximize his opportunities to rise to the top levels of the Party hierarchy, first becoming a PLA officer in the late 1970s and then serving in a variety of provincial leadership positions, progressively rising through the ranks. By 1979, Xi was on the staffs of the State Council and the Central Military Commission (CMC), serving as an assistant to the CMC Secretary General and later Minister of National Defense (1982), General Geng Biao, a revolutionary comrade of his father's. Geng Biao had helped Xi Jinping get the PLA job, and that Xi Zhongxun had, in turn, given Geng's daughter a position in Guangdong when he was Party Secretary there.
The Third Plenum of the 11th Communist Party of China Central Committee, held in Beijing in December 1978, was not a dramatic event for the world. There were no major disagreements - no clashes between different leaders. In many ways, the event had an almost disarming procedural smoothness. The newly appointed vice-premier, Deng Xiaoping, delivered a speech in which he broadly urged cadres to "seek truth from facts" and "liberate their thinking".
The elder Xi was rehabilitated after Mao’s death in part due to assistance from Hu Jintao’s patron Hu Yaobang, and his family was relocated to the "Nanshagou" housing compound in western Beijing, directly across from Diaoyutai. In December 1978, Xi Zhongxun was rehabilitated during the 11th Third Plenum of the CPC. When serving as governor of Guangdong Province, Xi Zhongxun saw that many Guangdong youth were fleeing to then prosperous Hong Kong. He then suggested resolving the problem not with a “Hong Kong Wall,” but by narrowing the gap in living standards between Hong Kong and Guangdong. Later Shenzhen of Guangdong was set as one of four Special Economic Zones (SEZ) in 1980, together with Xiamen, Shantou, and Zhuhai. At the end of 1980, Xi Zhongxun was put in charge of the central government’s ethnic and religious affairs.
In 1975 Xi Jinping became a Student of basic organic synthesis at the Chemical Engineering Department of Tsinghua University. Upon graduation in 1979 Xi became a secretary at the General Office of the State Council and the General Office of the Central Military Commission (as an officer in active service).
Xi Jinping received a "Leftist, Marxist" education, even though he supposedly has a doctorate in "law." He slowly worked his way up the ladder in Heibei, Fujian and Zhejiang provinces. By all appearances, with his father having been politically rehabilitated and rapidly regaining his power, Xi Jinping could have continued to rise quickly in the Central Party apparatus. Xi, however, reasoned that in the long run, staying in Beijing would limit his career potential. Staying with Geng Biao would eventually shrink Xi's power base, which would ultimately rest primarily on his father's and Geng's networks and political support. Moreover, in time, people would turn against him if he stayed in the Center. So in a calculated move to lay the basis for a future return as a Central leader, Xi asked for a position in the countryside. At the time going to the provinces was his "only path to central power." Xi had promotion to the Center in mind from day one." Xi knew how to develop personal networks and work the system, first using his father's networks and later building his own.
In 1982, he became a local official in Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei province. Xi was promoted in 1982 to Deputy secretary of the CPC Zhengding County Committee, Hebei Province and promoted again in 1983 to Secretary of the CPC Zhengding County Committee, Hebei Province, first political commissar and first secretary of the Party committee of people's armed forces department of Zhengding County.
In 1985 Xi became a Member of the Standing Committee of the Municipal Party Committee and vice mayor of Xiamen, Fujian Province. Then in 1988 Xi became Secretary of the CPC Ningde Prefectural Committee, Fujian Province, first secretary of the Party committee of Ningde Sub-Military Area Command. Xi became Secretary of the CPC Fuzhou Municipal Committee and chairman of the Standing Committee of the Fuzhou Municipal People's Congress, Fujian Province, first secretary of the Party committee of Fuzhou Sub-Military Area Command in 1990.
Xi became a Member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Fujian Provincial Committee, secretary of the CPC Fuzhou Municipal Committee and chairman of the Standing Committee of the Fuzhou Municipal People's Congress, first secretary of the Party committee of Fuzhou Sub-Military Area Command in 1993. In 1995 Xi was promoted to Deputy secretary of the CPC Fujian Provincial Committee, secretary of the CPC Fuzhou Municipal Committee and chairman of the Standing Committee of the Fuzhou Municipal People's Congress, first secretary of the Party committee of Fuzhou Sub-Military Area Command and in 1996 Xi was promoted again to Deputy secretary of the CPC Fujian Provincial Committee, first political commissar of antiaircraft artillery reserve division of Fujian Provincial Military Area Command.
Xi served as Deputy secretary of the CPC Fujian Provincial Committee and acting governor of Fujian Province, vice director of commission for national defense mobilization of Nanjing Military Area Command, director of Fujian Provincial commission for national defense mobilization, first political commissar of antiaircraft artillery reserve division of Fujian Provincial Military Area Command in 1999-2000.
From 2000-2002 he was Deputy secretary of the CPC Fujian Provincial Committee and governor of Fujian Province, vice director of commission for national defense mobilization of Nanjing Military Area Command, director of Fujian Provincial commission for national defense mobilization, first political commissar of antiaircraft artillery reserve division of Fujian Provincial Military Area Command.
Xi served in Fujian from 1985 to 2002 during the height of the infamous Yuanhua/Xiamen smuggling scandal--one of the largest ever uncovered in modern China's history. That he not only emerged unscathed from the scandal but has continued to advance through the ranks pays tribute to his ability, as well as his protected princeling status and the respect afforded his father.
From 1998 to 2002 he studied Marxist theory and ideological education in an on-the-job postgraduate program at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences of Tsinghua University and graduated with an LLD degree.
In 2002 Xi became the Deputy secretary of the CPC Zhejiang Provincial Committee and acting governor of Zhejiang Province, vice director of commission for national defense mobilization of Nanjing Military Area Command, director of Zhejiang Provincial commission for national defense mobilization and was promoted in 2002 to the Secretary of the CPC Zhejiang Provincial Committee and acting governor of Zhejiang Province, first secretary of the Party committee of Zhejiang Provincial Military Area Command, vice director of commission for national defense mobilization of Nanjing Military Area Command, director of Zhejiang Provincial commission for national defense mobilization. From 2003-2007 Xi served as Secretary of the CPC Zhejiang Provincial Committee and chairman of the Standing Committee of the Zhejiang Provincial People's Congress, first secretary of the Party committee of Zhejiang Provincial Military Area Command.
Diligence and frugality are the traditional virtues of the Chinese nation. Xi was strict with his family members. As he rose to adopt leading positions, Xi warned relatives and friends not to run any business or do anything in his name in the place where he worked. Whether it was Fujian Province, Zhejiang Province or Shanghai, Xi told the officials there that no one was allowed to seek private gain in his name and he welcomed everyone's supervision.
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 can be discerned, Xi's family and friends have had a good experience in the West. Xi was the only one of his immediate family to stay behind in China, with some speculating that Xi knew early on that he would "not be special" outside of China.
In 1985, as the leader of a delegation studying pig-raising techniques, he visited the city and stayed in the homes of several residents and dined in the homes of others. Xi Jinping won the hearts of ordinary Americans during a visit to a farming community in the Midwestern state of Iowa 15 February 2012, 27 years after he first visited the area as a mid-level official. The man presumed to be China's next president spent an hour sipping tea with residents in the town of Muscatine, and many said he remembered faces and recited events from his previous visit in 1985. Among those who met with Xi was local resident Tom Hoopes, whose farm Xi visited during that earlier trip to study U.S. agricultural practices.
"I'm visiting the United States to help implement the important consensus that has been reached between President Hu Jintao and President Obama, and I'm here to build the China-US cooperative partnership based on mutual respect and mutual benefit. And I want to engage with a broad cross-section of American society to help deepen the friendship between Chinese and American people," he said. Xi received a cooler welcome during a visit to the U.S. Congress in Washington, where senators and representatives pressed him on China's human rights record.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
