All the points you raise are completely valid but I don't really see the current sentiment in China coming to the same conclusions (yet). This is all completely anecdotal and limited to my China bubble but I feel like many people in China would have various answers for what Xi's legacy is: anti-corruption, elevating China's image abroad (as you pointed out in your excellent last article re the media wars), acceleration AI innovation (deepseek's "Sputnik moment"), making excellent use of rare earths as leverage in the trade wars, dominating the renewables sector - in short, making China great again. Almost none of my Chinese friends have any desire to emigrate to the US or Europe anymore, and those who study abroad mostly return to China immediately (again, totally anecdotal but that's what I'm observing right now). Incidentally, almost none of my friends have much love for Xi as a leader but they do feel like China is in a better position than it used to be even if they themselves are not (as you pointed out, high youth unemployment, deflationary pressures etc). It really all comes down to whether Xi's debt gamble will come back to haunt him and somehow undo the progress China has made on the world stage - he might either reap all the glory or all the blame.
Hello Jellyfish, thank you for taking the time to comment and raising some excellent points.
You're absolutely right this doesn't reflect prevailing thought in China, but that's almost exactly the point. I've tried to peer through the noise, think in terms of hindsight, from a few decades forward. Key fundamentals that might bear out. I.e. Corruption is absolutely a key aspect of Xi's time — but how relevant is that to the average Chinese citizen's daily life? Will it be remembered? And is it worth the increased reach of Party "education"?
To give a full account of the Xi years would run to thick book or twelve. Hence why I zeroed in on just Foreign Relations, of which Xi is almost entirely responsible, sets the ethos, and can be (somewhat) objectively judged against his predecessor via polls, events; plus Economy (of which, everything else domestically stems). While CPC's attempts to invest in new technology is real, it remains to be seen whether current hotspots like AI, or solar become actual lasting legacies. What happens if tariffs bite? Politics turns? Technology is leapfrogged? Or another country rises..?
To give Xi his due (and show a little more balance) one section I begrudgingly cut was ecological improvement. That whole area seems a marked departure from previous Governments, an attempt to enact wider cultural change, and looks to be delivering daily impact. If anything, I think it may be his greatest legacy.
Many thanks for this rundown on the long-term negatives of Xi’s rule. I view the man from a different perspective. Perhaps no one else cares but I do. In his version of Make China Great Again, the cultures and languages of China’s minorities will be utterly rooted out and destroyed. Only the great Chinese imperial past matters and is worth preserving, developing, and promoting. He is the ultimate Han chauvinist (just as Putin is the ultimate Great Russian chauvinist). Perhaps most Han Chinese don’t care and will think it’s only right that it should be that way. But Xi will go down in history as one of the great destroyers, like many Western colonialists. Once gone, these cultures and languages will be very hard to bring back. I have a personal stake in this since I know one of those unnecessary languages. And I have a deep and undying hatred for Xi. By destroying other cultures he demeans his own. Han culture is fine, but I’m afraid that I have a much lower opinion of it personally thanks to people like Xi.
Oof. I deliberately didn't stray near all that. Minority identity and this idea of zhonghua minzu is the complex underbelly of Xi's nationalist bolstering. Dispassionately discussing deficit numbers is much easier..
“It really all comes down to whether Xi's debt gamble will come back to haunt him” Absolutely. Part of the reason why AI development has been a major (and intensifying) focus—need a moonshot to kick start gdp growth again and sustain massive public spending.
Interesting article, I was just thinking the other day about how unsuccessful Xi seems to have been in building any sort of a personality cult, very rarely do you hear people singing his praises outside of official (and perhaps corporate) material, he barely ever pops up on my WeChat moments.
Small correction: the China favorable vs Xi confidence gap for Greece is 19, not 29
Tracks. I get a lot of complaints, but that might be because I'm foreign, so oft used as a sounding board/vent opportunity. Typically hear tacit nodding approval, rather than the enthusiastic clapping seen each night on Xinwen Lianbo
Especially when coupled with PRC's incredibly high GDP growth in that time. Perhaps the only time "..but at what cost?" can be excused on a China headline.
Well if you interact with the common everyday PRC citizen on the street, you might have heard of the saying ‘每一代领导人有每一代的任务’。This roughly translates as each generation of (chinese) leadership have the defining challenge of their times to tackle...and the defining challenge of Xi era is keeping China progress and rise as a nation intact admist hostile geopolitics. From this POV, XJP is deemed to have done a good job thus far of (i) inheriting the economic fruits from his predecessors and not squander a good starting hand away like the UK (ii) growing the inherited wealth further into new tech assets through industrial policy (electric vehicles, renewable energy etc) and boosting advanced manufacturing industrial capacity (Made in China 2025 vision, automated dark factories) (iii) modernising the armed forces giving China leverage power with other great powers geopolitics wise. Long story short, current consensus is that XJP will not be remembered as a pioneer and visionary i.e. Steve Jobs but he is still well regarded as a capable leader and successor i.e Tim Cook. Most Chinese now deem him above Hu but below Deng and Mao. But if he does succeed in the reunification of Taiwan during his term, that will be his ultimate defining legacy, and he will be elevated to be just below Mao.
I think what’s missing from your critique of Xi is that he inherited a dangerous problem that had to be fixed: the real estate bubble. This is something that Hu Jintao might have tackled, but he was derailed by the GFC and its aftermath.
From my understanding, Xi basically inherited a very frothy asset bubbly economy that would have been unsustainable anyhow.
He did several years of consolidation and planning before the “three red lines” policy unleashed the great deleveraging. For a while with huge real estate developers that were financial empires within themselves falling over like skittles, it seemed apocalypse might be around the corner.
But now, while China is debt-fueled, it is growing at a modest and targeted rate and it doesn’t seem like the wheels are going to fall off.
The consensus amongst western economists like Brad Setser and Michael Pettis is actually that China is doing too little fiscally to put money in the pockets of the consumer and get them spending again.
However, Xi’s choice was to turn on the credit spigot full bore instead, in effect exchanging a housing asset bubble for a tech manufacturing bubble.
The rest of the spending is quite often balance sheet repair.
The last chapter is not written, but if Xi can successfully avoid a Japan style zombie economy while exiting a housing bubble while gaining the technological edge for China on a big basket of cutting edge tech…that’s a win.
We also completely haven’t mentioned how he basically stared the Donald down in the tariff war. While this isn’t money in their pockets, it surely raised his stocks in the eyes of the Chinese people.
Greatest..? Perhaps to a couple of politically invested Party men, and a small band of perennially-online nationalists.
Call me cynical, but I think the average Chinese is much more worried about rising incomes, good education, affordable housing, stable jobs, accessible healthcare, childcare, elderly support, clean water, plentiful food, and the latest Douyin video than whatever an ungoverned island across the sea is doing.
All the points you raise are completely valid but I don't really see the current sentiment in China coming to the same conclusions (yet). This is all completely anecdotal and limited to my China bubble but I feel like many people in China would have various answers for what Xi's legacy is: anti-corruption, elevating China's image abroad (as you pointed out in your excellent last article re the media wars), acceleration AI innovation (deepseek's "Sputnik moment"), making excellent use of rare earths as leverage in the trade wars, dominating the renewables sector - in short, making China great again. Almost none of my Chinese friends have any desire to emigrate to the US or Europe anymore, and those who study abroad mostly return to China immediately (again, totally anecdotal but that's what I'm observing right now). Incidentally, almost none of my friends have much love for Xi as a leader but they do feel like China is in a better position than it used to be even if they themselves are not (as you pointed out, high youth unemployment, deflationary pressures etc). It really all comes down to whether Xi's debt gamble will come back to haunt him and somehow undo the progress China has made on the world stage - he might either reap all the glory or all the blame.
Hello Jellyfish, thank you for taking the time to comment and raising some excellent points.
You're absolutely right this doesn't reflect prevailing thought in China, but that's almost exactly the point. I've tried to peer through the noise, think in terms of hindsight, from a few decades forward. Key fundamentals that might bear out. I.e. Corruption is absolutely a key aspect of Xi's time — but how relevant is that to the average Chinese citizen's daily life? Will it be remembered? And is it worth the increased reach of Party "education"?
To give a full account of the Xi years would run to thick book or twelve. Hence why I zeroed in on just Foreign Relations, of which Xi is almost entirely responsible, sets the ethos, and can be (somewhat) objectively judged against his predecessor via polls, events; plus Economy (of which, everything else domestically stems). While CPC's attempts to invest in new technology is real, it remains to be seen whether current hotspots like AI, or solar become actual lasting legacies. What happens if tariffs bite? Politics turns? Technology is leapfrogged? Or another country rises..?
To give Xi his due (and show a little more balance) one section I begrudgingly cut was ecological improvement. That whole area seems a marked departure from previous Governments, an attempt to enact wider cultural change, and looks to be delivering daily impact. If anything, I think it may be his greatest legacy.
Many thanks for this rundown on the long-term negatives of Xi’s rule. I view the man from a different perspective. Perhaps no one else cares but I do. In his version of Make China Great Again, the cultures and languages of China’s minorities will be utterly rooted out and destroyed. Only the great Chinese imperial past matters and is worth preserving, developing, and promoting. He is the ultimate Han chauvinist (just as Putin is the ultimate Great Russian chauvinist). Perhaps most Han Chinese don’t care and will think it’s only right that it should be that way. But Xi will go down in history as one of the great destroyers, like many Western colonialists. Once gone, these cultures and languages will be very hard to bring back. I have a personal stake in this since I know one of those unnecessary languages. And I have a deep and undying hatred for Xi. By destroying other cultures he demeans his own. Han culture is fine, but I’m afraid that I have a much lower opinion of it personally thanks to people like Xi.
Oof. I deliberately didn't stray near all that. Minority identity and this idea of zhonghua minzu is the complex underbelly of Xi's nationalist bolstering. Dispassionately discussing deficit numbers is much easier..
Fair enough. And (Han) Chinese, at least in this generation, couldn’t give a rats.
“It really all comes down to whether Xi's debt gamble will come back to haunt him” Absolutely. Part of the reason why AI development has been a major (and intensifying) focus—need a moonshot to kick start gdp growth again and sustain massive public spending.
Interesting article, I was just thinking the other day about how unsuccessful Xi seems to have been in building any sort of a personality cult, very rarely do you hear people singing his praises outside of official (and perhaps corporate) material, he barely ever pops up on my WeChat moments.
Small correction: the China favorable vs Xi confidence gap for Greece is 19, not 29
GAH. Thank you~
Tracks. I get a lot of complaints, but that might be because I'm foreign, so oft used as a sounding board/vent opportunity. Typically hear tacit nodding approval, rather than the enthusiastic clapping seen each night on Xinwen Lianbo
Going from 33% debt:GDP ratio to over 80% in 12 years is just a staggering level of spending.
Especially when coupled with PRC's incredibly high GDP growth in that time. Perhaps the only time "..but at what cost?" can be excused on a China headline.
Well if you interact with the common everyday PRC citizen on the street, you might have heard of the saying ‘每一代领导人有每一代的任务’。This roughly translates as each generation of (chinese) leadership have the defining challenge of their times to tackle...and the defining challenge of Xi era is keeping China progress and rise as a nation intact admist hostile geopolitics. From this POV, XJP is deemed to have done a good job thus far of (i) inheriting the economic fruits from his predecessors and not squander a good starting hand away like the UK (ii) growing the inherited wealth further into new tech assets through industrial policy (electric vehicles, renewable energy etc) and boosting advanced manufacturing industrial capacity (Made in China 2025 vision, automated dark factories) (iii) modernising the armed forces giving China leverage power with other great powers geopolitics wise. Long story short, current consensus is that XJP will not be remembered as a pioneer and visionary i.e. Steve Jobs but he is still well regarded as a capable leader and successor i.e Tim Cook. Most Chinese now deem him above Hu but below Deng and Mao. But if he does succeed in the reunification of Taiwan during his term, that will be his ultimate defining legacy, and he will be elevated to be just below Mao.
"Too early to say" as the famous misquote attributed to Zhou Enlai goes.
I'm afraid this article fails to think from the perspective of the CCP or China more broadly.
A more in-depth analysis based on the cases listed in this article might actually lead to completely different conclusions.
Xi may end up being the last emperor of the CCP dynasty - that will be his ultimate “legacy”…
I think what’s missing from your critique of Xi is that he inherited a dangerous problem that had to be fixed: the real estate bubble. This is something that Hu Jintao might have tackled, but he was derailed by the GFC and its aftermath.
From my understanding, Xi basically inherited a very frothy asset bubbly economy that would have been unsustainable anyhow.
He did several years of consolidation and planning before the “three red lines” policy unleashed the great deleveraging. For a while with huge real estate developers that were financial empires within themselves falling over like skittles, it seemed apocalypse might be around the corner.
But now, while China is debt-fueled, it is growing at a modest and targeted rate and it doesn’t seem like the wheels are going to fall off.
The consensus amongst western economists like Brad Setser and Michael Pettis is actually that China is doing too little fiscally to put money in the pockets of the consumer and get them spending again.
However, Xi’s choice was to turn on the credit spigot full bore instead, in effect exchanging a housing asset bubble for a tech manufacturing bubble.
The rest of the spending is quite often balance sheet repair.
The last chapter is not written, but if Xi can successfully avoid a Japan style zombie economy while exiting a housing bubble while gaining the technological edge for China on a big basket of cutting edge tech…that’s a win.
We also completely haven’t mentioned how he basically stared the Donald down in the tariff war. While this isn’t money in their pockets, it surely raised his stocks in the eyes of the Chinese people.
Greatest..? Perhaps to a couple of politically invested Party men, and a small band of perennially-online nationalists.
Call me cynical, but I think the average Chinese is much more worried about rising incomes, good education, affordable housing, stable jobs, accessible healthcare, childcare, elderly support, clean water, plentiful food, and the latest Douyin video than whatever an ungoverned island across the sea is doing.