Who are the four new bureaucrats who will lead the economy of China
The Communist Party has selected four names who will hold key positions in China. That's who I am
The team of Chinese Communist Party bureaucrats who preside over the governance of the economy is about to undergo a profound restructuring. The Party elites have in fact identified the four names destined for key positions in the government of the country who will be subjected to formal and expected ratification by the National People's Congress, the Chinese parliament which normally endorses the decisions of the top leaders without problems.
Two days ago, during the third plenary session of the 14th National People's Congress, the legislative branch of China's parliament, President Xi Jinping secured a third five-year term as president of China.
The delegates voted unanimously (with a total of 2,952 votes), and also nominated Xi to the post of chairman of the Central Military Commission.
On the agenda in the next few days, according to what has been announced, there are the elections of other institutional leaders of the People's Republic, underlined Reuters .
The four mandarins who will run the economy
It is an article from CNN that anticipates the change at the top of the Party.
The four appointments start with the figure of Li Qiang, destined to become premier, and continue with Ding Xuexiang, designated for the role of executive vice premier, with He Lifeng as vice premier and finally with Zhu Hexin as new head of the central bank.
There is a trait d'union between the four and it is the fact that they have not studied abroad, unlike many other Party colleagues: a criterion that guided Xi Jinping's choices in terms of strengthening the Party's control over main economic institutions of the country, so far managed by personalities with degrees and doctorates obtained in foreign universities.
All eyes are now on this new set of four to see how they will address the current challenges facing the Chinese economy , which include a slowdown in consumption, rising unemployment, the housing market crisis, lack of business confidence, the debt crisis of local governments, an aging population and – last but not least – a deeply deteriorated relationship with the United States.
The new economic team will also have to do everything possible to achieve the levels of economic growth that will be established during the meeting of Congress, overcoming the doldrums of recent years which have seen growth targets belied by a stagnant and conditional economic performance by the Covid factor.
The new premier Li Qiang
Li Qiang's rise is connected to his role as party chief in Shanghai, where he presided over the famous two-month-long lockdown that triggered an unprecedented crisis in relations with the population. At the October Party Congress – the one that gave Xi Jinping an unprecedented third term at the top of the hierarchy – Li was crowned number two in the Party, a choice that laid the foundations for today's appointment.
63 years old, born in the eastern province of Zhejiang, Li began his career as a simple clerk at an irrigation station. He trained at Ningbo City College and then gradually climbed all the positions of the bureaucracy in his home province.
His rise to fame accelerated rapidly when he served as Xi's chief of staff when the latter was party chief of Zhejiang province between 2002 and 2007.
As noted by Julian Evans-Pritchard, senior economist at Capital Economics, it is precisely the personal ties between him and Xi that have made the Party opt for him to the detriment of other more qualified candidates.
His handling of the Party in Shanghai was characterized by a pragmatic and pro-business attitude. It is no coincidence that Tesla built its first gigafactory outside the United States right there and that the company founded by Elon Musk was allowed to fully own the plant.
In 2019, Li also presided over the launch of the list of technology stocks – a sort of Chinese Nasdaq – on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.
As Citi analysts wrote in a research report, thanks to Li's appointment "the Chinese business environment should become friendlier in the next two years thanks to the likely support of the new premier towards private companies and foreign investments" .
Executive Vice Premier Ding Xuexiang
Xi's current chief of staff, Ding has never led a province nor has particular references in the economic field: a singular anomaly for a man who will have to manage the domestic economy and fiscal policy of the country in the next two years.
Born in the eastern province of Jiangsu, Ding studied metallurgy before beginning his career at the Shanghai Research Institute of Materials, where he spent 17 years before being appointed deputy party chief in an unusual appointment for a simple researcher.
His career intersects with Xi's when he is chosen as his adviser in Shanghai at a time when the current president was the party chief of that province.
He arrived in Beijing in 2013 in correspondence with the appointment as President of Xi, of which Ding became the personal secretary.
Deputy Prime Minister He Lifeng
He Lifeng's appointment as deputy prime minister in charge of economic, financial and industrial affairs comes after the presidency of the powerful National Development and Reform Commission.
His education clearly differs from that of his predecessor Liu He, an economist with studies completed at Harvard: He Lifeng has in fact never studied abroad and graduated in Finance from Xiamen University.
His fame is due to the management of a maxi urban project in the city of Tianjin known as the "Manhattan of China" at the time when he was at the top of the Party of that city.
The new central bank governor Zhu Hexin
Zhu Hexin arrives at the top of the Central Bank after being chairman of the state-owned financial conglomerate CITIC Grup.
Aged 55, Zhu has spent most of his career working at the Bank of Communications in the wealthy eastern province of Jiangsu.
Between 2016 and 2018, he was the deputy governor of the southwestern province of Sichuan, and in 2022 he was transferred to the CITIC Group.
He too has no experience studying abroad, unlike his predecessor who could claim a doctorate in economics from the University of Illinois.
Criticality of the new appointments
These four new senior bureaucrats were selected based on a single criterion: loyalty to Xi Jinping. But what is for them a formidable asset could harbor serious risks for the Chinese economy.
As Sonia Opper, a professor at Bocconi University, explains to CNN, their selection "favors fidelity to competence".
"The risk", continues Opper, "is that the Chinese leadership becomes isolated and loses awareness of the possible alternative choices to face the many challenges that await China".
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/cina-partito-comunista-cina/ on Sat, 11 Mar 2023 06:10:02 +0000.