Generations of Chinese leadership in the context of "Xi Jinping"

⭐ In the context of Xi Jinping and Generations of Chinese leadership, what is a key distinction between him and many of his predecessors?

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⭐ Core Definition: Generations of Chinese leadership

Generations of Chinese leadership is a term historians use to characterize distinct periods of the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and, by extension, successive changes in the ideology of the CCP. Historians have studied various periods in the development of the government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) by reference to these "generations".

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👉 Generations of Chinese leadership in the context of Xi Jinping

Xi Jinping (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), and thus the paramount leader of China, since 2012. Since 2013, Xi has also served as the president of China. As a member of the fifth generation of Chinese leadership, Xi is the first CCP general secretary born after the establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC).

The son of Chinese communist veteran Xi Zhongxun, Xi was exiled to rural Liangjiahe Village, Yanchuan County, Shaanxi Province, as a teenager following his father's purge during the Cultural Revolution. He lived in a yaodong in the village of Liangjiahe, where he joined the CCP after several failed attempts and worked as the local party secretary. After studying chemical engineering at Tsinghua University as a worker-peasant-soldier student, Xi rose through the ranks politically in China's coastal provinces. Xi was governor of Fujian from 1999 to 2002, before becoming governor and party secretary of neighboring Zhejiang from 2002 to 2007. Following the dismissal of the party secretary of Shanghai, Chen Liangyu, Xi was transferred to replace him for a brief period in 2007. He subsequently joined the Politburo Standing Committee (PSC) of the CCP the same year and was the first-ranking member of the Central Secretariat in October 2007. In 2008, he was designated as Hu Jintao's presumed successor as paramount leader. Towards this end, Xi was appointed the vice president and vice chairman of the CMC. He officially received the title of leadership core from the CCP in 2016.

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Generations of Chinese leadership in the context of Jiang Zemin

Jiang Zemin (17 August 1926 – 30 November 2022) was a Chinese politician who served as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1989 to 2002, as the chairman of the Central Military Commission from 1989 to 2004, and as the president of China from 1993 to 2003. Jiang was the fourth paramount leader of China from 1989 to 2002. He was the core leader of the third generation of Chinese leadership, one of four core leaders alongside Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, and Xi Jinping.

Born in Yangzhou, Jiangsu, Jiang grew up during the years of Japanese occupation. He studied electrical engineering at the National Central University, later transferring to the National Chiao Tung University; he joined the CCP while he was in college, and graduated in 1947. After the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, he received training at the Stalin Automobile Works in Moscow in the 1950s, later returning to Shanghai in 1962 to serve in various institutes, later being sent between 1970 and 1972 to Romania as part of an expert team to establish machinery manufacturing plants in the country. After 1979, he was appointed as the vice chair of two commissions by vice premier Gu Mu to oversee the newly established special economic zones (SEZs). He became the vice minister of the newly established Ministry of Electronics Industry and a member of the CCP Central Committee in 1982. Jiang was appointed as the mayor of Shanghai in 1985, later being promoted to its Communist Party secretary, as well as a member of the CCP Politburo, in 1987.

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Generations of Chinese leadership in the context of Hu–Wen Administration

The Hu–Wen Administration was the Chinese leadership of general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chinese president Hu Jintao, and Chinese premier Wen Jiabao. Hu and Wen officially succeeded Jiang Zemin, Li Peng and Zhu Rongji in 2002. Using the two leaders' surnames, it is abbreviated as Hu–Wen.

Hu and Wen are considered the fourth generation Chinese leaders and are viewed as, at least ostensibly, more reform-oriented and more open-minded. Hu's contributions to the CCP ideology are officially termed the Scientific Outlook on Development.

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