Op-Ed: In China, Xi Jinping is getting an unprecedented third term. What should the world expect?
A new leader is coming. It happened in the United States in the election of Donald Trump and in France in the election of Marine Le Pen. It happened in Britain in the election of Boris Johnson and will happen in the United Kingdom and the European Union in the upcoming election of Jeremy Corbyn.
In the case of Xi Jinping, it happened because he won the highest level of Chinese Communist Party elections, which are the only contests in which candidates get a chance to choose the party’s next leader. That Xi had received more votes than any other member of the Communist Party by more than a 2-to-1 margin in the October 24th plenary assembly was no coincidence. It was a historic development—not only for Xi, who is now widely considered to have the best chance to become China’s next leader, but for the world as a whole.
The decision of the Communist Party’s Standing Committee, which selects the next leader, to endorse the legitimacy of the October 24th election is likely to be the single most important development in the history of the People’s Republic of China. It is one of the most consequential moments in the history of the modern world.
At the heart of this moment should be a key question: What can anyone expect from Xi Jinping in the next three years? What type of leader should we expect from him, and how should we deal with the consequences if his term does end?
The reality is that the decision to endorse a third four-year term for Xi Jinping will be controversial. The issue of “democratic choice” will be at the forefront of discussion between Chinese and Western media, diplomats, and academics. The question of who will be the next leader will be asked in the halls of congress and around the world.
The election has been watched by major world powers,
