Xi Jinping’s astounding purge of the senior leadership of the military is well documented, but another purge within the Chinese Communist Party has drawn less attention. Xi Jinping has ruthlessly gone after former Politburo Standing Committee member and one-time economic czar Wang Qishan.
Xi has not charged Wang with any crime, but the latter lives under virtual house arrest in Beijing. Wang has not been referenced in the Chinese official media since October 2023. But, perhaps just as important, Xi has systematically purged Wang’s patronage network, which he built over the course of his party career. Just last month, Li Xiaohong, a former personal secretary to Wang and once the most important disciplinary official overseeing the China Securities Regulatory Commission, was placed under disciplinary investigation.
Xi’s decision to go after one of the most dependable Chinese Communist Party leaders, who even conducted Xi’s anticorruption campaigns, is probably intended to make sure that Wang and other elders within the Communist Party do not stand in the way of Xi’s ambitions for a fourth term as China’s unassailable leader at the 21st Party Congress next year. Historically, retired party elders have played outsized roles in influencing the selection of top leaders. For example, former Vice Premier Chen Yun played a pivotal role in selecting Jiang Zemin as China’s leader after the Tiananmen crisis.
