Time_Asia-November_06_2017

WORLD

Xi declares

China will be

as dominant

as he now is

By Charlie Campbell/

Beijing

President Xi of China, center, flanked by new members of the Politburo’s Standing Committee, on Oct. 25

FIRST HE SHOOK THE HAND OF JIANG

Zemin, China’s 91-year-old former

leader. Then Xi Jinping, newly re-

affirmed as Chinese President for an-

other five years, strode down the

ranks of top cadres seated onstage at

Beijing’s Great Hall of the People on

Oct. 24, sharing congratulations on the

culmination of the 19th National Con-

gress of the Communist Party of China.

What made the day truly historic,

however, was Xi’s new position among

more exalted leaders. Upon having his

personal philosophy etched into the

national constitution—as “Xi Jinping

Thought on Socialism With Chinese

Characteristics for a New Era”—Xi

joins Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping

in the pantheon of modern China’s

most powerful men.

In the years since Mao founded the

People’s Republic in 1949, no leader

since the Great Helmsman himself

has been consecrated by name in

the constitution while alive. (“Deng

Xiaoping Theory” was appended only

as a posthumous honor to the architect

of China’s economic revival.) Xi joins

Mao on Mount Olympus at a time

when China boasts the world’s second

biggest economy and is extending

its global influence. If Mao’s era gave

birth to the People’s Republic and

Deng’s made the nation rich, then Xi’s

“new era” aims to transform it into the

world’s predominant superpower.

“It’s the coronation of Emperor

Xi,” says Professor Nick Bisley, an Asia

expert at Australia’s La Trobe Univer-

sity. “He is without question the para-

mount leader and one with a remark-

ably ambitious vision for China.”

‘WHY WOULD YOU PUT YOUR HEAD ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK?’—NEXT PAGE

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PHOTOGRAPH BY HOW HWEE YOUNG