Xi Jinping Waves Goodbye to the West

In November 2017, Chinese President Xi Jinping and former U.S. President Donald Trump strolled around the ‘Forbidden City’ in China’s capital of Beijing. The two were accompanied by Xi’s wife Peng Liyuan and Trump’s wife Melania Trump. While Trump declared Egypt having the oldest culture lasting 8,000 years, Xi’s hands came out of his pockets and casually, but firmly, declared that while Egypt was an older culture, “Chinese civilization is a unique lasting culture in the world that passed down through generations consistently.”  Trump nodded in acknowledgement, and the four carried on. 

Five years later, Xi’s concept of Chinese civilization has not changed; rather, it has arguably strengthened. Securing his third term as leader on October 23, 2022 and being backed by a united Politburo Committee, Xi revealed his ambitious plans to bolster domestic security and elevate China’s technological status. Though he never mentioned the United States specifically, Xi called for the need for China to be cognizant of the growing hostility in international affairs: “Be mindful of dangers in the midst of peace,” he said. “Get the house in good repair before the rain comes, and prepare to undergo the major tests of high winds and waves, and even perilous, stormy seas.” Indeed, Xi has grown weary of the United States following President Joe Biden’s global campaign on Chinese technology and Washington’s public support of Taiwan, as well as their protest against the Uyghur minority. This skepticism is leading to drastic implications in China’s social and cultural spheres as Xi attempts to limit contact with the West. In February of 2022 China limited travel into the country by discontinuing renewal for non-essential travel citing COVID-19 as the justification, and the Beijing Olympics in February did not allow foreign visitors. In 2020, China’s education system banned primary and secondary schools from using international textbooks, and a new textbook, “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism With Chinese Characteristics for a New Era” became a requirement for all schools in Shanghai. These steps draw deep parallels with the Maoist regime, in which Mao’s ideology promoted isolationism – for China to truly flourish, it must be entirely independent from the Western influences. 

In the 21st century, this approach is not completely possible, especially consider the past few decades. If there’s anything that China has learned from the past 50 years, it is that loosening its policies and opening itself up to the world has worked in its favor. Efforts, like the Great Leap Forward which established China as a major player in economic development, and Deng Xiaoping’s economic reform in the 1980s that introduced the Chinese economy to the perks of capitalism, has led China to benefit from globalization. The economic benefits of these actions has led China to hold the second largest economy and become the world’s largest exporter and trading nation. Isolationism would halt any further progress and prove to be dangerous for China’s interdependent economy. 

While China’s economic presence and cooperation will not falter, its economic existence is certainly more transactional compared to its cultural and social realms, which are both imperative for the world to remain connected. That is not to say that Xi is not focusing on domestic culture and society – he most certainly is. To unite the country together, Xi has cited Chinese civilization, as he described it to Trump in 2017, as a nation whose history reaches back thousands of years and holds national spirit that must be rejuvenated; his terminology for it is known as the “Chinese Dream.” Fulfilling this dream has led to a massive surge of nationalism and propaganda in the country. Adding on to his long list of titles, Xi Jinping has also named himself historian-in-chief this year and has established a campaign with the hope of uniting the Chinese people under a single nationalist  identity. This campaign is problematic for many reasons, most notably because China is a massive country with 31 provinces and thus a vast spectrum of cultural, ideological, and religious identities. We know this to be true with humanitarian crises like the Uyghur genocide in Xinjiang and the continuous political unrest in both Taiwan and Hong Kong. With the Communist Party being the very root of these conflicts, it seems ironic that the government, of all people, can foster a national identity.

Nevertheless, these national challenges won’t stop Xi. In April 2022, Xi released a five-year archeological plan with the objective of uncovering archeological sites and learning more about Chinese history and civilization, with a special focus on imperial, ancient China rather than contemporary China. The government hopes that by doing so, China will become invested and excited by its ancient history and recognize that China is united under many cultural traditions. 

Xi’s deep focus on developing domestic social and cultural ties is ambitious; as highlighted above, the leader who has overseen and advocated for Hong Kong and Taiwan’s assimilation back to China, discrimination against the Uygher’s, just to name a few, is attempting to unite the Chinese people together. At the same time, his growing skepticism of the West is leading him to limit social and cultural ideas into the country. His sheer strength as president, among many other positions and titles, will make these ambitions possible. In a world where these social and cultural relations among countries are what makes this world a more globalized, interpersonal place, China is seemingly uninterested, and eager, to wave goodbye to the West.

MOST RECENT ARTICLE