China's Xi Deals Knockout Blow to Once-Powerful Youth League Faction

The three most notable absences from China's new Communist Party leadership have one thing in common: they all rose through the ranks of the Youth League and were regarded as representatives of a once-dominant faction, whose influence Xi Jinping has now successfully quashed.

Even the larger Central Committee was bypassed as Xi installed supporters in key party positions during the recent twice-a-decade leadership reshuffle. Premier Li Keqiang and Vice Premier Wang Yang, both 67 and young enough to be re-appointed to the elite seven-member Politburo Standing Committee, were left out.

Hu Chunhua, a fellow vice premier and former high flyer who, at 59, had been considered a candidate for premier and, at one point, even a potential future president, failed to make it to the 24-man Politburo.

Analysts said the omissions demonstrate Xi's years-long campaign to destroy the faction was successful.

Victor Shih, a specialist in elite politics in China and a professor at the University of California, San Diego, said that with regard to Hu Chunhua, he believes that this has been Xi Jinping's primary strategy for shutting down the youth league faction.

Numerous cadres in that faction have had their careers stifled by him.

At Saturday's party congress closing ceremony, Hu Jintao, Xi's predecessor and a 79-year-old veteran of the Youth League, was abruptly led off stage by security. This dramatic event was widely seen as a symbol of the faction's demise.

Although it's still unclear exactly what happened, state news agency Xinhua claimed in two English tweets that Hu's health was somehow involved. In China, the social network is blocked.

The Youth League faction has been completely defeated, according to Cheng Li, an expert on the development of political leaders in China.

Li, who works for the Brookings Institution in Washington, continued, "It means Xi can do many things he wants to, and opposing forces have gotten weaker."

It can be interpreted as meaning that he preferred to emphasize the centralization of his power over the Western-style balance of power.

With more authority than any leader since Mao Zedong as he begins his third term in office, Xi faces a mountain of issues, including a poor economy, his own COVID-19 policy, which has forced China into a corner, and deteriorating relations with the West.

TRAINING GROUND

The term "faction" refers to individuals holding leadership positions in the Youth League, which traditionally serves as a feeder organization for the party by enlisting and developing some of China's brightest high school and university students.

According to official data, the Youth League's budget has decreased from nearly 700 million yuan ($96 million) in 2012, the year Xi came into power, to roughly 260 million yuan in 2021.

Over the same time period, membership fell from about 90 million to about 74 million.

The Communist Party of China has 97 million members total.

Dali Yang, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, stated that the CYL has lost its influence as a venue for developing leaders because it is a party-led organization.

But, he continued, "it has already been working hard to adapt to the changing political circumstances." The Youth League, he added, had established a social media presence, made nationalistic pride appeals, and participated in civic activities.

Attacking foreign companies accused of misbehavior in China, such as false advertising, has been a priority for the Youth League.

After its branch in the central province of Henan asked social media users to report the whereabouts of a BBC reporter covering major floods there last year, Western journalists claimed they received death threats.

When contacted for comment on Wednesday, the Youth League did not react right away.

In 2012, when Ling Jihua, a key aide to Hu Jintao, attempted to conceal the facts surrounding the death of his son—who was killed while operating a Ferrari that crashed in Beijing—its political image took a hit.

Ling was later accused of corruption and sentenced to life in prison.

XI'S 'ZHIJIANG NEW ARMY'

Since the party's founding a century ago, factions, cliques, and power bases have existed with varying degrees of influence.

The infamous "Shanghai Gang" of late leader Jiang Zemin, who is currently 96 years old, was among them.

Xi's faction, the so-called "Zhijiang New Army," was created while he served as Zhejiang's eastern province's party chief from 2002 to 2007.

The new leadership, according to John Delury, a professor of Chinese studies at Yonsei University in Seoul, is a reflection of Xi's dominance.

But history would serve as a timely reminder that no political system on earth has completely eliminated internal conflict, rivalry, and power struggles, he continued.

"After one particular faction is eliminated, another eventually emerges, though it may take some time."

(1 Chinese Yuan = 7.2560 Renminbi)