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The focus of next month’s Chinese leaders’ congress will be on the elite lineup leading the world’s second-largest economy. But another less-watched group will also advance, and President Xi Jinping’s eventual successor is likely to be among them.
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They are known as the luckiest generation: Communist Party cadres born in the 1970s. They miss both the Mao era, which wreaked havoc on education and the economy, and the high unemployment and housing crisis facing graduates today.
Instead, China’s stunning economic rise has brought them into universities and to the top of industries ranging from finance to commodities. They have built their careers in a brief window of internet freedom, economic integration through the World Trade Organization and global mobility — freedoms that Xi Jinping has curtailed by censorship, trade actions and Covid-19 border closures.
More than 100 post-70s have held key positions in various provincial ministries. They will move closer to power as Xi heads into a landmark third term at the party’s biannual national congress. They will make up 10 percent of the next Central Committee’s more than 370 members, mostly alternates, said Cheng Li, a scholar at the Brookings Institution’s John L. Thornton China Center.
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If Xi sets an age limit for everyone but himself, as widely expected, leaders born in the 1960s will retire within the next decade. This will clear the way for the generation of the 1970s to join the powerful Politburo. If Xi Jinping attends the 2032 National Congress as party leader, he will be 79 years old, older than any previous general secretary.
“This is a very important generation. They’re going to be the ones who oppose a potential shift in power,” said Victor Shih, an associate professor at UC San Diego who studies elite Chinese politics. “Their mindset may be more open to the world in due course.”
The 1970s generation will ascend to China’s leadership at a time when China will finally overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy, even as growth slows and the population declines. They are likely to take charge of key regions and institutions later in the century, when U.S. military commanders estimate that Xi will gain the ability to act in the Taiwan Strait.
Still, their relatively easy success could have given them “above-average” expectations of the Communist Party’s ability to enrich society, leading them to support more state control and oppose it, said Feiling Wang, a professor at the Sumnern School of International Affairs. Western values. at Georgia Tech. “They just remember the good old days,” he said. “Certainly, until recently.”
Here are five officials to watch:
Zhuge Yujie, 51
In March, Zhuge became the youngest deputy secretary of the party committee in the country and a long-term assistant to Xi Jinping, the right-hand man of Shanghai party secretary Li Qiang. The financial center where Zhuge was born and raised has always been a springboard to a high position. Xi is the former secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Party Committee. Before entering politics, Zhuge worked in state-owned enterprises, a common career path among the 1970s crowd, many of whom had led flagship companies or major financial institutions.
Liu Hongjian, 49
In 2021, Mr. Liu was promoted to the head of the government’s legal affairs work team, becoming the youngest member of the Provincial Standing Committee. Previously, he worked in Fujian for nearly 20 years, overlapping with Xi Jinping, who served there from 1985 to 2002. Xi Jinping has intersected the career paths of top leaders.
Liu Qiang, 51
Before becoming the Vice Governor of Shandong Province, Mr. Liu worked in the financial industry for 25 years, serving as President of the Shanghai Branch of Agricultural Bank of China Corporation and Vice President of Bank of China Corporation. In March, he became party secretary of Jinan, the capital of Shandong province, located between Beijing and Shanghai.
Shi Guanghui, 52
Mr. Shi has worked in Shanghai for about 30 years, first as a state-owned steel company and later as a deputy mayor. Earlier this year, he was promoted to deputy secretary of the Guizhou provincial party committee, becoming the second leader in the 1970s after Zhuge to hold that level.
Guo Ningning, 52
One of the few female leaders of the 1970s, Guo worked for the Bank of China in Hong Kong and Singapore, and was a deputy governor of the Agricultural Bank of China before entering politics. She is now the vice governor of Fujian Province and knows the media well. In a 2020 campaign to promote local seafood, Guo gorged on eel in a live video that attracted more than 1 million viewers on e-commerce platform Taobao.
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