Minxin Pei's recent piece arguing that the CPC's rule in China is in its twilight recalls similar analyses earlier this year, perhaps most notably David Shambaugh's "The Coming Chinese Crack-up" in the Wall Street Journal back in March.
I disagree that the CPC is on the brink of collapse. I could be wrong, of course, but I'd like to point out that both Minxin Pei and David Shambaugh represent a strong strand of opinion that wishes, rather obviously, that the severe pressures apparently bearing on CPC rule will lead to a crisis that will give an opening for the reform and liberalization that have been absent since 1989; in this hope, they are misguided and have misread the meaning of the undeniable changes in the Xi Jinping era.
I think it's already obvious by now that the post-Tiananmen era - but more generally, what I call the "extended Deng Xiaoping era" (1978-2012) - has ended with the leadership of Xi Jinping. But this hasn't necessarily made the regime weaker and more brittle; or even if it has, China is so much wealthier now than back in the 1990s and even early 2000s that it makes the immediate threat of mass social unrest and revolution a rather distant prospect.
Granted, the evaporation of what Minxin Pei calls "elite unity" is troublesome for continued party rule. But this overstates the degree to which the elites were actually united during the Jiang Zemin (1993-2004) and Hu Jintao (2004-2012) eras to begin with. Whatever loss of unity at the apex of the CPC power structure has been a long time coming - and it has arguably been much worse at different points during the past decade than it is today, when Xi Jinping's single-handed authority seems rather impregnable, at least publicly.
True, there have reportedly been no fewer than 20 assassination attempts on Xi Jinping since he assumed office, most of which, it would appear, are connected to disgruntled or fearful officials caught in the crosshairs of the anti-corruption campaign. So yes, it goes without saying that discord within the party has potentially catastrophic consequences.
On the other hand, as Xi's power further entrenches and consolidates, much more than mere enmity, dread, or hatred of the top leader will be needed to mount any serious attempt to undermine, let alone overthrow him. As Xi locks down his control of the military and internal security apparatus - early this year, for instance, he apparently replaced his elite personal security detail with more reliable loyalists - his enemies must contend with slimmer and slimmer chances that they could seize power even if they do somehow eliminate Xi himself. This will alter all their calculations of risk and cost versus potential gain and reward with respect to any scheming to remove Xi, even as it heightens their awareness of the immediate danger to themselves should they be suspected of treason.
Even more significantly, in my opinion, the recent simultaneous crackdown by Xi against civil society, internal party liberals, and nongovernmental reform groups, far from being a sign of his regime's incoherence or paranoia, is probably itself a cunning CPC power play. It's Xi basically telling the party elite and even the rank-and-file apparatchiks, "I have every intention of keeping us in complete charge of the country, with no external limits on our authority; but that's exactly why you must support my harsh measures to clean up our own mess, because if you don't let me do it, you'll only empower those who hate all of us, clean or dirty alike."
Xi Jinping is no Jiang Zemin or Hu Jintao; neither is he a Deng or a Mao; he isn't many of the things that many of us wish he were. But if anything, he's an exceedingly gifted politician who has decades of practical knowledge of the actual (not merely theoretical) workings of power and statecraft. None of his prominent critics in the Chinese world have anything remotely rivaling the résumé he boasts in that regard.
That being said, at least for the time being, Xi also seems to be able to count on much popular support for his anti-corruption purge, as well. Coupled with his strong nationalism, this appeals to the very real element of jingoistic pride in Han supremacy that was strongly nurtured throughout the post-Tianamen era (1989-2012), and is now a driving societal force with increasing international significance in the post-post-Tiananmen (i.e. Xi Jinping) era.
And even here, he is cold, cunning, and patiently methodical, driven less by emotion than by colorless hard calculation: don't count on him to overreact stupidly to Western, American, and regional efforts to check Chinese assertiveness. Like any smart nationalist strongman, he'll wait until popular demands for aggressive coercion against foreigners reach such a boiling point that by the time he actually pulls the trigger, he can claim to have exercised remarkable restraint.
All of this, in my humble opinion, is more bad news for liberals, reformers, and Westerners fearful of China's rise than it is for the CPC itself.
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