The Canada-China Institute for Business & Development (CCIBD) at Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University hosted a seminar on “China’s New Leadership and Implications for the World” on November 23rd 2016 with Dr. Cheng Li, Director and Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution’s John L. Thornton China Center.
Dr. Li’s speech was based on his new book Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era. In the years since he became general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012, Xi Jinping has surprised many people in China and around the world with his bold anti-corruption campaign and his aggressive consolidation of power. Given these new developments, we must rethink how we analyze Chinese politics—an urgent task as China now has more influence on the global economy and regional security than at any other time in modern history. In this book, Dr. Li examines how the structure and dynamics of party leadership have evolved since the late 1990s and argues that “inner-party democracy”—the concept of collective leadership that emphasizes deal making based on accepted rules and norms—may pave the way for greater transformation within China’s political system. Xi’s legacy will largely depend on whether he encourages or obstructs this trend of political institutionalization in the governance of the world’s most populous and increasingly pluralistic country.
About 100 people around the campus and outside of Ryerson attended the seminar.