Xi Jinping, who took power in late 2012, has modeled himself on Mao, even adopting the title “great helmsman,” while accumulating more concentrated power than Mao ever held by simultaneously controlling the Communist Party, the government, and the military commission. His anti-corruption campaign, launched amid China’s long history of officials profiting from office since ancient times, functioned as a political purge, targeting rivals loyal to predecessors Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao while shielding his own allies. Xi has also overseen severe persecution of the Uyghurs, a Turkic, largely Muslim minority in Xinjiang (“new territory”). Since 2014–2015, an estimated 1 to 3 million Uyghur men have been detained in prison camps that double as profitable factories — Mosher notes China is uniquely able to make its prisons turn a profit, unlike even the Soviet gulag. Han Chinese men are sent to live with the wives left behind, often coercing sexual relationships, while young Uyghurs are sent to factories elsewhere in China, required to learn Mandarin and study Xi’s writings. Uyghur women face forced sterilization, contraception, and abortion — the opposite of policies now encouraging Han Chinese births — which Mosher argues meets the legal definition of genocide under the Convention on Genocide, a determination former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made official in January 2021. Xi has also broken Deng Xiaoping’s two-term limit rule, intending to rule for life, and has aggressively pursued territorial expansion in the South China Sea, building military bases on artificial islands and threatening global shipping lanes.
1 What three centers of power does Xi Jinping simultaneously control, unlike Mao or Jiang Zemin?
2 What was the real function of Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign, according to Mosher?
3 Approximately how many Uyghur men have been detained in Xinjiang's prison camps?
4 What distinguishes the treatment of Uyghur women's reproduction from that of Han Chinese women under Xi Jinping?
5 What rule did Xi Jinping break that Deng Xiaoping had established to prevent another Mao-style dictator?
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