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The Party That Failed

An Insider Breaks With Beijing

January/February 2021 Published on December 4, 2020
Chinese security guards at the Communist Party's 19th Congress, Beijing, China, October 2017
The Chinese Communist Party's 19th Congress, Beijing, October 2017 Fred Dufour / AFP via Getty Images

CAI XIA was a Professor at the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party from 1998 to 2012. This essay was translated from the Chinese by Stacy Mosher.

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When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, I was full of hope for China. As a professor at the prestigious school that educates top leaders in the Chinese Communist Party, I knew enough about history to conclude that it was past time for China to open up its political system. After a decade of stagnation, the CCP needed reform more than ever, and Xi, who had hinted at his proclivity for change, seemed like the man to lead it.

点击此链接阅读中文版 (Read in Chinese).

By then, I was midway through a decades-long process of grappling with China’s official ideology, even as

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