Book talk - Xi Jinping: The hidden agendas of China’s ruler for life

Join us on Monday 16th where special guest, Willy Lam, will be talking about his new book 'Xi Jinping: The hidden agendas of China's ruler for life'. 

This book examines the policy, ideology and politics of Xi Jinping, State President and General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and China’s “ruler for life.”Through comparisons with former CCP leaders, including Deng Xiaoping, it assesses whether, having abandoned many of the key precepts of the Era of Reform and the Open Door, the conservative supreme leader’s restitution of Maoist standards might enable China to sustain economic growth and project hard and soft power worldwide. The book also examines whether the Communist Party will succeed in retaining the support of 1.4 billion Chinese in the face of unprecedented challenges in the economic and geopolitical arenas.

It also provides a comprehensive picture of Xi’s rise to power; his AI-assisted and “legalistic” surveillance and control mechanisms; China’s evolving economic system; Xi’s foreign and national-security policies and the implications of the 20th Party Congress of October 2022 from both domestic and foreign perspectives.

Being among the first books in English on the ambitious and multi-faceted agendas that Xi has laid out taking China up to the early 2040s, this will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of Chinese studies, China-US relations, East Asian politics and Contemporary Asian history.

This is an in-person event only. Registration is required.

Speakers

Willy Wo-Lap Lam is a Senior Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation, and a regular contributor to China Brief. He is an Adjunct Professor at the Center for China Studies, the History Department, and the Master’s Program in Global Political Economy at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is the author of six books on China, including Chinese Politics in the Era of Xi Jinping (2015). His latest book, Xi Jinping: The Hidden Agendas of China’s Ruler for Life, was released by Routledge Publishing in August 2023.

Dr. Yanran Yao (moderator) is a political scientist specializing in Chinese politics, civil society, and globalization. Before joining the Lau China Institute as a fixed-term lecturer, she has been teaching at the University of Hong Kong as a lecturer. She has extensive publications on journals including the Contemporary Journal of China. Her current research interests include Chinese diaspora community organizations and their roles in China’s overseas operations.