Comparison between the grand council in the Yongzheng era and the leading small groups in the Xi Jinping era: lessons for Xi's governance

• Main Author: Yao, Yutao
• Other Authors: -
• Format: Thesis-Master by Coursework
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2023
• Subjects: Social sciences::Political science
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/166269
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This dissertation is designed to reconsider the rationality of the mechanisms of power concentration in both imperial and contemporary China and apply the notion of “reproduction of the Chinese political culture” in specific cases. Based on the primary source of the Grand Council and the Leading Small Groups, this research explores the similarities between the Grand Council in the Yongzheng era and the LSGs system in the Xi Jinping era in aspects of their “informal channels of function”, “supra-ministerial coordination” and “direct information flow to the ruler”. The three lessons of the successful operation in the Yongzheng era in terms of effectively designing and enforcing the reforms as Yongzheng’s will are identified and applied to the actual function of the LSGs system of Xi since 2013, which includes the diligence of the ruler, suppression of factionalism among the political elite and construction of aligning value system to maintain accountability.