Politics of anticorruption in China: Paradigm change of the party’s disciplinary regime 2012–2017

Abstract

This article traces the process of Xi Jinping’s campaign in 2012–2017 and explains how an anticorruption effort has been transformed into an exercise of power-consolidation for his office. The findings of this article are three-fold. First, the power-consolidation process has benefited from a combination of an ideological campaign and a disciplinary campaign, which were not only synchronized but also feed into one another to achieve a shared goal. Second, the campaign became politicized around midterm and intensified afterwards. The pace of progress of the campaign coincided with Xi Jinping’s advancement of power. Third, the most significant outcome of Xi Jinping’s campaign is not the numbers of disciplined corrupt officials but the paradigm-change in the disciplinary regime of the Party: first, the reversal of the depoliticization process of the Party’s disciplinary regime; second, the retention of temporarily mobilized anticorruption resources; and third the simplification of evidence production procedure. The combined result is a considerable expansion of the CCDI’s anticorruption investigative capacities and a significant increase Xi Jinping’s leverage to impose political loyalty and compliance upon Party officials in the future.