China’s Xi and CCP Under Growing Pressure

Xi Jinping faces growing internal pressure despite tight control over the economy and Chinese society.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping (C) is applauded as he arrives at the closing session of China's rubber-stamp legislature, the National People's Congress, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11, 2024. Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

Commentary

The conventional wisdom that Xi Jinping has a firm grip over the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its key institutions is likely true—until it isn’t.

What does that mean in real terms?

Signs Xi May Be Under Pressure

Despite his apparent dominance, there are clues that Xi may be facing mounting internal resistance. Notably, he has skipped several high-level policy meetings in mid-2025, delegating them to Premier Li Qiang.

Observers also note that recent PLA Daily articles have referred more frequently to “collective leadership” and “shared responsibility,” signaling a possible reevaluation of Xi’s one-man authoritarian rule over China.

Curiously, in recent meetings with U.S. and European officials, Beijing has adopted a noticeably more conciliatory tone, which may be a sign of pressure on Xi from the CCP to stabilize foreign relations amid internal challenges.

A Great Divide Between Power and Performance

The fundamental criticism is that the unprecedented power that Xi has gathered for himself hasn’t delivered on the Party’s promise to the people to provide sustainable economic growth. Plus, Xi hasn’t fulfilled his own political promise in terms of leading China to greater economic performance or global influence.

In fact, China’s economic performance has cratered since the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. What’s more, the Wuhan lab has been identified as the source of the synthesized virus that plunged the world into a panic and caused great economic dislocations. These events occurred under Xi’s leadership.

Police and officials wearing protective gear work in an area where barriers are being placed to close off streets around a locked-down neighborhood in Shanghai on March 15, 2022. Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images

China’s prestige around the world has been irretrievably tarnished, especially with emerging economies, because of the global disappointment of the Belt and Road Initiative and its resulting debt traps, and that has led to charges of neocolonialism, which are certainly not easily deniable.

Furthermore, the Chinese regime’s arrogant disregard for its largest trading partners, characterized by multiple and entrenched adversarial trading practices, has reached a critical point, prompting the world’s leading technology, manufacturing, and retail companies, along with their investment capital, to flee China.

That trend is reversing a 30- to 40-year history of building business and commerce relationships with Beijing, culminating in Xi’s assertions of global dominance via the “Made in China 2025” project, which was nothing less than the attempted technological impoverishment of the rest of the world for the benefit of the CCP.

All of these policies were driven by Xi and the CCP. All have been colossal failures.

Widening Rifts Within CCP’s Old Guard

In political terms, these failures have revealed and widened rifts beneath the surface of the CCP that already existed but have since become more visible. Similar to geological fault lines that run deep beneath the surface of the earth, these rifts remain unseen, although not irrelevant to the stability of the current political structure.

To carry the metaphor, when the rifts become too wide, the landscape above becomes unstable and unsustainable. At that point, a sudden and earthshaking tectonic event occurs, often violently, that disrupts the status quo and reshapes the landscape above.

Xi is sitting atop a country riven with deep political fault lines and growing economic instability.

For example, retired Party elders, traditionally treated with deference within CCP ranks, have begun voicing concerns about the country’s direction under Xi. Former Premier Wen Jiabao and Li Ruihuan, ex-chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, have reportedly expressed reservations about Xi’s economic mismanagement and confrontational foreign policy. Although neither wields any formal power, their critiques indicate a wider discontent among the Party’s old guard.

Similarly, China’s “princelings”—descendants of founding CCP members and elites—have also criticized Xi’s policies and China’s developmental direction. They have even coordinated with foreign intelligence agencies regarding Xi and potential compromising information. They have found themselves allegedly targeted, bullied into silence, or otherwise neutralized by Xi’s faction.

Friction Within the Military

But it’s not just the old guard or displaced princelings that are disenchanted with Xi’s performance. Despite rigorous loyalty purges and frequent political reshuffles, Xi has replaced multiple high-ranking officers in 2024 and 2025, including Gen. Li Shangfu and Adm. Dong Jun, because of alleged corruption or disloyalty. Still—or perhaps because of it—the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) remains a potential source of dissent.

Analysts suggest that such purges may indicate internal conflict within the PLA hierarchy rather than routine discipline. Although the military remains under Xi’s control, visible instability within its leadership structure signals underlying tensions.

Middle Class and Entrepreneurial Discontent

China’s persistent economic troubles are also eroding public confidence among the middle and entrepreneurial classes. Youth unemployment remains high in many urban centers, and gross domestic product growth has slowed significantly amid a deep and enduring real estate crisis and export contraction.

Meanwhile, increasing censorship of local corruption scandals and restrictions on internet platforms have alienated younger professionals and private business leaders. These groups, once central to China’s rapid modernization, now feel stifled and anxious.

Succession Vacuum, Structural Risk

Perhaps the most delicate and yet pressing issue for the CCP is Xi’s refusal to name a successor. By removing term limits and centralizing authority, Xi has disrupted a decades-long norm of collective leadership and peaceful succession. Without an apparent heir or institutional mechanism to transition power, China faces the prospect of a leadership crisis in the not-too-distant future.

The longer this ambiguity persists, the more vulnerable the CCP becomes to factional struggles in the event of Xi’s sudden incapacitation or political failure. Preventing such a crisis appears to be top of mind for many within the Party, yet so far, Xi has not allayed their fears.

Perhaps doing so is now beyond even his reach, which may be his greatest failure of all.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.