The Triumph and Terror of Wang Huning (Excerpt)

The dark vision of China's secretive strategist, and us

Wang Huning, the man behind Xi Jinping.

One day in August 2021, Zhao Wei disappeared. For one of China’s best-known actresses to physically vanish from public view would have been enough to cause a stir on its own. But Zhao’s disappearing act was far more thorough: overnight, she was erased from the internet. Her Weibo social media page, with its 86 million followers, went offline, as did fan sites dedicated to her. Searches for her many films and television shows returned no results on streaming sites. Zhao’s name was scrubbed from the credits of projects she had appeared in or directed, replaced with a blank space. Online discussions uttering her name were censored. Suddenly, little trace remained that the 45-year-old celebrity had ever existed.

She wasn’t alone. Other Chinese entertainers also began to vanish as Chinese government regulators announced a “heightened crackdown” intended to dispense with “vulgar internet celebrities” promoting lascivious lifestyles and to “resolve the problem of chaos” created by online fandom culture. Those imitating the effeminate or androgynous aesthetics of Korean boyband stars—colorfully referred to as “xiao xian rou,” or “little fresh meat”—were next to go, with the government vowing to “resolutely put an end to sissy men” appearing on the screens of China’s impressionable youth.

Zhao and her unfortunate compatriots in the entertainment industry were caught up in something far larger than themselves: a sudden wave of new government policies that are currently upending Chinese life in what state media has characterized as a “profound transformation” of the country. Officially referred to as Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “Common Prosperity” campaign, this transformation is proceeding along two parallel lines: a vast regulatory crackdown roiling the private sector economy and a broader moralistic effort to reengineer Chinese culture from the top down.

But why is this “profound transformation” happening? And why now? Most analysis has focused on one man: Xi and his seemingly endless personal obsession with political control. The overlooked answer, however, is that this is indeed the culmination of decades of thinking and planning by a very powerful man—but that man is not Xi Jinping.

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This is an excerpt from my latest essay, just published in Palladium Magazine. Go read the whole thing. (It’s free!)

I’m pretty happy with this one, as very few in the West know anything about the life or ideas of Wang Huning, the secretive thinker behind three consecutive Chinese leaders and therefore quite likely the most influential political theorist on the planet today. And, as far as I can tell, there has been no similarly detailed profile written about him in the English language. That is a shame, because I think his ideas are not only key to understanding the global ideological struggles that are now coalescing and are likely to shape the decades ahead, but also provide a fascinating glimpse into how China views the upheavals now wracking the West - even as it sees itself now facing many of the same challenges as well.

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