Narrative, Logic, Contradiction: Xi Jinping's Story of China's Past, Present and Future

Abstract

China's current leader Xi Jinping is telling, and selling, a story to China and the world. Xi's grand narrative, the 'China Story', recounts a modernising China's journey to national rejuvenation. Naturally, this 'Chinese Dream' can only be realised under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) with its unique development model of 'socialism with Chinese characteristics'. The backdrop to this positive story is a bleaker reality: a downturn in China's economy, tighter political controls over modern Chinese life, ongoing protests in Hong Kong and deteriorating relations with the United States. In 2020, China has looked to turn crisis into opportunity, using the global COVID-19 pandemic to promote a political narrative about the superiority of its CCP-led governance system. However, the underlying argument of China's COVID-19 narrative is not new; it is simply another echo of Xi's existing China Story. This suggests that a broader study of Xi's grand narrative is warranted. Analysing his overarching message will inform an understanding of how the contemporary CCP uses narrative and its governance performance to support the legitimacy of its rule. This study examines the narrative, argument and potential flaws in Xi's China Story. Drawing from literatures on Chinese language and politics, discourse analysis and political narratives, it critically analyses a selection of Xi's official speeches along with three texts published in response. This analysis informs an argument that by weaving the CCP, socialism with Chinese characteristics and national rejuvenation into a narrative of China's past, present and future, Xi turns his China Story into a 'mythologic'. Xi's mythologic, a narrative framework of reality, seeks to justify perpetual CCP rule by presenting the CCP-led system of socialism with Chinese characteristics as the only pathway to rejuvenation. However, analysing critical readings of Xi's discourse reveals contradictions in not only the China Story but also China's broader 'discourse-political system'. These contradictions prevent the China Story from generating a sustainable justification for CCP rule. Nonetheless, Xi's mythologic provides valuable support for CCP legitimacy. But its reliance on a perception of continuous progress to legitimise CCP rule means it must continually realign narrative and reality to demonstrate such progress, explain new developments and accommodate new interpretations.