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William Zheng

China’s top leadership has made party governance the focus of a coming key conclave, signalling the significance of a clean record in the selection process ahead of next year’s national congress.
The Politburo, China’s top decision-making body, announced on Thursday that the fifth plenary session of the Communist Party’s 20th Central Committee would be held in October, state news agency Xinhua reported.
The meeting is likely to be the party’s most important gathering ahead of its 21st national congress in autumn 2027, where key leadership reshuffles and the endorsement of a fourth term for Xi Jinping are likely to take centre stage.
According to Xinhua, the October plenum will focus on “consistently exercising full and rigorous governance over the party”.
For Beijing, the expression usually means three things: fighting corruption, tightening party discipline and shoring up political loyalty.
More than 370 full and alternate members of the Central Committee – the party’s top political and executive body – will take part in the fifth plenum.

Typically, seven plenary sessions are held during each five-year term of the Central Committee, a body elected at every party congress.
The selection process for the next committee is understood to have begun earlier this year, and the screening is expected to last until the final months before next year’s congress.
The party constitution stipulates that the Central Committee hold at least one plenum each year, and the sitting body has observed this rule since the new five-year cycle began in 2022.
Over the past three decades, the plenary session held in the year before the party congress has typically addressed issues relating to ideology and party-building matters.
However, it is running one plenum behind schedule because the third one was delayed, causing a shift in subject for the fifth plenum.
Rather than discussing the five-year economic plan – which they addressed last year – the focus has shifted to party governance.
Xi’s anti-corruption drive, launched shortly after he took the party reins in 2012, has only intensified in recent years – bringing down scores of high-level officials across regions and policy areas.




Xie Maosong, a senior researcher at the National Institute of Strategic Studies, Tsinghua University, said the statement from Thursday’s Politburo meeting underlined the leadership’s acute awareness of the threat that corruption posed to the party.
It also highlighted a determination to filter out compromised candidates as preparations for next year’s reshuffle began, Xie added.
“The party will continue to learn from the corruption cases and come out with new preventive measures, new solutions in its anti-corruption toolkit, to select better candidates [for its new line-up in the 21st party congress],” he said.
The Politburo statement acknowledged “numerous new situations and problems facing the work of strengthening party discipline”, and attributed them to “profound changes in the circumstances in the outside world, within China and the ruling party”.
It also called on all members to develop a “deep understanding of the great significance [of] persistently advancing the comprehensive and strict governance of the party”.
This must be approached from the “strategic height” of consolidating party rule, drawing on “valuable experience” from the anti-corruption campaign through “higher standards and more concrete measures”, it said.
The coming plenum is expected to also endorse decisions made by the Politburo on changes to the sitting Central Committee.
China’s defence ministry announced in January that Zhang Youxia – a Politburo member and the first-ranked vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) – was under investigation for corruption along with Liu Zhenli, a Central Committee member and chief of the CMC’s Joint Staff Department.


In April, anti-corruption authorities announced that former Xinjiang party chief Ma Xingrui was under investigation, making him the second Politburo member ensnared this year and the third overall since 2022.
Ma has since been expelled from the party and removed from his public posts, under a decision endorsed by the Politburo on June 30 and expected to be ratified in the coming plenum.
A number of Central Committee members have also been detained by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection – the party’s top anti-corruption and political disciplinary body – since the last plenum, held in October last year.
They include full committee members Sun Shaocheng, the former party chief of Inner Mongolia, former emergency management minister Wang Xiangxi, former Jiangxi and Zhejiang party boss Yi Lianhong, and former Chongqing mayor Hu Henghua.
Xu Liuping, an alternate committee member and former party secretary and vice-chairman of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, was placed under investigation in May.
Another alternate member, Li Yunze, was abruptly removed from his position as chief of the National Financial Regulatory Administration in April. He later lost his seat in the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature.
Tsinghua University’s Xie said the statement from the Politburo meeting also indicated that the fifth plenum would elaborate on Xi’s political thoughts on party building.
He said party governance was an important part of the latest branch of Xi’s political thought launched in June’s national party building conference, which stressed the need to govern the party with discipline and unified leadership.
“It is a comprehensive approach to ensure the party’s long-term rule and ability to achieve its goals,” Xie said.
“Besides party governance, the latest thought also emphasised the importance of a unified and centralised leadership and insisted on an organisational system that is cohesive across different levels. All of these will be thoroughly discussed and endorsed at the plenum.”
Deng Yuwen, former deputy editor of the Study Times, the official publication of the cadre-training Central Party School, said the disciplinary infrastructure should screen for both political loyalty and personal integrity in its selection process.
“An official can appear to be extremely loyal in public and be unambiguous in policy implementation, while turning their position into a source of private and family benefits,” he cautioned.
Deng cited the recent downfall of Ma to underline his point. He argued that Ma’s ability to engage in corruption despite the Xi-led crackdown being in full swing showed that while the party’s anti-corruption apparatus was very powerful at punishing wrongdoing, it still needed to tighten routine oversight.


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China’s Communist Party

China’s October plenum plan reveals focus on party discipline ahead of 2027 congress

The plenum is the most important political meeting ahead of next year’s party congress, when Xi Jinping is due to begin a fourth term as leader. Photo: EPA

The Central Committee’s fourth plenary session was held in October last year. Photo: Xinhua

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Politburo calls on Central Committee to draw on the ‘valuable experience’ from the anti-corruption campaign


Politburo calls on Central Committee to draw on the ‘valuable experience’ from the anti-corruption campaign.


China’s October plenum plan reveals focus on party discipline ahead of 2027 congress

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Politburo calls on Central Committee to draw on the ‘valuable experience’ from the anti-corruption campaign

Politburo calls on Central Committee to draw on the ‘valuable experience’ from the anti-corruption campaign