China’s pivotal plenum shows long game, but can it overcome its soft-power wall?
Beijing looks to double down on tech self-sufficiency, yet its global favourability poses a challenge
NOVEMBER marks the 13th anniversary of President Xi Jinping’s elevation to general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. In the years since, as China’s fourth plenum last week highlighted, much has changed in the global political and economic landscape – including international perceptions of the balance of power and Beijing’s place in it.
However, it is not only Xi’s role at the apex of the Chinese political elite that has been a major constant during this period. Beijing’s grand strategy has also remained consistent: a longer-term, gradualist transition to power intended to allow the nation to grow stronger over an extended horizon.
A strategy of patience
This long-term approach was a major thread at the plenum, which could prove historic, as Beijing prepares a new, 15th five-year plan for release next year. This will be a 2026 to 2030 blueprint for China’s economic and social development with several key elements dialled up, including artificial intelligence (AI) and broader technology self-sufficiency.
Xi recently asserted that, when it comes to China’s “revitalisation”, long-term planning creates “a vital political advantage”. Within many circles in Beijing, this political and economic logic is seen as especially compelling when compared to the perceived chaos and short termism of the US, whose federal government continues to be shut down – even now – due to political gridlock over spending.
This core point was also echoed last week by Jiang Jinquan, a key official with the Communist Party Central Committee’s Policy Research Office. He declared that “scientifically formulating and continuously implementing the five-year plan is... a key political advantage... gaining strategic initiative in the midst of intense international competition”.
Since Xi took office, he has sought to project Beijing as a responsible global stakeholder. Within Beijing, the plenum’s focus on the long term is seen as a key element of this goal, projecting a predictability that can benefit the global economic landscape – a clear contrast to US President Donald Trump’s policy-by-social media approach.
To be sure, China is not without its own significant problems. It faces challenges in the property sector, uneven consumer demand and deflation. Moreover, a number of its five-year plans have backfired badly, such as those under Mao Zedong in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
However, many countries now increasingly perceive China as a significantly stronger player on the world stage. There is solid basis for this changing international sentiment.
The country has become a major force in areas like electric cars, wind and solar power, plus robotics and AI. Last week’s plenum, which released a near-5000 word communique, reaffirmed this direction of travel.
At the macro level, moreover, the International Monetary Fund has asserted for over a decade that the Chinese economy is now larger than its US counterpart on a purchasing power parity basis, which adjusts for the fact that goods are cheaper in China and other countries relative to the US.
However, without these cost adjustments factored in, the Chinese economy is still smaller than the US equivalent, and is unlikely to overtake it for many years, if ever.
In the context of continued tensions with the US in areas like computer chips, advanced software, rare earth metals and magnets, China decided at the plenum to focus on “substantial improvements in scientific and technological self-reliance... and steer the development of new quality productive forces”.
This reference to “new quality productive forces” denotes Xi’s stress on the need for greater home-grown, advanced technology, including in the defence area, so that Beijing can increasingly export this intellectual property.
As Goldman Sachs outlined in a recent report, a growing number of these Chinese home-grown firms are proving to be internationally competitive, earning a significant share of their revenue abroad. This includes Alibaba and PDD Holdings – which includes the e-commerce platforms Temu and Pinduoduo – whose foreign profits have the potential to become a new growth driver for the Chinese economy.
“Soft power, which rests upon the international attractiveness of a country’s foreign policy, political values and culture, is recognised by Beijing as a key political commodity, but one it has had limited success in cultivating.”
China’s soft-power deficit
However, the consequences of China’s continued significant gross domestic product growth during Xi’s tenure have been more than economic. The widespread international perception that the global balance of power has swung significantly has created tensions, and not only with Washington.
While many in China welcome recognition of the country’s growing might, this shift is not without headaches for Beijing’s policymakers. It has exposed the country to greater foreign scrutiny, and fed into perceptions that politicians like Trump have seized upon to tap into growing angst about China’s rise.
This may only become a bigger challenge in the future if China’s international influence, as well as economic and national strength, grow “markedly stronger” as set out in the plenum. This goal jars with Beijing’s longstanding grand strategy, which was premised on keeping a relatively low profile during the nation’s gradual transition to power.
The brighter spotlight on the country in recent years has exposed a soft-power deficit. Soft power, which rests upon the international attractiveness of a country’s foreign policy, political values and culture, is recognised by Beijing as a key political commodity, but one it has had limited success in cultivating. As international perceptions of its hard power change, its global favourability has become more difficult to manage.
As this critical scrutiny intensifies, as seems highly plausible, Beijing will need to find better ways to tackle this soft power deficit, such as more directly addressing foreign concern about its intentions as a rising power.
For instance, China’s image might benefit significantly from greater public diplomacy to win more foreign hearts and minds. Such measures could include utilising the country’s growing capabilities in space travel for high-profile international cooperation projects for the good of the world as a whole.
This agenda poses significant challenges. China’s soft-power deficit will likely persist, unless it is tackled as part of the long-term grand strategy reaffirmed at the plenum.
The writer is an associate at LSE Ideas at the London School of Economics
