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Since taking office in 2012, he has become head not only of the state, the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the military, as is normal for the country’s leader, but also of multiple new party supercommittees, making him That sparked speculation from international commentators that he is less of a president and more of an autocrat.
Now, a new bill in the US Congress wants to strip Xi of the title of “president,” with which most Western governments and English-language news organizations, including CNN, refer to him.
“The leadership of the People’s Republic of China has not been challenged in its vicious prosecutions of human rights abuses for decades,” the bill says. “Addressing the head of state of the People’s Republic of China as ‘president’ gives the incorrect assumption that the people of the state, through democratic means, have easily legitimized the leader who governs them.”
Xi’s titles have been a subject of controversy and some confusion. None of its official Chinese titles include the word “president” or translate to it, but all Chinese leaders since the 1980s, when the country began to open up its economy, have had that official English title in China.
Perry is not the first to ask for a change of appointment; For years, critics have argued that this split in Xi’s Chinese and English titles allows him to project an image of openness and representative leadership to the international community that is at odds with his authoritarian style and consolidation of power at home.
A quick story
Xi is known by three main titles in Chinese.
As president of the state (guojia zhuxi), is the head of state; as president of the Central Military Commission (zhongyang junwei zhuxi), is the commander-in-chief of the People’s Liberation Army (EPL); and as General Secretary of the CCP (zong shuji), is the head of China’s ruling (and effectively sole) political party.
These titles are used according to context; the military title is used when Xi deals with PLA affairs, for example.
It wasn’t until 1982, under a new leader pushing for China’s opening to the world, that another constitution was introduced. He reversed many of Mao’s changes by reestablishing the office of the State President, renaming the Party President as General Secretary, and introducing the new official English translation of “President,” which has since been used for each successive leader.
The word “president” has Latin roots that mean “sit before”, which is why it was initially used for school principals or committee leaders. Its meaning has nothing inherently to do with elections or democracy; but the United States was the first country to use the word as a title for the head of a republic, and other countries followed suit.
The recently adopted English title of “President” reflects this spirit of openness and increased international diplomacy. It also put distance between the country’s new leadership and Mao’s authoritarian regime, during which up to 45 million people starved, and got a little closer to how other modern countries referred to their leaders.
The change indicated “a kind of external alignment with international practices,” said Janny Leung, a linguistics professor at the University of Hong Kong School of English, in contrast to Soviet-era Chinese degrees that “have a strong association. historical communist “.
Some Western newspapers adopted the term president immediately, while others continued to use “leader of the Communist Party.”
But as China prepared to join the World Trade Organization in the late 1990s, taken as a sign that it was heading towards a more democratic future, the use of “Chinese president” as a title became widespread.
International setback
The country’s leadership and political landscape have also been transformed. While Deng and other officials of his time carefully moved away from the Mao era, Xi has worked to increase the Communist Party’s control over almost every aspect of society, drawing parallels between his style of government and Mao’s.
At the time, the CPP justified the change as necessary to align the presidency with Xi’s other two most powerful positions, party chiefs and the military, which have no term limits.
A ‘war of words’
This rise in tensions has been reflected in how senior US officials refer to Xi.
As the latest push to officially change Xi’s title, the “Naming the Enemy Law” is more of a political statement than a linguistic adjustment, said Leung, a professor at the University of Hong Kong.
The decision to strip Xi of his title as president is a “war of words, a way to diminish the legitimacy of the CCP in the current tension between the United States and China,” Leung said.
“If a foreign country says to China, ‘No, we are not going to use its official name,’ it just makes China lose face, regardless of the meaning of the term,” he added. “If that’s the term they choose and if you deny it or (refuse) to acknowledge it, I think that in itself challenges the face of the country.”
It is unclear how likely the bill is to pass; Although it has four other Republican co-sponsors, there are also only a few months left in this session of Congress. If it doesn’t become law by the end of the session in January, it will have to be scrapped and then reintroduced.
The power of such a law, however, rests on one thing: the assumption that Xi still wants to be called president. Some experts argue that he might prefer to revive the retired title of party chairman, which Mao last held, instead.
“This year we can see a lot of steps (from Xi) in preparation for the next XX Party Congress (scheduled for 2022), but we could also see that change in the English title of president,” said Wu Qiang, a political commentator. in Beijing. “The title of president means the highest absolute and absolute authority. The totalitarian title for the leader of the Party.”
If Xi regains the title, it would be his most significant step in continuing Mao’s legacy, Wu Qiang added, a sign that he “wants to return to the Maoist era.”
And adopting the term “president” could help Xi consolidate even more power, Leung said, perhaps making him literally the president of everything.
