Xi’s party: What to look for at the upcoming Chinese Communist Party plenum

From October 26 to 29, Chinese President Xi Jinping will convene the 20th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for its fifth plenary session. This almost annual, closed-door meeting is a Marxist-Leninist party-state tradition for signaling major policy directions. The CCP’s 205 full members and 152 alternates will lay the groundwork for Xi’s likely fourth five-year term, which begins after next fall’s quinquennial party congress, when roughly 2,000 CCP delegates descend on Beijing. The plenum will focus on how the world’s largest party manages its 101 million members. Yet the most interesting developments will concern personnel movement, as Xi’s purges have swept through the party elite.

Since last year’s party plenum, Xi has continued his anti-corruption campaign against his own allies. Two more Politburo members were toppled, leaving 21 members. The purge of the 20th Central Committee’s Politburo has become the body’s most sweeping since the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown. Meanwhile, the party’s supreme military council, the Central Military Commission (CMC), has been almost entirely decapitated: shrinking from seven members at the start of Xi’s third term to just two—Xi and General Zhang Shengmin, who oversaw the purges of his peers. At the theater-command level, one grade below the CMC, as many as 33 officers have been removed. Since our February 2026 study with CSIS of the purges of the high command, only a few senior officers have been promoted—and there have been a few additional dismissals. The wide range of Xi’s military purges suggests that he may be dissatisfied with his 2016 restructuring of the high command and could yet again restructure the CMC, perhaps at this plenum or next fall’s party congress.

Only a Central Committee plenum can repopulate the CMC, making this Xi’s likely last opportunity to reconstitute his high command before next year’s party congress. It would be rather remarkable for Xi to pass on this opportunity and leave the CMC in its current rickety state—and could well signal his lack of confidence that the remaining senior officers are capable of running the world’s second most powerful military. But even if Xi were to repopulate his high command, he would still face a problem of trust: if he could not trust his own allies in the PLA’s high command, how can he trust any newly minted generals? Many of Xi’s closest remaining civilian allies are also expected to retire at next year’s party congress, raising questions about whether he can assemble a team that he can trust to govern effectively in his fourth five-year term.

Personnel

At last year’s plenum, only 168 of the Central Committee’s 205 full members actually showed up—the lowest attendance in the post-Mao era. The unexplained absences of so many colleagues must have been rather chilling to the attendees—many of whom serve in far-flung corners of the country, and all of whom operate in a secretive, highly stovepiped bureaucracy. In an authoritarian system like China’s, these absences are often indicative of a future expulsion or the complete disappearance of a political figure.

• In the year since the last plenum, 16 of 205 full Central Committee members, and three of 152 alternate members, have been dismissed from their positions; another eight of 205 full Central Committee members and three of 152 alternates have been expelled from the party. An additional four Central Committee members and two alternate members are under investigation. The plenum will likely confirm the purges of those who have already been dispatched, per the CCP constitution, including two former Politburo members: former CMC Vice Chairman Zhang Youxia and Ma Xingrui.
• The plenum is the only institution capable of appointing new Politburo members, but Xi did not replace previous Politburo members who were purged and may see little reason to do so now. He was loath to replace General He Weidong after expelling him at the last plenum, and he is even more unlikely to do so now with the party congress only one year away.
• On the military side, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) started this term with 44 Central Committee members in 2022, but following dismissals and expulsions, only 17 are left standing. Of the 19 Central Committee members who have been dismissed from their positions since the last plenum, 12 are from the PLA. Of the 11 Central Committee members who have already been expelled from the party since the last plenum, two are from the PLA. Of the 23 alternate members from the PLA, one more officer has been removed, and an additional 18 are likely missing.
• Remarkably, among the 17 PLA officers left on the Central Committee, the whereabouts of almost every general or lieutenant general remain unknown, as most have not been seen for several months and may have been dismissed themselves. The only clearly active Central Committee PLA officers who have weathered the purges are Admiral Dong Jun and General Zhang Shengmin—and even Zhang is rumored to face trouble, given that his former colleagues’ corruption occurred on his watch.
• At the last plenum, Xi skipped over all the alternate Central Committee members from the PLA who should have been promoted to become full Central Committee members. Since the last plenum, only four PLA officers were promoted to general, none of whom are currently full or alternate members of the Central Committee. With the slow rate of promotions, there will likely be very few new generals and lieutenant generals promoted to the party congress next year—though it is still a question of who will continue to weather the storm of PLA purges in the remaining year before the party congress.

Meanwhile, as the plenum approaches and the purges continue, ministerial-level officials are jockeying to position themselves for promotion—including to the Politburo—at next year’s party congress.

• Since last year, at least 13 Central Committee members have taken on new roles. Candidates for the next Politburo will likely need to be under 65 and usually have two ministerial positions under their belt to be eligible for promotion to the Politburo, though these requirements are increasingly flexible under Xi. Around 55 officials may currently meet those criteria.

• Excluding the missing PLA officers, 15 more Central Committee members have retired, moved to a sinecure position, stepped down, or resigned since the last plenum, but remain on the Central Committee. Altogether, at least 28 individuals from this Central Committee have left their positions, likely due to age, but have not been purged.

Policy

The substantive focus of this year’s plenum will be party-building—and specifically “full and rigorous party self-governance”—as previewed at the Politburo’s September meeting. The concept of “full and rigorous party self-governance” (全面从严治党) entered the party vernacular at the 18th Party Congress when Xi came into power, marking a key focus for Xi throughout his rule. The Politburo’s pre-plenum announcement concentrated on broad, traditional concepts in Xi Jinping Thought, including an emphasis on the importance of party self-governance, rectification of prominent problems in the party, and further development of a favorable political situation.

Ahead of this plenum, Qiushi, the CCP’s leading theoretical journal, published a polemical speech by Xi on personnel management and cadre behavior—a theme consistent with his extensive pruning of the Central Committee’s ranks. He explicitly castigated politically opportunistic or self-interested behavior, as well as profligacy like “power-for-money, and power-for-sex transactions.” Prior to previous plenums on party building, corrupt behavior was named but not as extensively or descriptively as it was here. Likely aware of the upcoming party congress and questions over his own succession, Xi has taken a harsh tone with his underlings to warn against any sort of political jockeying and factionalism. These themes will likely be present throughout the communique and readouts of the plenum.

Other possible developments

Notably, during his first two terms, Xi has used the plenum the year before the party congress to establish his dominance within the party. This has sparked some rumors that Xi might make a bigger move like restoring the position of party chairman that Mao Zedong held—and which the party abolished in 1982—but the available evidence cannot substantiate these rumors. What we do know from his two previous plenums focused on party building is that Xi enjoys reasserting his centrality in the party today and in the course of the party’s history.

• At the sixth plenum of the 19th Central Committee in November 2021, the party adopted the “Resolution on Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Communist Party of China’s 100 Years of Endeavors,” which Xi used in part to elevate himself on par with Mao and Deng Xiaoping. This was only the third historical resolution in CCP history, after Mao’s 1945 resolution and Deng’s 1981 resolution.
• In Xi’s first term, the sixth plenum of the 18th Central Committee emphasized Xi’s accomplishments in strengthening party discipline. Taking place early in Xi’s tenure in 2016, the plenum was used to substantiate Xi’s recent anti-corruption campaign by adopting new documents on party discipline.

Conclusion

Xi began his third term by stacking the leadership with longtime allies and associates but has since turned his own anti-corruption crusade against them. As a result, he has dredged deeper from the party’s well of cadres and delayed reconstituting the high command. As Xi gears up for his fourth term, he risks becoming even more isolated, as his remaining allies on the Politburo Standing Committee should retire next year if they abide by the party’s informal retirement rules. Xi will have to replace them with younger men who will likely seek to ingratiate themselves with Xi—in the hopes of replacing him one day. Xi can replace the men but not the trust. And in a conspiratorial system like China’s, trust is the rarest political commodity.