As President Donald Trump unleashes sweeping changes across the US government and overturns decades of American foreign policy, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is preparing to hold a major political gathering designed to project something else: tightly-controlled stability. <\/p>\n
Thousands of delegates are arriving in the Chinese capital this week for the country\u2019s \u201ctwo sessions\u201d annual meeting, a highly choreographed spectacle where Xi and his officials will broadcast China as a major power that\u2019s confident in its direction and steadily advancing its tech prowess and global rise. <\/p>\n
That metaphoric split screen between the two powers will be in the spotlight on Wednesday morning in Beijing, when Trump\u2019s first address to Congress will roughly coincide with a state-of-the-union-like speech delivered by China\u2019s No. 2 official Li Qiang at the opening meeting of the National\u2019s People Congress (NPC), which rubber-stamps decisions already made behind closed doors. <\/p>\n
There, Li is expected to announce China\u2019s yearly targets for economic growth and military spending \u2014 and lay out how Beijing plans to continue its economic growth and transformation into a technological powerhouse in the face of mounting pressure from the United States. <\/p>\n
This year\u2019s two sessions, which includes roughly weeklong meetings of both the NPC and the country\u2019s top advisory body, gets underway as the White House is due to double the additional tariff on all Chinese imports to the US to 20% from 10%. Those duties sit atop existing tariffs on hundreds of billions in Chinese goods. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s unclear how Beijing will respond to the latest move. Last month, it took what were seen as modest retaliatory steps against 10% duties by <\/strong>slapping 15% tax on certain types of American coal and liquefied natural gas and a 10% tariff on crude oil, agricultural machinery, large-displacement cars and pickup trucks, while restricting exports of certain raw materials. <\/p>\n Despite the challenges, analysts aren\u2019t bracing for any major policy surprises or U-turns. True decision-making power lies with the Chinese Communist Party, whose authority cannot be challenged in the country \u2013 and Xi, the party\u2019s most powerful leader in decades. <\/p>\n The increased tariffs \u2014 and the threat of more economic and tech controls to come \u2014 are casting a long shadow over China\u2019s two sessions, which observers will also be watching for signs on how Beijing will continue to address its rumbling economic difficulties at home. <\/p>\n And signs point to Beijing staying the course on its leader\u2019s strategies to bolster innovation, industry and self-sufficiency to steel itself against frictions ahead: all while projecting that, in China, it\u2019s business as usual. <\/p>\n We must \u201cface difficulties head-on and strengthen confidence\u201d amid growing external challenges, the Communist Party journal Qiushi quoted Xi as saying in an article released Friday that\u2019s meant to set the tone for the gathering. <\/p>\n China is entering this year\u2019s two sessions buoyed by a surge of confidence and national pride in its tech sector. <\/p>\n Earlier this year, privately owned Chinese AI firm DeepSeek stunned Silicon Valley with the breakout success of its latest open-source large language model. Adding to that milestone: Beijing\u2019s long-term plans for achieving global dominance in green technologies have borne fruit, with its top electric vehicle maker rivaling Elon Musk\u2019s Tesla. <\/p>\n China\u2019s leaders are expected to continue to prioritize investment in innovation and making the world\u2019s second-largest economy self-sufficient in high tech. Xi and his cadres see high-end chips, quantum computing, robotics and AI as critical to powering economic growth and upgrading Chinese manufacturing. <\/p>\n \u201cChina needs to find a new engine for its economic development. The old model, the big infrastructure, construction\u2013driven (one), is probably not going to work \u2026 and (the high tech sector) is the most feasible path China has,\u201d said political scholar Liu Dongshu of the City University of Hong Kong. \u201cChina will prioritize this \u2013 and US pressure makes this more urgent.\u201d <\/p>\n Last month, Washington said it was considering expanding restrictions on US investment in sensitive technologies in China and would continue to restrict Chinese investment in strategic American sectors. <\/p>\n But it\u2019s not all negative pressure, Liu added, as China \u201csees an opportunity to replace the United States in some parts of the world order.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cChina may think that since (DeepSeek\u2019s success) it can be the leader in global AI over the US, or similarly in areas like climate change, where electric vehicles might be China\u2019s signature policy to solve the climate change problem,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n Observers will also be watching closely what steps Beijing may take to unleash private industry to advance innovation as it gears up for the potential of more restrictions from the US. <\/p>\n Xi sent a strong signal that China needed its entrepreneurs to step up in this fight last month, hosting the country\u2019s top tech executives in Beijing, where he proclaimed it was \u201cprime time\u201d for private enterprises \u201cto give full play to their capabilities.\u201d <\/p>\n Beijing followed the meeting with steps to improve market access for private firms and discussion of a Private Economy Promotion Law, which could be passed in the months, if not the days, ahead \u2013 seen as a significant course correction following a years-long, sweeping regulatory crackdown on private industry. <\/p>\n The two sessions gathering is also set, as in past years, to reflect Xi\u2019s increasingly tight grip over China\u2019s political system. The leader used the 2018 NPC meeting to pave the way for him to stay in power indefinitely, with the removal of the presidential two-term limit in the Chinese constitution. <\/p>\n Last year, the scrapping of a longstanding annual press conference led by the country\u2019s second highest-ranking official was widely seen as another sign of Xi\u2019s control over the official narrative \u2013 and eliminated a rare chance for journalists to interact with a top Chinese official. The event is not expected to resume this year. <\/p>\n This year, the gathering is expected to again highlight how united the political apparatus is around his vision for the future, despite the country\u2019s economic hurdles. <\/p>\n \u201cThe NPC this year will really be in the context of continuing to derisk China\u2019s rise and really hardening its posture against global uncertainties,\u201d including in Beijing\u2019s relationship with the US and Europe, said Nis Gr\u00fcnberg, a lead analyst at MERICS think tank in Germany. <\/p>\n As China \u201cdoubles down\u201d on this approach, deepening \u201cthe role of the party and the core of the party \u2013 Xi Jinping \u2013 to steer this whole process is more important than ever to the leadership,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n China\u2019s slowing economy has been roiled by a property sector crisis and high local government debt, while foreign investment has cratered, consumption has flagged and young people struggle to find jobs. <\/p>\n China earlier this year reported 5% economic growth in 2024, a figure viewed with heavy skepticism by many external observers, and analysts say it\u2019s likely to float a similar number for its GDP target this year. Signs for how Beijing plans to address these challenges will also be closely watched, after a raft of policy adjustments since last summer were seen as falling short. <\/p>\n In the days ahead, Beijing may unveil new efforts to boost consumer spending through stimulus or social welfare benefits. US tariffs make this even more urgent, observers say, as China\u2019s manufacturers may need to rely more on the domestic market. <\/p>\n Xi linked weak demand to China\u2019s \u201ceconomic security\u201d during a key Communist Party economic meeting late last year, according to his speech published Friday in Qiushi \u2014 in a signal of the increasing importance of addressing the issue. <\/p>\n But even still, analysts see little sign of a departure from Xi\u2019s primary focus on bolstering support for industry. <\/p>\n Beijing is likely to release policies to \u201cmake sure that at least the big and some of the medium-sized industrial producers can survive additional (US) tariffs,\u201d according to Victor Shih, director of the University of California San Diego\u2019s 21st Century China Center. <\/p>\n Beijing is counting on its subsidized companies being able to weather those tariffs, given the dependency of US industries on Chinese goods \u2013 and to have its own firms ultimately come out dominant. <\/p>\n \u201cSo in a sense they\u2019re not afraid of (them),\u201d he added, of US tariffs. <\/p>\n In the short term, such industrial support could create more friction with the US and China\u2019s other trade partners. The country\u2019s reliance on exports as an agent of growth propelled it to a nearly $1 trillion trade surplus with the rest of the world last year \u2013 a driving factor for Trump\u2019s tariff push. <\/p>\n For China, that fits in with the wider message it\u2019s expected to send in the coming days: even as headwinds mount, it\u2019s confidently staying its course \u2013 and ready to be seen as a champion of global trade and order. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As President Donald Trump unleashes sweeping changes across the US government and overturns decades of American foreign policy, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is preparing to hold a major political gathering designed to project something else:…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4660,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} High-tech prowess<\/h2>\n
\u2018Doubling down\u2019<\/h2>\n