The Rise and Fall of Ruling Oligarchs: Fighting ‘Political Corruption’ in China

Abstract

A new term that emerged in the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) official discourse during President Xi’s corruption crackdown is “political corruption.” To understand this type of corruption and why it is particularly unacceptable to the CCP, we extend the theory of oligarchy. We propose the concept of “political oligarchs” to encapsulate a group of Chinese political elites who rose to power through corrupt measures and engaged in defense of both wealth and political power. Their intent and capacity for the double defense paved their road to rise and fall. Comparisons of two high-profile cases further show how different career tracks and power resources can be utilized by politicians to help them grow into political oligarchs. Our research signifies the logic of using political power as a foundation of oligarchy in a single-party regime, in contrast to using material wealth as a foundation in other regimes as argued in existing literature. We also demonstrate the unique feature of concept adaptation in corruption crackdowns in China.