Authoritarian Policing Under Xi Jinping

As President Xi Jinping expands and deepens his mark on the Chinese political system, how should scholars assess the impact of his administration on core institutions such as the police? This article employs a mixed methods approach by combining data from interview research with text analysis of ministerial level documents to explore reforms and rhetoric in the public security bureaucracy during the first six years of Xi’s tenure. The timing, nature, and practical execution of police reform shed light on the priorities of the Xi administration and its ability to make changes to the police bureaucracy and enforce law and order in Chinese cities. The paper assesses key policing reform rhetoric using Jean-Paul Brodeur’s framework of high and low policing to analyze which areas of policing have received the most attention and in what ways. Ultimately, I find that preferences for “high policing” style stability maintenance reforms supersede concern for “low policing” activities such as crime-fighting, resulting in the further politicization of policing in China.