Wang Yi’s return to the helm of China’s foreign ministry is a reminder that Chinese Communist party elite politics are as opaque and brutal as ever. His predecessor, Qin Gang, was abruptly removed with no explanation on Tuesday after just seven tumultuous months in the job.
The decision provided some closure to the weeks of speculation about Qin’s absence. But although Qin’s personal fate remains unclear – he has still not been seen in public since his final meetings as foreign minister on 25 June – the reinstatement of Wang underlines the fact that Beijing wants to maintain continuity in its foreign policy.
In China, the government is subordinate to the Chinese Communist party (CCP). That means that the government position of foreign minister is less important than the chief of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission, a division of the CCP’s ruling body. Since January, that post has been held by Wang, who is, for now, holding both the party and government positions. Dual duties at such a high level of office are normally a temporary arrangement.
“Chinese foreign ministers really are less significant than we imagine,” says Rosemary Foot, an associate at the University of Oxford’s China Centre. The foreign minister implements foreign policy, but the party – led by Xi Jinping – shapes it. Wang is often described as China’s top diplomat, notes Steve Tsang, the director of the China Institute at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. “But in an important sense he is the second top diplomat, as Xi likes to play the primary role himself. He travels more than any of his predecessors, and holds a tight rein on foreign policy.”
So although it was Qin who met the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, in Beijing for more than seven hours last month, in a visit that was meant to help reset the downwards spiral of US-China relations, it was Xi who set the policy direction of re-opening dialogue with Washington. That is unlikely to change, even if Qin’s departure will make those conversations more awkward.
Before being catapulted to the top of China’s foreign ministry, Qin served as ambassador to the US and spent a decade at the Chinese embassy in London. Earlier in his career, he worked as a news assistant in the Beijing bureau of United Press International, an American news agency.
All this shaped him into a diplomat who was noted for his ease around western counterparts. Although not averse to “wolf warrior” style statements – in March he described US-China relations as a “zero-sum game where you die and I live” – he was also seen as a confident and candid interlocutor. Wang, who was foreign minister for nearly a decade before Qin took over at the end of last year, is markedly more stiff.
Where Wang shines, however, is in his exultation of “Xi Jinping Thought”, the philosophy that the CCP describes as the “action manual” for rejuvenating the Chinese nation. Wang has described Xi Jinping Thought as “a major achievement of epoch-making significance in the construction of new China’s diplomatic theory”.
After weeks of wild rumours about Qin’s absence, the reinstatement of Wang suggests that the line from Beijing is that it is business as usual. But the confusion and mystery surrounding the last few weeks have created a headache for Xi, who, Foot notes, “stuck his neck out” when he appointed Qin as foreign minster ahead of other candidates. Qin “wasn’t the obvious choice” for the post, but his close relationship with Xi seems to have helped him leapfrog into the role. Some analysts argue that Qin’s swift rise, brief tenure and dramatic fall reflect poorly on Xi’s judgment.
Aside from a brief reference to unspecified health issues, there has been no official explanation for Qin’s fall from grace. In the hours after Tuesday’s announcement, mentions of Qin started to be scrubbed from the website of the ministry of foreign affairs, including reports about his meeting with Blinken, suggesting that the health explanation is unlikely. But he does not appear to have been removed from the State Council, China’s top administrative body, suggesting that he hasn’t been fully purged from the party.
Rumours abound. Some analysts have suggested that his long stints overseas made him vulnerable to actual or perceived influence from western intelligence agencies. He may have simply fallen prey to CCP factionalism. The fact that gossip about him was not completely censored on Chinese social media indicates some willingness to tarnish his reputation. What remains the same is the fact that Xi, and not anyone else, is shaping China’s relationship with the wider world.
