This year’s Fifth Plenum differs from previous ones. While past plenums have often centered on the next five-year plan, the Fourth Plenum in 2025 already adopted recommendations for the 15th Five-Year Plan.
For the upcoming Fifth Plenum, the focus is “full and rigorous Party self-governance.”全面从严治党, and I found two articles in the latest issue of Qiushi- the Party’s leading journal- that offer some clues about the meeting’s direction. Their overlapping themes suggest that, beyond the previously announced focus on anti-corruption, the meeting may also address mechanisms for implementing decisions made by the central committee.
The first article is a republication of Xi Jinping’s January 12, 2026, speech at the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, under the title “Advancing Full and Rigorous Party Self-Governance with Higher Standards and More Concrete Measures.”以更高标准、更实举措推进全面从严治党 The second is “Improving Mechanisms for Implementing the Party Central Committee’s Major Decisions and Plans,”完善党中央重大决策部署落实机制, by Wang Xipeng, the Director of the Institute of Industrial Economics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
The opening section of Xi’s speech emphasizes the need to implement the Party Central Committee’s major decisions and plans with greater resolve and effectiveness. The second article takes more of a “problem diagnosis–solution” approach. Among the shortcomings Wang identifies are insufficiently specific task assignments that leave too much room for discretion; an excessive reliance on work logs and written documentation in inspections, with too little on-site verification; and difficulties sharing inspection findings across departments. These points actually highlight the absence of a dedicated mechanism to oversee policy implementation itself. Current practices rely more on submitting documentation up the administrative hierarchy to demonstrate that work has been completed, but make it difficult to verify whether the results have actually met policy objectives. This also means that, beyond doing their jobs, grassroots officials must spend additional time proving they have done them.
Mechanisms for Tolerating Could Be Key
Despite the emphasis on policy implementation, it would be overly simplistic to characterize this merely as a push for tighter control. Wang’s article also explicitly criticizes simplistic approaches to accountability, noting that grassroots officials may opt for inaction because “the more they do, the more mistakes they make.” Xi’s speech likewise states that working creatively and the resolute implementation of central decisions “are not in opposition.”
My reading is that Beijing wants to distinguish between a failure to implement policy and experimentation that remains faithful to the policy’s underlying objectives. This is one of the shifts I consider worth watching, although it remains unclear how that distinction will be drawn or what mechanisms will support it. Possibilities include defining circumstances in which officials are exempt from accountability, treating proactive correction of mistakes as grounds for more lenient treatment, or establishing separate boundaries for pilot initiatives and experimentation.
What to Watch
Two questions deserve particular attention. The first is whether “improving mechanisms for implementing the Party Central Committee’s major decisions and plans” will become a standalone agenda item. If it appears as a separate section, that would indicate that the top leadership has come to regard policy implementation as an institutional issue, rather than merely a disciplinary one.
The second is whether the performance assessment system will be revised. If subsequent assessments begin to rely less on documentation and work logs, and instead incorporate findings from on-site verification, progress toward policy objectives, and public feedback, this would change the incentive structure for grassroots officials. As Zhou Li’an argues in his article, there’s an “impossible trinity” of governance. Rigid targets, tightly prescribed implementation rules, and limited political and economic resources simply can’t be achieved all together. What interests me most is how a new balance might be struck among the three.
Below are the English versions of two articles I translated with the help of AI.
Advancing Full and Strict Party Self-Governance with Higher Standards and More Practical Measures
Author: Xi Jinping
Published: October 15, 2026
The “15th Five-Year Plan” period is a critical time for laying the foundations and making a concerted push toward basically achieving socialist modernization. To turn the blueprint drawn up by the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee into reality, we must uphold and strengthen the Party’s overall leadership, persistently advance full and strict Party self-governance, strengthen the whole Party’s sense of mission and fighting spirit, consolidate the Party’s unity, keep the Party’s ranks pure, and raise the Party’s capacity and level of leadership.
Caption: On January 12, 2026, Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, President of the People’s Republic of China, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, delivered an important speech at the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China. Photo: Xie Huanchi, Xinhua News Agency.
I. More Resolutely and Forcefully Implementing the Major Decisions and Plans of the Party Central Committee
Implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee is a fundamental requirement for upholding the Central Committee’s authority and centralized, unified leadership, and it is an important historical lesson in the continued development of the Party and the people’s cause. The Communist Party of China was born out of ideals and fights for its mission. It was under the strong leadership of the Party Central Committee that generations of Communists, undaunted by hardship, carried on the struggle and successfully led the Chinese people from semi-colonial, semi-feudal society to stand up, grow rich, and become strong, opening the right path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Today we have reached a critical stage in basically achieving socialist modernization, and the road ahead will certainly bring major tests, including fierce winds, towering waves, and even raging storms.
As long as we have ideals in our hearts, the nation in our minds, and mission on our shoulders, we can take the long view, steadily strengthen our confidence and strength, overcome any difficulty, and unite the whole Party and the whole country in one purpose, so that the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee are truly carried out. We must conquer one “Loushan Pass” and one “Lazi Pass” after another. All Party organizations and all Party members and cadres must strengthen their sense of political responsibility and historical mission, take the Party’s founding aspiration as their own core purpose, and devote all their wisdom and strength to accomplishing the Party’s central task. Leading cadres at all levels must start from the Party’s mission and tasks and establish and practice a correct view of performance. They should ask themselves whether their thinking and actions have strayed from the lofty ideal of communism and the shared ideal of socialism with Chinese characteristics, whether they have departed from the fundamental purpose of serving the people wholeheartedly, whether they have drifted from the Party’s line, principles, and policies or the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, and whether they have detached from national conditions and from the actual circumstances of their own regions and departments. With the spirit that success need not be credited to oneself but will surely bear one’s mark, they should focus single-mindedly on advancing Chinese-style modernization.
Our Party has sound mechanisms for implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, and overall they operate smoothly and effectively. At the same time, information gathered through inspection tours, audits, and supervision shows that problems persist, including failure to implement major decisions and plans, and implementation that is distorted or improper, and in some areas these problems are quite serious. It must be made clear that implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans is a basic requirement of Party political discipline and political rules. We stress “upholding the Two Upholds” (两个维护) and maintaining a high degree of consistency with the Party Central Committee. This must be reflected in concrete action, not empty slogans, and we must not say one thing and do another. Anyone who violates these requirements must be held accountable: criticized where criticism is due, adjusted where adjustment is needed, and disciplined where discipline is warranted. There must be no light or vague handling of such cases. Political supervision in this area must be strengthened.
During the 15th Five-Year Plan period, the tasks of economic and social development are extremely demanding. We must focus closely on the Central Committee’s strategic arrangements, including fostering a new development paradigm, promoting high-quality development, and accelerating the building of a new development pattern. We must concentrate on building a modern industrial system, developing new quality productive forces according to local conditions, building a unified national market, expanding high-standard opening up, steadily advancing common prosperity for all, preventing a return to poverty on a regular basis, resolving local governments’ hidden debt, strengthening ecological protection, and balancing development with security. We must strengthen supervision that is specific, precise, and ongoing, make good use of inspection results, reinforce supervision of rectification, and ensure that the decisions and plans of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee are implemented in practice. This year, local governments will gradually undergo leadership transitions. We must prevent officials from standing idle and waiting and watching as the transition approaches, and prevent officials who have just taken office from chasing short-term gains or “flip-flopping” (翻烧饼) after their arrival, so that the blueprint is followed through to the end. It should be emphasized that resolutely and forcefully implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans does not conflict with creative work. All work must be grounded in reality and proceed from actual conditions, and we must avoid rigid copying and one-size-fits-all approaches. While strictly supervising, we should support and encourage regions and departments to explore effective methods and approaches for implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans in light of their own conditions, so that the final results are consistent with the Central Committee’s intentions and the original purpose of the policies.
Implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans depends ultimately on people. We must be vigilant against “two-faced people” (两面人) who harbor double intentions and say one thing while doing another. Such people take many forms. Some constantly proclaim political loyalty and the “Two Upholds,” and react quickly and loudly to the Central Committee’s decisions, yet in practice they engage in deception, do as they please, ignore orders, and disregard prohibitions, committing what are known as the “seven haves” (七个有之). Others embrace liberalism in their thinking and put individualism above all, accepting the new era’s socialism with Chinese characteristics only when it suits them and rejecting it when it does not. Others engage in political opportunism, flattering and ingratiating themselves, following the wind, and moving toward wherever interests lie, always ready to “jump ship.” Others practice factionalism in organizational matters, forming cliques, excluding dissenters, and using collective names to serve small-group interests. Others practice departmentalism in their work, guarding only their own “small plot of land” and sacrificing the whole for the part and the long term for the short term. And others practice a misguided form of “good-person-ism” in their duties, failing to stop or correct problems they discover and letting them spread, claiming this preserves unity while in fact avoiding responsibility. All of these behaviors violate Party principles, seriously obstruct the implementation of the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, and cause enormous harm to the Party’s cause and image. They must be exposed boldly and cleared out decisively. During leadership transitions, we must be especially vigilant, promote genuinely loyal, reliable, honest, and responsible good cadres, and never allow “two-faced people” or those who put private interests first to slip through.
II. Using Institutions to Confine Power More Scientifically and Effectively
Confining power within a system of institutional constraints is an important task of full and strict Party self-governance in the new era. After the 18th National Congress of the Party, the first important intra-Party regulation we formulated was the Central Eight-Point Regulations (中央八项规定). We began with this because many problems associated with the “Four Undesirable Work Styles” (四风) appear on the surface as detachment from the masses and indulgence in luxury, but at their core they involve forming cliques for personal gain and colluding for mutual benefit, concealing exchanges of power for power, power for money, and power for sex, which seriously damaged the Party’s image in the eyes of the people. We started from the issues that the masses reacted to most strongly, set iron rules and imposed firm constraints, held fast to our goals and never relaxed, and used the spirit of nailing things down to implement them. This halted many unhealthy tendencies that were previously considered impossible to stop and eliminated some deep-seated ills that had persisted for years. It ended the chaos in which “hundreds of documents could not keep a single mouth in check,” and through the example of “moving the wooden pole to build trust,” it brought about a complete transformation of Party conduct and government style, generating powerful positive energy for the Party and the country’s development. The learning and education campaign carried out across the Party last year further unified thinking, deepened understanding, summarized experience, and improved measures, demonstrating our firm resolve to carry the Central Eight-Point Regulations through to the end. There is no shortcut to implementing the spirit of the Central Eight-Point Regulations. The key lies in two words: “constancy” (常) and “long-term” (长). Without constant attention, relapses occur; without long-term commitment, conscious compliance cannot take root. We must consolidate and expand the results of the in-depth learning and education campaign on the Central Eight-Point Regulations, continuously improve mechanisms for regularly identifying and resolving problems, and make work-style improvement routine and long-lasting.
Caption: From December 25 to 26, 2025, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held a democratic life meeting. Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, presided and delivered an important speech. Photo: Xie Huanchi, Xinhua News Agency.
The practice of thoroughly implementing the Central Eight-Point Regulations shows that to confine power within a system of institutional constraints, we must both perfect the rules, weaving a tighter and sturdier cage, and improve enforcement, strengthening firm constraints. Since the 18th National Congress, the Party Central Committee has attached great importance to the development of laws and institutions. The number of regulations formulated and revised is unprecedented, and a relatively complete system of Party laws and regulations has taken shape. At the same time, we must recognize that some rules are overly general, lack targeted and operable provisions, lack close coordination among different regulations and leave gaps and loopholes, and that institutional development for new fields, new business models, and new groups lags behind. We must continue to improve Party laws and regulations, strengthen institutional supply according to the real needs of Party building and governance, quickly establish rules where they are missing, and promptly revise and supplement those that are incomplete or outdated, so that the system is comprehensive yet not cumbersome, effective, and practical, and avoid the problem of “using a cattle pen to hold a cat” (牛栏关猫).
Over the years, we have taken a series of measures to enforce laws and regulations, but problems persist where institutional rules exist only on paper, and in some places enforcement weakens at each successive level, resulting in “a paper cage that cannot hold a tiger” (纸笼禁虎). When explicit rules are not upheld, unwritten rules inevitably flourish. When unwritten rules dominate, explicit rules become mere decoration. Why are there so many political brokers and political charlatans active in society? It is because unwritten rules render laws and regulations ineffective and create a “broken windows” effect. Some cadres rely on personal networks rather than organizational channels, and some people trust personal connections rather than Party discipline and the law. If this continues, “bad money drives out good,” and “a personal note outweighs an official seal,” which will inevitably erode the political ecosystem and breed corruption and disorder. To curb unwritten rules, the key is to strengthen the enforcement of explicit rules. We must strengthen the publicity and education of laws and regulations, guiding Party members and cadres to understand discipline and the law, to know the explicit rules, and to hold them in awe, recognizing that laws and regulations are both a “tight-fitting headband” (紧箍咒) and a “protective talisman” (护身符). We must further increase the transparency of Party and government affairs, ensure that power operates in the open, and deprive unwritten rules of their market. We must uphold the principle that everyone is equal before laws and regulations, that compliance is not subject to privilege, and that enforcement admits no exceptions. We must seriously punish those who “run red lights” or “climb over fences,” and hold accountable those who bear leadership responsibility, so that institutional rules truly become high-voltage live wires that no one dares touch.
The effectiveness of institutional implementation in a region or department depends largely on its “first person in charge” (一把手). To confine power within institutional constraints, we must focus on ensuring that the “first person in charge” takes the lead in implementing the rules. The Party Central Committee’s opinions on strengthening supervision of “first persons in charge” and leadership teams set clear requirements for implementing democratic centralism and improving supervision of “three major and one important” (三重一大) decision-making. Members of leadership teams at all levels, especially “first persons in charge,” must set an example, take the lead in implementing the rules thoroughly, and ensure that the related supervision is also effective.
III. Advancing the Fight Against Corruption More Clearly and Resolutely
Since the 18th National Congress, our Party has deepened self-revolution, resolutely opposed corruption, and successfully forged a Chinese path of anti-corruption under the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee. This path combines addressing both symptoms and root causes and advances in an integrated way to make cadres “unable, unwilling, and not daring” to be corrupt. This path must continue to be followed resolutely.
At present, corruption remains prone to occur and recur. Facts once again demonstrate that the Party Central Committee’s judgment that “the anti-corruption struggle remains severe and complex, and the task of eliminating the breeding grounds and conditions for corruption remains arduous and heavy” is entirely correct. The anti-corruption struggle is a never-ending process and a continuous task. We must carry it out with the spirit of the Foolish Old Man who moved mountains and the spirit of Jingwei filling the sea, and persist to the end. Facts also remind us that corruption is the greatest risk, greatest threat, and greatest challenge facing our Party, a roadblock and stumbling block on the path of national development. If allowed to spread unchecked, it will inevitably undermine the economic development environment, trigger various risks, and shake the foundations of Party rule. Practice has also taught us that anti-corruption is a major struggle that we cannot afford to lose and must never lose, one that cannot stop for a moment or retreat by a single step. As the poem says, “While sunken ships are passed by a thousand sails, sick trees ahead are greeted by ten thousand blooming spring”; diseased trees must be uprooted and felled where needed. We must “press on the fleeing enemy while we have strength to spare,” maintain strategic composure and combat resilience, continue to root out corruption thoroughly, and get to the source of the problem. No matter how great the resistance or the cost, we must carry the anti-corruption fight through to the end. Regardless of who it is, how high their position, or how great their past contributions, anyone who engages in corruption will not be spared!
We must maintain a steady high-pressure posture. We must hold to the principle that wherever corruption exists it must be opposed, wherever graft is found it must be purged, and evil must be eliminated completely, so that corrupt elements have nowhere to hide. We must focus on areas where power is concentrated, capital is dense, and resources are abundant, closely watch for collusion between government and business, the protection of capital by power, and the infiltration of capital into politics. We must increase the investigation of corruption among “first persons in charge” and young cadres, and firmly remove corrupt individuals who do not reform and persist in wrongdoing. We must resolutely punish bribe-givers who knowingly break the law or repeatedly offend. We must dig deep to uncover new and hidden forms of corruption, including expected benefits, arrangements for nominal shareholding, and the “revolving door” between government and business. We must further intensify centralized campaigns against unhealthy tendencies and corruption close to the masses, and strengthen the governance of cross-border corruption and efforts to pursue fugitives and recover stolen assets. Localities and departments where major corruption cases have occurred must thoroughly eliminate their lingering poisons and completely remove the sources of contamination.
We must continuously enhance the penetrating power of the anti-corruption fight. We must grasp the new trends and characteristics of corruption, innovate our methods, and more promptly discover, accurately identify, and effectively govern various forms of corruption. We must deepen the joint investigation and governance of “style” problems and corruption, seeing through the surface of “style” to expose the essence of corruption. We must thoroughly investigate the practice of using business to sustain officials, officials to protect business, and officials and businesspeople forming one body, which lies behind inaction and arbitrary action. We must also thoroughly investigate requests for favors and interest transfers behind improper hospitality, and severely punish those who associate with political brokers and political charlatans. We must strengthen the empowerment of technology and make greater use of big data and other tools to improve the efficiency of supervision, discipline enforcement, and law enforcement. Of course, the use of new technologies must be governed by strict ethical norms and data security, and must be carried out strictly in accordance with Party rules, discipline, and the law. We must improve the mechanisms for implementing anti-corruption responsibilities. Party committees (Party groups) at all levels must firmly shoulder their main responsibility, and Party secretaries must fulfill their responsibility as first persons in charge. They must hold firm positions with a clear stance, lead relevant parties in fully assuming their responsibilities, and not treat anti-corruption as merely the business of discipline inspection and supervision commissions. They must truly know their responsibilities, take them on, and fulfill them.
Caption: On July 15, 2026, Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, President of the People’s Republic of China, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, inspected Shanghai. This photo shows Xi chatting warmly with residents’ representatives, subdistrict cadres, and community workers at the Party-masses service station in a residential area of Shimin Xincun, Banshengyuan Road Subdistrict, Huangpu District, during his inspection. Photo: Xie Huanchi, Xinhua News Agency.
We must put greater effort into advancing the integrated approach from top to bottom. The integrated advancement of “unable, unwilling, and not daring to be corrupt” lies in the word “integrated,” and it is also difficult precisely because it is integrated. We must strengthen systemic thinking and act simultaneously, in the same direction, and comprehensively. In practice, we may have different emphases at different stages, but we must not separate or neglect any of them, and we must prevent stage-based or link-based thinking from undermining the effectiveness of anti-corruption efforts. We must further improve the anti-corruption work mechanism and ensure coordination in task deployment, resource allocation, work advancement, and performance evaluation. We must connect daily Party organization supervision, discipline inspection and supervision, and supervision through inspection tours, audits, petitions, and public opinion, making full use of the “shadowless lamp” (无影灯) of comprehensive supervision and the “scalpel” (手术刀) of vigorous case handling, and promote integrated governance through coordination across the whole chain. We must focus on learning from cases to promote reform and governance, analyzing the causes of corruption, identifying management loopholes, and using typical cases for warning and education, so that old problems do not recur and no cost is paid in vain. We must select and appoint cadres according to the standards for good cadres in the new era, build healthy and positive relations among Party comrades and clean and close relations between government and business, and continuously purify the political ecosystem. We must strengthen the development of a new-era anti-corruption culture, improve the relevance and effectiveness of integrity education, and vigorously create a social environment that values integrity, rejects corruption, and promotes frugality while opposing extravagance.
Discipline inspection and supervision agencies bear great responsibility and noble mission in advancing full and strict Party self-governance. They must always remember what they are meant to do, firmly uphold the Party’s unity, and resolutely safeguard the Party’s advanced nature and purity. We must continue to strengthen the standardization, rule-of-law basis, and formalization of discipline inspection and supervision work, and continually improve the quality and efficiency of supervision, discipline enforcement, and law enforcement. We must hold fast to the principle of turning the blade inward and resolutely eliminate the “害群之马” (horses that harm the herd). We must continue to strengthen team building according to the requirements of being politically sound, professionally capable, of good conduct, and clean, and forge a “steel team” of discipline inspection and supervision personnel who are loyal, clean, responsible, and courageous and skillful in struggle.
Note: This is the main part of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s speech at the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Commission for Discipline Inspection on January 12, 2026.
Improving the Mechanisms for Implementing the Major Decisions and Plans of the Party Central Committee
Wang Xipeng
“During the years of war, the Party Central Committee and Chairman Mao commanded the entire Party and army by telegraph. The ‘dit-da, dit-da’ of the telegraph was the voice of the Party Central Committee and Chairman Mao, and the whole Party and army obeyed it unconditionally.” At a conference on Party building in central and state organs, General Secretary Xi Jinping guided Party members and cadres to understand, through the sound of “dit-da, dit-da,” that the Party Central Committee must have authority that is supreme and whose decisions are final. He pointedly declared: “If orders issued by the Party Central Committee are not heeded, and if orders are not obeyed and prohibitions are not observed, then what is there to talk about in upholding the authority of the Party Central Committee and its centralized, unified leadership!” At the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the General Secretary again set a clear requirement: “We stress ‘the Two Upholds’ and maintaining a high degree of consistency with the Party Central Committee. This must be reflected in concrete action in implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee. We must not shout empty slogans, and above all we must not say one thing and do another.” Upholding the authority of the Party Central Committee and its centralized, unified leadership includes upholding its leadership system, procedures, and rules, as well as its decisions, plans, and work arrangements. Implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee is a basic requirement of Party political discipline and political rules. No matter how complex the tasks of a region or department, their primary responsibility is to implement the Party Central Committee’s major decisions and plans well. No matter how varied the positions and duties of Party members and cadres, their shared responsibility is to implement these decisions and plans well.
Implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee depends on both political consciousness and institutional safeguards. Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, the Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has established and improved the institutions and mechanisms for implementing its major decisions and plans. It has strengthened the political responsibility of all regions and departments for implementation and built a full-chain system of work mechanisms covering task allocation, supervised implementation, regular reporting, inspection and circulation of findings, follow-up on results, and supervision and accountability. This has effectively ensured that the Central Committee’s orders are carried out smoothly and that its directives are obeyed.
First, the leadership system has been continuously strengthened and improved. The Political Bureau of the Central Committee has adopted provisions on strengthening and upholding the Central Committee’s centralized, unified leadership, and it takes the lead in treating the implementation of major decisions and plans as an important political responsibility. Central decision-making and coordinating bodies play a role in top-level design, overall coordination, integrated advancement, and supervision of implementation on major tasks.
Second, a division of responsibilities has taken shape. Under the centralized, unified leadership of the Central Committee, Party committees (Party groups) at all levels align their work with the required standards. Functional departments divide up the work. Inspection bodies follow up on results. Discipline inspection and supervision agencies conduct political supervision. Grassroots units implement policies creatively. Together they clear every “capillary” of implementation.
Third, work mechanisms have become more practical and effective. Relying on the Party’s organizational system, from central and state organs down to the grassroots front lines, responsibility is layered and passed down step by step, forming a powerful national “one chessboard” effort. Party committees (Party groups) at all levels treat the implementation of the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans as their primary responsibility. They conscientiously implement the “first item on the agenda” system, break tasks down item by item, assign clear divisions of labor, maintain work ledgers, and adopt list-based management and project-based advancement.
Fourth, the institutional framework has become more systematic and complete. The Central Committee has formulated and revised Party regulations, including the Working Regulations of the Central Committee, the Working Regulations of Local Party Committees, and the Working Regulations of Party Groups. These regulations make implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans the first item among the duties of Party and government organs and the first function listed in the regulations on determining functions, structure, and staffing (the “three-determinations” regulations). The Central Committee has also formulated and revised regulations on intra-Party supervision, inspection tours, accountability, and disciplinary sanctions, thereby setting strict political discipline requirements.
Fifth, responsibility for implementation has been firmly enforced. The Party has strengthened education in political loyalty and political discipline, encouraged Party members and cadres, especially leading cadres, to establish and practice a correct view of performance, and seriously investigated and punished formalism and bureaucratism. It has established follow-up and feedback mechanisms, promptly studied and issued supporting policies and detailed implementation rules, strengthened political supervision, and deepened political inspection tours, ensuring unity of thought and consistency of action across the Party.
At present, the overall picture is clear. The institutions and mechanisms for implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans continue to improve, and regions and departments are resolute and forceful in carrying them out. However, measured against the political requirement of “not discounting anything in implementation” and the disciplinary standard of “orders obeyed and prohibitions observed,” some localities and departments still have shortcomings and bottlenecks that cannot be ignored. In breaking down tasks for implementation, faced with cross-departmental, comprehensive deployments, some localities and departments have task divisions that are not sufficiently specific and clear, leaving too much room for discretionary interpretation. This causes actual implementation to drift from the original intent of the Central Committee and directly affects the depth and effectiveness of policy implementation. In terms of coordination, the cross-departmental coordination mechanisms at the central level operate fairly mature, but in some localities the corresponding coordination mechanisms remain weak, and the problem of departments passing the buck and obstructing one another has not been eliminated, creating real bottlenecks for work. In supervision and inspection, the work of central and provincial-level inspection bodies is generally standardized, but supervision work at the municipal and county levels still has weak links. Some inspection work relies too heavily on ledgers and written submissions, with insufficient on-site verification and front-line guidance. Among Party comprehensive departments, functional departments, and specialized supervisory agencies, mechanisms for linked inspections and sharing of findings have not been fully established. In reporting major matters to superiors for instructions, some reports are not timely or precise. Reporting good news while withholding bad, acting first and reporting later, and evading key issues persist. Some focus on reporting results while neglecting the process, some submit requests to multiple bodies, some repeat reports on a single matter, and some substitute reports for requests for instructions. In accountability work, some accountability is generalized and simplistic. Some cases lean toward “holding those below responsible and not those above,” shifting blame onto grassroots Party members and cadres. Others apply disciplinary sanctions simply, without carefully analyzing the nature of the problem or the actual harm it caused. This dampens cadres’ enthusiasm, initiative, and creativity, and it encourages the passive mindset of “the more you do, the more mistakes you make; the less you do, the fewer mistakes; if you do nothing, you make no mistakes.” These are constraints that affect whether the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans take root and produce results.
The system for requesting instructions and reporting is an important political, organizational, and work discipline of our Party. Since the 18th National Congress, the Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has attached great importance to this work. It has formulated and issued a series of Party regulations requiring all regions and departments to promptly report major decisions, major matters, and important situations to the Party Central Committee, moving this work fully onto institutional, standardized, and scientific tracks. Caption: The Regulations of the Communist Party of China on Reporting Major Matters for Instructions, which came into effect on January 31, 2019. Photo: Sun Tong, graphic design.
During the 15th Five-Year Plan period, China faces a more complex internal and external environment, and the tasks of reform, development, and stability are extremely demanding. Whether it is achieving breakthroughs in technological innovation to overcome “chokepoint” problems, advancing coordinated regional development, pursuing green and low-carbon transformation, or ensuring and improving people’s livelihoods and preventing and defusing major risks, none of these will be easy. We must run the entire development process under the Party’s comprehensive leadership and the Central Committee’s centralized, unified leadership, and use a sound institutional system to turn the strategic blueprint into real results. The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee emphasized that we must improve the mechanisms for implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee to ensure they flow smoothly from top to bottom and are carried out forcefully. The major decisions and plans of the Central Committee are anchored in the development goals of Chinese-style modernization and concern the overall development picture and the fundamental interests of the people. Making each task take root and produce results depends on regions and departments implementing them fully and coordinating precisely and efficiently. Party organizations at all levels and the broad ranks of Party members and cadres must constantly examine whether their thinking and actions have strayed from the Party’s line, principles, and policies, or from the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans. They must break down departmentalism, prevent deviations in implementation, and pursue implementation with the determination of “leaving marks on iron and footprints on stone.” They must strengthen closed-loop supervision, hold each level accountable, and ensure there is no deviation in political direction, no gap between words and actions, and no shortfall in results.
Improving the mechanism for fully, accurately, and comprehensively understanding the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee
Thoroughly studying and understanding the strategic intent behind the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans is a prerequisite for implementing them well. If one has only a partial understanding of these decisions, or understands them incorrectly, it is easy to stray in practice, proceed superficially, or distort them. We must uphold and improve the “first item on the agenda” system, optimize mechanisms for transmitting and studying Central Committee documents, insist on linking theory with practice, and deeply understand the essential spirit and practical requirements of the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans. We must know both what is to be done and why, and truly absorb and internalize the spirit of the Central Committee. We must improve the mechanisms for turning study outcomes into action, so that after collective study, Party committees (Party groups) at all levels form clear work approaches and concrete measures, preventing the problem of “study and work being two separate layers,” where learning is one thing and doing is another. We must improve training and seminar mechanisms to help leading cadres at all levels deeply understand the strategic considerations, goals, tasks, and implementation paths of the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans. We must do the work of “decoding” policies and strategies, so that grassroots cadres understand both the task of “crossing the river” and the methods of “building bridges” and “building boats.” We must strengthen mechanisms for policy interpretation and dissemination. Relevant departments must promptly and accurately interpret the Central Committee’s spirit and the original intent of policies, serve as “spokespersons,” turn “document language” into “plain language,” and turn “grand principles” into “concrete matters,” so that the thinking and actions of Party members and cadres are truly unified with the Central Committee’s spirit.
Coordinated regional development is an inherent requirement of Chinese-style modernization. Since the 18th National Congress, the Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has planned and promoted major regional strategies, including the coordinated development of Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei; the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt; the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area; the integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta; and the ecological protection and high-quality development of the Yellow River Basin. These strategies have led to major achievements in coordinated regional development. Relevant provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities have conscientiously implemented the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, advancing regional coordinated development in greater depth and detail.
Captions for the four photographs in the original:
Upper left: Night view of the Xiong’an New Area, taken March 27, 2026 (drone photo, Xinhua reporter Xing Guangli).
Upper right: Shenzhen-Hong Kong Science and Technology Innovation Cooperation Zone at Hetao, taken April 24, 2025 (drone photo, Xinhua reporter Liang Xu).
Lower left: The Wangyu River cable-stayed bridge in Changshu, Jiangsu, after its closure, taken October 11, 2026 (drone photo, China News Service reporter Yang Bo).
Lower right: The Yellow River scenery in Lingwu, Ningxia, taken June 5, 2026 (drone photo, Xinhua reporter Yang Zhisen).
Improving the mechanism for organizing and implementing the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee
Whether the Central Committee’s decisions and plans can be translated into local practice, and whether a strategic blueprint can become a battle map for overcoming difficulties, is the touchstone for testing whether Party members and cadres are loyal to the Party and willing to take responsibility and act. Regions and departments must, on the premise of thoroughly understanding the Central Committee’s spirit and grasping the original intent of policies, promptly study and formulate specific implementation plans or measures suited to their actual conditions, and carry out detailed breakdowns and conversions. We must strengthen organizational implementation by establishing a management mechanism of “task list + responsibility list + deadline list,” clarifying key elements such as the implementing entities, goals, tasks, divisions of labor, deadlines, responsibilities, and supervision and support. This ensures that every stage has someone watching it, every task has someone managing it, and every milestone has a reckoning. We must establish a full-cycle management mechanism, covering everything from launch and advancement to acceptance and evaluation, with a closed loop across the entire chain and control over every process. We resolutely prevent efforts that start with great fanfare, drag on in the middle, and end without result. Competent departments must strengthen classified guidance and targeted policy measures. They should encourage regions and departments, on the basis of thoroughly understanding the essential spirit, to explore innovation according to local conditions and find effective methods and approaches for solving problems. We must improve the tracking and feedback mechanism for the implementation of the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, regularly collect and summarize the implementation situation across regions and departments, and for the prominent difficulties and problems reported by grassroots units, higher authorities must promptly study and issue supporting policies and implementation rules that can be executed in practice. We must improve channels such as grassroots联系点 (liaison points) and direct information reporting points, and establish a closed-loop workflow of “discover problems, compile and report, distribute for handling, track implementation, and feed back results.”
Strictly implementing the system for requesting instructions and reporting to the Party Central Committee
The system for requesting instructions and reporting is an important institution of the Party and an effective working mechanism for implementing democratic centralism. The purpose of strictly implementing this system to the Central Committee is to enable the Central Committee to understand the situation in each region and department promptly, comprehensively, and accurately, so that it can analyze the situation realistically, make decisions, and solve problems. Regions and departments must conscientiously implement the Regulations of the Communist Party of China on Reporting Major Matters for Instructions, truly shoulder their primary responsibility for requesting instructions and reporting, and strictly follow the subjects, scope, procedures, and methods stipulated in the Party Constitution and Party regulations. Major decisions, major matters, and important situations that concern the overall picture or involve important decisions must be promptly reported to the Central Committee for instructions. We must improve the system of special reports on implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans. With a highly responsible attitude toward the cause of the Party and the people, we must report both good news and bad, both achievements and mistakes, and both results and processes. We must not exaggerate or fabricate, must not conceal problems or whitewash the situation, and must not be empty and superficial or deceive superiors and mislead subordinates. We must establish and improve a mechanism for correcting errors. For problems in requesting instructions and reporting on major matters, such as inappropriate subjects, inaccurate content, irregular procedures, or unreasonable methods, superior Party organizations must promptly remind and correct them, and reflect these situations in evaluations and circulated notices, so that responsibility for requesting instructions and reporting is effectively transmitted and enforced.
Improving the mechanism for supervising and inspecting the implementation of the major decisions and plans of the Party Central Committee
To test the real effectiveness of implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans, a scientific system of supervision, evaluation, and assessment is essential. We must further clarify divisions of responsibility, make Party committees (Party groups) at all levels bear primary responsibility, have discipline inspection and supervision agencies strengthen political supervision, and give full play to the roles of Party and government inspection bodies and relevant functional departments. Under the unified leadership of the Party committee, we must establish joint conference systems between Party and government inspection bodies and discipline inspection and supervision agencies, regularly agree on priorities for supervision and inspection, strengthen work coordination, information sharing, and resource sharing, and form a combined force of supervision. We should understand the implementation situation through various methods, including open inspections, undercover visits, and follow-up visits, go deep into the grassroots to identify deep-seated contradictions and problems, and both identify problems and help solve them. We must do the “second half” of supervision and inspection well. Through regular joint conferences, we should hold “joint consultations,” jointly “prescribe remedies” for prominent problems identified, carry out centralized rectification for widespread problems, and push for their resolution. We must strengthen the circulation of information, both amplifying typical examples and promoting good experiences and practices, and drawing negative examples as warnings and incentives. We must strengthen the development of laws and regulations and pay attention to elevating good experiences and practices formed in implementing the Central Committee’s major decisions and plans into institutional norms. We must improve evaluation work, establish scientific and objective standards, and focus on whether implementation is faithful to the original intent of the Central Committee’s policies, whether policy goals have been achieved, and whether the expected results have been obtained. This will free grassroots units from “filling in forms and preparing for inspections,” so they can truly focus their energy on implementation. We must establish a long-term mechanism for correcting formalism and bureaucratism, and seriously investigate and punish misplaced performance views, “image projects” and “vanity projects,” data fabrication, and blind decision-making.
Author: Researcher, China Academy of Discipline Inspection and Supervision