The gifted man who runs the most important propaganda machine on the earth | EUROtoday

At the age of 14 he entered Peking University. At 20, he already had a doctorate in Chinese Literature. In the tutorial world, Li Shuleia plump, small boy who had come from a poor county within the central province of Henan, was often known as the kid prodigy. In addition to intellectually giftedHe had a great way with phrases, had individuals expertise and was very patriotic. His potential was immense in a China which, on the finish of the 80s, was advancing in its financial explosion beneath the insurance policies of reform and opening. Li's expertise didn’t go unnoticed throughout the ruling Communist Party (CCP). He was recruited into the Central Party School, the academy the place the nation's nice leaders have been educated.

At that point, Beijing despatched its most promising younger officers to review within the United States, at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Politics, additionally centered on coaching future public leaders. Li was a kind of chosen. Returning to the CCP academy, he spent just a few years as a literature instructor till, in 2008, he was appointed vice director of the get together college, then run by present President Xi Jinping.

Li would forge an in depth bond with Xi, who, in 2014, a 12 months after taking the reins of the nation, would push his good friend into politics. He began within the management of the CCP within the southern province of Fujian, an ideal place to get an inside take a look at the functioning of a neighborhood administration. Then he was appointed head of the Beijing anti-corruption physique and, in 2017, as undersecretary of the identical establishment however on the nationwide degree, he directed, along with Xi himself, the campaign towards corruption that took out lots of of hundreds of officers in any respect ranges, together with political rivals of the president.

It's Li's flip jackpot in 2022, after the get together congress during which Xi revalidated a brand new mandate, additional elevating his place as supreme chief. Li was promoted to highly effective Politbur, the best decision-making physique of the CCP. He was additionally named head of the Publicity Department of the Central Committee, Beijing's propaganda arm.

Li, at 60 years outdated, leads the important thing device within the message that the Xi Government sells to the world at a time when it intends to problem the US for hegemony in a extra multipolar world playground. The job of the person thought-about by many to be considered one of Beijing's brightest minds is to manufacture the official narrative that spreads all through China. In addition, he controls the media and is the final word supervisor of all publications and movies that seem on Chinese screens.

“China has strengthened control over all forms of public expression, expanding its powerful department of propaganda to absorb the agencies responsible for regulating the media and monitoring the production, distribution and screening of domestic films,” explains Li Datong, former editor of the China Youth Daily, the official youth newspaper of the CCP. In some political circles in Beijing it’s mentioned that Li, who can also be considered one of Xi Jinping's major advisors, is within the swimming pools as a future successor of the omnipresent chief from China. But for now, his occupation is concentrated on working the world's largest propaganda machine.