This week on Sinica, our friends at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs invited us for a live show taping before a small group. Kaiser is joined by Lizzi Lee, MIT-trained economist-turned-reporter who hosts the Chinese-language show "Wall Street Today" as well as The China Project's "Live with Lizzi Lee," both on Youtube; and by Damien Ma, who heads the Paulson Institute's in-house think tank MacroPolo. These two top-shelf analysts of Chinese politics break down what was important — and what was just a sideshow — at the 20th Party Congress, and offer their knowledgeable perspectives on the individuals named to key posts and what this likely means for China's direction. Don't miss this one!

2:40 – Findings from MacroPolo’s “fantasy PBSC” experiment   

8:18 – Did China watchers overemphasize Xí Jìnpíng’s 习近平 political constraints?  

12:31 – Support for Lǐ Qiáng 李强 across different political factions

17:23 – Changing factional composition of Chinese elite politics

20:20 – Return of the technocrats

23:27 – “Generation skipping” in China’s recent political promotions

28:26 – The selection of Cài Qí 蔡奇

32:46 – Lǐ Shūlěi 李书磊 as a successor to Wáng Hùníng 王沪宁

37:07 – The future of China’s economic leadership

39:52 – Selection of the vice premiers 

41:18 – The future of China’s diplomatic core

45:28 – The Hú Jǐntāo 胡锦涛 episode

49:22 – Revising the zero-COVID policy

51:17 – Reassessing China’s intentions vis-à-vis Taiwan 

A transcript of this interview is available at TheChinaProject.com.

Lizzi: Prestige, Manipulation, and Coercion: Elite Power Struggles in the Soviet Union and China after Stalin and Mao by Joseph Torigian

Damien: Slouching Towards Utopia by Brad DeLong

Kaiser: "Taiwan, the World-Class Puzzle," a Radio Open Source podcast hosted by Christopher Lydon