The Red Emperor

Xi Jinping rules over 1.4 billion people and the second biggest economy on earth. He commands huge armed forces and runs a technology programme meant to dominate the globe. His ambition is to take the place of the United States and to change the world order. Xi''s life story is full of drama : plots, purges, murders, a power struggle and a pandemic. The book, based on new sources , leads the reader from the poor, isolated China of the 1950s to the modern economic and military juggernaut of today. It reveals how the Chinese elite groomed Xi as a manager only to get a dictator, a man who has made himself into a new version of Mao and who dares not give up power. The fresh material includes open-source Chinese coverage that the experts have missed, access to the papers of a deceased high official, information from personal friends of the Xi family and briefings from intelligence sources.

Préface
A concise, readable and revelatory biography of the most powerful man in the world.

Auteur

Michael Sheridan

Texte du rabat

'Michael Sheridan is one of the best informed and wisest writers on China' - Chris Patten, last governor of Hong Kong

The Red Emperor presents an eye-opening portrait of Xi Jinping, the man who presides over 1.4 billion people and the second largest economy on earth. Born a 'princeling' to one of Communist China's ruling families, the young Xi was exiled to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. He fought his way back to the top by stealth, privilege and guile. In 2012, following the spectacular fall of his rival Bo Xilai, Xi Jinping became the leader of China.

In a compulsively readable narrative, veteran foreign correspondent Michael Sheridan takes the reader from the poor, isolated country of Xi's youth to the military and economic superpower of today. In Xi's new China, family mafias struggle for power amid murder, corruption and sex scandals as ministers and generals vanish in purges. No one is safe in his techno-security state. Xi is an absolute ruler whose word is law on everything from war and peace to the ruthless campaign against Covid-19. He aims to dominate world trade, to defeat Western democracy and to make China the supreme power in the East. A loner and a risk-taker, he is the most consequential leader of our time.

Drawing on intimate stories from the closed world of China's leading families and two decades of first-hand reporting, Michael Sheridan sheds new light on the history and politics of China. The book reveals that behind the façade of the Chinese Communist Party there is a modern dynasty and a new emperor.