Changes and Continuities in Tibet Autonomous Region Leadership since 2012: Ethnic Composition, the Tibet Aid Program and Professional Backgrounds

Abstract

This paper maps the changes and continuities in leadership in Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) since 2012, when Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Based on an analysis of career trajectories of officials, their biographical data, and other sources, the paper examines cadre management and appointments as a component of China’s Tibet policy. It looks at leadership at prefecture, provincial, and national levels and seeks to answer the following questions – what are the general profiles of cadres in TAR? What are the patterns of change in ethnic composition of cadres and what role does the Tibet Aid Program play in this respect? What do cadre management and the patterns of appointments reveal about China’s Tibet Policy? 

Keywords: Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), ethnic representation, cadre management, leadership, Tibet policy, change.

List of Tables

Table 1: Administrative-Political Hierarchy in China and Number of Administrative Divisions in TAR

Table 2: Ethnic Composition of TAR’s Population (As per Census of 2021) 

Table 3: Top Leadership of TAR

Table 4: Key Officials and Statistics of Top Leadership at Prefecture Level 

Table 5: Tibetan Cadres in the Central Committee

Table 6:Tibet Aid Cadres in Key Positions in TAR (as of June 2023)

Table 7: Leaders at Provincial Level with Economics and Science & Engineering Background Transferred from Elsewhere in TAR (as of June  2023)

List of Figures

Figure 1: Ethnic Composition of the Standing Committee of the People’s Congress of TAR

Figure 2: Ethnic Composition of the People’s Congress of TAR

Figure 3: Ethnic Composition of the Standing Committee of Party Committee of TAR

Figure 4: Ethnic Composition of Party Committee of TAR

Introduction

This paper maps out the leadership in Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) in the post-20^th Party Congress period, its composition, and policy implications during the third term of Xi Jinping as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC). It also examines the changes and continuities since 2012 by focusing on whether and how ethnic composition of leadership at prefecture and provincial level has changed and the significance of these changes for understanding China’s Tibet policy. Understanding leadership reshuffles is a key component of understanding CPC policies in TAR as they provide a reflection of existing policies in the region, tell us about who the new leaders are, and also reveal possible policy directions based on their ideological and policy orientations and career trajectories.

Although the reshuffle of individual officials at various levels is an ongoing process with frequent transfers, promotions and demotions, large-scale changes take place every five years at county, prefecture, provincial and national levels, each level preceding the next higher level in the Party-state hierarchy. The leadership selection for both state and party takes place simultaneously; the CPC Central Committee (CC), National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s legislature, and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) represent three key organs of the Party-state and this national level institutional structure is replicated down to the county level (Donaldson 2017: 110).

Each level has a Communist Party Committee, a Standing Committee of the concerned Party Committee, People’s Congress, CPPCC, and government/bureaucracy (see Table 1). All other institutions, such as the courts, for example, are similarly replicated at each level. The latest cycle of five-yearly leadership transition started with selection committees of Party, CPPCC, and People's Congress at county and prefecture levels in 2021 and ended with the 20th National Party Congress of October 2022 and the sessions of CPPCC and NPC in March 2023, which formalized the leadership changes in both Party and state at the national level (Xinhua 2022). 

Local and provincial leadership in TAR feed policy inputs to the higher levels and implements policies on the ground, and hence, understanding the leadership is an important aspect of understanding policies in general. Moreover, given questions over the legitimacy of the Chinese state in TAR, leadership is a key component of understanding the policy focus and planned trajectories of the central leadership. 

Table 1

Administrative-Political Hierarchy in China and Number of Administrative Divisions in TAR

Administrative Level in China	Total No. in TAR	Mode of Election/Selection	Legislative Power	Party/People’s Congress Standing Committee
Province/Autonomous Regions/Special Regions	1	Indirectly by immediate lower level	Yes	Yes
Prefecture-level: Prefecture/Prefecture-level cities/Autonomous Prefectures	7	Indirectly by immediate lower level	Yes	Yes
County-level: counties/county-level cities/urban districts/Autonomous counties	74	Indirectly by immediate lower level	Yes	Yes
Township-level: Towns/Townships/Minority Townships/Urban Subdistricts	685	Direct Election	No	No
Village level: street, neighbourhood and villages committees	5,579	Direct Election	No	No

Sources: The National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China 2018; China Statistics Press Co. Ltd. 3-5.

There are very few studies on leadership in TAR (Connor and Barnett 1997; Barnett 1999; Yasheng 1995; Arpi 2013; Ranade 2017). In addition, these studies do not examine cadre management and leadership during Xi Jinping’s tenure since 2012 except those by Claude Arpi and Jayadeva Ranade analysing leadership changes just after the 18th Party Congress in 2012. This study fills a gap by examining the issue of representation of ethnic Tibetan leaders from prefecture levels up to the central level, Han leadership in TAR, and the Tibet Aid Program (援藏计划 yuan Zang jihua), which includes transfer of cadres from elsewhere in China as a key component of the policy, alongside the transfer of capital and enterprises. It also examines the Tibetan members of national bodies namely, CC, NPC and CPPCC. By so doing, it provides an analysis of the significance of how the Chinese state manages ethnic Tibetan cadres at various levels.

The analysis is focused on the following questions:

1. What is the general profile of leadership in TAR?
2. What explains the low representation of Tibetans at national, provincial and prefecture levels?
3. Who are the emerging next generation leaders among Tibetans?
4. What role does Tibet Aid Program play in Han leadership representation in TAR?
5. What does the nature of leadership in TAR tell us about China's Tibet policy?

Methodology

The analysis is based on biographical data and career trajectories of leadership at prefecture, province, and national levels in TAR during Xi Jinping’s tenures as General Secretary since 2012, as well as of ethnic Tibetan cadres at prefecture and provincial levels from other Tibetan areas in Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan, and Yunnan provinces. It has looked at cadres in People’s Congresses, CPPCCs, Party Committees and Standing Committees at these levels. In addition, the paper has consulted primary and secondary sources to contextualize why leadership changes and ethnic composition matter in understanding China’s policies in TAR.

In China’s administrative hierarchy, the county is the lowest level of administrative unit with legislative powers and standing committees of the CPC and People’s Congress. Prefecture-level administrative units function as political and administrative conduits between lower-level bureaucracies that deal with the people on everyday basis and higher-level leadership and bureaucracies (Tsai and Tian 2023).

Prefectural-level leadership level plays a very important role in China; it becomes more significant in ethnic minority regions in terms of whether they have ethnic minorities in the ranks and whether they follow the Party or collude with dissenters. In TAR, cadres at provincial and prefecture level are crucial to implementing the Party-state’s policies and getting feedback from the ground level; this level is also where future leaders from outside TAR usually start their career.

The remainder of the paper is divided into four sections. The first section analyses overall trends in ethnic composition of party and government institutions from prefecture level upwards. The second section then discusses whether and to what extent the cadre transfer policy under the Tibet Aid Program shapes the ethnic composition of leadership in TAR. The third section highlights the major factors which favours promotion to higher levels as well as profiles such key leaders, who have been promoted in recent times. The final section summarises key findings of the paper.

Leadership in TAR since 2012: Changes and Continuities

This section provides an in-depth analysis of provincial and prefecture level leadership in TAR. It focuses on the leadership composition and changes in the Standing Committees of the Communist Party, Standing Committees of People’s Congress, and governments. The key anchor of the analysis is whether and how much the ethnic composition of leadership has changed since Xi became the General Secretary in 2012. Analysts of the Chinese state have highlighted that ethnic Tibetan cadres are getting less importance during Xi’s tenure with increasing domination of Han ethnic leadership (Arpi 2013). This arguably signifies the Chinese state’s deliberate promotion of Han ethnic leadership in an effort to deal with perceived security and stability threats.

An ideal situation is when the composition of leadership reflects the ethnic composition of TAR population as well as follows the laws and rules of China’s political system. Table 2 provides a snapshot of the ethnic composition of the population of TAR. Here, the Han population only includes their population according to the census, which counts only those Han with hukou (household) registration in TAR. In addition, based on the 6^th Census of China data from 2000, Chinese sources estimate that there is a “floating and temporary population” ranging from 5% to 6% of TAR population, the majority of whom are Han who have migrated to TAR (Ma and Lhundup 2008; Ma 2011; Ma 2018). This proportion has certainly gone up as the Chinese state has promoted Han migration and increased investments in socio-economic policies in the region over the years (Zangmo 2019).

Table 2

Ethnic Composition of TAR’s Population (as per Census of 2021)

Ethnicity	Total	Share of Total (in %)
Tibetan	3,137,901	≈86.01
Han	443,370	≈12.1
Mongol Hui Monpa Salar Lhoba Dengba Naxi/Nakhi Sherpa Bai and others	66,829	≈1.85

Source: Xizang Zizhiqu Tongjiju 2021. 

The Standing Committee of the Communist Party in TAR is the main party organization at the provincial level. In this institution, the changing dynamics of ethnic representation have started to reflect in its composition (see Figure 1). Up to the 8^th TAR Party Committee (2006-2011) there was almost equal representation of Han (six) and Tibetan officials (seven). This has changed in subsequent Party Committees with Han officials (at 60% of total) having majority. Thus, in this crucial party institution, the representation of Tibetans has gradually declined. If this trend continues, the Party Committee at provincial level will reflect the ethnic composition of current prefecture party committees, discussed below, with Han being an overwhelming majority in next five to 10 years. 

Meanwhile, the Party Secretary of TAR provincial Party Committee has always been a Han. People’s Liberation Army (PLA) officers served as Party Secretaries until December 1988, when a civilian cadre, Hu Jintao, was sent to the region for the first time. Since then, the profiles and backgrounds of cadres at this position have shifted from military to other domains, namely, experiences in internal security and social management, economic affairs, ideology, among others. The current Party Secretary, Wang Junzheng, was appointed in 2021. He was previously Party Secretary of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, a quasi-military organization, and head of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee of Xinjiang. Since 2012, while two Tibetan ethnic Deputy Secretaries have been appointed along with two Han deputy secretaries, overall, the balance has remained in favour of Han, in comparison with previous period.

Figure 1

Ethnic Composition of the Standing Committee of Party Committee of TAR