Who Represents? Xi Jinping’s Grand United Front Work, Legitimation, Participation and Consultative Democracy

Abstract

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) ‘with-Chinese-characteristics’ discourse proclaims its superiority in reflecting people’s genuine needs without poisonous partisan politics, as in Western democracies. The Party’s consultative democracy, as represented by its allies in forums including the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, is key to this superiority. Consequently, the organizer of these inputs, the United Front Work Department (UFWD), is a key element of CCP legitimacy as its organizer of representation of the increasing number of non-Party social forces. This ostensible alliance allows the Party to proclaim itself as the representative of the overwhelming majority of the Chinese people. Nevertheless, little recent work has been done on either this consultation or the Department. Through the processes of legitimation and de-legitimation, this article decodes how this consultative process works by examining the UFWD’s methods in relation to religious believers. Under Xi Jinping, united front work is again being prioritized and is closely tied to his reform plans.