Much ink is spilled on China’s leader Xi Jinping, one of the most powerful rulers in the world. Yet the legacy of his father, the revolutionary Xi Zhongxun (1913–2002), is often overlooked. Xi’s father was one of the “Eight Elders” of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), working at the right hand of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai. He helped build the Communist base in Yan’an in the 1930s; initiated the Special Economic Zone reforms after Mao’s death; led the United Front’s efforts in Tibet, Xinjiang and Taiwan; and was purged multiple times — leading to his son Xi Jinping being “sent down” to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution.
Last week, we were delighted to have author and academic Joseph Torigian discuss the life of Xi père, subject of his new biography The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping (Stanford University Press, 2025). A sweeping narrative of the Chinese revolution that draws on previously untapped documents, interviews and diaries, the book shows Xi Zhongxun’s struggle to balance his own feelings with the Party’s demands. Through the story of the father, we learn about the son — and the ideological nature of the Party he leads:
Being the son of Xi Zhongxun didn’t show Xi Jinping that politics is about banquets and flowers. What it really showed him was the fickleness of human nature.
Joseph Torigian
Speakers
Joseph Torigian is Associate Professor at the School of International Service at American University and a Research Fellow at the Hoover History Lab at Stanford University. He is the author of The Party’s Interests Come First (2025), a biography of Xi Zhongxun.
Orville Schell is the Arthur Ross Director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations at Asia Society, and co-publisher of the China Books Review. He is a former Professor and Dean at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of over ten books about China. He is a regular contributor to The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, Foreign Affairs and other publications, and has traveled widely in China since the 1970s.
The video of this talk was also published at Asia Society. ∎