while adhering to an extreme interpretation of Chinese nationalism. A beneficiary of the massive modernization campaign launched by Deng and stewarded by Jiang and Hu, Xi has spoken most forcefully and openly about the union of communism and Chinese nationalism in service to the CCP’s ambitions for global preeminence.
At the 19th Party Congress in October 2017, the CCP amended its Party Constitution to enshrine Xi’s concept of “the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation.”157 Xi emphasized the fidelity of his synthesis of Chinese communism and Chinese nationalism to the party’s fundamental teachings: “At its founding,” he said, “the Communist Party of China made realizing communism its highest ideal and its ultimate goal, and shouldered the historic mission of national rejuvenation.”158
The flourishing of the individual, according to the party, flows from the flourishing of the nation. “History shows that the future and destiny of each and every one of us are closely linked to those of our country and nation,” Xi said in a 2012 speech. “One can do well only when one’s country and nation do well. Achieving the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is both a glorious and an arduous mission that requires the dedicated efforts of the Chinese people one generation after another. Empty talk harms the country, while hard work makes it flourish.”159
Individual and national flourishing, Xi emphasized in a 2019 speech, are indissolubly bound up with the triumph of communism and socialism: “In today’s China, the essence of patriotism is the complete combination of our devotion to the country, to the Chinese Communist Party and to socialism.”160 The patriotic work of national rejuvenation, as Xi explains it, culminates with China’s dominance of a globe-spanning socialist order.161
