In 2020, after I criticized Xi, I was expelled from the party, stripped of my retirement benefits, and warned that my safety was in danger. I now live in exile in the United States, but I stay in touch with many of my contacts in China.

Contrary to Chinese propaganda and the assessment of many Western analysts that [Xi] rose through his talent, the opposite is true. Xi benefited immensely from the connections of his father, Xi Zhongxun, a CCP leader with impeccable revolutionary credentials who served briefly as propaganda minister under Mao.

In the CCP, moving from the district level to the provincial level is a major hurdle, and for years, he could not overcome it. But once again, family connections intervened. In 1992, after Xi’s mother wrote a plea to the new party leader in Fujian, Jia Qinglin, Xi was transferred to the provincial capital. At that point, his career took off.

Outsiders may find it helpful to think of the CCP as more of a mafia organization than a political party. The head of the party is the don, and below him sit the underbosses, or the Standing Committee.

Like the mafia, the party uses blunt tools to get what it wants: bribery, extortion, even violence.

One part of Xi’s plot to consolidate power was to solve what he characterized as an ideological crisis. The Internet, he said, was an existential threat to the CCP, having caused the party to lose control of people’s minds. So Xi cracked down on bloggers and online activists, censored dissent, and strengthened China’s “great firewall” to restrict access to foreign websites. The effect was to strangle a nascent civil society and eliminate public opinion as a check on Xi.

Since assuming power, Xi has quickly promoted his acolytes, often beyond their level of competence. His roommate from his days at Tsinghua University, Chen Xi, was named head of the CCP’s Organization Department, a position that comes with a seat on the Politburo and the power to decide who can move up the hierarchy. Yet Chen has no relevant qualifications.

The most brazen change Xi has ushered in is to remove China’s presidential term limit. Like every paramount leader from Jiang onward, Xi holds three positions concurrently: president of China, leader of the party, and head of the military.

Why, unlike his predecessors, is Xi so resistant to others’ advice? Part of the reason, I suspect, is that he suffers from an inferiority complex, knowing that he is poorly educated in comparison with other top CCP leaders. Even though he studied chemical engineering at Tsinghua University, Xi attended as a “worker-peasant-soldier,” a category of students admitted in the 1970s on the basis of political reliability and class background, not their academic merits.

Breaking with Deng’s dictum that China “hide its strength and bide its time,” Xi has decided to directly challenge the United States and pursue a China-centric world order. That is why he has engaged in risky and aggressive behavior abroad, militarizing the South China Sea, threatening Taiwan, and encouraging his diplomats to engage in an abrasive style of foreign policy known as “Wolf Warrior” diplomacy. Xi has formed a de facto alliance with Russian President Vladimir Putin, further alienating China from the international community. His Belt and Road Initiative has generated growing resistance as countries tire of the associated debt and corruption.

When Xi came to power, he came to see the private sector as a threat to his rule and revived the planned economy of the Maoist era. He strengthened state-owned enterprises and established party organizations in the private sector that direct the way businesses are run.

Predictably, China has seen its economic growth slow, and most analysts believe it will slow even more in the coming years. Although several factors are at play—including U.S. sanctions against Chinese tech companies, the war in Ukraine, and the COVID-19 pandemic—the fundamental problem is the CCP’s interference in the economy.

In an authoritarian state, it is impossible to accurately measure public opinion, but Xi’s harsh COVID measures may well have lost him the affection of most Chinese.

For the first time since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, China’s leader is facing not only internal dissent but also an intense popular backlash and a real risk of social unrest.

High-tech surveillance is presumed to be so pervasive that party elites, including retired national leaders, do not dare communicate with one another outside official events, even about mundane matters.

The most likely outcome this fall is that Xi, having so rigged the process and intimidated his rivals, will get his third presidential term.

In a futile attempt to invigorate the economy without empowering the private sector, Xi will double down on his statist economic policies. To maintain his grip on power, he will continue to preemptively eliminate any potential rivals and tighten social control, making China look increasingly like North Korea.

The moves he would likely make in a third term would raise the odds of war, social unrest, and economic crisis.

If Xi were to attack Taiwan, his likeliest target, there is a good chance that the war would not go as planned, and Taiwan, with American help, would be able to resist invasion and inflict grave damage on mainland China.