Li Qiang (; born July 1959) is a Chinese politician who is the premier of China and the second-ranking member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Li joined the CCP in 1983, and first worked in the Communist Youth League in Rui'an. Later serving in provincial department of civil affairs, he became the party secretary of Yongkang in 1996, the party secretary of Wenzhou in 2002, the Political Legal Affairs Secretary of Zhejiang in 2011 and later the deputy party secretary of the province. He served as the governor of Zhejiang from 2012 to 2016, later serving as the party secretary of Jiangsu from 2016 to 2017. In 2017, he was elevated to become a member of the CCP Politburo. He subsequently served as the party secretary of Shanghai from 2017 to 2022. During his tenure in Shanghai, he pursued pro-business policies and handled the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2022, he was promoted to the Politburo Standing Committee. In 2023, he became premier, succeeding Li Keqiang. During his tenure, Li oversaw a strengthening of the premier's position, and has handled the economy of China. Having served together with current CCP general secretary Xi Jinping in Zhejiang, Li is considered part of the New Zhijiang Army, the party faction of Xi Jinping, the CCP general secretary and top leader since 2012. The close relationship started in the mid-2000s when both held party positions in Zhejiang Province. Li is generally regarded by observers as pro-business and has voiced support for economic reforms.
Early life and education Li was born in the city of Rui'an, Zhejiang, in July 1959 in his maternal grandfather's house. Li's father, Li Xiju (), came from a poor family in Dong'ao Village, Caocun Town and worked as a government clerk and cadre when he grew up. His mother, Ruan Xiulian (), was from the township of Mayu (), Rui'an, and made a living by selling pork when she was young. In his youth, Li was cared for by his maternal grandmother and other elders. He finished primary and secondary school in Mayu. He became a worker in the Irrigation Pump Station of Mayu in July 1976 at the age of 17 after graduating from secondary school, working there until 1977, and worked in the Third Tool Factory of Rui'an from 1977 to 1978.
Li Qiang studied agricultural mechanization at the Ningbo Branch of Zhejiang Agricultural University from 1978 to 1982. He studied sociology by correspondence at the private China Sociology Correspondence University (; defunct in 2021) in Beijing from 1985 to 1987.
Li attended Zhejiang University for on-the-job graduate studies in management engineering from 1995 to 1997 and the Central Party School for on-the-job graduate studies in world economics from 2001 to 2004. He attended Hong Kong Polytechnic University from 2003 to 2005 and received an executive Master of Business Administration (MBA) in 2005.
Early career Li joined the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in April 1983. He worked as a clerk at the Rui'an County Committee of the Communist Youth League of China (CYLC) from 1982 to 1983, and later as the secretary of the committee from 1983 to 1984. He then served in progressively senior roles in the provincial department of civil affairs. He first served as the deputy division head and then division head of the Rural Relief Division of the Zhejiang Provincial Civil Affairs Department from 1984 to 1991. He then served as the director of the Civil Affairs Department's Personnel Division from 1991 to 1992, and finally as the deputy head of the Civil Affairs Department from 1992 to 1996.
In 1996, he became a member of the Party Standing Committee of the prefecture-level city of Jinhua and the Party secretary of the city of county-level city of Yongkang (which is part of Jinhua). In 1998, he was reappointed as the deputy director of the Zhejiang Provincial Government's General Office. In 2000, he became the director and party secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial Government's Bureau of Administration for Industry and Commerce.
In 2002, he was appointed as the party secretary of the prefecture-level city of Wenzhou. By then he was only 43, and was the youngest party secretary of Wenzhou in history. During his tenure in Wenzhou, he supported the development of private businesses in the city. He also gave support to light industry, aiming to create an "international light industry city".
In 2004, Li became the secretary-general of Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee and earned a seat on its Standing Committee in the next year, serving under then Zhejiang's party secretary, Xi Jinping, in charge of administration and coordination. During this time, he became close to Xi, eventually being regarded as a close ally of him. During this time, Li accompanied Xi in numerous work trips, helped edit his speeches and helped draft Xi's policies. Li was credited with helping draft and clarify Xi's Double Eight Strategy, which listed eight comparative advantages of Zhejiang and eight corresponding actions to improve the province. Due to his association with Xi, Li is considered to be part of the New Zhijiang Army, a group of officials who worked with Xi in Zhejiang.
Guangming Daily in 2015 noted that, during his tenure in Zhejiang, Li told a professor at Zhejiang University that the province's local government needed an "independent think-tank like the RAND Corporation" to evaluate its performance, saying that it was "very difficult" for official organizations and officials to give objective analysis and criticize their superiors. This led the professor to establish a non-governmental group of experts in 2009, with Li as its honorary director. In February 2011, he became the Political and Legal Affairs Secretary of Zhejiang province, and several months later was made deputy party secretary.
Local tenures
Zhejiang (2012–2016) After the 18th CCP National Congress, he became an alternate of the CCP Central Committee. On 21 December 2012, he became the acting governor of Zhejiang, succeeding Xia Baolong who was promoted to the provincial party secretary, and was officially elected as governor by the Zhejiang Provincial People's Congress on January 30, 2013. During his tenure in Zhejiang, he asked the non-governmental group of experts to write reports on his performance that "tell the truth", and later paid them a visit for a face-to-face feedback after feeling their first reports weren't critical enough. Li also pursued reforms to the administrative review and approval system in Zhejiang.
In 2014, when Zhejiang was preparing to hold an international internet conference, Li proposed that the host city turn into a pilot zone for unblocking China's strict internet controls for Western firms, an idea that was ultimately not approved by the central leadership. He also started a project to create "characteristic towns", small towns focused on one type of business that have a pro-business climate and good physical environments. These included "Dream Town" for tech entrepreneurs and "Chocolate Town" for chocolate producers, both located in Zhejiang. This project was endorsed and spread to rest of China by Xi. The Economist reported in 2023 that "many such towns became speculative hotspots for housing developers, and the kinds of businesses they were supposed to cultivate sometimes failed to take off".
Jiangsu (2016–2017) On 30 June 2016, Li was named party secretary of Jiangsu. He was removed as Zhejiang governor on 4 July 2016, when he was succeeded by Che Jun. He served for 15 months, becoming the shortest serving Jiangsu party secretary in the history of the People's Republic. In his first month, Li conducted 12 field surveys, covering northern, central, and southern Jiangsu. During his tenure, he arranged meetings with business officials such as Jack Ma of Alibaba Group to encourage investments.
Shanghai (2017–2022) Following the first plenary session of the 19th CCP Central Committee, held after the closing day of the 19th Party Congress in October 2017, Li was elected to the Politburo. On 29 October 2017, Li was appointed as the party secretary of Shanghai, becoming the first official to govern Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Shanghai. He is considered to be "business-friendly", having implemented pro-business policies while in Shanghai such as the opening of the Shanghai Stock Exchange STAR Market. He oversaw increasing foreign investment in the city, including the gigafactory of Tesla, Inc. He has also implemented policies like lowering the threshold for internal migrants to obtain residency permits and creating five new towns to lessen the land supply shortage. In August 2018, he oversaw the inauguration of the Shanghai Financial Court.
In early 2022, Shanghai implemented a two-month COVID-19 lockdown in Shanghai, which significantly impacted the economy, leading Li to be blamed for the handling. Nevertheless, reportedly he was more open to the idea with living with COVID. There were also views that Li was pressured from the Central leadership to implement a lockdown, and that initially, Li had adhered strictly to the guidelines of leading epidemiologists in China, including Zhang Wenhong, who maintained a 'flexible strategy' on anti-Covid measures. It is also said that Li and Zhang had a good personal relationship, as the two were both from Rui'an, a city under the Wenzhou prefecture. According to The Wall Street Journal, Li is one of the few people in the top leadership that wants China to introduce Western mRNA vaccines against COVID-19. Reportedly, he tried to arrange for BioNTech to provide its vaccines in China.
Premiership (2023–)
Following the first plenary session of the 20th CCP Central Committee, held after the closing day of the 20th Party Congress in October 2022, Li was elected to the CCP Politburo Standing Committee as its second-ranking member. Effectively putting him on track to become the premier, observers speculated that the lack of Central Government experience would make him heavily dependent on support from Xi to run the State Council. On 28 October, he was succeeded by Chen Jining as the party secretary of Shanghai. Reuters reported on 3 March 2023, citing sources, that Li pushed for the quick relaxation of zero-COVID rules in late 2022, resisting pressure from Xi, who wanted to slow the pace of the reopening. It also reported that Li had become the head of the CCP's COVID taskforce, and had also encouraged local governments to continue loosening COVID restrictions.
In December 2022, Li attended the opening ceremony of the 13th National Congress of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce and gave a speech "on behalf of the Communist Party's Central Committee and the State Council", hinting at his role in the State Council. Li was appointed as premier by the National People's Congress on 11 March after being nominated by President Xi Jinping during the first session of the 14th National People's Congress, taking over from Li Keqiang. He is the first person since Zhou Enlai to rise directly to premiership from local government without any prior working experience in the central government, especially as a vice premier.
Domestic policy