Executive Summary
The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, held in October 2025, set the foundation for the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030). The meeting reaffirmed Xi Jinping’s central leadership, emphasised stability and national security, and advanced economic self-reliance through innovation and “New Quality Productive Forces”. It also called for boosting domestic consumption to address structural weaknesses in growth. Alongside continued anti-corruption efforts, the plenum signalled a strategy combining political consolidation, technological modernisation, and internal demand to guide China toward its 2035 modernisation goals.
Introduction
From the 20th to the 23rd of October 2025, the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) held the 4th Plenum in Beijing. A plenum, or a ‘plenary session’, is a meeting of the CPC which happens between party congresses which are held every five years. Normally, around seven plenums are held between party congresses, with each focusing on a different issue. The 4th plenum, this time, however, was important as it came ahead of the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan (FYP) and set the stage for the drafting of the 15th FYP, which will cover the period from 2026-2023. The official communique stated that:
“This period will be critical…..to reinforce the foundations and push ahead on all fronts toward basically achieving socialist modernisation by 2035. It will thus serve as a key link between the past and the future.”
(Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025)
The plenum serves as an important indicator of what direction the Chinese economy will take and the policy priorities of China’s leadership. The Politburo Standing Committee (PSC), China’s top decision-making body, presided over the meeting, and President Xi Jinping delivered important addresses. The recommendations made by the 20th Central Committee for the formulation of the 15th FYP were also adopted. This policy brief examines the decisions taken at the plenum, what they tell us about the potential priorities of the 15th FYP and what the implications may be for Chinese economic and security policy.
Analysis
The opening sections of the communique released after the plenum meeting concluded were heavily focused on issues that the party has long held important, such as ensuring ‘stability’ while pursuing progress, ensuring development and security, and ‘safeguarding national security and stability’ (Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025). The outcomes of the 14th FYP were also assessed positively, and it was noted that the leadership of the Central Committee with Xi Jinping at its ‘core’ has led the Chinese people in responding to a host of challenges, such as the ‘once-in-a-century’ COVID pandemic. The communique assessed the end of the 14th FYP period by stating:
“With China reaching new heights in terms of economic strength, scientific and technological capabilities, and composite national strength, we have made solid new strides in advancing Chinese modernisation and gotten off to a successful start on our new journey toward the Second Centenary Goal.” (Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025)
The emphasis on continued stability and the leadership of Xi Jinping shows two things: that the primacy of the party and the continued rule of the party remain the chief goals of the CPC. A key component of ensuring the CPC’s control over power remains tight is portraying a ‘clean’ image of the party to the Chinese people, and to this effect, a number of key officials have been purged from senior positions since Xi assumed the mantle of leadership in 2013. His focus on ‘self-revolution’ (Jinping, 2022) is meant to turn the party into a clean, disciplined organisation able to rule China indefinitely and escape the cycle of dynastic rise and fall (Thomas et al, 2025). The series of purges continued in the run-up to the plenum as He Weidong, China’s number two general, and navy admiral Miao Hua, the Chinese military’s former top political officer, were both removed (Chen, 2025). Their removal, along with that of others, was confirmed shortly before the plenum as they “seriously violated Party discipline and are suspected of serious duty-related crimes involving an extremely large amount of money,” according to the spokesperson for the Chinese Defence Ministry (Chen, 2025). He Weidong’s removal was of particular note as he was also a member of the Politburo and the powerful Central Military Commission (CMC) and is the first CMC member to be removed since the 1966-67 Cultural Revolution (Reuters, 2025). In their place, General Zhang Shengmin was appointed as a new vice chair of the CMC (Jie, 2025). In addition, the plenum confirmed the expulsion of 11 full Central Committee members and 4 alternate members, highlighting that the ‘anti-corruption’ campaign extends beyond the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). The promotion of Zhang Shegmin was also restricted to the CMC and not the Politburo, as is customary, which, combined with the number of vacancies on the CMC, means that future additions are likely, although these may be deferred till the next party congress, which will likely be held in 2027. There have been speculations about Xi’s hold on power (Zeng, 2025), but a reading of the communique shows that the centrality of Xi’s leadership and Xi Jinping Thought remain steadfast.
On the economic front, there have been calls for the CPC to take measures to boost consumption (Pettis, 2024) as it remains a key issue plaguing the economy since the dual shock of COVID and the collapse of the real estate crisis. On this front, the communique noted that:
“We should build a robust domestic market and work faster to foster a new pattern [of] development. Guided by the strategy of expanding domestic demand, we should work toward improving living standards while increasing consumer spending and coordinate investments in physical assets and human capital” (Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025)
It also called for ‘special initiatives’ to boost consumption, but what exactly these measures will be remains unclear so far. The “Recommendations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China for Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development” which was adopted at the 4th plenum reiterated this focus by stating that achieving a “notable increase in household consumption as a share of GDP” should be a major objective of the 15th FYP and that “Domestic demand should play an increasingly greater role as the principal engine of economic growth, and the potential for growth should be fully unleashed.” (Recommendations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) for Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development, 2025).
Beyond consumption, however, a major focus of the session was on innovation as a key driver of economic security, which shows the importance the party places on ensuring that key dependencies are identified and replaced with domestic alternatives to minimise China’s exposure to foreign supply chokepoints. To this end, ‘New Quality Productive Forces’ (NQPFs) will play a key role in helping China “achieve greater self-reliance and strength in science and technology” and “enhance the overall performance” of China’s innovation system, “raise innovation capacity across the board”, and help it take a “leading position in scientific and technological development” (Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025). ‘New Quality Productive Forces’ refer to “‘advanced productivity that is freed from traditional economic growth mode and productivity development paths’ and are characterised by ‘high-tech, high efficiency and high quality’” (Cambridge Industrial Innovation Policy, 2024). The focus on NQPFs is not entirely new but signals that the 15th FYP is likely to continue China’s efforts to transform itself into an innovation hub and “seize the historic opportunity presented by the new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation” (Communique of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2025). However, despite an ever-growing focus on making China the global hub of innovation and technological development, the party is unlikely to look away from traditional sectors especially manufacturing for two main reasons; these industries are major sources of employment which has been a problem area recently especially among the youth but also because the party will want to avoid creating new foreign dependencies in these sectors by offshoring them.
Conclusion
The 4th plenum provided key insights into how the 15th FYP is likely to take shape. The CPC will continue to focus on new technologies to boost manufacturing, achieve ‘high quality growth’, green growth and economic and technological self-reliance. The party is prioritising reducing China’s dependencies on foreign actors as much as possible, and if successful, this would have a significant impact on China’s global standing, allowing it to not just have a greater say in the global economy thanks to an innovative economy, but also make it less vulnerable to tools of economic warfare such as sanctions and tariffs. The recent curbs imposed on rare earths were already a sign of how much influence China has on the global economy, and the Communist Party and its leadership likely want to extend this by tailoring the economy to not just address domestic concerns but also enhance China’s ability to shape the rules of the global economy. Doing so would greatly increase China’s global standing and the party’s legitimacy and, indeed, ability to continue its supreme hold on power.
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