Speaker: Jonghyuk Lee (Assistant Professor in China Programme, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University)

Due to the rise of China and the hegemonic competition between the U.S. and China, there is a global high interest for the Chinese political elite. So far, many scholars have predicted the elections of China’s central leaders through literature review and historical insight. Prof. Lee uses machine-learning techniques to develop a model for predicting Chinese Communist Party leaders’ promotion. The model systematically quantifies the data of 20,000 party leaders who worked from 1982 to 2020 to extract over 300 characteristics per individual and uses these to predict the promotion into high positions. The results of this study can be used as a practical model to predict the highest positions of the future Chinese Communist Party. Also, the study presents a way to quantitatively use political data in contemporary China’s various sociopolitical issues.