An article in Foreign Policy on October 16, 2017, said that to strengthen his base, Xi Jinping had turned his attention to the lower levels where he has overseen a massive shake-up in the provincial leadership, with 23 of the 31 party secretaries being reassigned since 2016 alone. Since he took power, the number of arrests of senior Central Committee or provincial Standing Committee officials has also increased dramatically — 28 officials in 2014 alone, which is nearly six times greater than the highest number of arrests during the second term of Hu Jintao between 2007 to 2012.

As 2017 began, Xi Jinping very obviously began packing a few more of his followers in key positions, including He Lifeng as the head of the National Development and Reform Commission and Cai Qi, who is still not even an alternate member of the Central Committee, as the Party Secretary of Beijing. Undoubtedly after the 19th Party Congress, a few more of his followers, such as Shanghai Mayor Ying Yong and Central Organization Department Vice Director Chen Xi, will be poised to take over key positions and enter the Politburo. Xi Jinping has simultaneously, unlike his predecessors, launched his own propaganda blitz right from the start.  The official People’s Daily began a massive Xi-themed propaganda campaign almost immediately after he assumed power in a manner that was quantitatively and qualitatively different from the campaigns of previous leaders (with exception of Mao Zedong). On average, the People’s Daily under the Jiang administration carried roughly 3,000 stories per year mentioning him. For Hu, it was a little over 2,000 self-referential stories per year. With Xi, in stark contrast, mentions per year in the People’s Daily have already have reached 5,000, with little indication that this pace will slow down. Equally significantly, the People’s Daily reduced reporting on Hu Jintao to near zero almost as soon as Xi assumed power.

Wang Qishan, too seems to have taken advantage of the anti-corruption campaign to maneuver his own allies into key positions, including Lin Duo, Jiang Chaoliang, and Lu Hao. The number of Wang Qishan followers (again, those with shared work experience) has risen sharply since 2012. More recently, there are rumors that Wang’s former colleague, Yang Xiaochao, is in the running to head the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, the country’s top insurance regulator.