The Party: The Secret World of China's Communist Rulers

In this provocative and illuminating account, Richard McGregor offers a captivating portrait of Chinas Communist Party, its grip on power and control over China, and its future.

Chinas political and economic growth in the past three decades has been one of astonishing, epochal dimensions. The most remarkable part of this transformation, however, has been left largely untold—the central role of the Chinese Communist Party. In The Party, Richard McGregor delves deeply into Chinas inner sanctum for the first time, showing how the Communist Party controls the government, courts, media, and military and keeps all corruption accusations against its members in-house. The Partys decisions have a global impact, yet the CCP remains a deeply secretive body, hostile to the law and unaccountable to anyone or anything other than its own internal tribunals. It is the worlds only geopolitical rival of the United States, and is primed to think the worst of the West.

“Few outsiders have any realistic sense of the innards, motives, rivalries, and fears of the Chinese Communist leadership. But we all know much more than before, thanks to Richard McGregors illuminating and richly-textured look at the people in charge of Chinas political machinery.... Invaluable.” — James Fallows, National Correspondent for The Atlantic

The Party is Financial Times reporter Richard McGregors eye-opening investigation into Chinas Communist Party, and the integral role it has played in the countrys rise as a global superpower and rival to the United States. Many books have examined Chinas economic rise, human rights record, turbulent history, and relations with the U.S.; none until now, however, have tackled the issue central to understanding all of these issues: how the ruling communist government works. The Party delves deeply into Chinas secretive political machine.

Richard McGregor is a reporter for the Financial Times and the publications former China bureau chief. He has reported from North Asia for nearly two decades and lives in Washington, D.C.