Hail Caesar! The political economy of China’s national security turn in economic governance

There has been a national security turn in China that has marked a shift in modus operandi from ‘development-first’ to ‘security-first’, but why would the leadership downplay a highly legitimising governance approach that has underpinned China’s massive growth rates and the basis of regime survival for over 40 years? This article problematises dominant explanations that centre great power competition, adopting instead a Gramscian approach that takes seriously the domestic and transnational sources of state authority. We argue that China’s national security turn is best understood as a Caesarist hegemonic project defined by charismatic leadership, arbitration between social groups, and coercive rule, rooted in global, state and societal conflicts inherent to global capitalism. Driven by crisis-prone conditions of escalating US-China rivalry, intra-state factional stalemates over China’s industrial overcapacity, and deepening societal inequality, the article demonstrates how a Xi Jinping-led national security faction has sought to recalibrate the Chinese hegemonic project. In this light, the national security turn is not wholly a response to inter-state security competition but also a means to further extract the latent growth potential from China’s development model and consolidate the position of Chinese state actors and of China between a US-led Global North and China-led Global South.