A Fusion between Mao and Capitalism: Xi Jinping is setting China on a Unprecedented Path

Two days before the publication of his much-anticipated memoir Red Roulette: An Insider’s Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today’s China, author Desmond Shum received a phone call from his former wife, Whitney Duan. Duan is the central figure in Red Roulette and had been missing since 2017, with no word from the Chinese government about her condition, whereabouts or alleged crimes. That call came with one request: cancel the publication of his book. It is clear that Xi Jinping is concerned about the secrets Shum reveals in this provocative new memoir, and he should be. With an economic crisis looming in the collapse of Evergrande, with international investments shrinking after his crackdown on Chinese corporations, with a world questioning China’s responsibility for the pandemic that has left 4.55 million dead worldwide, and with even the CCP elite now losing faith in his ideologies, Xi Jinping’s dream of a dictatorship may be fading.