China's Communist Party Opens Fifth Plenum on Discipline in Beijing

China's ruling Communist Party opened its fifth plenum in Beijing on Monday, October 26, a closed door meeting of the Central Committee that will run until Thursday, October 29, and set the tone for the party congress in 2027.

The meeting is the fifth plenary session of the 20th Central Committee, the party's largest top decision making body, with roughly 300 full and alternate members, Reuters reported in its guide to the session. The formal agenda is a draft decision on strengthening what party language calls full and rigorous self-governance, Xinhua reported, via Aju Press. Xi Jinping delivered a work report to the session on behalf of the Political Bureau, Aju Press said.

A plenum about the party itself

Fifth plenums often deal with economic plans. This one turns inward. The fourth plenum in October 2025 already adopted recommendations for the 15th Five-Year Plan, covering 2026 to 2030, so the economic framework is set and this session deals with discipline, supervision of officials and the anti-corruption drive, according to AFP reporting carried by CNA.

That drive is now in its 14th year. Disciplinary authorities opened cases against more than one million people last year, including more than 100 officials at ministerial or provincial rank or above, The Guardian reported. In party language, corruption and disloyalty are treated as linked problems, and analysts quoted by The Guardian said the scale of the investigations raises the question of how much of the campaign is about graft and how much is about loyalty.

Personnel is the other open question. Eight seats on the Central Committee lie vacant, and another 15 members are under investigation and at risk of replacement, according to AFP reporting carried by CNA. That points to the lowest plenum turnout since Mao Zedong died in 1976, the same reporting said.

Why it matters

The plenum is the last big alignment meeting before the 21st Party Congress in 2027, where Xi is expected to seek a fourth term as party leader and oversee a leadership reshuffle, Reuters reported. The rules written this week on discipline, spending scrutiny and supervision of officials will shape who rises, who falls and how tightly the center controls the party before that congress.

For the rest of the world, the meeting matters for a simpler reason. A leadership focused on internal discipline and loyalty is also the leadership setting economic and foreign policy for the world's second largest economy, at a moment when Chinese stocks have fallen for 11 straight weeks on weak domestic demand.

What comes next

Little news is expected before the close. Attendees are traditionally confined to the venue for the meeting, foreign media and most Chinese reporters get no access, and proceedings are not made public in detail until the session ends, Reuters reported. On the day the plenum closes, Thursday, October 29, the official Xinhua news agency is expected to issue a communique giving the agreed decisions in broad party language, with a fuller document following days later.