ИСТИНА

The ideological struggle between representatives of Left and Right had always been an important nerve of the Chinese politics since the beginning of the period of Reforms and Openness, and also during the earlier period of the PRC. With the advent of globalization and the digitalization of the public space the ongoing Left-Right polemics assumed a new quality as it transformed itself into a much more vocal struggle, now accessible to a wide audience of Internet users. The development of an open polemics signaled a new era of online ideological battles suggesting a move towards a more pluralistic and open public domain. This was especially visible in the period of Hu Jintao and close to the end of that era took, in certain respects, quite intense forms. Since the ascent of the fifth-generation leadership measures were undertaken to scale down the intensity of public debate as it was probably perceived at the top as containing serious risks for the governing ability of the CPC. In this paper we will try to look at how did the conditions change since the beginning of Mr. Xi’s term and what are the possible implications for the future of this important sphere.