A group of the Communist Party of China (CPC) members review the Party oath at the Red Detachment of Women Memorial Park in Qionghai, South China's Hainan Province, on June 30, 2024, a day before the CPC celebrates its 103rd founding anniversary on July 1. Photo: VCG

The 103-year-old Communist Party of China (CPC) demonstrates strong resilience as a flourishing organization, with the number of CPC members reaching 99.185 million, the latest data showed on Sunday, a day ahead of the CPC's 103rd founding anniversary.

The number of CPC members reached 99.185 million as of the end of 2023, up 1.2 percent year-on-year. Among the 2.408 million new members in 2023, 53 percent hold a junior college degree or higher while 82.4 percent are aged 35 or younger, according to a CPC statistical report.

In its early years, the CPC had only over 50 members and over the course of 103 years of its development, that number has increased to 99.185 million members, showcasing its resilience as a flourishing organization, Zhang Xixian, a professor at the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, told the Global Times on Sunday.

Zhang credited the increasingly robust organizational growth to its alignment with the demands of China's development and its embodiment of the core tenets of Marxist theory.

Zhang continued to say that the reason why the CPC has grown from strength to strength, why it has won the support of the people, and why it has overcome various risks and tests and won victory after victory is ultimately because the CPC is an advanced political party.

The newest data also proves this point. Throughout 2023, 2.408 million new Party members were recruited, of which 1.276 million are frontline workers, accounting for 53 percent. 

Among the new members, 53 percent hold a junior college degree or higher, totaling 1.28 million, while 82.4 percent are aged 35 or younger, amounting to 1.983 million in total.

Among the entire 99.185 million members, there are 55.786 million with a junior college degree or above, accounting for 56.2 percent, an increase of 1.5 percentage points from the previous year. Workers and farmers remain the main body of the Party, accounting for 33 percent of the total.

The structure of the Party continues to be optimized, with more than half of the Party members having received junior college education or above. The optimized structure empowers the Party organization to maintain its vitality and better adapts to the development tasks of the times, Zhuang Deshui, a deputy director of the Research Center for Government Integrity-Building at Peking University, told the Global Times.

CPC organizations at the primary level continued to improve in 2023. At the end of the year, there were 298,000 Party committees, 325,000 general Party branches and about 4.6 million Party branches at the primary level in China, the report showed. 

Building a close bond with the masses through the CPC organizations at the grassroots level is essential for the organization to maintain an advanced nature. It solves the real problems facing the people, and promotes the continuous improvement of people's happiness, Zhuang said. 

An article by Xi Jinping, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, on the missions and tasks of the CPC on the new journey of the new era will be published on Monday, according to the Xinhua News Agency. 

The article by Xi, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, will be published in this year's 13th issue of the Qiushi Journal, a flagship magazine of the CPC Central Committee.

The article is part of a report delivered by Xi to the 20th CPC National Congress on October 16, 2022.

The article describes the central task of the CPC after the 20th National Congress as leading the Chinese people of all ethnic groups in a concerted effort to realize the Second Centenary Goal of building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects and to advance the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation on all fronts through a Chinese path to modernization.

"Today, we are closer, more confident, and more capable than ever of reaching the goal of rejuvenating the Chinese nation. At the same time, we must be prepared to work even harder to get there," says the article.

The entire Party must forge ahead with confidence and determination; proactively identify, respond to, and steer changes and prevent and defuse risks; and keep on striving to secure new successes in building a modern socialist China in all respects, the article adds.

Zhuang told the Global Times in the face of changing international and domestic situations, the CPC must and will play a crucial role as a stabilizing force. This role reflects its ability to withstand any challenges, as well as unite and lead the entire nation.