According to the party constitution, the CCP adheres to Marxism–Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, socialism with Chinese characteristics, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Three Represents, the Scientific Outlook on Development, and Xi Jinping Thought. Officially, the CCP is committed to communism and continues to participate in the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties each year. The current leader is Xi Jinping, elected at the 18th Central Committee held on 15 November 2012. Through these posts, the party leader is the country's paramount leader. The party's leader recently holds the offices of general secretary (responsible for civilian party duties), Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) (responsible for military affairs) and State President (a largely ceremonial position). When the National Congress is not in session, the Central Committee is the highest body, but since the body meets normally only once a year most duties and responsibilities are vested in the Politburo and its Standing Committee, members of the latter seen as the top leadership of the Party and the State.
Theoretically, the highest body of the CCP is the National Congress, convened every fifth year. The party is officially organized on the basis of democratic centralism, a principle conceived by Vladimir Lenin which entails open discussion of policy on the condition of unity among party members in upholding the agreed-upon decision. The CCP leads an authoritarian Marxist–Leninist one-party state in China. It is also one of the two major historical contemporary parties in Chinese history, the other being the Kuomintang. The CCP controls the country's armed forces, the People's Liberation Army (PLA). The party grew quickly by 1949 the Nationalist Government of the Kuomintang (KMT) had been driven from mainland China to Taiwan after the Chinese Civil War, leading to the establishment of the People's Republic of China on 1 October 1949. The CCP was founded in 1921, mainly by Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao, with the help of the Far Eastern Bureau of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and Far Eastern Secretariat of the Communist International. The CCP leads eight other legally permitted subordinate minor parties together as the United Front. The Chinese Communist Party ( CCP), officially the Communist Party of China ( CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). "Communist Party of China" in Simplified (top) and Traditional (bottom) Chinese characters