Chen Boda
Senior CCP officials have privately compared Wang to Chen Boda or Mikhail Suslov, going so far to claim that he and Wang Qishan are Xi's "brain" and "backbone" respectively. Both of them are believed to be hold significant influence over Xi Jinping and are sometimes considered to be the primary decision makers in the Politburo. Unlike Wang Qishan, Wang has traditionally kept an extremely low profile and was largely unknown to the Chinese public outside the party and academic circles, but after his elevation to the Politburo Standing Committee in 2017, he has emerged as a more public figure.