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In a surreal scene on the front steps of a gated community in Shanghai, a resident in a bright red rain jacket, mask and visor gave a lecture to a team of hazm-dressed Chinese officials on the borders of state power.
With the loud support of his neighbors, he expressed disappointment with the quarantine measures that lock people in their homes, arguing that state power is bound by what the law allows. “I want to ask you which clause of which of our country’s laws gives you this power?” He said, according to a video of the incident, widely circulated online.
The impromptu legal lecture comes amid a new wave of outrage over Shanghai’s overcrowding, where in an attempt to end China’s worst coronavirus outbreak since 2020, the city government this week further tightened restrictions in some areas. In some areas, residential buildings and shops are boarded up. Officials confiscated house keys to prevent escape from the isolation prison, while the empty homes of those placed under centralized quarantine were turned upside down as they were flooded with disinfectant.
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The escalating disruption of daily life by China’s “zero covid” policy, promoted at the highest level, risks alienating a population that has begun to rely on what some scholars describe as the Communist Party’s implicit contract with the public: The leadership supports economy, allows people to get rich and stays out of everyday affairs in exchange for political calm.
“The tacit agreement between us has been broken,” said a Shanghai-based Chinese journalist who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of repercussions. “Initially you left me to live a happy life, I would not do anything against your interests, but such trust no longer exists. I think this may be the most serious problem [caused by lockdown]”
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While politicians seem genuinely concerned about a possible tsunami of coronavirus infections and deaths spreading uncontrollably, the choice to stick to the current policy was also made because President Xi Jinping believes China is reaching zero, demonstrating the superiority of his rule. over Western democracies, especially the United States, according to Lynette Ong, a professor of Chinese politics at the University of Toronto.
“He has been pushed into a corner where it is difficult to get politics back,” she said.
The politicized nature of COVID-19’s policy raises concerns about C’s personal management style, which increasingly relies on mass mobilizations in which everyone is expected to carry out orders. This re-establishment of the party in the lives of ordinary citizens makes comparisons with dark periods in China’s past and raises fears that society no longer has a place for a peaceful life, uninterrupted by ideologically motivated campaigns.
The escalation of the blockade in Shanghai was triggered by a meeting last week by the powerful Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Communist Party, where it doubled its policy of total intolerance to coronavirus infections among the general population. The meeting concluded that anyone who doubts or denies the approach must “fight” against it.
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Shortly afterwards, Shanghai began to reverse what was a gradual, albeit uneven, relaxation. Li Qiang, the party’s local secretary, described the new measures as “military orders”, citing a practice in which army officers promise to either succeed or accept military punishment for failure.
“This definitely has a tinge to the ‘Great Leap Forward’ in the 1950s, when politics commanded,” said Karl Minzner, a senior Chinese research fellow at the Foreign Affairs Council, given Mao Zedong’s disastrous campaign to catch up with industrialized nations. the production of steel and grain, which ended in mass starvation.
One of the defining tragedies of Mao’s rule was distorted politics, in part because of cowardly low-level officials who reported to superiors for a more rosy picture than reality. Hunger after the big jump was exacerbated by areas covering grain shortages. Critics say Xi could also make similar misconceptions because dissenting voices are muffled and local officials tell officials what they want to hear.
In the period after Mao’s reform, which began in 1978, party leaders began to leave the daily control to experts, which allowed for more openness and discussion. But since taking office, the party has re-established itself.
“This has a deadly effect on the debate within the party state,” Minzner said. “People are starting to repeat what they think the top leader wants to hear. And here, policy-making is becoming very fragile and very extreme. “
Speculation has been swirling about the political consequences of public outrage over the blockade before a change of leadership in the autumn, when many of the party’s top officials are expected to be replaced.
Some analysts say the reaction in Shanghai will make it difficult for Li, the 62-year-old party leader who is considered an ally of Xi, to secure a top position on the Politburo’s Standing Committee.
However, in addition to tracking possible increases or decreases, most expect C’s direct control over decision-making to be increased in Congress. This could take the form of a new title as “party chairman” or “people’s leader”. Xi’s personal political ideology can also be elevated to a status equal to that of Mao’s party founder.
Locked up, Shanghai residents avoid censorship to go online
Yet acts of violence by police and low-level officials imposing restrictions in Shanghai have led to online comparisons of the chaos and trauma of the later years of the Mao era. In a video posted on the Weibo microblog on Monday, a homeowner walks around his apartment and notes everything that disappeared during the disinfection, including food from the refrigerator, sheets, curtains and clothes.
The most popular comment below the video is “Ah, I’ve seen it in history textbooks, its search and confiscation,” a reference to common practice during the Cultural Revolution in the late 1960s, when radical Red Guards raided homes in search for prohibited items.
While Xi’s style of governing remains different from Mao’s preference for chaotic mass movements, scholars say both leaders share a preference for political campaigns to mobilize society as a whole.
As a sign of how tired the residents are, middle-class Shanghai men in red raincoats are now appealing to the rule of law to oppose the excessive power of the state.
It was probably inspired by Chinese lawyer Luo Xiang, who in a lecture on the virus explained how state power should extend only to what is codified in the law. In video after video, residents began repeating Luo to demand legal justification for the harsh measures.
But China’s top leaders are less interested in the law than in achieving the results they want – even if it means breaking the law – the Shanghai-based journalist warned: “China’s policy is about results. The law is for procedure, but they are not interested in procedure. They just want results. “
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