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Anger boils over in China as Xi Jinping’s approach backfires

China is at a fork in the road and neither path is looking good for President Xi Jinping who risks looking weak and causing “mass deaths”.

Jamie SeidelJamie Seidel
@JamieSeidel
5 min read
November 29, 2022 - 12:47AM
‘Extraordinary’ protests erupt across China

Protesters are on the street. China’s censorship system has been overwhelmed. The battle for Zero Covid has taken an unexpected turn. And President Xi Jinping’s future is in the firing line.

This is Mr Xi’s battle. He made it so from the outset.

“I myself give the orders. I myself make the plans,” he declared as the Covid-19 epidemic erupted out of Wuhan in January 2020.

His objective was clear. Zero Covid. No Surrender. No Retreat.

But, like his strongman counterpart Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Mr Xi failed to check if total victory was even possible. And any step-back threatens to make him look weak.

Now the chant “step down” is echoing through the streets of Beijing and Shanghai.

Others are less diplomatic: “Traitor Xi Jinping! Step down! Dictatorial Government, step down! F**k …”

The trigger appears to have been the death of 10 people in Xinjiang province. The doors of their apartment building had been welded shut as an anti-Covid lockdown measure. But then a fire broke out.

The tension, however, has been simmering for months.

Videos began circulating in October of workers at Apple’s Foxconn plant in Zhengzhou fleeing authorities ahead of a lockdown. It was no minor event. The iPhone manufacturing facility employs 200,000 people.

Since then, similar scenes at varying scales have exploded across China.

Now Mr Xi isn’t just battling a coronavirus pandemic. He’s fighting an idea. Zero Covid, Zero Tolerance.

A protesters shouts slogans during a protest against China’s strict zero Covid measures on November 28, 2022 in Beijing, China. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images.
A protesters shouts slogans during a protest against China’s strict zero Covid measures on November 28, 2022 in Beijing, China. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images.

China’s been on the front line of the Covid pandemic now for three years. So why, with such enormous social and economic costs persisting, does Zero Covid still exist?

“There are two main reasons why Zero Covid won’t be abandoned, at least in the short term,” argues Chatham House Asia-Pacific Programme analyst Bill Hayton. “Firstly, because China is woefully unprepared for the spread of the virus; and secondly, because the Communist Party loves Zero Covid.”

‘Life above all else’

The Communist Party’s slogan is “Life above all else”. It’s intended to convey its commitment to the people – not profits.

Its state-controlled media boasts China is the only nation in the world to prioritise the welfare of its people in such a way. It points to the US Covid-19 death toll of over 1 million as justification for its draconian measures.

“While there is a compelling argument in the aggregate for the stark comparison in death rate, the reality of grinding lockdowns has worn people down,” argues Asia Society Policy Institute analyst Barclay Bram.

Life is for the living. So what kind of life is being locked up in an apartment, losing one’s job, without access to food, friends, family or medical care?

“Zero-Covid represents a new form of legitimacy for the Communist Party,” says Mr Bram.

Previously, single-party rule was a contract between the people and the state that offered economic growth in exchange for authoritarian controls.

“But zero-Covid has shown the Party reaching for a different form of legitimacy … the Party is now willing to sacrifice economic growth for something even more sacred: life itself.”

Now, Zero-Covid measures are not working as well as they once did.

Omicron has become the dominant strain. It’s four times as contagious as the earlier Delta variant. And more sufferers are asymptomatic for longer – meaning the virus gains a deeper hold on a community before the warning signs are sounded.

And that comes as people are less willing to sound the alarm once they feel symptoms for fear of the inevitable lockdown.

Feet of clay

Communist Party officials at the community level face overwhelming contempt.

They have two jobs; keep their populace happy, and do what Beijing says.

But Beijing gets to punish them. Not the populace.

“Under this framework, local cadres cede their politician role to the bureaucrat role; they follow orders from superiors in the bureaucracy rather than trying to appeal to their constituencies,” says Johns Hopkins University China analyst Zhuoran Li.

And they must “be seen” to be doing their jobs with vigour.

That’s resulted in public spectacles – such as PCR swabbing of fish mouths. But fish don’t have lungs.

“People believe local governments are treating them as fools through these performances,” Mr Zhuoran writes in The Diplomat.

“Instead of winning support and understanding from the people, performative governance heightens the conflicts between an unpopular policy and popular discontent, further undermining the support for mobilisation.”

China would be in trouble if Mr Xi were to capitulate to the virus.

It still has the hurdle of high natural immunity ahead of it, ironically because of the relative success of its lockdowns until now.

Vaccination rates are reported to be high. But doubts surround the accuracy of the figures, given the extreme pressures local government Communist Cadres face from on high. And then there are questions about the effectiveness of China’s homegrown vaccine.

An abandonment of Zero Covid could trigger a pandemic wave big enough to overwhelm the health system. And this could lead to even greater anger and chaos in the streets.

China's President Xi Jinping faces death and humiliation if he abandons Covid zero. Picture: Jack Taylor/AFP
China's President Xi Jinping faces death and humiliation if he abandons Covid zero. Picture: Jack Taylor/AFP

“The consequence of such mass death on public opinion, after three years of huge national sacrifice in the name of Zero Covid, must terrify the Politburo,” says journalist and author Hayton. “And this is far from the only domestic challenge facing the Communist Party.”

Unemployment. Business collapse. Investment turmoil. Housing availability. Soaring national debt. Contempt.

“It’s not hard to imagine a perfect storm of popular dissatisfaction in the not-too-distant future,” he warns.

One man to rule them all

The Communist Party has spent 70 years cementing its control over the Chinese people.

Mr Xi has spent the past 10 years cementing his control over the Communist Party.

Protesters hold up a white piece of paper against censorship as they march against China’s strict zero Covid measures in Beijing, China. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images.
Protesters hold up a white piece of paper against censorship as they march against China’s strict zero Covid measures in Beijing, China. Picture: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images.

“During his decade as Party general-secretary, Xi Jinping has prioritised one thing above all: control,” says Hayton.

“For him, the Communist Party is the machine that keeps the country together and drives it forward. All the ills of the 2000s – the corruption, loose morals and the weakening of the sinews of state — can be blamed on the loss of Party discipline.”

This, he says, means Zero-Covid remains an appealing policy. It provides an excuse for extreme measures.

We’ve seen evidence of this: When angry customers protested outside a collapsed bank in Henan province, they suddenly found their smartphone-app health status turned red. They were blocked from travelling. They were compelled to return home and enter lockdown.

“Even if zero-Covid policies are functionally relaxed, “epidemic prevention” has proven far too useful a rationale for all kinds of monitoring,” argues Asia Society Policy Institute analyst Johanna Costigan.

“Between surveillance cameras in public and phones in pockets, the Chinese Communist Party … appears to be achieving a two-sided entree into people’s personal lives – watching them from telescopes and microscopes simultaneously.

“Convincing them to give that up would be a herculean task.”

And Mr Xi has need for it – if he is to remain Chairman for Life.

China’s draconian surveillance and social control systems are being put to the ultimate test.

Students at a Nanjing university have been seen chanting, “long live the people”. Not the Communist Party.

In Shanghai, protesters have dared to declare: “Down with the Chinese Communist Party, down with Xi Jinping.”

Elsewhere, protesters have been holding blank pieces of paper high. Words, they know, can get them in trouble.

“Even after the tide of Covid eventually retreats, China will be left with the reinforced surveillance and the digital and physical barricades that have been constructed over the past three years,” writes Hayton.

“Yet if, as expected, the economy heads further south in the coming months, the Party is going to need something else to keep the people mobilised.”

Jamie Seidel is a freelance writer | @JamieSeidel

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Originally published as Anger boils over in China as Xi Jinping’s approach backfires

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Original URL: https://www.themercury.com.au/business/work/anger-boils-over-in-china-as-xi-jinpings-approach-backfires/news-story/deec5a9d26c5de1cdcb50026e122cde2