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Wu Guoguang: Xi Jinping’s Reversal of the Course, Will China’s Transition be Peaceful or Marked with Bloodshed?

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Cheng Xiaonong: U.S.-China Strategic Relations Have Crystallized

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Xinhua Commentaries: “Exposing the Three Major Political Deficits of the U.S.”

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The CCP’s Performing Arts Troupes in the U.S.

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China’s ‘Deadbeat Map’ App Exposes Social Credit of People Nearby

Chinese authorities are testing a new application that allows mobile phone users to check the social credit of people nearby. This is China’s latest effort to use technology to implement a social credit system for its 1.4 billion citizens. The beta version of the app, known as the “Deadbeat Map” released on China’s most popular mobile platform WeChat, was tested in Hebei Province last week. The user can use the program to detect, within 500 meters of range, those who do not pay their debts.

With a click on a person’s icon on the map, the app will display that person’s personal information, including name, part of the address, and the offense.

Beijing Youth Daily, an official newspaper in Beijing, has praised this practice. The author said that the innovative measures of using technology to expose the deadbeats accurately are worthy of praise. The article said that, although the court arbitration dealt with those found untrustworthy, they had many evasive methods to escape from the court. The social platform can subject them to ethical pressure from acquaintances.

Critics are concerned that citizens’ privacy is violated. Delia Lin, a lecturer at the University of Melbourne in Australia, told the Daily Telegraph that those unable to pay their debts due to poverty will find themselves “subjected to this kind of surveillance and this kind of public shaming.”

WeChat users can also report the untrustworthy people through this small program. If they find leads about the “deadbeat’s” property, they can report it to the app’s editor, and the information will be submitted to the back-end administrator and then to the court enforcement authorities.

China began to develop a social credit system in 2011, giving credit scores to individuals and companies. The scores are used to determine whether someone can use specific services such as a loan application or transportation services.

The New York based Human Rights Watch, however, sees this as part of a massive surveillance plan of the Chinese government. The practice of using technology to collect public information, such as the widespread use of facial recognition technology and the installation of tracking chips in student uniforms has also drawn public criticism.

Source: BBC Chinese, January 25, 2019
https://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/simp/chinese-news-47004328

Briefings | | |   Information/Technology

RFA: State Council Ordered to Ban For-Profit Kindergartens

Radio Free Asia reported that the State Council issued a notice on January 22, stating that the state will put more effort into building a public education system for kindergartens and no for-profit kindergarten will be permitted. The notice requires that a comprehensive investigation of all kindergartens be completed before the end of April of 2019.

According to RFA, at present, there are two types of kindergartens in China. The first one includes government sponsored public kindergartens and public college and enterprise affiliated kindergartens. The other type is a private kindergarten. Public kindergartens mainly receive funding from the government or from enterprises. The teachers at the private kindergartens are highly skilled but the admission cost is also higher. They are more popular among middle-class families.

The RFA article quoted comments from people in China regarding a policy change which will allow government subsidized kindergartens gradually to take over the private kindergartens. One person told RFA that the public kindergartner uses the teaching materials that the municipal Department of Education designs. The private kindergartens are special. They make a profit and focus on quality education. They produce their own teaching materials, which have fewer contents involving public brainwashing. If the government transforms kindergartens from private to public, that will make it easier for it to brainwash the kids.

On January 21, the National Bureau of Statistics of China announced that the number of births in 2018 was 15.23 million, a decrease of 2 million from 2017. Some mainland media reported that from 1997 to 2017, the proportion of Chinese public kindergartens dropped from 95 percent to 44 percent.

Source: Radio Free Asia, January 24, 2019
http://https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/kejiaowen/ql1-01242019083419.html

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics

Xi Jinping Speaks about Omnimedia

Omnimedia is a relatively new concept of media still in development. In China, the discussion of omnimedia started around 2008 or 2009. Although it may refer to different  people who may have different ideas, generally speaking, Omnimedia refers to a communication of information based on the integration of different channels of transmission – print, television, radio, Internet, mobile phone – and different means of presentation – text, images, animation, audio, and visual – so that the audience will absorb the information via multi-dimensions.

Xinhua News Agency reported that the Chinese communist party’s politburo held a group study session on January 25 in Beijing. Xi Jinping, the general secretary of the party, stressed that promoting media integration and building the omnimedia has become an urgent issue. “It is necessary to use the fruits of the information revolution to promote in-depth development of media integration and make the mainstream public opinion stronger.” The “mainstream public opinion” usually refers to the public discourse that is in line with the party’s ideology.

Xi said that the party’s newspapers and periodicals should strengthen the innovation of the means of communication and develop various new media such as websites, Weibo and WeChat channels, electronic newspapers, mobile newspapers, and Internet TV. This also should include exploration of interactive, service-oriented, and experience-oriented communication. The party’s voice should directly cover all types of user terminals.

At the same time, Xi demanded that new media adhere to the correct political direction. The mainstream media should provide more true and objective information with clear-cut views and in a timely manner, so as to take control of public opinion. Xi also emphasized safeguarding national political security, cultural security, and ideological security in terms of the contents of omnimedia communication, and guarding against the risks that new technologies, such as big data, may pose.

Source: Xinhua News Agency, January 25, 2019
http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2019-01/25/c_1124044208.htm

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics

With Economy Slowdown, China’s Local Governments Cut Revenue Targets

Due to the downward pressure on China’s economy in 2019, as well as the central government’s tax cut effort, China’s provinces and cities have lowered their fiscal revenue growth targets. Many places have planned to tighten their belts.

Provinces such as Jiangsu, Beijing, Sichuan, Henan, Hebei, and Fujian have lowered their 2019 revenue growth targets, vis-a-vis the 2018 growth rate.

Sichuan’s budget report states that the economy faces a large downward pressure in 2019, and this makes fiscal revenue growth more difficult. At the same time, with the implementation of a large scale tax cut and fee reduction policy, the public budget of 898.4 billion yuan (US$132 billion) for the whole year still cannot make ends meet. The growth of Sichuan’s public budget revenue in 2018 was 9.3 percent; in 2019 it was down to 7.5 percent.

The growth of Beijing’s 2019 fiscal revenue target was also reduced to 4 percent from 6.5 percent growth last year. 2019 will see a reduction of Beijing’s fiscal income of about 30 billion yuan (US$4.4 billion). With even more aggressive tax cuts and fee reduction measures, pressures will continue on the growth of fiscal revenue.

Jiangsu lowered its revenue growth target from 5.6 percent in 2018 to 4.5 percent in 2019.

In Hubei, the level of three major types of public expenses – buying and using government cars, overseas trips, and official receptions – face a projected reduction of 5.6 percent.

Source: Central News Agency, January 24, 2019
http://https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/201901240168.aspx

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

China’s Internet Czar Deletes 7 Million “Harmful” Posts

According to the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), the central Internet regulator and censorship agency of China, between January 3 and January 23, the Special Action of Internet Ecological Control cleaned a total of more than 7.09 million pieces of harmful information, closed 308,000 illegal accounts, suspended 733 websites, and removed 9,382 mobile applications.

Since 2016, the Chinese authorities have stepped up control of the Internet. In November 2018, in response to a series of “chaotic problems” in self-media accounts, CAC closed more than 9,800 accounts that were “transmitting politically harmful information, maliciously tampering with the history of the party and history of the country, impairing the nation’s image, circulating rumors, and spreading false information”.

Source: Voice of America, January 23, 2019
https://www.voachinese.com/a/china-internet-control-20190123/4755206.html

Briefings | | |   Information/Technology

CCP Published Political and Legal Affairs Work Regulations

Recently the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee published “Political and Legal Affairs Work Regulations” (Regulations).

Article Ten of the Regulations listed the responsibilities of the local CCP party committee. The first one was to “coordinate the political and legal affairs work that is related to national security, especially the events related to political security whose core is the ruling party’s security and the ruling system’s security.” The second one is to “coordinate social stability work and timely and properly handle important issues or emergencies that will affect social stability.”

Article Eleven stated that a Political and Legal Affairs Committee will be established at the Central Committee, at the local party committee, and at the county level or above. A township or street (in the city) party committee will establish a committee member position for the Political and Legal Affairs work.

Shi Cangshan, an independent China issue expert, commented, “In the past the CCP’s lowest policing structure was the local police station at the township or street level (in the city). Now the Political and Legal Affairs Committee for the first time, is extending itself to that level. This is related to its recent strengthening of communist ideology.” He also felt that it shows the old stability maintenance mechanism is no longer sufficient for putting down public dissatisfaction and protects.

Sources:
1. Xinhua, January 18, 2019
http://www.xinhuanet.com/2019-01/18/c_1124011592.htm
2. Epoch Times, January 22, 2019
http://www.epochtimes.com/gb/19/1/22/n10994697.htm

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics Social Stability

Xiang Songzuo: Four Reasons China’s Economy Slid in 2018

Xiang Songzuo is a Chinese academic and an economist. He serves as the Chief Economist of the China Agriculture Bank and is a professor at the Renmin University School of Finance. He has become known for asserting that China’s GDP growth was only 1.67 percent in 2018.

Recently, Xiang made another speech on the reasons why China’s economy slid so badly in 2018:

First, tightened government financial control caused many companies to face a shortage of capital supply. However, this was not the main reason.

Second, China’s stock market dropped 30 percent and lost 7 trillion yuan (US $1 trillion) in value in 2018. Xiang felt that the scale of the stock market crash in China over the past ten years is comparable to the drop in the U.S. in 1929. Xiang pointed out that, in the past ten years, Chinese companies’ growth has not been based on improvements in technology or growth in profits or assets, but rather on borrowing from banks. He quoted Zhu Yunlai, son of former Primer Zhu Rongji, who stated that China’s total debt exceeds 600 trillion yuan (US $90 trillion). Chinese companies just do not make money. However, this was still not the main reason.

Third, the government’s inclination to eliminate private ownership and expand state owned companies has greatly hurt private companies’ confidence and their incentive to grow. In Xiang’s view, this was the most important reason.

Fourth, the trade war with the U.S. was an external reason.

Xiang also warned that nowadays Chinese have become addicted to playing with debt and high leverage financing. This is actually a mirage and will collapse soon. When all people all of sudden realize that the assets (e.g. real estate property or financial products) that they bought are not worth that much, everyone will try to escape (and avoid big financial losses), but by then nobody will be able to escape.

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

YouTube Video Revealed That China’s Economy Went Downhill Dramatically

A YouTube video showed a Chinese person commenting that, in 2018 the economy in Liaoning Province went downhill dramatically. The setting was in a meeting, but the person’s identity is unknown. From the way he talks, he may be a member of the People’s Political Consultative Conference (PPCC) or a government official.

He stated that Shenyang, the capital city of Liaoning, didn’t make its GDP target in 2017 and then its economy slid downhill in 2018 (this means that it didn’t make the 2018 goal either, since Chinese officials always want GDP to surpass the previous year).

“When the PPCC members came (to the meeting), they all lowered their heads and avoided the question of making money this year. There were no such scenes (as in early years) where one said ‘I made 50 million yuan (US $7.5 million)’ and another one said ‘I made 800 million.’”

“I take full responsibility to tell you all, that all I gained in 2018 was only age but no wealth. However much you invested, that is how much you would lose. We now claim (Shenyang) made 1 trillion yuan (US $150 billion) in GDP (in 2018). Dalian city’s economic situation was much better than (Shenyang), but it only reported 700 billion yuan. We shouldn’t give too excessively big a number in our government report.”

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources