Inspired by our own government, no doubt
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Xi Jinping Revives Decades-Old Playbook To Supercharge China’s Surveillance State
Chinese President Xi Jinping is seeking a more potent surveillance state in China and reviving a Mao-era program to achieve it, The New York Times reported Saturday.
The revamped approach, dubbed the “Fengqiao Experience for a new era” by Xi, further utilizes everyday citizens to pre-emptively ward off any perceived threats to the government and solidify the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) grip on China’s sprawling society, according to the NYT. “Fengqiao” is a reference to a town in China where Mao-era residents were encouraged by the party to “re-educate” their neighbors through public humiliation and insults.
Beijing is encouraging local governments to hire increasing amounts of workers to watch “assigned grids,” and in April the party issued guidance for managing those workers, the NYT reported. The guidance outlines potential rewards and punishments for monitors of the grids, and calls for doubling down ideological instruction.
The newly unveiled approach adds to China’s already-expansive surveillance state, which boasts 15 million citizens as government informants as well as numerous police officers and party workers, according to the NYT.
Citizen investigators help FBI track down Jan. 6 rioters
They started in January ‘21 and are still going strong.
