Xi Jinping, China’s Censorship Trap

China: The most memorable COVID-19 protest slogans that have emerged across China since last month has been "Chinese Communist Party, step down" and "Xi Jinping, step down," chanted by young people in Shanghai. These chants later spread throughout the world, writes Ge Chen.

For the first time, a large number of Chinese protesters chanted slogans demanding the resignation of the sole ruling party and its top leader.

Not even 1989, the year of China's pro-democracy movement, saw such powerful political appeals, let alone the two decades of mercantilism that followed the Tiananmen Square crackdown, or the subsequent decade of renewed ideology after Xi took power.

Given the Chinese government's strict restrictions on free expression, the emergence of such slogans is surprising, even given the widespread dislike for COVID-19 lockdowns and the strong reaction to the aftermath of the Urumqi fire.

Why are so many Chinese suddenly daring to yell slogans demanding regime change and the removal of the supreme leader in a society where censorship is deeply ingrained?

My response is that Xi and his party have fallen victim to censorship. In a one-man dictatorship that does not completely obstruct the free flow of information, the more precisely targeted an allegedly inflammatory speech is at the dictator, the less likely the dictator is to hear it.

Censoring authorities must distinguish dictator-related speech from other forms of subversive speech when dealing with political speech and withhold the former from the dictator.

As a result, the risk of severe punishment for those who make that collective statement is reduced.

In a censorship trap, a dictator's subordinates censor the information he has access. It is not uncommon for a dictator to live - and believe - in a lie woven by those around him.

Yuan Shikai, the first President of the Republic of China who declared himself Emperor in 1916, read fake newspapers produced by people around him, including his son, every day.

All of the "news," including claims that the people all wanted Yuan to be their emperor, were made up to please him. After all, when a dictator is unhappy, the people around him suffer first.

Last month's G-20 summit in Indonesia saw a faint echo of this historical episode. When Xi chastised Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the translators surrounding Xi refused to relay Trudeau's response regarding information transparency in Canada to Xi.

Instead, the translator provided a brief synopsis. What he said to Xi on Trudeau's behalf sounded like "OK, I'll do it," when the Canadian leader had pushed back on Xi's criticism.

From this vantage point, it is doubtful that Xi will have immediate access to information such as the protest slogans calling for his resignation.

Delivering this message to Xi would imply admitting that previous ideological propaganda efforts by his subordinates, including efforts to legitimise Xi's extended tenure, had largely failed. It's easy to imagine Xi's cronies as submissive flatterers who keep telling him that the Chinese people all support his life tenure at a time when he has monopolised power.

Who dares to report to Xi that "the people's real political demand is that you step down," aside from transmitting protesters' requests to lift the lockdown?

This is supported by Xi's subsequent reaction to the protests. He told European Council President Charles Michel that the protests were sparked by "student frustration."

If Xi had received those messages, he would have made such a sympathetic and lenient comment toward those who demanded his resignation.

In China's previous scenario of collective oligarchy, if protesters raised a slogan demanding that the Communist Party relinquish power, the top authorities would have immediately known about it and responded strongly; ruthless suppression would have been the immediate response.

However, since Xi's elimination of other political factions within the party, the Communist Party's collective ship has become Xi's personal boat. If Xi's subordinates still used the "our party" approach when reporting an emergency to him, they would be on an equal footing with Xi. Instead, they must think and act within the context of "your party."

However, reporting to Xi explicitly that the people want "your party" to step down is as implausible as asking him to step down.

As a result, Xi is not always able to make his own decisions. For example, he cannot decide to suppress the most "subversive" speech in the most thorough and ruthless manner because that speech is never relayed to him.

Although the censorship machine is still in operation, its primary goal is to avoid offending the highest leader with subversive remarks, as doing so would cause Xi to doubt the ability of those around him.

This has resulted in a predicament. Speech is subversive for the censorship machine as long as it is based on independent thinking. However, even a compliment can be subversive for ordinary protesters.

After all, only the top leader has the longest speaking time in front of the camera at all plenary party congresses and people's congresses in China. Everyone else seemed to be unhappy during these events.

Everyone is aware that others are dissatisfied. Everyone is aware that everyone else is aware that everyone is dissatisfied.

But no one will say anything. When asked to speak, everyone seemed enthralled by every tedious and insignificant detail of something that didn't matter, because all important decisions are made outside of formal bodies and through opaque political means.

More people should stand up and support the Chinese people's demands in this censorship trap. Only in this manner can the risks posed by those protesters in China be reduced.

Many overseas young Chinese who supported the protests abandoned their usually detached and sophisticated demeanour. This is because they realised that they could no longer remain neutral and stay out of it in the face of such post-COVID-19 totalitarian rule.

In an address to the French National Assembly in 1848, Alexis de Tocqueville stated, "I believe we are sleeping on top of a volcano; I am deeply convinced of this."

Although real change in China may be some time away, the country's historical development will inevitably lead to a Tocquevillean moment of profound social transition. Censorship by dictators will only hasten the arrival of this moment.

GUEST AUTHOR

Ge Chen

Ge Chen is an assistant professor in Global Media & Information Law at Durham Law School and an affiliated fellow of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. He is the author of "Copyright and International Negotiations: An Engine of Free Expression in China?" (Cambridge University Press, 2017).