On March 27th, the Ministry of Education of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) released the “Negative List of Regulations for Basic Education (2026 Edition)”, which includes 20 so-called “strictly prohibited” high-pressure bans. Many interviewees pointed out that this document is not a general teaching norm, but rather a move by the CCP to strengthen ideological control over students at the institutional level in the face of a political crisis.
Currently, this document named “norms” has been sent by the Ministry of Education of the CCP to education departments at all levels in provinces, autonomous regions, directly-administered municipalities, as well as the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, and has been comprehensively implemented. After the issuance of the document, departments at all levels are required to “ensure implementation in every school, so that principals, teachers, and everyone are aware and pass the test.”
Several scholars told reporters that this list aims to thoroughly alienate China’s basic education system into a political tool of dictatorship, setting clear “institutional barriers” for schools.
Beijing political scholar Yan Xin (pseudonym) said in an interview, “This ban is essentially a political red line, not a teaching norm. Placing it at the forefront indicates that the primary task of current basic education is to serve the consolidation of the CCP’s rule foundation, and secondly, knowledge transfer. This order reveals the CCP’s true purpose of ensuring the ‘red empire’ remains unchanged.”
Yan Xin analyzed, “Compared to the fanatic propaganda during the Mao Zedong era, the vigorous implementation of such bans at present indirectly demonstrates the widespread dissatisfaction of the grassroots towards the CCP. It is precisely because the people’s hearts are lost that the CCP feels extreme panic and has to resort to such coercive means to survive.”
The list categorizes ideological control as the top ban, explicitly prohibiting actions such as “opposing the Party or socialism”, vilifying the Party and the nation, defaming leaders or role models, and splitting the country.
Retired teacher Pan Xi from Renmin University told reporters that this list completely tears down the CCP’s facade of “educating and nurturing”. He said, “This is not a red line, it is clearly a noose around the necks of teachers and students! The CCP places political loyalty above educational science, indicating that in their eyes, students are not lives in need of spiritual enlightenment, but ‘political expendables’ mass-produced. They do not want talent, they want slaves.”
This ban extends to exams, teaching materials, forums, lectures, and even private electronic devices and online media. In response, Mr. Wang, a history teacher at a high school in Shanghai, lamented to reporters that the campus had become a “political spy agency” with no pure land left: “The current monitoring is all-encompassing. Not only do teachers have to ‘align’ for 45 minutes in class, but even recommending a public account to students or expressing a sentiment in a parent-school group chat at home could lead to denunciation. This all-encompassing ‘verbal prison’ is forcing teachers into ‘mental self-harm’, maintaining silence in fear. If one option does not align with the ‘Party line’, the teacher’s job is not guaranteed.”
A Taiwanese student named Wu studying at Zhejiang University also revealed to reporters the atmosphere of terror on campus: “The CCP is very nervous now, with multiple cameras installed in classrooms facing students, recording all interactions between teachers and students in class. The school explicitly prohibits ‘splitting the country’, and this brainwashing method is very repugnant to us Taiwanese students. Since they have installed so much surveillance, why introduce this ‘negative list’? It shows that they themselves know that this brainwashing is a thorough failure, and we will not be brainwashed.”
Regarding the second ban that prohibits occupying time for so-called ideological, political, sports, art, and labor courses, Yang Xiao, an education researcher from Hunan, said the logic is insidious and intertwined.
He pointed out, “Recently, parents discovered mandatory expressions in student textbooks such as ‘love the Communist Party’. The CCP’s so-called ‘guarantee of ideology and politics courses’ essentially forcibly occupies the bandwidth of teenagers’ brains. By first defining the ‘ideological no-go zone’ in the first ban, and then ensuring the ‘brainwashing duration’ in the second ban, for students, the so-called quality education is just a front. Foolish education and party-formatting are the true goals.”
Regarding the aspects of “reducing burden” and “standardizing enrollment” in the list, Yang Xiao believes that this is just another political show under the backdrop of CCP’s monopoly on educational resources. Another commentator pointed out that from a unified curriculum system to rectifying the education and training industry, the CCP is constructing a “wall-less prison” nationwide. When all expressions are preset with political pitfalls, education becomes a “relay of lies”. This environment is fundamentally destroying the independent personalities of a generation of Chinese people.