Recently, there have been clear signs that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is further tightening its control over information. Experts believe that driven by extreme insecurity, the CCP is creating a more closed “black box,” resembling a real-life political absurdity version of “1984” in China.
The Epoch Times has learned that the CCP is currently monitoring people’s lives on a large scale through its grassroots “community workers.” Individuals with overseas connections have become targets of special scrutiny, with their communications with foreign entities being monitored. Behind this surveillance network is the so-called “authoritarian patch,” the Central Social Work Department.
At the same time, the CCP has been banning various economic data that are unfavorable to the stability of its regime, such as land sales, foreign exchange reserves, bond trading data, and more. China’s major academic database, the China National Knowledge Infrastructure, restricted access for overseas subscribers starting from April 1, 2022. Data related to the truth about pandemic deaths has been effectively silenced.
The level of political opacity has intensified. In recent years, the resumes of high-level CCP officials and bureaucrats have started shrinking. Senior officials frequently go missing, with reasons for their disappearances and whereabouts kept secret. Personnel adjustments within the CCP’s military are not publicly announced.
On February 27, 2024, the online case database of the CCP’s Supreme Court saw a steep decline in the number of cases uploaded.
The traditional press conference of the CCP’s “Two Sessions” held by the Premier, a practice spanning over 30 years, was canceled in March 2024. This move is seen as a further tightening of information control and a regression in openness to the outside world.
Legal expert and independent commentator Yu Ping expressed to The Epoch Times on May 7 that a characteristic of authoritarian governments is information control. The internet firewall originally set up by the CCP aims to prevent the public from accessing information it does not wish to be known while promoting information it wants the public to receive.
Yu Ping noted that under Xi Jinping’s leadership, there has been a reversal in government transparency.
“The lack of transparency has always been a major feature of the Communist Party (government), but under the Hu-Wen administration, some non-threatening government affairs were made public. Xi Jinping believes that openness is harmful to his regime, so he is retracting and gradually removing information from local government websites. Many cases that were previously online on the Supreme Court’s website have been taken down.”
Yu Ping stated that in previous years, many individuals in China had used laws on government information disclosure to demand public information from the government and even sued in court for transparency. The CCP found this passive, hence the recent shift towards stricter information control.
Yu Ping emphasized that the CCP incurs significant costs to maintain stability, such as building firewalls, which restrict innovation among Chinese technology personnel. On the other hand, restricting the information available to the public makes the population easier to manipulate, which serves the CCP’s interests. In the name of regime stability, negative impacts hindering social development are disregarded.
Assistant Researcher at the Taiwan Institute for National Defense Security, Zhong Zhidong, stated to The Epoch Times on May 8 that the CCP’s tightening of information control is due to both internal and external crises. Xi Jinping harbors extreme insecurity about his regime. “He feels insecure, so he continually emphasizes security.”
In recent years, the CCP has successively pushed laws such as the Counter-Espionage Law, the Management of Activities Conducted by Foreign Non-Governmental Organizations within China Law, the National Security Law, the Cybersecurity Law, and the Law on State Secrets.
On April 29, 2024, Minister of State Security Chen Yixin published an article in a CCP Party School publication, declaring that the Ministry of State Security would launch the “Five Anti-Struggle” against subversion, hegemony, separatism, terrorism, and espionage.
Zhong Zhidong stated that by placing subversion as the first among the “Five Antis,” the CCP’s extreme insecurity is vividly revealed. “Under this securitized mindset, it tends towards closure and non-interaction with the outside world.”
While reinforcing internal control, the top echelon of the CCP continues to emphasize the need for external openness. A recent CCP Politburo meeting dedicated a rare amount of discussion to reform and opening up, as well as attracting foreign investment. Even after tightening control, the CCP has invited foreigners to China, implementing visa-free policies for many countries.
Yu Ping pointed out that with China’s economy facing a sharp contraction, the CCP knows that domestic demand is insufficient and seeks foreign investment to boost the economy. Thus, while strict domestic control is maintained, an external gateway is opened to welcome international capital. However, harmonizing these two aspects proves challenging as they inherently conflict.
Yu Ping believes Xi Jinping cannot abandon the banner of reform and opening up, but the significance of this slogan differs from what leaders in the late 1970s proposed. “In the past few decades, China transitioned from Mao Zedong’s totalitarian regime to an authoritarian one, but Xi Jinping is reversing back to totalitarianism, where government authority intervenes in every aspect of people’s lives, returning to the era of Mao.”
Yu Ping suggested that the CCP’s efforts to attract foreign investment under the guise of openness are far from ideal. Foreign investors are aware of the high risks, leading many to adopt a wait-and-see attitude and even withdraw without the intent to return.
Zhong Zhidong noted that the CCP aims to create an illusion of separating politics and economics, hoping to achieve both economic development and political control simultaneously. “It wants to create an illusion of separating politics and economics, maintaining strict control over political security while establishing an economic liberal system.”
However, he pointed out that the CCP’s intensified internal control methods have deterred many foreign investors, who fear being apprehended at any moment.
George Orwell’s novel “1984” is frequently used to describe totalitarian regimes. In the novel, the entire country is governed by the party, employing thought police to persecute individuals and control their thoughts. Big Brother is the leader of the party, promoting extreme personal worship. The protagonist Winston Smith is a peripheral party member who works in the Ministry of Truth, responsible for propaganda and rewriting history with false information replacing the truth.
Yu Ping suggested that the situation under Xi Jinping’s leadership closely resembles the conditions depicted in “1984” by George Orwell, almost eerily accurate. What the Communist Party is currently doing mirrors the absurd political scenario depicted in Orwell’s novel, becoming a reality. If the former Soviet Union bore some resemblance to “1984,” the CCP’s current actions are even more akin to this absurd social reality.
Yu Ping even speculated whether Xi Jinping and his cohorts had studied “1984,” as they seem to believe that the surreal political scene proposed by Orwell is highly practical in China, thus guiding their actions.
Zhong Zhidong also stated that Orwell’s “1984” accurately depicts the current CCP’s authoritarian rule and omnipresent government surveillance. However, the CCP has taken further steps. One such approach is distorting the Chinese people’s perception of reality. By manipulating the media to brainwash the populace, the CCP creates a starkly different perception from the actual state of affairs.
“People in China may still perceive China as a country well-received by the international community, contrary to the negative global impression of the CCP’s authoritarian rule,” Zhong mentioned.
Another advancement on top of Orwell’s “1984” description is the CCP’s use of technology to strengthen its totalitarian rule. Zhong noted that the CCP has systems like the Skynet Project and the social credit system. Through mass surveillance, big data, and artificial intelligence, the CCP’s regime permeates society, exercising omnipresent control.
Yu Ping suggested that Chinese society under this increasingly closed system is destined to fall behind. However, the future political landscape in China is full of uncertainty, making it challenging to predict when the CCP regime might collapse.
“A more optimistic view is that at some point, an event could trigger the collapse of the CCP’s regime, but on the other hand, the tolerance level of the Chinese people is strong, and they will not rebel until they have no other choice, which is a bit pessimistic,” he noted.