In the first quarter of 2025, there were nearly 44,900 cases of violations of the so-called Central Eight Regulations, an increase of 75% compared to the same period last year; in 2024, the number of violations of these regulations had doubled since 2014. Analysis indicates that corruption is a characteristic of the power structure and system of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), shaping the “ecosystem” of its officialdom.
Last week (June 2nd to June 8th), information released by the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and National Supervision Commission indicated that 16 people were investigated, 9 were disciplined, and there were 5 instances of violations related to eating and drinking.
On May 28th, the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and National Supervision Commission announced a summary of the investigation of violations of the Central Eight Regulations in April this year. In that month, a total of 18,845 cases were investigated, with 16,513 individuals receiving disciplinary actions.
In terms of the level of investigation, in April, there were 97 cases involving prefectural-level leadership, 993 cases involving county-level leadership, and 17,755 cases involving officials at township and sub-district levels. Among these, the issues involving township and sub-district-level officials accounted for 94.2% of the total number of cases investigated.
According to a report by the Hong Kong media South China Morning Post on June 9th, since March of this year, the CCP has been implementing a new round of the Eight Regulations.
In March of this year, the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection released an expanded list of what are known as the “80 violations of the Eight Regulations,” covering various aspects from fund management to official receptions, meeting arrangements, business trips, government vehicle and office usage, referred to by officials as the “80 red lines.”
The report states that since early May, Beijing has dispatched eight “Central Guidance Teams” to inspect the implementation of the Eight Regulations by various ministries, local governments, state-owned enterprises, and universities. However, similar to Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign, in recent years, as the movement against extravagance has deepened, violations have not decreased but have instead increased.
According to statistics from the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, there were nearly 44,900 cases of violations discovered in the first three months of this year, with nearly 39,400 individuals receiving penalties, showing an increase of 75% and 50% respectively compared to the same period in 2024; in 2024, there were approximately 225,000 cases of violations, almost double that of 2014; and over 221,000 individuals faced disciplinary actions, more than six times the number from a decade ago.
In December 2012, Xi Jinping put forward the so-called Central Eight Regulations at the 18th CCP Political Bureau meeting.
On June 9th, Professor Sun Guoxiang of the Department of International Affairs and Business at Taiwan’s South China University told Epoch Times that the CCP becomes more corrupt as it opposes corruption. In recent years, violations have not only failed to decrease but have shown a trend of “more inspections leading to more corruption,” indicating the presence of multiple structural and systemic issues in its system.
Just as the CCP vigorously promotes the Eight Regulations, officials openly violate these regulations in defiance.
On March 22nd, during a conference on learning the Central Eight Regulations in Luoshan County, Xinyang City, Henan Province, 10 officials from the political and legal system violated the rules by indulging in improper eating and drinking. The leading figure among them was Li Xianlin, a member of the Luoshan County Party Committee and Secretary of the Political and Legal Affairs Commission.
Li Xianlin and five others consumed 4 bottles of liquor, and one person died later that afternoon after drinking. Following the incident, when the Luoshan County Political and Legal Affairs Commission reported to the County Party Committee, they concealed the drinking situation of the deceased individual, and the County Party Secretary Yu Guofang, knowing the report was false, did not report it to higher authorities.
The CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection stated that this case of improper eating and drinking occurred during the education on implementing the Central Eight Regulations and was a “typical case of lawlessness and defiance, extremely serious in nature and detrimental in impact, and must be strictly handled.”
For example, on the evening of May 9th, He Yunyu, the Party Committee Secretary and Chairman of the Rural Revitalization Investment Co., Ltd. in Lujiang County, Hefei City, organized a meal against regulations, along with 12 leading cadres of Lujiang County, resulting in He Yunyu being dismissed from office and the other 11 individuals being suspended for inspection.
Scholar Li Yuanhua studying in Australia told Epoch Times that these regulations are merely a facade; wining and dining officials is a common practice among CCP officials. “When Xi goes anywhere, not only is he treated to food and drink, but those around him are also treated.”
Li Yuanhua pointed out that the Eight Regulations are merely a superficial act by the CCP, making it seem as if the party is clean and its regulations are strict. Eating and drinking are just surface activities, with the real essence lying in the exchange of interests and achieving certain goals through these actions.
He said, “CCP officials want to hold office because they want the right to be corrupt, and the higher the position, the more corruption they can indulge in. Whether it’s eight rules or eighty rules, everyone is just following the wind, and more people won’t stop splurging just because of these regulations.”
Professor Sun Guoxiang believes that under the CCP system, where power is highly concentrated and lacks external independent supervision and transparency, it leads to a situation of “policies on the top, countermeasures on the bottom.” In order to advance their careers and maintain connections, officials still need to establish networks of interests through irregular gathering, gifts, and other means. Many irregular behaviors are rooted in the internal “unwritten rules” and personal networks of the system, and while the anti-corruption movement has its deterrent effect, it has not been able to eliminate structural problems such as power-seeking behavior and collusion between officials and businesses.
He believes that corruption is a characteristic of the CCP’s power structure and system, where one-party rule, high levels of power monopoly, and opaque resource allocation have made corruption a “lubricant” for the operation of power, becoming part of the ecosystem of officialdom.