Over the past few days we’ve been given a few key illustrations as to how much the Communist Party intends to reform – and seen approximately what decade they think they’re living in.
China’s president-in-waiting Xi Jinping has been MIA since September 1st. In typical Communist Party fashion, the government is pretending like nothing is amiss. Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said, “We have told everybody everything” – which of course means they’ve told nobody anything.
The Chinese government also recently asked that a Taiwan/Tibet Independence symbol be taken down…in Oregon. The Chinese consulate in San Francisco asked the Corvallis local government to force a Taiwanese-American to take down the mural he’d painted. It would have otherwise been shrugged off by the handful of people that happened to drive past it. Instead, the Chinese government has made yet another cringe-worthy soft power fail.
Both cases show the CCP’s go-to response for unpalatable events: Suppression. It’s hardly changed throughout its 63 year tenure.
It’s wholly delusional about the time it lives in now though – a time where a hefty hunk of the world’s population holds in their pockets the ability to take photos and video and then spread them and whatever other information they wish for the world to see. After a steady stream of unsuccessful attempts at covering up damaging events over the past few years, the CCP still hasn’t learned that sometimes transparency is in its own interest.
Take Xi Jinping’s mysterious absence. 10 years ago if anyone in the public happened to notice, they’d hardly have the capability to inform others. Suppression made sense. But today we all know something is up. And by trying to keep the lid on it completely, the government is egging on absurd rumors that are much worse than whatever it is they’re trying to hide. (Could whatever actually happened really be any worse than rumors of a double assassination attempt by Bo Xilai loyalists?)
In trying to hide things that are already partially or completely public knowledge, the party is highlighting its own insecurity and weakness, which is never good for authoritarian rulers.
10 years ago if I tried to spread pictures of a forced abortion or take part in a village uprising over illegal land grabs, I’d be disappeared and my family scared into silence. 99 times out of 100 nobody would ever be the wiser. The officials responsible and the greater system that enabled their actions would be left unscathed.
But in today’s world, the government – after trying vainly to cover them up – had to capitulate completely in cases like those of Feng Jianmei and Wukan. If I’m an activist in today’s China, I’m a lot less frightened to speak out against government injustices than I would have been even three years ago. If I protest and am hauled off, I know there’s a good chance somebody will catch it on video or can alert the weibosphere, ensuring my safety. The government’s attempts to hide these things used to be terrifying. Now they’re just pathetic.
For nearly the entirety of the CCP’s rule, it’s projected the image of an all-powerful monolith that’s not to be fucked with. Refusing to 
acknowledge that top leaders are encumbered by personal lives or bodily functions like the rest of us is part of this image. This probably explains the instinctive suppression of what could be no more than a back injury.
But today’s China is showing (much to the chagrin of the CCP) many of the features of a transparent democratic society where leaders must bend to the public will – even if it’s not in their own interest. They could jump on the inevitable wave of democratization, but officials who’ve enjoyed an elevated status in society for decades are loathe to do so. So we still see this instant inclination toward suppression.
I’m reminded of the scene in Wizard of Oz where Dorothy and her pals are confronted by the enormous “great and powerful Oz.” But they eventually discover that it’s just a weak man pulling levers as he pathetically implores the gang to “pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”
When you peak behind the CCP curtain, it’s full of scared and vulnerable people, wondering what badly-needed moves toward transparency will mean for them and the way they’ve lived their lives.
Sinostand 