Why China's 'mass line' movement is headed for a dead end
Chang Ping says the 'mass line' education campaign is little more than a Mao-inspired attempt to incite the masses to toe the party line, and doomed to failure in today's China
Last weekend, Guizhou vice-governor Chen Mingming commented on his Sina Weibo microblog on a shooting case in Miami, Florida. A subsequent exchange with another blogger led him to say: "Some people curse their own country every day, but they continue to stay here rather than move to the US! [They should] go to America as fast as they can! But first they should have plastic surgery, so they won't be recognised as Chinese."
One blogger suggested that such criticism stems from people's love of country - the deeper the love, the harsher the criticism. But Chen retorted: "Some people don't love their own country, and feel upset about being a Chinese. So just let them go to the US, the faster the better! Human scumbags!"
Meanwhile, the Chinese Communist Party has been steering a "mass line" education campaign, aimed at broadening and cultivating contacts with the masses.
On April 19, the Politburo resolved to spend about a year carrying out the campaign in groups from the top down within the party, starting from the second half of this year. The party has set up an office to lead and conduct the campaign, while two party websites have jointly launched a website for the mass line movement.
Relevant educational activities and meetings have since been held across the country to this end. Official news items are beginning to appear tagged with a "mass line" label.
On June 18, the day the party officially launched the campaign, President Xi Jinping addressed the issue in a long speech, calling mass line the party's "ruling lifeline" that must guide all its work.
