FT: “China’s Communist party has unleashed a rectification campaign of a scale and tone not seen in more than a decade as the leadership seeks to address frustration over corrupt officials while avoiding bold political reforms.
As investors wait for party chief Xi Jinping to initiate long-delayed economic reforms and liberals in China push for political change, Mr Xi is taking a page out of the playbook of Mao Zedong, the charismatic but dictatorial politician who led China through a sequence of mass campaigns.
Mr Xi, in a speech on Tuesday, exhorted the party that it must embrace the “mass line” to avoid its extinction. Every cadre, demanded Mr Xi, must “look in the mirror, tidy your attire, take a bath and seek remedies” to clean the party from formalism, bureaucratism, hedonism and extravagance.
All cadres from county level upwards have to attend study and criticism sessions during the year-long campaign. State media are blanketing the public with interpretations of the “mass line” – the concept that the party must remain close to the people to understand and address their needs.
“This is a very big thing for the party’s style. There has been nothing like it for at least the past decade,” says Wang Wen, the former commentary head of the party tabloid Global Times who now leads a think-tank at Renmin university.
via China’s Communist party takes page from Mao’s playbook – FT.com.
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