{"id":25609,"date":"2020-11-22T18:48:53","date_gmt":"2020-11-22T10:48:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chinaworker.info\/?p=25609"},"modified":"2020-11-22T23:05:03","modified_gmt":"2020-11-22T15:05:03","slug":"students-protest-prison-like-restrictions-across-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinaworker.info\/en\/2020\/11\/22\/25609\/","title":{"rendered":"Students protest prison-like restrictions across China"},"content":{"rendered":"

Student protests sweep Chinese campuses against draconian lockdowns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hong Liuxing (\u7ea2\u6d41\u661f) chinaworker.info<\/p>\n

Due to the coronavirus pandemic the Chinese state imposed strict lockdowns on university and school campuses\u00a0since April. In August, the Ministry of Education announced a partial relaxation\u00a0of the rules for the new semester that started on 1 September. But many schools continued with hard lockdowns, involving strict exit controls and security guards blocking school exits, which gave rise to significant student protests in several regions. This article was written in October.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Universities across China continue to be in lockdown. 37 million students across\u00a0the whole country\u00a0are not allowed to leave their campuses, officially to \u201cprevent the further spread of the pandemic\u201d.\u00a0Protests have erupted at campuses in many different parts of the country.\u00a0In such repressive conditions, the students of China have demonstrated their commendable bravery in\u00a0the\u00a0face of totalitarian rule.<\/p>\n

To stifle criticism, the CCP dictatorship makes massive propaganda claims about \u201cdefeating\u201d the pandemic and the economic crisis, but these boasts are\u00a0exposed by the very nature of student demands \u2013 against the unbearable sanitary conditions of the dormitories. From the use of \u201cgutter oil\u201d\u00a0[cooking oil recycled from waste]\u00a0in campus canteen food to increasing water prices and cuts on already limited shower times for students, the\u00a0cash-starved education system\u00a0spares nothing for students while the\u00a0government\u00a0conducts a three trillion yuan bailout for\u00a0businesses and local governments that have furloughed and laid off millions of workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cFive demands\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Students from Dongguan to Hefei have organized protests against the campus authority\u2019s draconian restrictions, adopting a set of \u201cfive demands\u201d against skyrocketing water and electricity fees, bans on takeaway food, and shortening of internet usage time.\u00a0This is significant: the use of \u201cfive demands\u201d has become a feature of\u00a0some protest situations in China and is directly copied from last year\u2019s Hong Kong mass struggle, even if the content of the demands varies.<\/p>\n

The students\u2019 final demand is almost a mini-Hong Kong protest call for\u00a0democracy, pushing for the democratic election of student delegates to negotiate and fight for the students\u2019 demands. The authorities have\u00a0predictably\u00a0laid accusations of \u201cforeign influence\u201d against the student leaders. A hashtag on Weibo [China\u2019s most popular social media platform] relating to the protests was read more than 150 million times before being quickly censored. With these short bursts of defiance, a prairie fire of student protests has spread across the country.<\/p>\n

The biggest attack on students has come from the shortening of their 7-day national holiday to just one day. 2,000 students from Tengzhou High School in Shandong province demonstrated against the holiday restriction, advancing the spirit of resistance against the\u00a0regime\u2019s\u00a0increasing\u00a0everyday repression \u2013 and winning.<\/p>\n

These demonstrations should not be underestimated. They represent a deep discontent and angry mood among the youth against the dictatorial capitalist system and the pressures it places on them as future workers. Even high schoolers are bravely raising the slogan \u201cFight until death, Give us back holidays\u201d, writing in their mobilization letter that \u201cwe\u2019ve been silent for too long\u201d and that \u201coppression will never seek to constrain itself because of our submission\u201d. Famous Mao phrases like \u2018wherever oppression exists, there will be resistance\u2019 have also been popular.<\/p>\n

The campus protests are connected to the Jasic struggle of 2018, in which around 60 leftist students supported workers\u2019 strike action and calls for an independent trade union in Shenzhen. A much wider layer of students, while not directly involved because of the extremely repressive conditions, followed this struggle closely through surreptitious online forums and chat groups and then became radicalized against the rich and powerful.<\/p>\n

Budget cuts<\/strong><\/p>\n

Restrictions on students\u2019 rights are often at the forefront of\u00a0attacks, as the schooling system under capitalism seeks to produce obedient workers for future profits.\u00a0Extreme levels of\u00a0control in universities therefore reflect a very real fear from the CCP as the contradictions under\u00a0its state-guided\u00a0capitalism have become completely unmanageable.<\/p>\n

The newest wave of attacks on\u00a0people\u2019s\u00a0livelihoods includes a 9.8% or 13.7 billion yuan cut to the 2020 education budget, no doubt pushing more\u00a0households\u00a0to rely on the massively expensive system of private tutoring, where parents can spend an average of 120,000 yuan a year on tutors in a country that has over 600 million living under 12,000 yuan per annum. This egregious inequality is further exacerbated by underfunded schools, creating\u00a0huge numbers\u00a0of low-income workers that are forced to work in sweatshop conditions\u00a0\u2013 this applies to the service and even tech sectors, not only China\u2019s infamous factory sweatshops.<\/p>\n

But students cannot win the battle against budget cuts and rising fees alone; the entire system of capitalism headed by the CCP is at fault. Many of the 8.7 million college students expected to graduate this year won\u2019t be able to find jobs, and the same spirit of resistance\u00a0should\u00a0be targeted against the rampant inequality that pervades capitalist society.<\/p>\n

The bravery of\u00a0the\u00a0student protests should inspire workers to take action and defend their own interests against the mass layoffs and wage cuts the bosses and\u00a0the\u00a0state have enacted. Only through the working class, who are at the center of production under capitalism, can the entire system of oppression be defeated.<\/p>\n

Already, the state has gone on the counter-offensive,\u00a0with school authorities often backed up by the police, rounding up so-called ring leaders and cracking down on the protests. It is a familiar pattern from the CCP authorities to initially offer some partial concessions to defuse a\u00a0movement, but then follow later with repression against those it identifies as \u201cagitators\u201d. This will not be the end of the matter, however. China has a long history of student protests that in turn trigger mass workers\u2019 struggles and even revolutionary movements, as in 1919 and 1989. The CCP dictatorship is particularly nervous about protests by students for this reason. The recent protests and their nationwide appeal are like the first tremors before an earthquake, they are a sign that huge mass struggles are on the way.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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