Wang Xiangwei

China Briefing | China’s Covid-19 lockdown dramas show Beijing must learn to trust its people

While outside observers believe China faces a growing ‘trust deficit’ with the world, polls show residents’ faith in Beijing has never been higher

But if the CCP wants to continue enjoying a high degree of faith by Chinese nationals, officials need to lock up their paranoia amid the Omicron wave of Covid-19

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Why you can trust SCMP

People walk next to the fence installed to block out a quarantined area in Shanghai. Photo: EPA-EFE

Wang Xiangwei

Published: 9:30am, 30 Apr 2022

For many observers, China faces a growing “trust deficit” with the rest of the world, particularly with advanced economies, as exemplified by a US-based Pew Research Centre survey in 2020 which showed unfavourable views of the country had reached historic highs amid rising geopolitical tensions.

But China’s officials are having none of it. Rather, they take pride in frequently citing surveys by two other American institutions to show that the Chinese Communist Party and the government enjoy a high-level “trust surplus” among the general population.

The latest Edelman Trust Barometer – a survey conducted by the world’s largest public relations firm and released this year in January – showed trust among Chinese citizens in their government was a record 91 per cent, the highest seen in a decade, as compared to the US where trust in government was at 39 per cent.

Another survey published by the Harvard Kennedy School in 2020, which examined data and conducted interviews between 2003 and 2016, indicated a 93.1 per cent satisfaction rate with the central government.

According to Edelman, China’s swift handling of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, which led to a low mortality rate and kept the economy strong, boosted confidence in the government.

A Beijing resident undergoes a Covid-19 test on April 28, 2022. Photo: Reuters

Indeed, for much of the past two years, the public has exhibited high levels of trust in the government’s zero-Covid strategy, complying with perhaps the world’s toughest virus control measures, including prolonged lockdowns that involved massive disruptions to people’s lives and the blatant intrusion of their privacy. Many Chinese nationals have genuinely seemed to buy into the government’s argument that China’s Covid success proved the party’s autocratic and centralised system of governance was superior.

But China’s increasingly surreal and Orwellian response to the latest Omicron-fuelled outbreak has caused widespread hardships and anger over the zero-Covid policy, which risks eroding its bond of trust with the people.