Tyranny Fiercer Than a Tiger: Now Targeting CCP Officials Too

Photo Caption: The first session of the 14th National People's Congress will open on March 5, 2023, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China. (Photo by Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)

People News – The story of "tyranny fiercer than a tiger" is likely familiar to many. It tells of a woman who lived in the mountains where tigers had killed three generations of her family, yet she refused to move because there was no tyranny in the mountains. Upon hearing this, Confucius sighed, "Remember this, tyranny is fiercer than a tiger." The moral of the story is that while tigers are brutal, tyranny is even more ruthless.

The original intent of the story was to criticize oppressive rulers who inflict suffering on the common people. However, in today's world of pervasive tyranny, it seems not only ordinary people are suffering—officials themselves are also in "high-risk" positions. Some say that under Xi Jinping, China has become a place where even officials cannot live peacefully. Recent developments, such as the investigation of General Miao Hua, member of the Central Military Commission and director of the Political Work Department of the People’s Liberation Army, suggest a new wave of purges is underway. The fear and instability among high-ranking CCP officials appear to be escalating yet again.

Is It Easy to Be a "Servant" in the "Three-Slave Society"?

Under authoritarian regimes, officials typically wield unchecked power to oppress and exploit the people. This stark opposition between officials and citizens often overshadows an underlying reality: officials themselves often lead difficult lives under authoritarian rule. China can be described as a "three-slave society," consisting of slaves, servants, and slave masters. While the suffering of slaves is well-known, and the privileges of slave masters are evident, the plight of servants often goes unnoticed. Whether called "officials" or "cadres," they are essentially servants within the Chinese political system. The current trajectory of Chinese politics increasingly highlights the hardships of being a servant, offering critical insights into the system.

Within the "three-slave" framework, servants are inherently double-faced. On one hand, they act as petty slave masters, wielding power to exploit the people; on the other, they are high-level slaves, subject to the whims of even more powerful authorities. Viewed from below, the first face dominates. During periods of political stability or prosperity, every petty slave master abuses their public power to exploit the people, reaping personal gains and behaving tyrannically in society. A decade ago, the infamous "My dad is Li Gang" incident revealed how even the son of a low-ranking public security official could act with impunity, similar to the children of high-ranking national leaders. That was the face of China's so-called "prosperous era."

Against this backdrop, Xi Jinping launched a vigorous anti-corruption campaign upon taking power. Many servants had come to view themselves as outright slave masters, which naturally posed a threat to the supreme slave master’s control. From above, the perspective shifts: in the eyes of the top autocrat, even a department-level or provincial-level official is insignificant. Under Xi’s rule, around 600 provincial and ministerial-level officials have been investigated, with over 50 in 2024 alone. Miao Hua, categorized as a "vice-national-level" official, follows the fates of Qin Gang and Li Shangfu, who also held such ranks before their downfall. Among those who ascend to vice-national status, few achieve it without decades of flattery, scheming, and wrongdoing. They likely viewed themselves as untouchable slave masters at their peak, yet they find themselves imprisoned and stripped of all power. Truly, being a servant is no easy task.

The Current Political System Also Harms Officials

I do not sympathize with these "servants," but I want to emphasize this: while the current political system primarily harms the people, it also victimizes officials. The idea of "tyranny fiercer than a tiger" applies here—not only does this ruthless tyranny devour ordinary people, but it also consumes cadres. In Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign, aren’t these senior officials often referred to as "tigers"? These "tigers" wreak havoc and harm the people not because they possess any exceptional abilities but because they are tools of authoritarian politics. This system, more ruthless than these "tigers," not only oppresses the people but can turn on its servants and devour them at any time.

The problem is that some servants fail to grasp this logic. They believe that their downfall is solely due to Xi Jinping’s actions. Some argue, "Yes, but before Xi Jinping, during the 'golden era' for officials, wasn’t it still an authoritarian system? Back then, didn’t these servants thrive, rise through the ranks, and act with impunity? Why didn’t that authoritarian system devour its servants?"

This is a classic case of “the mushroom born in the morning knows not of dusk; the cicada born in summer knows not of autumn.” We need not go as far back as Mao Zedong's era of purges, even though Mao was the creator of this political system. Consider instead the imprisonment of Politburo member Chen Xitong or the execution of National People’s Congress Vice Chairman Cheng Kejie. How did these cases arise? It is true that during Jiang Zemin’s and Hu Jintao’s combined 20-plus years in power, fewer high-ranking officials were purged. The authoritarian system seemed less inclined to devour its servants during that time. However, focusing solely on the system’s appetite while ignoring its inherent logic cannot fully explain the phenomenon.

This logic involves at least three key points: During the so-called "golden era for servants," widespread corruption and brutality among officials—epitomized by cases like "My dad is Li Gang"—not only provided Xi Jinping with ample targets but also legitimized his anti-corruption campaign, allowing him to "hunt tigers and swat flies" under the guise of restoring order. More critically, how could Xi Jinping manage to take down hundreds of powerful senior officials, tens of thousands of mid-level bureaucrats, and hundreds of thousands of county- and township-level cadres who exercised unchecked power over the people daily? This is not solely his doing; it is the system itself that granted him such power. This system was created by Mao Zedong, inherited by Deng Xiaoping, and maintained by Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. The essence of this system lies in its extreme concentration of power and its relentless suppression of human nature. This system opposes not just the humanity of certain individuals or groups but the humanity of everyone, including the system’s own servants.

Pity these servants of power. Having once shared in the spoils of monopolized authority, they remain devoted to maintaining that monopoly, even as they languish in prison cells. If ordinary people are often trapped in the mindset of "blaming corrupt officials but not the emperor," then servants, when they fall from grace, frequently fall into the trap of "blaming the emperor but not the system of imperial power." In this sense, tyranny’s cruelty surpasses even that of a tiger—it consumes not only their lives but also their minds. Tragic indeed!

(Adapted from Voice of America)