Former Chinese President Jiang Zemin passed away last Wednesday at the age of 96. Although he was nominated by the conservative wing of the party leadership after the brutal crackdown on demonstrations in Beijing’s central Tiananmen Square in 1989, he is collectively remembered as the leader of a golden decade when China’s incredible economic growth and attracting foreign investment became the industrial laboratory of the world. Jiang’s death came as current Chinese leader Xi Jinping faced the biggest wave of social unrest since 1989, just a month after he was elevated to the rank of quasi-emperor at the 20th Communist Party Congress to begin his third presidency with powers that no predecessor had. after the death of Mao Zedong. Demonstrations in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and other major urban centers, as well as on dozens of university campuses, focused on lifting the long-term lockdown imposed by the authorities as part of a coronavirus-free pandemic strategy that bears Xi’s personal stamp.

Unlike the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc European countries, Maoist and post-Maoist China is accustomed to open forms of social protest such as strikes, sit-ins, rallies and demonstrations. However, in the last three decades, any manifestations of popular discontent were, as a rule, local in nature and were directed against local officials, leaving the central leadership defenseless. This time, the wave of protests took on a nationwide scale, and in some cases became overtly political.

However, any comparison to the Tiananmen Square uprising would be unrealistic. In 1989, against the backdrop of the collapse of the Eastern Bloc and an open split in the party leadership between the so-called Gorbakhtsy and the hardliners, millions of Chinese took to the streets in more than 300 cities demanding democracy. One million people gathered at Tiananmen Square in Beijing alone. Last weekend’s protests numbered in the thousands, a drop in the ocean of 1.4 billion Chinese. Today’s party leadership is aligned around Xi, Chinese youth are not looking to the West but are embracing Chinese nationalism, and social discontent with the detainees remains focused on the lengthy prison sentences imposed by the zero coronavirus policy.

To be fair, China was not alone in choosing this strategy. Many Asian countries, as well as New Zealand and Australia, also introduced strict and lengthy lockdowns early in the pandemic, when effective vaccines were not yet available. However, at some point, especially after vaccines appeared, patience began to wear thin. Excesses such as the inhuman months-long isolation in Shanghai have exacerbated the situation. In the context of reduced economic activity due to restrictive measures, rising youth unemployment to 20% and falling business profits, a broad social front has formed calling for the lifting of restrictions. However, the hopes that many had pinned on a change of course since the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation were denied to China. A harbinger of what was to come was a major uprising by workers at the Foxconn industrial complex in Changzhou, which manufactures iPhones and iPads for Apple. A deadly fire in Urumqi, Xinjiang province, which has claimed ten lives, was the latest cause for protests as many believed draconian restrictions prevented fire and rescue crews from reaching their destination on time.

The prolonged restrictions imposed by the authorities as part of the strategy to combat the coronavirus are now causing public outrage.

Under these circumstances, Xi Jinping faces serious dilemmas. If he insists on a strict zero-covid policy and does everything possible to suppress the protesters, he risks turning the riots into a real social explosion. On the other hand, if he makes a 180-degree turn, he risks not only his personal prestige, since this will be, as it were, an admission of the failure of his policy, but a serious, humanitarian crisis. With the pandemic raging in some 80 cities, the sudden lifting of restrictions threatens to choke hospitals and cause many millions of victims of the virus. Several Western media outlets have accused Xi of refusing to import new-type mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna from the West because of his nationalist ankylosis and limited themselves to less effective Chinese ones. This criticism seems unfounded. As Le Figaro wrote, the effectiveness of Chinese vaccines after three doses is comparable to Western ones. But these are China’s real problems: firstly, vaccination rates for the elderly and most vulnerable remain low, and secondly, the population’s overall immunity is very limited, as a small percentage have been exposed to the virus due to the lockdown. .

For now, the Chinese leadership appears to be leaning towards traditional carrot and stick tactics, with moderate crackdowns and occasional loosening of restrictions, especially in cities that have been hardest hit by lockdowns, a reduction in testing of the general population and an accelerating rate of vaccinations. . In the first year, this tactic seems to have paid off, as demonstrations were limited after the weekend’s big bang. But exceptions, such as Guangzhou, one of the country’s largest industrial centers, where mass protests clashed with police on Wednesday, suggest that new outbreaks are always on the agenda.

At this juncture, Jiang Zemin’s death has added another headache to Xi Jinping, who is called to lead ceremonies honoring his very different predecessor. Associations with 1989 are ominous in this regard. The reason for the demonstrations at the time was the death of Hu Yaobang, the CCP’s general secretary until 1987, who, although not as popular as he was in power, became a hero and symbol of the rebels through his death. Could something similar have happened to Jiang? It’s hard, but you never know.