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Lockdown punctured the Chinese dream

We went from no lockdown to one of the world’s strictest and longest shutdowns since the pandemic’s early days.

Lockdown punctured the Chinese dream
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During Shanghai’s chaotic lockdown, we were shut in our apartments, incessantly swabbed and at risk of being dragged away to grim quarantine facilities by pandemic workers and police in their dreaded white PPE suits. We went from no lockdown to one of the world’s strictest and longest shutdowns since the pandemic’s early days. In processing the broken promises and trauma, one thing seems clear: Something has been lost in China. Not just lost jobs, income or time or the friends who have left to avoid the next lockdown but also a loss of our shared faith in China itself.

For years, there was a sense among Chinese in our 20s and 30s that China — with its newfound strength, stability and seemingly limitless possibilities — was the place to be. I believed it, too. Even COVID was framed as a Chinese success story. While much of the world struggled with the pandemic, China kept its huge population mostly safe through aggressive response measures. The government made clear that this signified China’s strength, the superiority of its system. It was hard to argue with.

Omicron punctured that myth. Applying the same zero-tolerance policy to the highly contagious variant — which tends to have less severe symptoms if someone is vaccinated — caused more harm than good. With Shanghai shut down, many of us faced the prospect of running out of food for the first time in our lives, until authorities mounted an emergency supply effort. Authorities took away residents who tested positive for the coronavirus even though the vast majority were asymptomatic, separated families, soaked apartments with disinfectant and rounded up or killed pets.

Those requiring treatment for other illnesses had to go without, and a collective effort emerged online to record lives lost during the lockdown from other causes — disease, old age or suspected suicide. More than 200 made the list. Meanwhile, state-controlled media parroted Xi’s call to “put people’s lives above all else,” which sounded like a cruel joke. Dozens of other cities also were put under full or partial lockdown. Hints of an imminent reopening repeatedly raised hopes, then faded.

Raised on the story line of a stronger nation led by a government that made all the right moves, most Chinese have learned to live with less attractive aspects of life here: censorship, growing surveillance and a slowing economy that is a source of worry for growing numbers of new job seekers. But the lockdown has magnified these problems. Surveillance is becoming ever more entrenched by COVID-tracking measures, and paralysing the economy for two months — how many businesses won’t recover? — exacerbates employment fears.

The citywide lockdown is over, but are we out of the woods? The Communist Party will hold a sensitive meeting this year during which Xi is expected to extend his grip on power. Controlling COVID is essential to ensuring that all goes as planned. It’s been described as a war that must be won. Already, some Shanghai communities have been forced back into lockdown. A younger generation whose faith has been damaged might walk the path of dissent, as happened at Tiananmen Square in 1989. That’s unlikely in today’s China. Party control is absolute; the lockdown made that clear. It’s easier to try to forget and move on. Many are simply voting with their feet. Some have fled abroad, and others are fast-tracking plans for overseas study or drawing on family or friendship ties in other countries to get out. It’s striking how quickly the land of opportunity gave way to something closer to the dark days of the Cultural Revolution, when Mao Zedong plunged China into chaos by putting radical politics and his agenda above the people. This sense of regression will continue to drive some people away. The vast majority who stay may find it difficult to continue lending unquestioning support to a government that, when it dragged people from their homes, also snatched away their belief in a China that was moving forward.

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DTNEXT Bureau
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