Case

From Pandemic Control To Zero-COVID Politics

Zero-COVID showed how public health, cadre accountability, grassroots grids, health codes, and propaganda framing became one power chain.

What The CCP Is Doing

Zero-COVID began under the language of public health, but gradually became a political task. It connected virus control, cadre accountability, city management, grassroots grids, health codes, testing, quarantine transfer, propaganda mobilization, and public opinion censorship into one chain. The policy was no longer only a medical judgment. It became a political project for testing cadre loyalty and governing capacity.

The project placed every person inside management. Movement, residence, work, medical care, shopping, school, and travel between cities could all be connected to health codes and grassroots control. A technical system gave a color, grassroots offices enforced restrictions, platforms controlled discussion, and propaganda explained necessity. Public health became training in social obedience.

How It Works

The first step was politicalization of the target. Zero-COVID was defined as a line that had to be upheld, making local officials afraid to adjust. The second step was indicator-based execution. Testing frequency, case numbers, quarantine counts, lockdown scope, and social clearance became local pressure. The third step was combination of technology and grid control. Health codes, travel codes, testing records, and community checks together determined a person's ability to move.

The fourth step was downward responsibility. To avoid blame for outbreak spread, localities expanded lockdowns, transferred people early, and tightened control. The fifth step was public opinion suppression. People who questioned policy, recorded secondary disasters, or exposed grassroots problems could face deletion, muting, summons, or accusation. The sixth step was abrupt reversal. When the policy changed, the logic people had been required to obey changed quickly, while responsibility remained difficult to trace upward.

Key Facts

Zero-COVID shows the extreme form of campaign-style governance. It was not a single-department policy. It was a convergence of nearly the whole governance system: organization departments evaluated cadres, health authorities provided professional appearance, police and grassroots offices enforced control, technical platforms managed movement, propaganda shaped emotion, and cyberspace authorities handled criticism.

The harm came not only from lockdown itself, but from a power chain that could not correct itself. Localities knew excessive lockdowns caused secondary harm, but feared outbreak failure more. Grassroots workers knew residents suffered, but feared incomplete tasks more. Platforms knew real problems existed, but feared public opinion spread more. Each link placed political safety above human need.

Consequences

The first consequence was the capture of the body by governance systems. A person's movement, medical access, work, and family life could depend on codes, passes, communities, and notices. The second consequence was damaged social trust. Neighbors, workplaces, volunteers, and communities were pulled into control, turning relations into risk management. The third consequence was disappearance of responsibility. After policy reversal, many harms were treated as past events rather than publicly accountable injuries.

Zero-COVID also revealed the danger of technical governance. A health code looked like a public health tool, but once connected to administrative power, it could decide who moved, who did not, who was transferred, and who could not seek care. Technology was not only convenience. It became a power switch.

Our Position

Zero-COVID politics was a stress test of the CCP power structure. It showed how the Party-state can turn public health into political loyalty, technical tools into movement permission, grassroots grids into household control, and propaganda lines into emotional discipline. What must be remembered is not only how strict lockdowns were, but how quickly the system entered bodies and daily life. Zero-COVID ended, but that power capacity did not disappear.