BEIJING (HRNW) — China has ordered closer adherence to the dictates of the ruling Communist Party and leader Xi Jinping in legal education, demanding that schools “oppose and resist Western erroneous views” such as constitutional government, separation of powers, and judicial independence.
The order was dated Sunday, a week before China’s ceremonial parliament begins its annual session and reinforces the leading role on ideology assumed by Xi, who is named no less than 25 times in the document. Already China’s most powerful leader in decades, Xi was granted a third five-year term as party leader last year and has removed term limits on the presidency, effectively allowing him to rule for life.
Similar directives have been issued in past, with students encouraged to report on professors who speak positively about Western concepts of governance.
Despite the intertwining of the Chinese and global economies, Xi has sought to purge liberal Western concepts from the education system, ordered that foreign religions be “sinicized” in order to operate in China. He has also attempted, with limited success, to reorganize popular culture along more conservative lines, going so far as to ban “effeminate” men from the state broadcaster.