SINGAPORE – Under President Xi Jinping, the Communist Party of China has sought to aggressively reassert control of the economy, pursuing some of the country’s largest private companies in an attempt to reclaim what it considers the capitalist excesses of an era previous.
Now, the party, which this year celebrates the centenary of its founding, is making it increasingly clear that it intends to fit into the private lives of Chinese citizens to a point that has not been seen in decades.
This week, party officials have introduced new limits on the amount of time young Chinese can spend playing online. The restrictions come amid a crackdown on pop culture icons and follow moves to drastically limit extracurricular tutoring.
Taken together, these movements represent a shift in the social contract that existed under Xi’s two immediate predecessors, in which the party expanded personal freedoms in exchange for an acquiescence to the party’s monopoly on politics.
The party says its goal is to give more active form to the next generation of Chinese.