Chinese government officials
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- Category: current online writing
- Published on Saturday, 11 June 2011 11:51
- Written by Erik
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People are telling me what it's like to be a government official in China. This is what they say:
- If they want to become government officials, students must be members of the Communist party. Only party members can be trusted and only they can have a successful official career. The Communist party is about the state, not about the working-class or world-revolution.
- Businessmen have money, but government officials have power. Power is better than money. If you have power you can get money, but if you only have money you cannot necessarily get power.
- Goverment officials, if they're male, very often have a "second wife." Whether female government officials have a second husband is less clear.
- In addition, being a government official is a stable job. Students always point this out. No risk of being fired.
- All government bureaucracies have a double-structure -- one belonging to the ordinary administration, the other to the Party. It is the party officials who rule over ordinary officials.
- Getting ahead in this hierarchical structure is the only thing that really matters. This is true of universities too which make no pretense at being collegiate structures. Forget publishing. You make a career for yourself by bashing other people's heads together. Universities are disciplinary institutions.