New provisions shed light on the murky dealings of China’s para-police organization.
In recent days, the Beijing Municipal government has issued guidelines aimed at controlling the methods and curtailing powers exercised by the city’s municipal management agency. But why did they feel the need to reign in such a seemingly benign organization.
The chengguan are another of China’s numerous idiosyncrasies; an urban management and administration bureau that has taken the powers of para-police. They are responsible for the handling street merchants and vendors and are charged with keeping the streets orderly and safe. So why are they so universally hated?
One reason for this is that their extra-legal status, authority and powers offer a huge opportunity for corruption and abuse of power, which has received unusually high profile coverage in the Chinese media. In one notable case in Yunnan province, local residents protested a police station when 30 Chengguan officers were accused of beating a local 17 year old boy to death, according to State media.
In similarly shocking incidents, allegations that the chengguan beat a pregnant woman sparked three days of rioting in the southern town of Xintang; and a water mellon vendor in Shanghai was left permanently brain damaged after a scuffle with five officers.
For more archive footage of the Chengguan, click here.
With their reputation having already sunk so low that only a submarine could find its wreckage, its difficult to imaging what could damage it further. However, they were struck by another blow last year when a copy of a chengguan training manuals was liberated and posted on the internet, advising officers to “take care to leave no blood on the face, no wounds on the body, and no people in the vicinity.” This dismal image reached such shockingly subterranean levels even the China Daily conceded, with uncharacteristic frankness, that their behaviour had “scarred the Government.”
The new measures announced by Beijing government are interesting in and of themselves, in part because of their ambiguity – a common feature of Chinese laws – and part because they shed a revealing light on the activities of what often looks like a form of paramilitary neighbourhood watch.
In true Chinese fashion, the rules include “the three prohibitions and the four ‘not allowed’.” In itself, raising the interesting question of the difference between prohibition and not allowed. According to Jeff Crosby, long time China watcher and Managing Director of a culture and art consulting firm, the first provision of the new ruling states that officers are not allowed to beat, curse or abuse. However, the wording specifies ‘consumers’ not people – leaving an interesting ambiguity. Are chengguan still allowed to beat, curse or abuse vendors?
Amid the more obvious forbidding of the accepting gifts or bribes, a practice widely believed to systemic within the organisation, the third prohibition is more interesting. The prohibition of divulging privileged information. Crosby speculates on rumours that this provision is linked to the blackmailing of unfortunate victims after seizure of sensitive information in raids and searches.
In addition to this the chengguan are not permitted to confiscate goods by force, search cars, or chase cars or people fleeing from the scene. The final point seemingly more concerned with public order.
However, the new provisions do not seem to be law, indicating the moves may be more of a public relations exercise as is common with many proclamations. If this is a PR exercise, then the Beijing government have got their work cut out for them.
Scroll down to view a copy of the Chengguan training manual (Chinese).
