PureInsight | October 28, 2026
[PureInsight.org] How a society treats people who are different from the mainstream, yet have harmed no one, often reveals more about its true level of civilization than anything else.
Those who are treated unjustly today may belong to a group you know little about—or have absolutely nothing to do with. But if a country can, for political reasons, first label a group of people in a particular way and then have the propaganda apparatus, police, judiciary, and even society as a whole treat them according to that label, then the problem will ultimately extend far beyond that particular group. The question that truly concerns everyone is this: Does the law judge a person according to what they have actually done, or according to what those in power say that person is?
This logic still exists in mainland China today. From political labeling amid struggles for power at the highest levels to the experiences of ordinary people seeking to defend their rights, petitioning the government, practicing their faith, or expressing their views, people often find that what they face first is not the facts themselves, but how their identity has been defined. When the political winds shift, who can guarantee that they will never become the next person or group singled out as an “enemy”?
And leaving China does not necessarily mean completely escaping the reach of this influence. In recent years, international human rights organizations have classified China’s surveillance, harassment, and pressure on overseas dissidents, religious groups, and other Chinese people—including pressure exerted through relatives inside China—as forms of “transnational repression.” Publicly documented cases have shown that a person living in the United States can, because Chinese police demand that he return to China, cause his wife—who has returned to China to visit family—to be prevented from leaving the country. Police have even explicitly told her that she herself had done nothing wrong, but that she would be allowed to leave only after her husband returned to China for questioning. What this tactic exploits is precisely the one thing people find hardest to give up—their family.
At the same time, the state’s ability to regulate people and property across borders continues to expand. The State Council Regulations on Exit and Entry Administration, which are scheduled to take effect on September 15, 2026, further institutionalize mechanisms for notifying and enforcing decisions prohibiting people from leaving the country. This year, China has also significantly intensified tax investigations into overseas income, foreign investments, and offshore assets, while expanding its ability to obtain information about assets held abroad through cross-border financial information exchanges. The new tax rules even cover people who have obtained permanent residency or citizenship in a foreign country but continue to maintain their primary economic ties to China.
These different measures obviously cannot simply be equated with the political persecution of 1999. But together, they raise an increasingly relevant question: After a person leaves China, how far can his or her identity, family, freedom of movement, and property actually be separated from the power of the Chinese state?
From this perspective, what happened to Falun Gong in 1999 was never merely an issue concerning Falun Gong.
It concerns every Chinese person.
It concerns whether an ordinary person has the right to appeal when confronted by state power; whether a person can live according to his or her conscience and faith; and whether, when faced with dissent, social conflicts, and large-scale public grievances, a government chooses to listen, rely on the law, and communicate—or instead chooses political labeling, the creation of enemies, and repression.
In 1999, China experienced an extraordinarily clear historical moment at the crossroads between these two paths.
By then, China had already gone through more than two decades of reform and opening. Although it had experienced the major political setback of the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, the market economy continued to develop, society continued to change, and people's sense of autonomy was growing. After decades of political campaigns, Chinese society still retained, for a time, the possibility that social conflicts did not necessarily have to be elevated once again into struggles between friends and enemies, and that citizens' grievances could be addressed through petitions, administrative coordination, or even legal channels.
It was against this backdrop that an event with far-reaching consequences took place in Beijing on April 25, 1999.
After a Tianjin publication ran an article that Falun Gong practitioners considered unfair, approximately 5,000 practitioners went to relevant institutions in Tianjin and the Youth Science and Technology Expo magazine to seek dialogue about the articles and clarify the matter based on their own experiences. Tianjin police subsequently deployed riot police to disperse the practitioners. Some were beaten, and 45 Falun Gong practitioners were arrested. In response to what had happened in Tianjin, to demand the release of those detained, and to seek a normal environment in which to practice, more than 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners went to Beijing on April 25 and gathered near the central government's petition office, hoping to present their grievances through normal channels.
A spontaneous gathering of people on such a scale was undoubtedly highly sensitive under China's political system. Yet no violent confrontation occurred that day. Human Rights Watch recorded that more than 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners gathered peacefully and orderly near Zhongnanhai. Freedom House likewise records that then-Premier Zhu Rongji took a conciliatory approach, met with representatives of the petitioners, and helped secure the release of practitioners detained in Tianjin. The petitioners in Beijing subsequently dispersed on their own.
Looking back at that day today, what deserves to be remembered is not simply that “more than 10,000 people went to Beijing to petition,” but something more fundamental: an event involving a large group of people that appeared extraordinarily complicated and sensitive—and could even have been regarded as a major political crisis—was peacefully resolved through communication within a single day.
This demonstrated that China at the time was capable of dealing with major social conflicts through normal means. The government did not collapse, and society did not descend into chaos. A premier was willing to come out and listen to the people. The protesters expressed their demands through representatives. Issues that could be resolved were resolved, and then people went home. No one needed to become an enemy, and there was no need to launch a political campaign.
Ten years earlier, in 1989, China had already demonstrated that when popular demands were defined by the highest levels of power as a political threat, the Chinese Communist Party could still resort to repression. Yet on April 25, 1999, it demonstrated something else: even when faced with a large-scale gathering of citizens, another path—peaceful and rational—was possible. What ultimately determined the direction of history was not whether there was a way to resolve the problem, but which way those holding the highest power chose at that historical crossroads.
Had history continued along that path, April 25 could very well have become a landmark in China's gradual movement toward more rational, tolerant, and law-based governance.
But history took a turn precisely at this point.
I. April 25: A Major Social Conflict Could Have Been Resolved This Way
On April 25, Zhu Rongji was initially confronted with a straightforward set of questions: Why had so many people come? Why had people been arrested in Tianjin? What were their demands? And how should the government respond?
The starting point of this approach was simple: first recognize that the people on the other side were individuals who could be engaged in dialogue and ordinary citizens with legitimate grievances to express; then address the matter based on the facts. Precisely because of this approach, an incident that could easily have been politicized ultimately ended in a relatively peaceful manner.
This is where the real historical significance of that day lies.
It demonstrated that when a government faces a large-scale gathering of citizens, repression is not the only option. Even when the numbers are large and the situation is sensitive, as long as people are not violent and have not harmed others, a government can still resolve the issue through listening, communication, and administrative measures.
Of course, this does not mean that Zhu Rongji subsequently remained opposed to the suppression of Falun Gong. Once persecution became an established policy of the Chinese Communist Party, he did not publicly break with it. Therefore, revisiting April 25 today is not about portraying Zhu Rongji as a hero who resisted the system.
What truly matters is the historical fact that day left behind—one that cannot simply be erased:
China could have resolved this issue without resorting to persecution.
And that path had already been demonstrated to be viable in practice.
It is precisely for this reason that everything that happened afterward deserves even greater scrutiny.
II. Why Was an Issue That Had Already Been Resolved Turned into an Enemy?
If violence had occurred on April 25, if people had stormed government offices, or if the petitioners had demanded the seizure of political power, then the government’s decision to take security measures could at least have been a legitimate matter for discussion.
But that was precisely not what happened that day.
More than 10,000 people came and maintained order. Representatives went inside to talk, and their concerns received a response. Once the matter was resolved, the crowd dispersed on its own. In other words, April 25 itself had already provided the answer: this conflict could be handled peacefully.
So why, then, was an issue that had already been resolved later turned into a nationwide political crisis?
This may be the key to understanding 1999.
Zhu Rongji saw “the situation”: people had been arrested, people had come to petition, and the government needed to understand what had happened and resolve the matter.
Jiang Zemin, however, saw “a threat.”
In a system where all important forces in society are ultimately expected to remain under the organizational and political control of the Communist Party, a large group that was not directly organized by the Party, yet had its own beliefs, moral principles, and social connections, could easily be viewed as an uncontrollable force. The principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance followed by Falun Gong practitioners were not bestowed by the Communist Party, nor did they require political authority’s approval to exist. A person could live according to his or her own faith and strive to be a good person without relying on a political organization.
For a government that genuinely allows society to maintain a degree of autonomy, this should not constitute a threat. But for a system that places political control above social autonomy, independence itself can become a problem.
And so, the question fundamentally changed.
Originally, the question was: What did these people do?
Later, it became: Who are these people?
A person’s actions should have been judged according to facts and law. Instead, a political label was imposed first, and that label then determined how the state could treat the person.
This is precisely the kind of logic that repeatedly appeared throughout the Chinese Communist Party’s political campaigns. Whether during the Anti-Rightist Campaign or the Cultural Revolution, similar methods were used: first designate the enemy, then use propaganda to construct an image of that enemy, mobilize the organizational system to demand that society take a position, and ultimately make the police, judiciary, workplaces, schools, and even families operate around political objectives.
What makes 1999 particularly alarming is that, after two decades of reform and opening up, China had seemingly been gradually moving away from this kind of campaign-style governance. Yet over the issue of Falun Gong, it returned to this old path.
What Jiang Zemin initiated was not an entirely new political method.
What he revived was precisely the method most familiar to the Communist Party: first create a distinction between “us” and “the enemy,” then mobilize the entire machinery of the state to deal with the “enemy” that had been created.
III. Jiang Zemin — A Perennial Sinner at a Historic Crossroads
The persecution that continued for more than two decades could of course not have been carried out personally by Jiang Zemin alone. Countless Party and government officials, police officers, propaganda agencies, judicial institutions, and grassroots organizations participated in it. To explain such an enormous state action entirely as the work of one individual would not adequately capture the complexity of history.
But that does not mean Jiang Zemin’s responsibility can therefore be diminished.
On the contrary, one of the most important facts about 1999 is that another path had already existed—and had already been proven workable.
The way the April 25 incident was handled had already demonstrated that the issue could be resolved through communication. There was no violence and no genuine threat to the regime. Had the authorities continued along that path, the matter could quite possibly have remained an ordinary issue of social governance.
But Jiang Zemin chose to reject that path.
He re-politicized an issue that had already been peacefully resolved, redefined a faith community as a target that had to be suppressed, and pushed the machinery of the state toward comprehensive repression. By July 1999, a nationwide crackdown was underway. In the years that followed, international human rights organizations continued to document serious abuses, including arbitrary detention, prolonged imprisonment, and torture.
Precisely because there had already been a successful example of peaceful resolution, what happened afterward cannot be explained by saying that “there was no other way at the time.”
There was another way. It had already been tried, and it had already worked.
It simply did not continue.
Therefore, if we ask who bears the most direct political responsibility at this historical crossroads in 1999, the name Jiang Zemin should not be allowed to fade into historical ambiguity.
His responsibility lies not merely in initiating a campaign of persecution, but in the fact that, at a moment when another possibility had briefly emerged in China, he personally turned the country back toward the political-campaign path most familiar to the Communist Party.
Yet holding Jiang Zemin responsible is only the first layer of the question.
The deeper question is: Why could the personal will of one supreme leader turn an issue that had already been peacefully resolved into a nationwide political campaign?
Why, once the highest authority made a decision, could the propaganda apparatus, police, judiciary, Party organization, schools, workplaces, and even grassroots society so quickly mobilize around it? Why could the law not stop it? And why, even when there were differing opinions within the Party, could they ultimately not develop into any genuine system of checks and balances?
Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that the machinery of political campaigns had never truly disappeared.
As long as the highest authority could once again declare “who the enemy is,” that machinery could be activated all over again.
In this sense, Jiang Zemin’s personal choices and the Communist Party system itself are not two separate issues. It was precisely this system that enabled one person’s malicious intentions and actions to be rapidly transformed into the actions of the entire machinery of the state.
IV. When a State Begins to Persecute Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance
On July 20, 1999, the Chinese Communist Party launched its nationwide crackdown on Falun Gong. Large numbers of Falun Gong practitioners were detained, subjected to forced labor, imprisoned, tortured, and even killed for refusing to abandon their faith. There have also been allegations of forced organ harvesting from practitioners.
Yet if we understand this persecution only in terms of the number of victims and what they endured, we still underestimate the damage it inflicted on Chinese society as a whole.
Because what this persecution targeted was precisely “Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance.”
In a normal society, honesty should be respected, kindness should be protected, and a person’s ability to show tolerance and restraint in the face of pressure and competing interests should be regarded as a virtue. But once a group whose guiding principles are Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance is labeled by the machinery of the state as a target that must be suppressed, an extremely dangerous inversion of right and wrong takes place.
An ordinary person might know a Falun Gong practitioner personally and know that this individual has never harmed anyone. They might even know that the person has become kinder and more self-disciplined through practicing. Yet television, newspapers, and workplaces continually tell them an entirely opposite story. Officials are required to declare their positions; workplaces are expected to fulfill political assignments; schools, communities, and families are drawn into the campaign as well. Even people who know that something is wrong may choose to remain silent because of their jobs, personal safety, family, and practical interests.
Over time, one of the most dangerous changes in a society begins to emerge:
People do not necessarily stop knowing the difference between right and wrong. Instead, they gradually become accustomed to surrendering their own judgment of right and wrong in the face of power.
They may know perfectly well that someone is a good person, yet be afraid to say a single word in that person’s defense. They may know that official propaganda contradicts what they have witnessed with their own eyes, yet continue repeating it anyway. They may know that a person who has committed no crime should not be treated this way, yet because “the authorities have already defined him,” they feel there is no need to question it further.
Once this transformation takes hold, it cannot affect only Falun Gong practitioners.
The morality of a society does not exist as something abstract. It is built through the countless everyday choices of ordinary people. A person choosing to be honest, a businessperson refusing to sell counterfeit goods, a doctor refusing to deceive a patient, a company refusing to sell toxic food, a government official refusing to use public power for personal gain—these seemingly unrelated actions all depend on a common premise: people believe that there are certain things one should not do, even if doing them would bring personal benefit.
That is morality.
But if the state itself continually demonstrates to society that, for political purposes, right and wrong can be reversed; that, for the sake of political power, good people can be portrayed as bad people; and that once a political label has been imposed, facts, law, and even human dignity can all be pushed aside, then the consequences of that example cannot remain confined to the political sphere.
They will gradually seep into business, government, education, medicine, and relationships between people.
People begin learning not “What is the right thing to do?” but “What is the safest thing for me to do?” They stop asking first, “What should I not do?” and instead ask, “What will benefit me most?”
Looking at Chinese society today, many people cannot help but feel a profound sense of unease. Fraud and counterfeiting, as well as food-safety problems, continue to recur. Basic trust between people is often lacking. In business, education, medicine, and even public life, personal interests are frequently placed ahead of right and wrong. When confronted with injustice, people's first instinct is often self-preservation. Strangers are wary of one another, and sometimes even when someone clearly needs help, people hesitate to intervene because they are afraid of taking on responsibility.
These problems of course have their own direct economic, institutional, and social causes. But at a deeper level, when a society is forced for a prolonged period to accept an inversion of right and wrong, lies taking precedence over facts, and political power taking precedence over conscience, the process itself inevitably erodes the most basic moral foundations of society.
As the fifth of Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party points out, Jiang Zemin and the CCP's political machinery formed a relationship of “mutual exploitation” during this persecution: Jiang Zemin relied on the machinery of violence, propaganda, and organization that the CCP had developed through decades of political campaigns to carry out the persecution, while that machinery was itself fully reactivated through the creation of a new “enemy.”
In 1999, Jiang Zemin and the CCP's political machinery exploited each other to launch the persecution of Falun Gong—and of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. This became a critically important turning point in the broader process of moral collapse.
If speaking the truth can bring punishment while repeating lies is safer; if people who insist on being kind can be targeted while those who carry out unjust orders are rewarded; if maintaining one's conscience in the face of political power requires a heavy price while abandoning one's principles can provide practical security, then the longer this inversion of values continues, the more thoroughly a society's moral boundaries will be hollowed out.
If a society cannot even protect “truth,” how can people build trust with one another?
If “kindness” can become dangerous in the face of political power, why would people continue to be kind?
If standing by one's principles in the face of threats comes at a cost, while abandoning one's conscience makes survival easier, what kind of people will such a society ultimately reward?
This may be one of the most important—and yet long-overlooked—threads in the dramatic deterioration of moral standards in China after 1999.
And today, twenty-seven years later, as an increasing number of different groups—from people of faith and rights defenders to entrepreneurs, overseas dissidents, and even their relatives who remain in China—may in various ways encounter political labeling, restrictions on leaving the country, pressure exerted through family members, or forms of transnational control, perhaps people are only now beginning to see more clearly what that door opened by the persecution of Falun Gong ultimately led to.
What was breached was the boundary that was supposed to protect everyone.
V. What Was Silenced Was Not Just a Group, but China’s Future
Twenty-seven years later, as people look back on the recently departed Zhu Rongji and revisit April 25, perhaps the question that truly deserves to be asked is no longer simply whether Zhu Rongji handled the situation well at the time.
Because April 25 itself had already provided an answer.
That day, a highly sensitive petition involving more than 10,000 people was resolved without violence. The government and the people were able to talk. Conflict could be resolved through communication. A country did not need to turn people into political enemies simply because they held different beliefs.
On April 25, 1999, China had once given an answer:
Listen to them.
A few months later, Jiang Zemin gave another answer:
Turn them into enemies.
The distance between these two answers was not merely the difference between two approaches to handling social conflict. It represented two fundamentally different choices between right and wrong.
The first choice recognizes that people are, above all, human beings. It recognizes that even if a person does not belong to the Party's organizational system, and even if that person has beliefs of their own, they can still express their grievances through normal channels. The second choice, by contrast, revives the politics of dividing society into friends and enemies. It places a person's identity above his or her actions: once those in power declare someone an “enemy,” the entire state can be mobilized to reform, suppress, and ultimately destroy that person.
This is also why the consequences of 1999 could never remain confined to Falun Gong.
A society was forced to learn how to protect itself in the face of lies, how to remain silent in the face of kindness, how to let political labels replace facts, and how to place immediate personal interests above conscience. When a state begins persecuting people who strive to live according to Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance, what it destroys cannot be limited to a single faith community.
What it ultimately destroys is society's shared standard for distinguishing right from wrong.
The many painful problems visible in China today of course have complex and varied causes. But looking back twenty-seven years, 1999 was undoubtedly a historical rupture that cannot be avoided. That year, China had glimpsed another path—and had already demonstrated that the path was entirely workable.
It was Jiang Zemin who cut that path off.
Yet the question history leaves for the Chinese people cannot end there.
Because if one bad person simply made one wrong decision, then replacing that person should seemingly bring the problem to an end.
But that is not what happened.
What is truly disturbing is this: Why was one person able to turn an issue that had already been peacefully resolved into a nationwide persecution? Why, whenever the highest political authority redraws the line between us and the enemy, can the entire machinery of the state so quickly mobilize behind it? Why are the law, institutions, and society unable to prevent such a thing from happening?
When we pursue these questions to their logical conclusion, we are no longer confronting only Jiang Zemin's personal responsibility. We are confronting the deeper question of why a political system can repeatedly manufacture enemies, invert right and wrong, and make the entire machinery of the state submit to such a distortion of truth and justice.
Perhaps this is the most profound reflection that 1999 leaves for China today.
The true bottom line of a civilization has never been how much wealth it creates, how many skyscrapers it builds, or how much power it possesses in the world. It lies in how a country treats a defenseless person who simply wishes to hold on to his or her faith and conscience when standing before political power.
On April 25, 1999, China briefly demonstrated:
We can listen to them.
And a few months later, another choice cuts off that path.
What was silenced, therefore, was not merely the right of one group to live and practice its faith normally.
What was silenced was also a future that might have brought hope to all of China.
Chinese version: https://www.zhengjian.org/node/303894
