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Campanile, Federico (2019)

Restoring the CCP’s moral legitimacy: An internal perspective on China’s Social Credit System

Master thesis | Asian Studies (120 EC) (MA)
The Social Credit System is an automated mechanism that, collecting citizens’ personal information, aims at restoring trustworthiness in Chinese society. At the same time, this system might serve the purpose of restoring CCP’s moral legitimacy. To shed a light on this second objective, I explore and explain how morality came to be relevant in sustaining political authority in imperial China and why it is still important in Chinese contemporary political discourse. After having depicted the symptoms of China’s moral decay, I analyze the scope and objectives of the SCS. Specifically, I show how the logic behind a peculiar form of Chinese social relation, namely guānxi came to influence the SCS. Moreover, I depict the SCS as an educative tool to mold a new kind of society hinging on the concept of sincerity. Nevertheless, I caution about the potential risks and inefficacies of this didactic automated mechanism.
Social Credit System
Moral legitimacy
CCP
Chinese politics
Confucianism
Big data
Author
Campanile, Federico
Faculty
Faculty of Humanities
Specialisation
MA Chinese Studies
Supervisors
Creemers, Rogier
ECTS Credits
15
Language
en