A crucial enabling factor in the growth of the Tiananmen Square protests was the bickering among China’s leaders. This time there is no sign of division
. But as someone so mindful of his own party’s history and that of other communist countries, Mr Xi will shudder at some of the echoes of the past. Students have gathered on numerous campuses, calling not only for freedom from covid-related lockdowns, but also broader political freedoms. Their actions recall the early days of the protests 33 years ago, when students seized an opportunity—official mourning for the death of a reformist leader—to press for political change., died at the age of 96.
The party prefers to remember it as an outpouring of anti-Western sentiment. Participants were enraged by the giving away of German-held territory in China to Japan by the victors of the first world war. But it also spawned inquiry into what had made the West strong. Many concluded that the essential ingredients were science and democracy. In 1989 student protesters liked to present themselves as latter-day May Fourth campaigners, fighting for a long-neglected goal.
in sympathy involving mainland students at numerous Western universities—the most widespread of their kind in decades.Mr Xi may take comfort, however, from differences between the recent unrest and events in 1989. A crucial enabling factor in the growth of the Tiananmen Square protests was division and dithering among China’s leaders. The rifts among them were huge and obvious. On one side were reformers who wanted to give market forces a freer rein and create a more relaxed political climate.
Such tension is hard to imagine today. Mr Xi is general secretary and head of the armed forces. He has relegated the role of prime minister to the sidelines. Retired elders, who were then very influential, present little threat to Mr Xi. The death of Mr Jiang, his predecessor-but-one, has removed a figurehead of potential opposition, but Mr Jiang had long been too weakened, physically and politically, to pose any serious challenge.
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