SHANGHAI — Warning of threats from “decadent lifestyles,” China’s ruling Communist Party yesterday demanded heavier political indoctrination of university students and stricter control over campus organizations and Internet bulletin boards.
The demands were spelled out in a document excerpted on the front page of the People’s Daily and other party newspapers. It complained of “many weak links” in political education.
“Most students still love the Communist Party, love the motherland and love socialism, but changes in the situation at home and abroad are sternly challenging their ideological and political thinking,” the document said.
A former head of the party’s youth league, President Hu Jintao has emphasized traditional socialist conformity and strict party control during his two years as party chief. Independent-minded media have been punished, dissidents rounded up and further measures erected to detect and trace subversive speech on the Internet.
The document demands more student participation in compulsory military training and tougher party control over student groups, especially among new types of campus organizations such as online communities.
It singled out campus Internet bulletin boards, among the freest forums for discussion in China, where criticism of the government can bring a long prison term. Such forums must be made to serve the goals of political indoctrination, it said.
“Resolutely guard against the pernicious influence on students of all forms of harmful culture and decadent lifestyles,” the article said.
Other measures included offering free museum tickets to further “patriotic education,” as well as encouraging government offices and businesses to support student charity work.
Many on the Internet greeted the announcement with disdain, citing recent campus scandals involving bribe-taking administrators.
“Shouldn’t we first shore up ideological education among administrators so they won’t feel embarrassed to teach their students?” read one unsigned posting on the popular Sina.com Web site.
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