In December 2017, Xinhua reported a written instruction by Xi Jinping on formalism and bureaucratism. It called for firm measures “in particular against prominent problems such as making many statements in a high key, with little action and poor implementation” (表态多调门高、行动少落实差).
Two-Faced People
Article 51 of the Communist Party’s Regulations on Disciplinary Action, in their 2018 version, punishes members who are disloyal and dishonest toward the Party, “are one thing outside and another inside, comply in public and defy in secret, and deceive those above and below.” The Party calls such a member a 两面人, a two-faced person.
In January 2026, Xi Jinping described such people to the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection. Some, he said, “state their position very quickly and in a very high key” on carrying out the Party’s major decisions, “but in fact comply in public and defy in secret.”
Words for Later
再说 Let’s talk about it later. Literally “speak again.” Used to put a decision off.
从长计议 To plan for the long term. Not to decide now.
好说 Easy to discuss. A modest, polite phrase. It can also mean “that can be arranged.”
推三阻四 To push three and block four. To give one excuse after another.
敷衍 To deal with something only on the surface.
Patting One’s Chest
拍胸脯 To pat one’s chest. To take responsibility, to vouch for something. A dictionary example: “No problem, I dare to pat my chest on it!”
打包票 To issue a guarantee. To give a full guarantee.
包在我身上 Wrap it on my body. Leave it to me, I guarantee it.
The Good-Person Card
你是个好人 “You are a good person.” Since the 1990s, this has been a common way to turn down a suitor, often followed by “I believe you can find someone better than me.” The phrase spread from online forums in Taiwan.
Internet slang calls it receiving a 好人卡, a “good-person card.” To refuse a suitor gently is 发卡, to hand out a card.
Asking for One’s Bones
In the Han dynasty, Shu Guang and Shu Shou served together as tutors to the crown prince. After five years, Shu Guang said: “Know when enough is enough, and there is no disgrace. Withdraw when the work is done, that is the way of Heaven.” On the same day, both reported sick.
After three months of sick leave, Shu Guang said that his illness was serious and petitioned to “beg for his bones” (乞骸骨), the old formula for asking to retire. The emperor agreed and gave them twenty jin of gold. Hundreds of carriages saw them off.
Following Master Red Pine
Zhang Liang was the chief strategist of Liu Bang, the founder of the Han dynasty. After he was made a marquis, he announced: “To be teacher to an emperor by a three-inch tongue, with a fief of ten thousand households and the rank of marquis, this is the highest a commoner can reach. For me it is enough. I wish to leave the affairs of men and wander with Master Red Pine.”
Master Red Pine is a legendary figure. Zhang Liang stopped eating grain and practiced breathing exercises. After the emperor died, Empress Lü insisted that he eat, and he gave in. (Sima Qian, Records of the Grand Historian)
Steps to Come Down
给台阶下 To give someone steps to come down. To offer a way out of an awkward position.
不了了之 To settle a matter by not settling it. To leave it unfinished, let it drag on, and count it as done.
冷处理 Cold treatment. To leave a matter untouched for now and settle it at a better moment.
推托 To decline with an excuse.
婉拒 To refuse gently.
People in the Middle
中间人 A person in the middle. Someone who introduces, mediates or witnesses between two sides.
和事佬 A peacemaker. Someone who settles quarrels.
说和 To talk two sides into making peace. The word appears in Dream of the Red Chamber.
托人 To entrust a matter to another person. To ask someone to act on one’s behalf.
The Fengqiao Experience
In 1963, during the Socialist Education Movement, Fengqiao district in Zhuji, Zhejiang, dealt with the “four categories” of class enemies by having local people supervise and reform them on the spot, without arrests. Mao Zedong wrote an instruction that other places should copy it.
Over the decades, the Fengqiao Experience came to mean settling disputes locally. Xinhua sums it up: “Small matters do not leave the village, big matters do not leave the town, conflicts are not passed up.”