On June 28, 2013, at a national conference on organization work, Xi Jinping set out five standards for a good official: firm conviction, service to the people, diligence and pragmatism, daring to take responsibility (敢于担当), and honesty.
The same five phrases now stand in Article 1 of the revised Civil Servant Law, in force since June 1, 2019.
甩锅 To throw the pot. To shift the blame onto someone else.
背锅 To carry the pot. Short for 背黑锅, to carry the black pot, to take the blame for others.
踢皮球 To kick the ball around. Said of offices that pass a matter back and forth to avoid responsibility.
不求有功，但求无过 Seek no merit, only avoid faults.
多一事不如少一事 One more matter is worse than one matter less.
In 1950, the scholar Qian Zhongshu was asked to join the committee translating Mao Zedong’s Selected Works. He told his wife, Yang Jiang: “This job is not easy to do. Seek no merit, only avoid faults.”
In his Record of Daily Knowledge (日知录), the 17th-century scholar Gu Yanwu distinguished between protecting a state and protecting all under heaven. Protecting the state is a matter for the ruler and his ministers. “Protecting all under heaven is the responsibility of even the humblest commoner.”
Liang Qichao later condensed the idea into the phrase 天下兴亡，匹夫有责: “The rise and fall of all under heaven is the responsibility of every commoner.”
In 1046, the statesman Fan Zhongyan wrote The Yueyang Tower (岳阳楼记). Near its end, it describes the ideal of the virtuous men of old: to be “the first to worry about the worries of the world, and the last to enjoy its pleasures” (先天下之忧而忧，后天下之乐而乐).
According to a 2019 report, the essay is a must for school exams, and visitors who could recite it in full were admitted to the tower for free.
In 2016, Xi Jinping called for “three distinctions.” Mistakes made in reform through lack of experience or bold trials should be distinguished from knowing violations. Errors in experiments not yet forbidden should be distinguished from defiance of clear bans. Unintentional faults made to promote development should be distinguished from violations for private gain.
In May 2018, the General Office of the Central Committee issued an opinion to set up mechanisms for tolerating and correcting errors (容错纠错). Officials who miss a target but break no rule and seek no private gain are not to be judged negatively.
On April 3, 2003, Health Minister Zhang Wenkang said that SARS was under control and that Beijing had only 12 cases and 3 deaths. On April 20, Beijing’s reported number of cases jumped from 37 to 339. Hours after that press conference, the Party Center and the State Council removed Zhang and the mayor of Beijing, Meng Xuenong, from their Party posts.
Meng resigned as mayor, taking responsibility for the failure (引咎辞职). Five years later, as governor of Shanxi, he resigned again after a tailings dam collapse in Xiangfen.
In October 1934, Lu Xun published the essay Have the Chinese Lost Their Self-Confidence? (中国人失掉自信力了吗). He answered that since ancient times China has had “people who work hard with their heads down, people who strive with all their strength, people who plead for the people, people who give their lives for the truth.” These, he wrote, “are the backbone of China.”
As a Party secretary of Lankao County in Henan, Jiao Yulu worked to fight the county’s floods, sandstorms and salt-alkali soil, and died of liver cancer on May 14, 1964, still in office.
The Party named him “a model for county Party secretaries.” In 1990, People’s Daily published an editorial titled “Leading cadres must learn from Jiao Yulu.” In March 2014, Xi Jinping visited his memorial in Lankao.
In his Government Work Report of March 2015, Premier Li Keqiang said that officials who do nothing (为官不为) and lazy, idle administration must be publicly exposed and firmly held accountable.
At his press conference on March 15, he explained: “The doors are easy to enter now and the faces are friendlier, but nothing gets done. That is officials not doing their job, and they must be seriously held accountable.”