Xi promotes 'mass line' campaign

Party chief urges leaders to listen to criticism in the workplace

President Xi Jinping, who is also the Communist Party of China chief, urged Party members to better use criticism and self-criticism in their work to improve on their abilities to find and resolve their own problems.

Xi said that criticism and self-criticism are powerful weapons to solve contradictions within the Party.

"The members should constantly relay criticism and self-criticism on their work to boost unity and the implementation of democratic centralism," Xi said at a three-day meeting with top officials from Hebei province that ended Wednesday.

Xi's statements during his meetings with Hebei officials reiterated two major themes from his ongoing "mass line" campaign, which was launched in June and aims to strengthen the Party's ties with the people as well as clean up decadent work styles, including formalism, bureaucracy, hedonism and extravagance.

During the meeting, Xi called for a persistent fight against the four undesirable work styles as they are "harmful, stubborn in nature and prone to relapse".

He urged Party members to resolve their problems with an open mind and carry out criticism and self-criticism based on facts instead of personal interests or relations.

In examining their own work styles and conduct, officials from Hebei province discovered several major problems.

They pointed out that officials did not fully carry out local inspections and only made passing glances at projects while speaking loudly of their achievements in order to pursue praise.

These actions, according to the Hebei officials, showed that they did not rightfully serve the people. Some officials also did not place the public's interests high on their list of priorities.

Based on these problems, the Hebei officials searched for causes and established plans to correct these problems. Xi said that they should focus on solving these problems and follow exemplary work styles.

Meetings with officials, Xi said, are a good way to promote the "mass line" campaign.

"The'mass line' campaign should not tail off once it gets started," he said.

"Criticism and self-criticism, the traditional CPC methods to keep a good working style, will help Party members keep close ties with the public and be alert to harmful habits or even crimes," said Liang Yong, a researcher at the Shijiazhuang Academy of Social Sciences in Hebei province.

Some officials would turn a blind eye on the misdoings of colleagues even though they knew it's wrong, while the stress of this tradition will improve the work efficiency of the government and good relations with the public, he said.