Silencing the Lambs

How does one fight corruption without a system of checks, balances and independent bodies with the power to investigate? Is it even possible? China’s new leader, Xi Jinping, has joined a parade of predecessors pledging to reign in the plague of rampant corruption that infects his nation at every level, threatens the ability to control the nation’s biggest polluting plants and factories, and seems to be perpetuating an upper class of princelings stymying a genuine attempt to spread economic success to more people.

But Xi has one huge problem: there is one source for all power in China: the Communist Party. The People’s Liberation Army goes not report to the government: it only reports to the party. The entire judicial system is completely below the Party infrastructure. Even for large Chinese corporations with listings on international stock exchanges where corporate regulation is lawfully vested solely with the board of directors, top officers are appointed, replaced and fired solely at the discretion of the Party. The only body authorized to investigate corruption is the Party, and Party leaders have complete control of everyone at their level and below… a practice that works its way to the top. Further, it is very commonly accepted practice, until one reaches the highest peaks within the Party (and then it up to your relatives to score), for senior party cadres in charge of approving business activities to receive stock, options or direct asset ownership in the very activities they are governing.

For top government functionaries, there is one organization, the Central Organization Department, that must vet each and every one of the Party’s top leaders. Folks who work at that ministerial division, all in an unmarked building in Beijing, are indeed all-powerful. The problem, of course, is that only the Party can investigate itself and absent embarrassment to the Party – corruption, malfeasance, or misfeasance that is so obvious to the global community that it can no longer be hidden – the Party leaders at each level simply will not prosecute their own. Oh, if you make enough political enemies and the Party needs a scapegoat, such individuals go down and go down hard. Death sentences, long prison terms and the like are very possible (although forgiveness and reinstatement are not unheard of). It isn’t the courts that decide who lives and who dies. By the time a judicial body “tries the case and passes sentence,” the Party has long-since made the decision.

The Communist Party is whatever they define themselves to be. They refer to Marxist/Leninist doctrine and define their view of “democracy” as a party appointed to administer on behalf of the people. One must assume that Xi has the best of intentions, truly wanting to represent his people to the best of his ability. But he has to deal with what is, and his political strength has yet to stabilize. On May 24^th, I presented one case where obviously the Party (and most probably Xi) allowed the press to serve as an outside investigatory body. But the Party is the single and solitary force behind everything in China. The Party disdains the Western notion of checks and balances, claiming that progress is slowed and societal goals lost in the battle between dissonant factions. They point to our economic collapse and the filibuster-driven roadblocks in Congress as clear examples of our “inferior” system of governance.

Lest we settle into an aura of smugness, there are forces within our government that seek to sidestep the Civil Service Commission to allow firing government employees who blow loud whistles… seeking a balance between national security and a need to have an open and transparent democracy, tilting heavily towards the former. “[There is] a barely noticed memo quietly released by the Obama administration earlier this year…  Issued on Jan. 25, the memo instructs the director of national intelligence and the Office of Personnel Management to establish standards that would give federal agencies the power to fire employees, without appeal, deemed ineligible to hold ‘noncritical sensitive’ jobs. It means giving them immense power to bypass civil service law, which is the foundation for all whistle-blower rights.

“The administration claims that the order will simply enable these agencies to determine which jobs qualify as ‘sensitive.’ But the proposed rules are exceptionally vague, defining such jobs as any that could have ‘a material adverse impact’ on national security — including police, customs and immigration positions… In the past decade, whistle-blowers have exposed everything from the Bush administration’s efforts to censor reports on climate change to the Food and Drug Administration’s failure to stop the sale of unsafe drugs like Vioxx. 

“Almost invariably, those who have spoken out have faced harsh reprisals, a problem addressed by the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act, a landmark bill passed by Congress last year that provides compensatory damages to whistle-blowers who win their cases after an administrative hearing. President Obama signed the law; he also issued a directive calling for new whistle-blower protections for employees in the intelligence community.” Eyal Press writing in the May 27^th New York Times.

But our government doesn’t really seem to want such whistle-blowers, and once such a brave individual surfaces, he or she is immediately treated like an untrustworthy pariah. “The Obama era has been a strange time for whistle-blowers. Agencies with investigative powers have become more responsive to tips from whistle-blowers. Important new laws have been enacted.

“Yet during Mr. Obama’s first term, a record number of national security officials were prosecuted for allegedly leaking classified information to the press, a zeal that continues today, with aggressive tactics employed to locate officials who leaked information to Fox News and The Associated Press… The administration apparently strongly supports whistle-blower rights — except when that support collides with its desire to appease the national security establishment.” NY Times. It’s time to pick our system of government and live by it. Do we prefer the Chinese format or something that is American and homegrown?!

I’m Peter Dekom, and between harmful inquiries against a free press and punishing whistleblowers, we walk a fine line that threatens our very basic governmental assumptions.