A document recently leaked by a petitioning department in a certain region of China reveals the development of a "warning model for petitioners who engage in persistent and disruptive petitioning." This model analyzes petitioning behavior, assesses individual risk levels, and prioritizes identifying illegal, overstepping one's authority, and malicious petitioners. The model, using blue, yellow, orange, and red as warning levels, aims to identify "core leaders" and "potentially active petitioners." According to a petitioner in Shandong, local authorities have further refined the "risk" of petitioners into six levels.
Chinese local governments have been obstructing petitioners from reaching the National Petition Office in Beijing for over two decades, emphasizing the need to establish a so-called "early warning mechanism." A recently released document further calls for "accurately identifying all types of illegal petitions, persistent petitioners, and those who cause disturbances," with a focus on identifying "disorderly petitions bypassing higher levels," "petitioners with malicious intent in visiting Beijing," and "potential petitioners who are still active."
The document, titled "Evaluation Model for Warning of Petitioners' Persistent and Disturbing Petitions," has entered its second revision. The model categorizes petitioners into four warning levels, assessing their risk based on their petitioning history over the past year.
Petitioners reveal that the "black level" is the highest level of control
Mr. Zheng, a longtime Shanghai petitioner, confirmed in an interview with Radio Free Asia on Thursday (the 22nd) that the document he had seen was true. He revealed that local governments have similar tiered documents to prevent petitioners from entering Beijing: "They monitor petitioners' risk levels, which range from blue, yellow, and red. I'm in the highest level—black. This categorization has been in place for a long time. Our city leaders also told me that I belong to the top level of prevention and control. For example, when Beijing held the 'Two Sessions,' others weren't under control, but I was already under surveillance."
The internal document, which is several pages long, shows that the authorities are using data mining technology to analyze the trends of petitioners, focusing on "core leaders" and "potential petitioners who are still active."
Jiangxi rights activist Liu Lequn told this station that local governments have long used data models to restrict petitioners from petitioning, and this restriction has now spread to all aspects of their lives, including going out to do business and visit relatives and friends. He said: "Every time the Two Sessions are held, the government will hire seven or eight security guards to monitor you in advance and not allow you to go out. When you go out on other days, they use your phone to locate you. Not long ago, I was in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai, and other places, and my room was searched in a Hangzhou hotel. The police asked me what I was doing there, who I was traveling with, who I wanted to see, and what my license plate number was. They checked very carefully."
In recent years, China's court system has also established a petition risk warning mechanism. For example, the Shanxi Provincial High People's Court has implemented a three-level warning system: "red, orange, and yellow," corresponding to different petition risk levels and formulating corresponding handling measures.
As early as 2010, Yan Yaojun, a scholar from Tianjin University of Technology, and others published an article proposing that "systematic monitoring, evaluation and analysis of letters and visits and a series of issues reflected in the process of letters and visits should be carried out, and on this basis, possible letters and visits problems should be discovered and predicted in advance."
Risk ratings have become a tool for suppression, and rights defenders cannot escape monitoring.
These mechanisms have sparked widespread concerns about privacy and freedom of expression. Shandong petitioner Lu Qiumin told this station that local authorities categorize petition warnings into six levels, with her at the highest level. "I'm at the highest level, jointly monitored by the Ministry of State Security, the Ministry of Public Security, and the Petition Office. The local government has assigned 'stability control personnel' to follow me constantly."
She pointed out that local officials are worried that petitioners going to Beijing will affect their careers: "The National Bureau of Letters and Calls has a point-deducting system for local officials. If petitioners go to the National Bureau of Letters and Calls, local officials will be deducted points, which may affect their promotion or even lead to dismissal. The documents currently leaking online are actually internal local materials, which exist in all regions. We can all feel it."
Shanxi scholar Deng Guangqing pointed out that the authorities' logic of viewing petitioners as "potential dangers" has long been widely used in the stability maintenance system. He said: "From human rights lawyers to religious believers, from worker organizers to ethnic minorities, China's 'precision governance' is to control dissident groups through technological means under the banner of 'prediction' and 'prevention'."
The logic of "potential hidden dangers" extends to petitioners
Nanjing rights activist Mr. Zhu (who declined to use his full name for security reasons) said the public security system has used "organizational mobilization capabilities" as a criterion for evaluating petitioners: "It's not about what you've done, but what you 'could' do. Now, this logic is also being applied to petitioners."
A Beijing-based legal scholar who declined to be named told this station that without judicial independence and legal safeguards, such early warning mechanisms can easily be used as tools to suppress rights defenders: "Once there is a lack of transparency and a complaint mechanism, this type of predictive governance becomes a means of arbitrarily infringing on citizens' rights."
Currently, the original text of this document is difficult to find online. Our station tried calling the Nanjing and Jingdezhen Petition Offices, but no one answered the calls.
