China’s Social Credit System: A Step Towards Dystopia? Part Four: Joint Punishment
The Joint Punishment System was produced by a 2016 meeting involving 45 different government agencies. At its core, it is an agreement to share data and use a national blacklist for internal decisionmaking.
Two questions cut to the heart of the Joint Punishment System: how do you get on the blacklist? And what happens once you’re on the blacklist?
Standards for admittance onto the blacklist are simple: put yourself in a position of contempt of the authorities, such as by failing to appear for a mandatory court date or failing to comply with government policies like taxation.
Being on the blacklist, which lasts two years, means a life of restrictions. These include but are not limited to access to senior job positions, purchasing real estate, and participating in “high-class” activities like international travel, five star hotels, and first class flights. In March of this year, the government reported that 9 million plane ticket sales and 3 million train ticket sales had been blocked through the national blacklist.
Following the initial implementation of the Joint Punishment System, the national government began encouraging subsectors and local governments to carry out their own experiments.
The travel industry quickly implemented its own blacklist to penalize things like scalping train tickets or prank-opening emergency exits. This blacklist came with a travel ban of up to a year. Housing, food security, and several others followed suit. The national government published a list of a dozen “model cities” in 2017, each with a noteworthy approach to the Joint Punishment System. Standouts from this list include Weihai, which was recognized for its efficient technical infrastructure, and Rongcheng, which has adopted a stickier version of the Suining experiment in which they grade citizens from AAA to D based on a points system.
By this point, the SCS has built considerable momentum, moving with the full force of a billion people and a centralized government. But it won’t all be smooth sailing ahead…
Next: Part Five: Barriers
Part One: Introduction
Part Two: Historical Context
Part Three: 2014 Social Credit Plan
Part Four: Joint Punishment System
Part Five: Barriers
Part Six: Looking Ahead
