How ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ is taking over China’s classrooms

From this month, in an extension of a personality cult not seen since Mao Zedong, ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ is being incorporated into China’s national curriculum. School textbooks are emblazoned with Xi’s smiling face, together with heartwarming slogans telling readers as young as six that their leader is watching over them. ‘Grandpa Xi Jinping is very busy with work, but no matter how busy he is, he still joins in our activities and cares about our growth,’ reads one.

‘Xi Jinping Thought’ must be taught at all levels of education, from primary school to graduate programmes, and there is special emphasis on capturing the minds of the youngest children. ‘Primary schools will focus on cultivating love for the country, the Communist party of China, and socialism,’ according to Global Times, a CCP tabloid. A circular issued by the National Textbook Committee Office of the education ministry says that primary school children must be made aware that ‘Chairman Xi guides the whole party and the Chinese people’.

Textbooks are tailored for each age group. Six- to eight-year-olds are told of the need to ‘button the first button of life correctly’, an injunction often used by Xi to stress the need for conformity and obedience from an early age. The messages to older children get a little more complex — but only a little. They stress the need for ‘absolute partyleadership’, with Xi at the helm.

The books often employ folksy homilies to make their point. One explains how Xi’s love for China began with a lecture his mother gave him at an early age about a patriotic Song Dynasty general. Another explains how Xi, who has no military experience, has a ‘deep feeling for the army’ because he wore military uniforms when he was a child. There is plenty of nationalist chest-thumping, as students learn how Xi defeated Covid-19, lifted China out of poverty and set the country on a path towards becoming a ‘modern socialist great power’.