A
huge oil painting entirely covers one wall of a bedroom. As
the painting slowly slides up, it reveals a wall of banknotes
stacked in bundles. Whipping off the quilt, one finds the
king-size bed is made of banknotes too. Such a haul of cash is found in
the villa of a lowly division head of a certain ministry, the banknotes
totalling 230 million yuan (US$33 million) hidden in almost every
corner.
The scene comes from the second episode of the television series,
In the Name of the People, dubbed by media as the Chinese version of
House of Cards, the hit UK and then US political drama.
Written by Zhou Meisen, one of the most influential contempo-
rary writers in the political genre, the series is built around a compli-
cated corruption case brought to light by a conflict at a factory in a
fictional province.
The 55-episode series became an immediate hit after its debut
on Hunan Television, one of China’s most pioneering networks, on
March 28, 2017. Its pilot episode attracted a total of 350 million
views on television and online. The programme has become one of
the highest-rated domestic TV dramas of all-time on rating and re-
view site Douban with a score of 8.7 out of 10, with 56,524 votes.
Sponsored by the TV and Film Production Centre under the Su-
preme People’s Procuratorate (SPP), the highest agency responsible
for both investigation and prosecution in China, the programme is
the first drama series since 2004 to feature high-level government
corruption as the primary theme. It is part of President Xi Jinping’s
sweeping anti-corruption campaign launched at the 18th National
Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2012.
The programme’s unprecedented choice of making a deputy-state-
level official a villain, faithfully depicting the internal power struggles
within officialdom and explicitly revealing the lifestyle of senior of-
ficials, has already earned the series the reputation of “the most daring
anti-graft drama ever made in China.”
Breaking the Ice
The genesis of In the Name of the People came about with Fan
Ziwen’s repeated visits to his old friend, the renowned writer Zhou
Meisen, at the end of 2014.
Fan, deputy of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate’s Film and Tele-
vision Centre, badgered Zhou into picking up his pen again to write
an anti-graft drama that reflects the intensified anti-corruption cam-
paign of recent years.
As one of the best-known writers of political fiction, 61-year-old
Zhou Meisen has written a series of political novels including Supreme
Interest, Absolute Power and The State’s Public Prosecutors. Many of his
works have been adapted into television series. Due to the sensitivity
of the subject, anti-corruption programmes usually have to undergo
extremely strict censorship. An anti-graft work, even when painstak-
ingly completed, still faces the danger of being cancelled.
Zhou told ChinaReport that when his previous work Absolute Power
(2002) was submitted to the State Administration of Press, Publica-
tion, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) for censorship, more
than 800 parts of the original script were marked for changes. An-
other of his works, The State’s Public Prosecutors (2003), went through
eight months of censorship and seven rounds of major changes, yet
was still almost cancelled.
SAPPRFT banished TV dramas that dealt with corruption from
primetime hours in 2004 so as to “protect the youth.” Since then a
decade called the “silence period” followed for anti-graft dramas, dur-
ing which programmes featuring corruption could only be broadcast
after 11pm.
“Authorities used to insist on the incorrect belief that anti-corrup-
tion-themed works would exert a very negative effect on society. But
putting the leash on anti-graft-themed works, to some extent, has al-
lowed the deterioration of corruption,” Zhou told ChinaReport.
From 2004 to 2014, the most shocking social reality for Zhou was
that corruption became increasingly rampant. “It’s a self-deluded idea
that banning anti-graft stories would inhibit corruption. It turned out
to be quite the opposite. See, it’s getting worse,” Zhou added.
Originally, the writer felt hesitant when invited to write a new se-
ries. The question as to whether or not an anti-graft drama could be
produced haunted him for a long time.
The then director of the Television Series Administration Bureau
under SAPPRFT, Li Jingsheng, supported Fan Ziwen’s idea of creat-
ing a new drama production to reflect the latest anti-corruption cam-
paign. Li gave a guide for the theme: “The principle [of the work] is
to fight against corruption, instead of demonstrating it. The core mes-
sage it conveys needs to be ‘anti-corruption, pro-clean government
and positive energy.’”
Zhou eventually began writing the series in early 2015, and the
writing process went smoothly. He finished the first two episodes in
just one week. “My inspiration spurted out,” said Zhou, describing
his creation as an accumulation of a decade of preparation.Flesh and Blood
Zhou Meisen’s familiarity with officialdom also comes from his
personal experience.
He was a deputy secretary-general in the municipal government of
Xuzhou City in east China’s Jiangsu province in 1995. The one-year
term gave him a chance to learn the way the government operated.
He made friends with officials there and witnessed their rise and fall.
He told ChinaReport that, many officials, due to a lack of political
background and resources, might struggle to get promoted and end
up staying in the same position for decades. “Many of my friends were
already a division head 25 years ago, but still remain in the same posi-
tion 25 years later,” Zhou said.
In such situations, the writer pointed out, there exist two com-
mon psychologies within officialdom: some officials, with hopeless
prospects for their future career, just muddle along all day and would
rather sit idle than do work where they might make mistakes; others
stick to the idea of “the more, the better,” embezzling as much money