[dmix]

People tend to significantly overvalue the executive branches power combined with the worst cases you hear in the news when evaluating the freedom of the average person in a country. The economic freedom indexes can be quite surprising compared to popular perception.

But still I read something like 1 in 4 people are party members whether directly or indirectly. That’s a whole lot of people directly involved in the snitch line.

[qd6pwu4]

there are 90 million party members among 1.4 billion people. I don't know how to count indirect party members. But I don't think that is near 1/4, that's too exagerating

[dmix]

I remember that stat from Evan Osnos book on China (a New Yorker journalist). It was between direct members, soldiers, student groups, workers groups, various retired people, and affiliate associations.

I’m sure that number is a bit inflated but the reach of the party at the local and individual level is quite significant.