Introduction

This chapter discusses police failure — focusing on the case of a seventeen-year-old Xiao Hu. It details the inability of two officers to do their jobs and the more systemic problems facing policing in today's China. To fully understand policing in China, the chapter begins with the observation that success in the area of protest response brings challenges to other areas of policing. It argues that the policing of social unrest in China was not always so successful, recalling that protests in the 1980s were handled haphazardly and with little guidance from above. All this changed in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. Fearful that another Tiananmen-size uprising might unseat the Chinese Communist Party's rule, central government leaders directed police and military officials to develop a more unified approach to dealing with social unrest. The chapter then shifts to explicate what does everyday policing looks like. It examines the physical and mental hardships of the job — heavy caseloads, limited resources, and inadequate training.