Impact of the Social Credit System in China on Political Communication

The social credit system, created in the PRC in 2014 and which has been in widespread use since approximately 2016, is being evaluated.The assessment by the population is being considered. An estimate expressed in market indicators is given. Assessment by a learned community trying to comprehend the social credit system in terms of the paradigm of authoritarian government analyzed.The results of the consideration of market indicators show that the introduction of the social credit system did not have an impact on business climate indicators such as BCI or PMI.Meanwhile, for the sake of business climate indicators, the social credit system was introduced, as was stated when it was created: this system was designed to prevent unscrupulous behavior of frms. Thus, the declared goal of introducing a social credit system was not achieved.It seems logical to wonder if there was a different goal from the declared goal of introducing social credit, the goal of strengthening the tendency of authoritarian government.At the same time, point studies of the assessment of the social credit system by the population showed a high level of approval of social credit by citizens.Western liberal thought with its cult of individualism sees the following consequences of the introduction of a social credit system: violation of human rights, non-observance of the principle of social justice, violation of the principle of privacy, violation of the principle of equality of rights, development of totalitarian and authoritarian tendencies.It is assumed that some conclusions based on this approach may be called into question due to a mismatch of values: it is proved that assessment categories based on the values of extreme individualism are poorly applied to Chinese society, whose ideology is based on collectivist values.In this regard, a fundamentally different approach is applied to assessing the social credit system: signs of authoritarianism are postulated as the presence of unequal opportunities for symbolic construction of reality; the social credit system is tested for such capabilities within the theory of mass communication.The social credit system used to control the content of Internet sites will have an extremely negative impact on political communication, making it more asymmetric, on the democratic structure of the political system and human quality.