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Chinese government workers have a lot to worry about these days. Cash-strapped local governments are struggling to pay their salaries. Political controls are tightening in the name of national security. A yearslong anti-corruption purge shows no sign of ending.<\/p>\n
Now, the workers also have to make sure not to get slapped with a \u201cSnail Award\u201d \u2014 a designation that more localities are rolling out to shame their lowest-performing employees.<\/p>\n
\u201cThrough this sarcastic \u2018encouragement,\u2019 the awardees can blush and sweat and refresh their minds,\u201d read one commentary on a Communist Party-affiliated website<\/a>, noting that they had hurt the party and the government\u2019s credibility by just \u201cgetting by.\u201d<\/p>\n Perhaps now more than ever, the Chinese government cannot afford to have its officials slacking off. As economic growth slows, it needs leaders to introduce new projects, attract investors and inspire ordinary people \u2014 in essence, unleash the dynamism that powered China\u2019s rise.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n But many officials seem unmotivated, if not outright afraid to act. Under China\u2019s hard-line leader, Xi Jinping, the state has cracked down on various sectors, from internet companies to private-tutoring firms to finance. It has become impossible to guess what might be next in line. Any policy that deviates from the central government\u2019s could be seen as politically disloyal.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Whereas officials once competed to claim flashy infrastructure projects, officials have more recently been punished for raising money or pushing forward construction projects without authorization. The safest route, it seems, is to do nothing.<\/p>\n Until it\u2019s not. Amid the flurry of calls for officials to step up, at least three cities have been giving out snail awards, according to People\u2019s Daily<\/a>, the party\u2019s official mouthpiece. Video clips on Chinese social media<\/a>, taken from a state-run television show in Sichuan Province, show stony-faced men in suits being handed framed certificates.<\/p>\n That is one of the gentler punishments. An urban district in Guangdong Province said that it had set up a database to track officials it said were \u201clying flat\u201d \u2014 Chinese slang for slacking off. Other places have boasted of reassigning or firing employees.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the party\u2019s internal anti-corruption body, said last month that it punished 138,000 officials<\/a> in 2024 for offenses including \u201cirresponsibility,\u201d \u201cinaction\u201d or \u201cpretending to work.\u201d That was more than double the number the year before, and by far the category with the most people punished. The second-most-common offense, improperly giving or receiving gifts, had half as many culprits.<\/p>\n \u201cTaking tough measures to deal with \u2018lying flat cadres\u2019 is actually to protect the enthusiasm and initiative of those who are doing things and being enterprising,\u201d the anti-graft body said in a recent article<\/a>.<\/p>\n Trying to frighten already scared officials into action, of course, may not be a recipe for success. So the central authorities have also tried to strike a more reassuring tone. On Monday, Mr. Xi met with some of the country\u2019s top entrepreneurs<\/a>, which many observers saw as a signal of a renewed embrace of the private sector. That could nudge local governments to be more willing to collaborate with them.<\/p>\n In December, two top commissions that oversee state-owned companies\u2019 investments pledged to \u201creasonably tolerate normal investment risks.\u201d If a project failed to meet expectations, the people responsible could be exempted from punishment, the commissions said<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Officials have also suggested that party members can be given a second chance. An official in Sichuan Province who directed unauthorized funds toward a public toilet construction project was let off with just a warning, the local disciplinary committee there said<\/a>, because he had not been seeking personal gain.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n But local officials are unlikely to be convinced, because the overall trend toward tighter political controls is clear, said Dongshu Liu<\/a>, a professor of Chinese politics at City University of Hong Kong. Even if Beijing is encouraging officials to be proactive now, the space for doing so is limited. \u201cThey want you to work hard, but they want you to work hard on following central orders,\u201d Professor Liu said.<\/p>\n Indeed, speaking to the disciplinary commission last month, Mr. Xi doubled down on his calls for political purges, urging officials<\/a> to \u201cnot give a single step\u201d in cracking down on corruption and other bad behavior.<\/p>\n Even if Beijing can convince lower-level officials that it is politically safe to take risks again, those officials may have other reasons not to do so. Some local governments have reportedly been unable to pay their workers. The most low-level officials must also contend with growing workloads, often involving frequent in-person checks on residents and businesses, as Mr. Xi pushes for the state to increase its presence in daily life<\/a>.<\/p>\n