New Chinese textbooks play up national security, Xi Jinping Thought and Vietnam, India wars

New books on Chinese language, history, as well as morality and law to be handed out to junior and primary students at start of autumn semester

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The Ministry of Education is introducing new textbooks for morality and law, which will give more space to Xi Jinping Thought and emphasise traditional Chinese culture and national security. Photo: CCTV

Published: 2:00pm, 28 Aug 2024Updated: 5:28pm, 28 Aug 2024

New Chinese school textbooks will give more space to national security and traditional culture in Beijing’s latest move to step up ideological propaganda and control.

Primary and junior high school students starting the autumn semester next week will be handed the new textbooks on Chinese language, history, as well as morality and law, state broadcaster CCTV said on Tuesday.

Morality and law was known until 2016 as ideology and politics. It is a mandatory subject that promotes the ideology of the ruling Communist Party.

Topics highlighted in the new textbooks include the president’s political philosophy, Xi Jinping Thought. There will also be an emphasis on traditional Chinese culture and national security, according to a Ministry of Education official cited in the report.

All Chinese nationals receive nine years of compulsory education, six in primary school and the rest in junior high. The new textbooks will initially be used in the first and seventh grades, and will be extended to all nine grades within three years, according to CCTV.

The new morality and law textbook would introduce the “main content and historical status” of Xi Jinping Thought, the report said.