Two-faced person (Chinese:两面人;[1]Pinyin: Liǎng Miàn Rén) is a Chinese political term often used by theChinese Communist Party (CCP) to describe an official or party member who is either corrupt or ideologicallydisloyal to the party.[2][3]Xi Jinping, the current general secretary of the CCP and China's president, has repeatedly said that the Chinese people should "Resolutely fight against two-faced cliques and two faced-persons."[4]First used in the 1960s, the term began to be used more frequently in the 2010s in response to proponents ofXinjiang independence and critics of China's approach to theUyghur people.
In 1967, the Chinese literary theoristZhou Yang, who was a supporter ofMao Zedong, was labelled as two-faced bygang of four memberYao Wenyuan, in an essay titled “On the Two-Faced Counter-Revolutionary Zhou Yang (《评反革命两面派周扬》)".[5][6][7]
In 2017 theCyberspace Administration of China, which administers access to the Internet in China, publicly criticized its former directorLu Wei, calling him "a typical two-faced person (典型的两面人)".[8][9][10]
Since 2017, the term has also been used to refer to Uyghur politicians and celebrities who secretly supportXinjiang independence, and to those criticizing Chinese policies related to theUyghurs.[2][11][12] Famous examples areShirzat Bawudun andSattar Sawut, who respectively are former heads of justice and education in Xinjiang.[13][14]
In 2020,Zhao Zhengyong, 69, the former chief of theShaanxi Provincial Committee of the Communist Party was sentenced to death following his conviction for embezzling over $100 millionyuan. Just before his conviction, he was called a "shameless two-faced person (可耻的两面人)" in a CCP publication.[15][16] Three years prior to this, Zhao had called in the same journal for a crackdown on "two-faced people in government".[17]
In 2021, fashion houseHugo Boss was accused of being two-faced following its criticism of Chinese labor and human rights practices regarding Uighurs working in Xinjiang.[18] The United States responded that the criticism was part of a state-run campaign designed to criticize those who had encouraged a boycott of Uighur-produced cotton.[19]