The big but unsurprising news out of China is that — golly gee! — the government tried to cover up the huge chemical spill in the Songhua River that has closed down water supplies for nearly four million people in the city of Harbin. The International Herald Tribune reports on the timeline of events and how the government was finally forced to act. Similarly, the Washington Post describes the political fallout caused by the coverup.

Environmental destruction due to the fast pace of industrialization and lack of regulation has been a big issue on the minds of the Chinese people for a long time and is likely one of the biggest movers of public unrest nowadays. The riots that are spreading through China have been a hot topic here at Publius when they really flare up, and over and over again they are over the same issues. Environmental problems and corruption by local officials definitely top off the list.

I find it very believable that it was local officials who tried to cover up the whole disaster, though of course I do wonder if there was any collaboration with higher-ups. But as the facts emerge, it looks like corruption has once again played its hand, and just as China’s problems continue grow, so do the options available to the everyday Chinese person to vent their frustration against the government.

Last year, at least three million people joined in over 58,000 protests, an increase of 15% from the year before. Meanwhile, people withdrawing their membership from the Communist Party is breaking 15,000-20,000 people a day. Corruption is in the hundreds of billions of dollars. And the Chinese government itself is expecting social unrest to hit stage red by 2010 if nothing is done. People are taking to online message boards and text messaging because they fear talking bad about the government out loud, and engaging in massive public protest when they have no last resort but to do so. There’s strength in numbers, after all.

The problem for the government is that its unaccountable top-down power structure inherently prevents it from reforming quick enough to deal with issues; meanwhile, problems continue to be covered up by local officials who take bribes in exchange for their silence. It’s important to realize that this is more than an isolated event, and even more than a trend dating back to past the SARS coverup. This corruption is an epidemic that is quickly leading to the discrediting of the communist government in the eyes of the Chinese people themselves. What happens when 2010 rolls around?