The dramatic shifts in policies and practices of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) over the course of its tumultuous 75-year history underscore the decisive importance of political leadership. Institutionally, China closely resembles other former and surviving Communist regimes. Operationally, however, its dynamic patterns of governance reflect the shifting concerns of a succession of visionary Communist Party leaders.

Among the most distinctive features of Chinese Communist Party governance is the frequent deployment of work teams to conduct campaigns, implement policies and troubleshoot crises. An underappreciated aspect of work-team operations from Land Reform to the present has been the active participation of educated intellectuals as key intermediaries between central leaders and grassroots society. Serving in effect as “missionaries” of the Party, intellectual work-team members function as trained “ritual specialists” in carrying out their appointed mission. Although work teams are often not the most efficient or effective means of governance, the impact of work-team experience on team members themselves is consequential. Employing quasi-religious practices designed to promote the ideological incorporation of intellectuals, work teams have helped to forestall the emergence in China of an alienated class of dissidents like those whose criticisms eroded the legitimacy of Communist regimes elsewhere in the world.

This SHEA white paper identifies knowledge gaps and challenges in healthcare epidemiology research related to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) with a focus on core principles of healthcare epidemiology. These gaps, revealed during the worst phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, are described in 10 sections: epidemiology, outbreak investigation, surveillance, isolation precaution practices, personal protective equipment (PPE), environmental contamination and disinfection, drug and supply shortages, antimicrobial stewardship, healthcare personnel (HCP) occupational safety, and return to work policies. Each section highlights three critical healthcare epidemiology research questions with detailed description provided in supplementary materials. This research agenda calls for translational studies from laboratory-based basic science research to well-designed, large-scale studies and health outcomes research. Research gaps and challenges related to nursing homes and social disparities are included. Collaborations across various disciplines, expertise and across diverse geographic locations will be critical.

Among various grassroots governance practices adopted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), few have proven more adaptive and effective than the deployment of work teams—ad hoc units appointed and directed by higher-level Party and government organs and dispatched for a limited time to carry out a specific mission by means of mass mobilization. Yet, perhaps because work teams straddle the boundary between formal and informal institutions, they have received scant analytical attention. While work teams figure prominently in narrative accounts of the major campaigns of Mao's China, their origins, operations, and contemporary implications have yet to be fully explored. This article traces the roots of Chinese work teams to Russian revolutionary precedents, including plenipotentiaries, shock brigades, and 25,000ers, but argues that the CCP's adoption and enhancement of this practice involved creative adaptation over a sustained period of revolutionary and post-revolutionary experimentation. Sinicized work teams were not only a key factor in securing the victory of the Chinese Communist revolution and conducting Maoist mass campaigns such as Land Reform, Collectivization, and the Four Cleans; they continue to play an important role in the development and control of grassroots Chinese society even today. As a flexible means of spanning the center-periphery divide and combatting bureaucratic inertia, Chinese work teams, in contrast to their Soviet precursors, contribute to the resilience of the Communist party-state.

Mainstream Chinese discussions of “democracy” have long betrayed a decidedly populist understanding of the concept. Xi Jinping draws freely on this tradition in formulating his China Dream. Xi's efforts are part of the Chinese Communist Party's “re-Orientation” of official propaganda to showcase the glories of the ancient civilization that it claims to represent and rejuvenate. The idea of “democracy” (minzhu 民主)—understood in populist rather than institutional terms—plays an important role in the process. This populist interpretation of “democracy” seeks to elide the fundamental contradiction between Enlightenment values and illiberal politics. Whether it will prove persuasive to contemporary Chinese intellectuals remains to be seen.