A brief prehistory of China’s social credit system

Abstract

This article situates China’s social credit system in a historical perspective by exploring its antecedents. The historical roots of the social credit system can be found in personnel archives for officials during imperial times, the Dang’an (personnel dossier) system under Communist rule, and the failed legislative proposal to establish “morality files” on Chinese citizens in the early 2010s. By recognizing their historical continuity and disjuncture, the article places the social credit system in its unique sociocultural contexts and provides alternative narratives to the current dominant state framing of the social credit system.