China’s AI-Powered Surveillance State

Issue Date October 2025
Volume 36
Issue 4
Page Numbers 151–60
file Print
external View Citation

Read the full essay here.

With an increasing number of drones swarming the skies over Chinese cities and police operations led by AI, Chinese party officials appear to strengthen control over their population. This essay argues that while AI surveillance can reduce the CCP’s reliance on human police officers, the irreducible human unpredictability associated with the vast numbers living within the PRC’s borders will remain the CCP’s Achilles’ heel. These people will remain highly inventive and unpredictable, especially when party-state officials blunder and create economic or personal distress.

About the Author

Valentin Weber is a senior research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations and a China Foresight associate at LSE IDEAS. He has been an Open Technology Fund Senior Fellow in Information Controls at Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, and holds a doctorate in cybersecurity from the University of Oxford.

View all work by Valentin Weber

Image Credit: JADE GAO/AFP via Getty Images