Survey ranks Shanghai second-safest city in China… after Lhasa

By Michael Evans
More people in Shanghai say they feel safer in public than in almost any other city in China, according to a survey by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
The only city whose residents reported a greater feeling of security was the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, which also received top marks for healthcare, public transportation, and public services. Lhasa is also of course swarming with soldiers and on near total lockdown at many times during the year, so take this survey with a PLA tank sized piece of salt.
Ranking just below Shanghai in safety were Xiamen, Ningbo, and Hangzhou. Beijing narrowly missed the top ten, ranking 14th out of a total of 38 cities surveyed.
Overall, however, the survey found major concerns over violent crime among China’s urbanites.
Nearly 40 percent of those surveyed across China said that they felt afraid to go out at night, while 39 percent said they worried about the security of their property when away from home for an extended period of time. These attitudes reflect those felt in the West, where fear of crime nearly always outstrips actual crime, often rising significantly even as crime statistics fall.

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