Here's what I think are the core information problems that cause delusions in Beijing like 'we're gonna win the municipal elections'
a) the people charged with manipulating public opinion are also the same people charged with reporting on it.
b) even inside the mainland, the purges and paranoia have rendered questioning the success of policy extremely risky, even in 内参 (the internal report material)
c) I strongly suspect that the quality of staff in the HK and Taiwan offices is very low. Why? Because those are really cushy posts, and are therefore more likely to go to the politically or personally well connected than the competent
The best Chinese embassy staff are always, like, the guys posted to the Gambia or Suriname - bright kids from provincial families who were funneled into local language training and have spent a decade building up real knowledge and contacts
d) underlying all this is that the CCP leadership genuinely believes it can use big data to circumvent its information problems and has a mistaken faith in the reliability of the data its own systems supply
