BEIJING (AFP) ― An open revolt against officialdom by Chinese villagers last week demonstrated the challenge social unrest poses to the Communist party as it prepares for a generational leadership handover.

Angered by decades of government land grabs, the villagers of Wukan drove out local Communist officials and police, erecting roadblocks to stop them re-entering and electing their own leaders.

The protest has become a symbol of rising public anger over a plethora of perceived injustices, from corruption to income disparities, that analysts say will bring growing difficulties for China’s leaders as economic growth slows.

“What’s enabled the leadership to maintain stability is the economic pie’s growth. If the pie shrinks, the unrest is more likely to grow,” said Willy Lam, history professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Wukan is located in the wealthy southern province of Guangdong, China’s manufacturing heartland, where thousands of factory workers have gone on strike in recent months as slowing export demand forces manufacturers to cut pay.

In November, more than 7,000 workers went on strike at a Guangdong factory making Western brand shoes, clashing with police in a protest over layoffs and wage cuts.

A mass protest earlier this year in the northeastern city of Dalian forced the government to move an unpopular chemical plant ― another sign, analysts say, that China’s growing middle class is increasingly willing to fight back.

“So far, there is no nationwide movement in China like the Arab Spring this year or Solidarity in Poland in the 1980s, so the Communist party doesn’t yet face a full-frontal challenge,” said Lam.

“(But) the recent rise in isolated incidents still paints a picture of instability, which is why the Beijing government has required Sina’s millions of ‘weibo’ users to register their real names.”

Despite strict censorship, China’s weibos ― microblogs similar to Twitter ― have been key to organizing and publicizing many recent protests, with users setting up new accounts as fast as authorities can close them down.

On Friday, authorities ruled that users of Beijing-based weibos ― including the most popular, run by web giant Sina ― must register under their real names.

“The authorities recognize the organizing power of the Twitter and Facebook of China ahead of the leadership change,” Lam told AFP, referring to Chinese versions of the banned social networking services.

China’s President Hu Jintao will next year end his second term as party head and hand over to a successor ― widely expected to be Vice President Xi Jinping ― kicking off a once-in-a-decade leadership handover.

The new party head will take over Hu’s presidency in March 2013, when Premier Wen Jiabao and his government will also step down.

The Communist party lays great emphasis on the need for stability and social harmony, and analysts say its paramount concern is to be seen to be able to manage unrest.

Earlier this month China’s security chief, politburo member Zhou Yongkang, warned provincial officials they must be more prepared for the “negative impact” of slowing economic growth.

Any drawn-out unrest in Guangdong might even jeopardize the expected promotion next October of the provincial Communist party chief to the national Standing Committee.

Wang Yang, 56, is known as a reformer, but has had his focus on improving provincial living standards interrupted by a series of high-profile labor and land disputes.

“At the beginning of this wave of unrest, Wang tried to pacify the people of Guangdong, thinking that the usual mix of intimidation and pacification would work,” Lam said. “In hindsight, that was a mistake.”

The grievances of the Wukan residents are repeated across China as officials seeking to cash in on a property and building boom have forced farmers off land to make way for luxury apartments, golf courses and factories.

Wary of the possibility of protests similar to those that swept the Arab world, Beijing has engaged in a nationwide clampdown on dissent this year, with many activists and lawyers detained.

On Friday, a Chinese court sent the renowned human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng back to jail, saying he had violated the terms of his probation, a move condemned by rights groups and Washington.

But Nicholas Bequelin of Human Rights Watch says some of China’s moves to stop unrest in politically significant times ― such as the 2008 Olympic Games

― have had undesired effects.

“There is such a premium on preventing any kind of visible problem from emerging that it often creates a blowback, creating an intensity of incidents,” Bequelin told AFP.

“Chinese are just not ready any more to shelve their pressing demands when they’re told that they’re in a sensitive period.”