Staving Off Revolution
If the leadership chooses happy-story PR and toothless reforms for show in the hopes it will all blow over, these subterfuges have the potential to push dissatisfaction beyond the point of control.
Whatever else we might say or think about the leadership class, they tend to have a keen sense of self-preservation.
Policies that would have been rejected out of hand as politically impossible become normalized as leaders rush to stave off revolution.