Issues in the Development of China's Communist Struggle in the 21st Century – English

The Examination through Historical Materialism and the Lifeline of the Proletarian Party

In the face of severe challenges in the current economic field and the complex disguises in the ideological sphere, we now more than ever need to return to the fundamental philosophy of Marxism—objective materialism and dialectics. This is not merely an academic posture but a ideological line that determines the survival of our proletarian party.

1. Adhering to the Marxist philosophy of seeking truth from facts: Acknowledging contradictions, rejecting one-sidedness

The philosophy of Marxism, namely dialectical materialism, has two most prominent characteristics: one is its class nature, openly declaring its service to the proletariat; the other is its practical nature, emphasizing the dependence of theory on practice, with the criterion of truth being social practice.

We must recognize that human history is a continuous process of development from the realm of necessity to the realm of freedom, a process that will never end. Therefore, we must always approach the achievements and mistakes of our party in different historical periods with a developmental perspective and an attitude of seeking truth from facts. Seeking truth from facts means that "truth" refers to all objectively existing things, "facts" refer to the internal connections of objective things, that is, their laws, and "seeking" means we must study them. We must proceed from objectively existing facts and derive guiding principles, policies, and methods from analyzing these facts.

We cannot "ponder hard in isolation to 'devise methods'" like the idealists, because that "will certainly fail to produce any good methods." We must overcome that subjectivity, one-sidedness, and superficiality. One-sidedness means not knowing how to look at problems comprehensively, seeing only the part and not the whole, seeing only the trees and not the forest.

We must acknowledge that contradictions exist within everything. To affirm everything or negate everything in our work is one-sided. If we only see the bright side and not the difficulties, we cannot effectively struggle to fulfill the Party's tasks. Similarly, seeing only the shortcomings and mistakes while ignoring the mainstream will cause people to lose confidence.

Therefore, we must squarely face the mistakes and contributions made in every period and by every leader. Only in this way can we avoid repeating historical errors and make our work "more correct, more vibrant, and richer with each iteration.

2. The Warning from the Soviet Union: Khrushchev's Erroneous Line and the Crisis of the Party's Credibility

In handling historical issues, the lessons from the Soviet Union are extremely profound.

Khrushchev's secret report at the 20th Congress of the CPSU, which publicly denied previous leaders and one-sidedly criticized their mistakes while ignoring their contributions, created a major ideological rift within the Party and the international communist movement, dealing a heavy blow to it.

We must recognize that the erroneous ideological and political line initiated by the Soviet leadership under Khrushchev was the fundamental cause of the eventual collapse of the Party and the state. In addressing the issue of Stalin, the Soviet Union adopted an extreme approach—suddenly lowering him from "a height of ten thousand zhang" to "nine thousand zhang underground." This wholesale and one-sided negation of historical figures and periods created confusion among cadres and the masses regarding their own history and weakened the Party's theoretical foundation. They even adopted the shortcomings of others, and by the time they prided themselves on mastering them, those very practices had already been abandoned elsewhere, resulting in a "stumble and fall.

The deeper issue lies in Khrushchev's "Three Peaces" theories—"peaceful coexistence" and "peaceful competition"—which, against the backdrop of the West intensifying its peaceful evolution strategy, amounted to nothing more than wishful thinking. They served to dismantle the ideological fortifications of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and provided an opening for hostile forces to advance their peaceful evolution agenda. The errors of this line led the Soviet Union to disproportionately prioritize heavy industry in economic development while neglecting agriculture and light industry, resulting in shortages of goods in the market and monetary instability. Their policies toward peasants, such as the "compulsory procurement system," "exploited the peasants bitterly," akin to "expecting the hen to lay more eggs without feeding it grain, and wanting the horse to run fast without letting it graze." The combination of this rigid economic system and one-sided historical negation caused the masses to seriously doubt the Party's governance capacity and political line, ultimately leading to tragic consequences.

3. China's Wisdom: Deng Xiaoping's Historical Assessment of Mao Zedong and Political Steadfastness

In stark contrast to Khrushchev's approach toward Stalin, Comrade Deng Xiaoping's handling of Chairman Mao's historical status and merits and demerits during the period of rectifying errors demonstrated the political wisdom and historical steadfastness of a proletarian revolutionary.

Comrade Deng Xiaoping did not treat Chairman Mao in the manner of Khrushchev but affirmed Chairman Mao's immense contributions. Comrade Deng Xiaoping stated that Comrade Mao Zedong had three parts error and seven parts achievement, and overall remained a great Marxist. Comrade Deng Xiaoping upheld the restoration and development of the "ideological line of seeking truth from facts" regarding Comrade Mao Zedong. He explicitly emphasized the need to guide the Party's work with the accurate and complete Mao Zedong Thought and criticized the erroneous policy of the "Two Whatevers," pointing out its incompatibility with Marxism.

The evaluation of "seven parts achievement, three parts error" is just. It prevented China from completely negating its history and avoided the loss of the "entire foundation of legitimacy and justice" for the Party and the state due to ideological rifts, as seen in the Soviet Union. It is precisely this responsible attitude toward history that has safeguarded China's stability to this day. As the great leader of the Chinese people, Chairman Mao is a spiritual symbol in the hearts of the masses. Just as the proletariat needs its own contingent of intellectuals, Chairman Mao is the soul of the people. Upholding his historical contributions means preserving the people's fundamental trust in the Party and maintaining the political foundation of the country.

We must recognize that Comrade Deng Xiaoping's course correction was built precisely upon profound reflections of historical errors such as the "Cultural Revolution." These mistakes and setbacks taught us lessons, making us comparatively wiser, and enabling us to handle our affairs better. The theories of class struggle and the people's democratic dictatorship within Mao Zedong Thought remain crucial ideological weapons in our fight against revisionism and the bureaucratic bourgeoisie. The dictatorship of the proletariat represents the highest expression of the proletariat's revolutionary role in history.

4. Evaluating Deng Xiaoping: Outstanding Economic Contributions and Limitations of the Era

Just as we cannot one-sidedly negate Chairman Mao's historical contributions, we must not one-sidedly negate Comrade Deng Xiaoping's great contributions while facing economic challenges today. His immense contributions to China, particularly in the economic sphere, are indelible.

1 .Remarkable Achievements in Economic Development

Comrade Deng Xiaoping's core contribution lies in his clear assertion that poverty is not socialism and in leading China onto the path of liberating and developing productive forces.

1. The Second Revolution in Liberating Productive Forces: He explicitly stated that reform is China's second revolution, fundamentally transforming the economic system that constrained the development of productive forces. The success of rural reforms, especially the "sudden rise" of township enterprises, resolved the issue of employment for a large surplus rural labor force and promoted the development of both industry and agriculture.

2.  Strategic Decision of Opening Up: He pointed out that a major reason for China's prolonged stagnation and backwardness was isolation. Adhering to the policy of opening up serves as a supplement to developing productive forces, enabling the absorption of foreign capital and technology, which ultimately benefits socialism.

3.  Ideological Liberation and Theoretical Innovation: He resolved the fundamental issue that "whether planning or market forces play a larger role is not the essential difference between socialism and capitalism," breaking through the rigid dogmas of the past and laying the theoretical foundation for China's economic takeoff.

It was precisely the reform and opening up initiated by Comrade Deng Xiaoping that enabled China to achieve rapid economic development within just a few decades, lifting the country out of long-term poverty and backwardness and significantly improving the living standards of the people.

II . Historical Limitations and New Challenges

However, we must also adhere to the dialectical method of analyzing contradictions and acknowledge that any historical figure has limitations. Historical constraints prevent Comrade Deng Xiaoping from being resurrected to solve the problems China faces today. In his era, the primary task was to develop productive forces and address the issue that "poverty is not socialism." In this process, new contradictions and problems inevitably emerged, particularly the negative factors brought about by marketization and opening up.

He himself was clearly aware that opening up and revitalizing would inevitably bring some negative elements. He emphasized the need to "work on two fronts simultaneously": one hand promoting reform and opening up, the other cracking down on criminal activities and advancing cultural and ethical progress. He explicitly stated that socialism has two fundamental principles: first, maintaining public ownership as the mainstay, and second, preventing polarization.

The issues China faces today—such as wealth disparity, class differentiation, and capital's infiltration of media—are absolutely not what Comrade Deng Xiaoping wished to see. Particularly, the greatest danger after our Party assumed power is becoming detached from the masses, and capital's erosion of the media precisely hinders our ability to listen to the people's voices and undermines public trust. These problems have been exploited and exacerbated in the new historical period by bourgeois bureaucrats and a handful of class enemies attempting to transform our country into a high-tech slave society.

Therefore, the current problems can by no means be attributed solely to Comrade Deng Xiaoping. We must both affirm Comrade Deng Xiaoping's contributions to the nation and the revolution, and address deviations in the reforms with the principle of "learning from past mistakes to prevent future ones, and curing the sickness to save the patient." We must uphold and develop his core line—adhering to the Four Cardinal Principles and persisting in reform and opening up—while utilizing socialism's inherent advantages to resolve the capitalist drawbacks arising from the marketization process.

Only when we apply the living soul of Marxism—the method of analyzing specific issues concretely—to provide pertinent analyses of these contradictions and decisively utilize the dominant role of the public sector economy to correct right-deviationist tendencies in economic practices, can we avoid new historical mistakes, continue advancing the proletarian revolutionary cause, and ultimately achieve the great goal of common prosperity. We must maintain the spirit of arduous struggle and rely on the consciousness of the masses to overcome those true enemies who attempt to exploit our fear of color revolutions to push for economic color revolutions using capitalist methods.

When examining the historical course of contemporary China from the philosophical perspective of objective materialism, a grand and complex panorama becomes clear: Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has, through firm political will and profound self-revolution, corrected many prominent problems in our Party and national production and livelihood, initially significantly enhancing government credibility and national prosperity. However, amid the current China-U.S. trade war and various challenges under new circumstances, the Communist Party of China now faces a phase where accumulated problems from the past are erupting collectively.

The depth and breadth of these challenges cannot be fully resolved by relying solely on one generation of leadership. It requires us not only to address current economic difficulties but also to thoroughly cleanse and critique the historical toxins lingering in ideological, political, and economic practices.

1. Regularized Anti-Corruption: The Historical Mission to Save the Communist Party of China

In facing the historical process of domestic and international risks and challenges, our Party must consistently serve as the backbone for the entire nation, continuously enhancing its capacity to resist corruption, prevent degeneration, and withstand risks. The regularized anti-corruption struggle promoted by Comrade Xi Jinping since assuming office is precisely the most profound response to the governance crisis of the proletarian party.

We must acknowledge that if corruption intensifies unchecked, it will inevitably lead to the demise of both the Party and the country. It is precisely with this recognition of "survival or extinction" that regularized anti-corruption, through resolutely addressing the "Four Forms of Decadence"—formalism, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance—as well as tackling the susceptibility and prevalence of negative corruption in certain areas, has accomplished the historical mission of saving the Communist Party of China.

Comrade Mao Zedong warned early on that our military must adhere to correct principles in the relationships between officers and soldiers, between the army and the people, and between the army and the Party, and must never commit the error of warlordism. Cadres must persist in the system of participating in collective productive labor, which is "a fundamental matter under the socialist system," helping to overcome bureaucracy and prevent revisionism and dogmatism. When corruption and bureaucracy prevail, cadres become "masters riding on the backs of the people," their actions disconnected from the interests of the people, ultimately leading to alienation from the masses, loss of popular support, and eventual failure.

The core of anti-corruption and work style construction lies in closely linking the Party with the masses and cadres with the masses, maintaining flesh-and-blood ties with the people. The political significance of anti-corruption lies in fundamentally correcting the degeneration of the Soviet Communist Party leadership, which began during Khrushchev's era and peaked under Brezhnev—they progressed from pursuing personal promotions and family privileges to ultimately betraying the fundamental interests of the people.

This anti-corruption struggle has greatly restored and enhanced the credibility of the Party and the state. It precisely takes the people's standpoint as the starting point and ultimate goal, ensuring that the Party always shares the same heart, breath, and destiny with the people.

2. The Concentrated Outbreak of Historical Issues and the Rigidity of Ideological Lines

However, the issues left over from the early stages of reform and opening up thirty years ago, particularly the negative effects of excessive marketization and unequal distribution of power, are now entering a period of concentrated eruption. These problems include unbalanced, uncoordinated, and unsustainable development, significant disparities in urban-rural and regional development as well as income distribution among residents, and the potential squeeze on the vitality of the real economy due to high tax burdens.

This has led Comrade Xi Jinping to stabilize the fundamental aspects both economically and ideologically, requiring the continuation of reform and opening up while simultaneously correcting the right-deviationist maladies that have emerged during this process.

One notable internal issue is the excessive rigidity in thinking. This rigidity stems from a one-sided summary of historical experiences and a fear of the power of the masses.

I . The Exploitation of "Emancipation of the Mind" and the Cage of Oppression

We must examine history with the attitude of dialectical materialism. In the late 1970s, our Party needed a thorough emancipation of the mind to correct the erroneous "Left" line. Tracing back even further, the movement based on the theory of "continuing the revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat" was claimed to be an emancipation of the mind.

Comrade Mao Zedong advocated the "Great Voicing, Great Liberation, Great Debate, and Big-Character Posters," which were innovative forms created by the masses, aimed at overcoming bureaucracy, sectarianism, and subjectivism within the Party through democratic movements under centralized leadership and mass self-criticism. This indeed presented an excellent opportunity for ideological liberation created by Chairman Mao during his tenure. We once loudly called for the overthrow of Confucius, we dared to act and fight, and even witnessed "extreme freedom and democracy" on the democracy wall calling for Comrade Deng Xiaoping to lead.

However, this practice of ideological liberation was quickly distorted. Comrade Mao Zedong emphasized the need to trust the majority of the masses while remaining vigilant against the die-hard anti-socialist elements, who likely constituted only about two percent but still represented a significant force. Unfortunately, this movement was exploited by a handful of royalists and children of the elite, turning the Cultural Revolution in its later stages into a situation where the elite's offspring fabricated charges, engaged in infighting, and divided the country. This exploitation transformed a movement originally aimed at opposing revisionism and bourgeois bureaucracy into a cage that suppressed thought in its later phases.

II . Oppression by Grassroots Bureaucracy and the Stigmatization of Socialism

This fear of ideological emancipation and mass struggle, combined with the excessive administrative power granted to grassroots officials in the early stages of reform and opening up for the sake of efficiency, led to chaotic grassroots management and laid the groundwork for subsequent right-leaning practices.

In particular, Comrade Deng Xiaoping's proposal to use "administrative and legal means" to maintain stability was misinterpreted and abused by some grassroots officials in practice. During specific periods, such as under the pressure of birth planning targets and the "Strike Hard" campaign, it indeed resulted in grassroots officials wielding the stick of the law to arbitrarily exploit and oppress the people. To meet birth planning quotas, they forcibly implemented sterilization, and to maintain low crime rates, they fabricated charges on a large scale to arrest so-called dangerous individuals.

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