| The historic significance of the Third Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party held from December 18 to 22, 1978 lies in part in its restitution of full democracy inside the Party.
In Chinese Communist Party history, the rectification campaign of 1942 and the Enlarged Working Conference convened by the Party Central Committee in 1962 were models of full inner-Party democracy which ensured victory for the revolution and construction.
How could such a great Communist Party as ours have tolerated the tyranny of Lin Biao and the "gang of four" for ten long years? The fundamental lesson drawn is that there must be full democracy inside the Party.
An abnormal situation existed for some dozen years in the political life both inside and outside the Party because of Lin Biao and the "gang of four" crushing democracy, demolishing the legal system and instituting a fascist "all-round dictatorship" over the Party and the people so as to usurp Party and state leadership. We are now working to set things to rights and bring about an early accomplishment of the four modernizations. And politically, the pressing task is to ensure inner-Party democracy and bring socialist democracy into full play.
Central Committee Role Crucial
The Chinese Communist Party is the ruling party in this country and if Party cadres do not know what democratic centralism is about and inner-Party democracy is in an abnormal state, then democracy and legality in the political life of the state will merely be vacuous talk. Within the Party, the discipline is that the lower level is subordinate to the higher level, and the entire Party is subordinate to the Central Committee. If democracy does not exist at the lower level, it is comparatively easy to correct this so long as the higher level is correct. If there is no democracy at the higher level, especially if there is no full democracy within the Party Central Committee, its effect will be widespread and it will be more difficult to rectify. Therefore, whether or not there is normal democratic life within the Party Central Committee plays a decisive, leading role. Only when this leading role is taken hold of can the key to solving the question of democracy be grasped.
A review of our Party's history will demonstrate this. Whenever there was full democracy within the Party Central Committee, the correct line could be fully implemented, the revolutionary cause could move ahead smoothly and the Party could flourish and grow; conversely, whenever the political life of the Party Central Committee was abnormal and wilful, counterrevolutionary destruction of democratic centralism emerged, such as that caused by Lin Biao and the "gang of four," the revolutionary cause suffered a serious setback.
During the period of democratic revolution, the third "Left" line represented by Wang Ming dominated the Party Central Committee the longest and caused the heaviest damage to the Party. The exponents of this line brought out an anti-democratic method in inner-Party struggle and a factionalist policy towards cadres organizationally in order to push Wang Ming's erroneous line politically, militarily and ideologically. The Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party adopted by the Seventh Plenary Session of the Party's Sixth Central Committee in 1945 has made a correct analysis of this.
"In order to enforce their will, the exponents of the third 'Left' line invariably and indiscriminately branded all Party comrades who found the wrong line impracticable and who therefore expressed doubt, disagreement or dissatisfaction, or did not actively support the wrong line or firmly carry it out; they stigmatized these comrades with such labels as 'Right opportunism,' 'the rich peasant line,' 'the Luo Ming line,' 'the line of conciliation' and 'double-dealing,' waged 'ruthless struggles' against them and dealt them 'merciless blows,' and even conducted these 'inner-Party struggles' as if they were dealing with criminals and enemies. This wrong kind of inner-Party struggle became the regular method by which the comrades who led or carried out the 'Left' line raised their own prestige, enforced their own demands and intimidated the Party cadres. It violated the fundamental principle of democratic centralism within the Party, eliminated the democratic spirit of criticism and self-criticism, turned Party discipline into mechanical discipline and fostered tendencies to blind obedience and docility; thus the development of living and creative Marxism was hampered and damaged. A factionalist policy towards cadres was combined with this incorrect kind of inner-Party struggle. The factionalists did not regard veteran cadres as valuable assets of the Party; instead they attacked, punished and dismissed from the central and local organizations large numbers of veteran cadres who were experienced in work and had close ties with the masses but were uncongenial to the factionalists and unwilling to be their blind followers and yes-men. Nor did they give proper education to new cadres nor handle their promotion seriously (especially those of working-class origin); instead they rashly promoted new cadres and cadres from outside who lacked working experience and close ties with the masses but were congenial to the factionalists and were merely their blind followers and yes-men, substituting them for veterans in the central and local organizations. Thus, they not only attacked old cadres but spoiled new ones. Moreover, in many places where an incorrect policy for suppressing counter-revolutionaries became entangled with the factionalist policy towards cadres, large numbers of fine comrades were unjustly dealt with under false charges, and this caused the Party most grievous losses. Such factionalist errors very greatly weakened the Party, causing dislocation between higher and lower organizations and many other anomalies in the Party."
Examples of Inner-Party Democracy
The Zunyi Meeting in 1935 built up the leadership of Comrade Mao Zedong's correct line within the Party. To eliminate the adverse influence of Wang Ming's line, the Party Central Committee headed by Comrade Mao Zedong, after much preparatory work over a long period, initiated a Party-wide rectification campaign from 1942 onward to combat subjectivism, sectarianism and stereotyped Party writing. At the same time, from 1942 to 1944, the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee first discussed and then led the senior cadres of the whole Party to discuss the Party's history, especially that period from the beginning of 1931 to the end of 1934 when Wang Ming's line emerged dominant. At these discussions, full scope was given to democracy, and sincere criticism and self-criticism were made. As to the erroneous line, emphasis was on analysing the environment obtaining then, the content of the errors and the social, historical and ideological origins which gave rise to the errors, and not on the responsibility of individual comrades. The Marxist method of concrete analysis of concrete question was adopted and the spirit of seeking truth from facts and the approach of neither regarding everything as all positive nor everything as negative were encouraged. In this way, correct centralism was applied on the basis of extensive democracy and an all-round, scientific summary was arrived at on certain questions in the history of the Party when Wang Ming's line held sway. This unified the thinking of the whole Party and greatly raised the Marxist ideological level of the Party cadres. It was an unprecedented, deep-going, great, democratic movement within our Party. It set an example of correctly unfolding inner-Party struggle, conducting inner-Party education and giving play to normal political life within the Party. This kind of ideological and political unity within the Party on the basis of democratic centralism ensured our great victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan and the War of Liberation within a short space of several years and, after nationwide liberation, significant victory in socialist revolution and construction.
From 1958 to 1962, China's socialist construction met a major setback and tremendous difficulties were encountered by the national economy. Both subjective and objective factors were responsible, but the major cause was the lack of normal democratic life within the Party and the damage of the Party's democratic centralism. Some leading cadres abandoned the Party's fine style of work - making investigation and study and seeking truth from facts. They arbitrarily issued orders, refused to listen to differing views, would not countenance criticism and freely carried out character-assassination. Consequently, certain mistakes and failures in work which could have been quickly and easily corrected grew more and more serious.
At the Enlarged Working Conference convened by the Party Central Committee in 1962 and attended by more than 7,000 cadres above the level of county Party committee secretary, the Party Central Committee put forward the principle of "three no's" - no picking on others' faults, no stigmatizing, and no flaying out at others with a big stick - to permit all participants to speak their minds freely and air their views fully. At the meeting, Comrade Mao Zedong made an important speech centring on democratic centralism. He elaborated the importance of democracy, without which there could be no correct centralism, and he shouldered the responsibility for the mistakes in work in the preceding period, which set an example for cadres at various levels. In explaining the dialectical relationship between the realm of necessity and the realm of freedom, Comrade Mao Zedong said that to a very large extent we were still acting blindly in our work because our knowledge of the law governing socialist construction was still very inadequate. He called on all Party members to go among the masses, carry out deep-going investigation and study and find out the objective laws governing the development of things.
This was another meeting which witnessed the Party Central Committee giving full play to democracy. After the meeting, the democratic style exhibited at this meeting was taken down to the various levels by the cadres and implemented throughout the Party. Democracy in the Central Committee promoted democracy in the whole Party, and democracy within the Party furthered democracy in society. This lively political situation enabled us to swiftly overcome our difficulties and a vigorous atmosphere once again emerged in socialist construction.
Why Lin Biao and the "Gang of Four" Could Run Amok for So Long
However, after Lin Biao and the "gang of four" had usurped a portion of power in the Party and over the Cultural Revolution, they launched a violent counterattack to foul up the democratic atmosphere inside and outside the Party which had been created at the 7,000-people meeting. They turned the relationship between ourselves and the enemy upside down and maliciously magnified the mistakes of veteran cadres and other good comrades, framed charges against them, wilfully put innocent people into prison and even made all members of their family and relatives, running into millions, suffer along with the innocent victims. They substituted factionalism for Party spirit, stirred up conflicts among the masses and for a time even paralysed the Party organizations. The result was widespread social chaos and unbridled terrorism. Their attitude to Mao Zedong Thought and Comrade Mao Zedong's words was self-serving. They established all sorts of fetishes and taboos so that it was impossible, inside and outside the Party, for the masses in general and leaders at the top level to speak out. Comrade Mao Zedong predicted at the 7,000-people meeting: Without giving full scope to people's democracy and inner-Party democracy, "the dictatorship of the proletariat will turn into a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, and a reactionary, fascist dictatorship at that." This prophecy of Comrade Mao Zedong's unfortunately came true when Lin Biao and the "gang of four" climbed into the saddle.
The deeper the exposure and criticism of Lin Biao and the "gang of four" went, the more the people asked themselves: How could Lin Biao and the "gang of four" run amok for over ten years inside such a great Party as the Chinese Communist Party? The Party has millions of members, in particular a large group of tested veteran cadres who could effectively cope with the Kuomintang reactionaries and the imperialists. But why were they powerless against a handful of scoundrels like Lin Biao and the gang? What lessons must be drawn from this? There is only one answer: Political life inside the Party had been abnormal for years and democracy had been missing inside the Party. These had led to an absence of democracy in society as a whole. So, the most fundamental lesson to be drawn today is the necessity to have full democracy inside the Party.
Historic Significance of the Third Plenary Session
Since the end of the "gang of four," the Party Central Committee has taken a number of important measures to eradicate the influence of Lin Biao and the gang. The 11th Party Congress and the Fifth National People's Congress were convened and the Marxist line, principles and policies were formulated. The national economy has been fast developing, and an excellent situation of unity and stability has emerged. The Party Central Committee has pointed out the necessity to revive the fine traditions of seeking truth from facts and following the mass line, of comprehensively and accurately understanding and applying Mao Zedong Thought, of adhering to the principle that "mistakes must be corrected whenever discovered," and rehabilitating those who had been wrongfully accused and branded by Lin Biao and the "gang of four." These were essential to ensuring full democracy and normal political life inside the Party. The discussion in recent months on practice being the sole criterion in testing a truth has played a positive role in emancipating the mind and smashing fetishes. But up till now, only a very few have really emancipated their minds. Many cadres, especially some senior cadres, still have misgivings. They look warily right and left at each step and cannot uphold principle and truth. If minds are not emancipated and democracy is not given full play, bureaucracy is sure to hold down the pace of the four modernizations.
It was precisely under these circumstances that the Party Central Committee recently convened a working conference and the Third Plenary Session. At these meetings, the fine tradition dating back to the days of Yanan was restored and every participant aired his views freely. A lively atmosphere prevailed at these meetings. Senior cadres adhered to the principled stand that a Party member must uphold truth and correct mistakes. They said what they had not dared to say in the past. They raised and settled questions which had been impossible to settle for many years. Since their minds were emancipated, they used their heads and offered many effective suggestions and proposals to do our work better and to swiftly bring about the four modernizations. It was precisely on the basis of ensuring full democracy inside the Party that many important decisions were able to be adopted at the session. The Third Plenary Session decided that this practice must be introduced into the whole Party, the whole army and the people of all nationalities throughout the country.
The meeting is of far-reaching significance in the history of our Party. It not only made the historic decision of shifting the focus of the work of the Party to realizing the four modernizations, but organizationally provided reliable guarantee to that end, by giving full scope to inner-Party democracy, first of all ensuring full democracy in the Party Central Committee.
Comrade Mao Zedong had pointed out long ago: "Ours is a country in which small-scale production and the patriarchal system prevail. and taking the country as a whole there is as yet no democratic life; consequently, this state of affairs is reflected in our Party by insufficient democracy in Party life. This phenomenon hinders the entire Party from exercising its initiative to the full. Similarly, it has led to insufficient democracy in the united front and in the mass movements." (The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War.) This was said 40 years ago. During this time, our Party has acquired much experience and many lessons on this, but up till now, this question is still not entirely solved. Reality today compels us to solve it in real earnest. Now that the Party Central Committee has set an example, the whole Party must learn from this and give free play to democracy and ensure full democracy and normal inner-Party political life. So long as democracy is ensured and upheld, there is great hope for our Party and for the early accomplishment of the four modernizations.
(A slightly abridged translation of an article in Renmin Ribao, January 11. Subheads are ours.) |
