Sources of Chinese Tradition, Volume 2

by Wm. Theodore de Bary

  There is the Chinese People’s Republic, turning in a new direction, brightening the world.

  The history of mankind is opening a new chapter.

  The orders of nature will also follow the direction of revolution.

  The name of Stalin will forever be the sun of mankind.

  Long live Great Stalin!

  Long live Our Beloved “Steel"!

  [Trans. by Chaoying Fang]

  JI YUN: “HOW CHINA PROCEEDS WITH THE TASK OF INDUSTRIALIZATION” (1953)

  Citing Lenin, Stalin, and the Soviet Union as models for the CCP, this statement gives early priority to heavy industry and agricultural collectivization in a Soviet-style Five-Year Plan. The Communists saw large-scale projects and a planned economy as the key to the nearly century-old goal of wealth and power.

  The five-year construction plan, to which we have long looked forward, has now commenced. Its basic object is the gradual realization of the industrialization of our state.

  Industrialization has been the goal sought by the Chinese people during the past one hundred years. From the last days of the Manchu dynasty to the early years of the republic, some people had undertaken the establishment of a few factories in the country. But industry as a whole has never been developed in China. . . . It was just as Stalin said: “Because China did not have its own heavy industry and its own war industry, it was being trampled upon by all the reckless and unruly elements. . . .”

  We are now in the midst of a period of important changes, in that period of transition, as described by Lenin, of changing “from the stallion of the peasant, the farm hand, and poverty, to the stallion of mechanized industry and electrification.”

  We must look upon this period of transition to the industrialization of the state as one equal in importance and significance to that period of transition of the revolution toward the fight for political power. . . .

  It was through the implementation of the policies of the industrialization of the state and the collectivization of agriculture that the Soviet Union succeeded in building up, from an economic structure complicated with five component economies, a unified socialist economy; in turning a backward agricultural nation into a first-class industrial power of the world; in defeating German fascist aggression in World War II; and in constituting itself the strong bastion of world peace today.

  We are looking upon the Soviet Union as our example in the building of our country. Soviet experiences in the realization of industrialization are of great value to us. . . .

  The foundation of socialism is large industrial development. Lenin said, “There is only one real foundation for a socialist society, and it is large industry. If we do not possess factories of great size, if we do not possess a large industrial structure with the most advanced equipment, then we shall generally not be able to talk of socialism, much less in the case of an agricultural country.”

  Accordingly, in order to enable our state to progress victoriously toward socialism, we must construct large industries. . . . Numerous facts have proved that it is futile to attempt the enforcement of socialism on the foundations of small agriculture or small handicrafts. Industry must first be developed to provide possibilities for the collectivization and mechanization of agriculture, for the socialist reform of agriculture.

  At the same time, only with industrialization of the state may we guarantee our economic independence and nonreliance on imperialism.

  [Ji Yun, in People’s Daily, May 23, 1953; adapted from Selden, The People’s Republic of China, pp. 290–292]

  LI FUQUN: “REPORT ON THE FIRST FIVE-YEAR PLAN FOR DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATIONAL ECONOMY OF THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA IN 1953–1957, JULY 5 AND 6, 1955”

  Although called a “report,” the following is more a restatement of the goals of the first five-year plan than an actual account of progress made. Nevertheless, these policies did succeed in establishing some industrial base by the mid-fifties. Note the heavy investment in major capital construction, reflecting a similar Soviet emphasis on large-scale state projects of great visibility.

  The general task set by China’s first five-year plan was determined in the light of the fundamental task of the state during the transition period.

  It may be summarized as follows: We must center our main efforts on industrial construction; this comprises 694 above-norm construction projects, the core of which are the 156 projects that the Soviet Union is designing for us and on which we lay the preliminary groundwork for China’s socialist industrialization; we must foster the growth of agricultural producers’ cooperatives, whose system of ownership is partially collective, and handicraft producers’ cooperatives, thus laying the preliminary groundwork for the socialist transformation of agriculture and handicrafts; and in the main, we must incorporate capitalist industry and commerce into various forms of state capitalism, laying the groundwork for the socialist transformation of private industry and commerce. . . .

  The total outlay for the country’s economic construction and cultural and educational development during the five-year period will be 76,640 million yuan, or the equivalent in value of more than 700 million taels [a little over an ounce] of gold. Such an enormous investment in national construction would have been absolutely inconceivable in the past. This is possible only for a government led by the working class and working wholeheartedly in the interests of the people.

  Investments in capital construction will amount to 42,740 million yuan, or 55.8 percent of the total outlay for economic construction and cultural and educational development during the five-year period. Of the remaining 44.2 percent, or 33,900 million yuan, part will be spent on work occasioned by the needs of capital construction, such as prospecting resources, engineering surveying and designing, stockpiling of equipment and material, and so on. Part will be spent to develop industrial production, transport and posts and telecommunications, including such items as overhaul of equipment, technical and organizational improvements in production, trial manufacture of new products, purchase of miscellaneous fixed assets, and so on; another part will serve as circulating capital for the various economic departments; and still another part will go to funds allocated to all economic, cultural, and educational departments for operating expenses and for the training of specialized personnel. . . .

  The industrialization that our country is striving to achieve is socialist industrialization, modeled on Soviet experience and carried out with the direct assistance of the Soviet Union and the people’s democracies. It is not capitalist industrialization. Therefore, our industry, particularly those branches producing means of production, is capable of rapid development.

  [Adapted from Selden, The People’s Republic of China, pp. 295–300]

  CHANGES IN MID-COURSE

  MAO ZEDONG: “THE QUESTION OF AGRICULTURAL COOPERATION,” JULY 31, 1955

  Under the Soviet model, Chinese agriculture, through the sale of grain to the Soviet Union, was to provide the resources to fund an ambitious industrialization program. By the mid-fifties, however, the leadership realized that agricultural production was lagging and the surplus derived from it was insufficient. Collectivization of the land was seen as the solution to this problem. However, farmers, having received land in the early land reform movement, could be expected to resist subsequent moves for them to surrender it. The program thus was envisioned as a long-term project that would take decades and would be done on a voluntary basis. In the following, Mao spelled out the steps by which the people could be persuaded to join in the process: building small-scale cooperatives that would then be expanded into large production units. When the farmers saw the advantages of cooperative farming, he thought, they would join the cooperatives of their own accord.

  When production fell, in part on account of the farmers’ noncooperation, however, Mao decided to press ahead, convinced that the masses would go along with the tide of revolutionary change and that the eventual results would confirm the rightness of his policies. Instead of taking seve
ral decades, China’s land collectivization was accomplished in a year or two. Though less violent than the Soviet collectivization of the thirties, it was not without resistance and loss of life.

  The following passages reveal, in the way Mao expresses himself, how easily his own thoughts are put into the minds of others—how prone he is to letting the strong conviction of his own rightness color his reading of a situation.

  A new upsurge in the socialist mass movement is in sight throughout the Chinese countryside. But some of our comrades are tottering along like a woman with bound feet, always complaining that others are going too fast. They imagine that by picking on trifles, grumbling unnecessarily, worrying continuously, and putting up countless taboos and commandments, they will guide the socialist mass movement in the rural areas along sound lines.

  No, this is not the right way at all; it is wrong.

  The tide of social reform in the countryside—in the shape of cooperation—has already reached some places. Soon it will sweep the whole country. This is a huge socialist revolutionary movement, which involves a rural population more than five hundred million strong, one that has very great world significance. We should guide this movement vigorously, warmly, and systematically, and not act as a drag on it. . . .

  It is wrong to say that the present pace of development of the agricultural producers’ cooperatives has “gone beyond practical possibilities” or “gone beyond the consciousness of the masses.” The situation in China is like this: its population is enormous, there is a shortage of cultivated land (only three mou of land per head, taking the country as a whole; in many parts of the southern provinces, the average is only one mou or less), natural catastrophes occur from time to time—every year large numbers of farms suffer more or less from flood, drought, gales, frost, hail, or insect pests—and methods of farming are backward. As a result, many peasants are still having difficulties or are not well off. The well-off ones are comparatively few, although since land reform the standard of living of the peasants as a whole has improved. For all these reasons there is an active desire among most peasants to take the socialist road. . . .

  We have been taking steps to bring about a gradual advance in the socialist transformation of agriculture. The first step in the countryside is to call on the peasants, in accordance with the principles of voluntariness and mutual benefit, to organize agricultural producers’ mutual-aid teams. Such teams contain only the rudiments of socialism. Each one draws in a few households, though some have ten or more. The second step is to call on the peasants, on the basis of these mutual-aid teams and still in accordance with the principles of voluntariness and mutual benefit, to organize small agricultural producers’ cooperatives semi-socialist in nature, characterized by the pooling of land as shares and by single management. Not until we take the third step will the peasants be called upon, on the basis of these small, semi-socialist cooperatives and in accordance with the same principles of voluntariness and mutual benefit, to unite on a larger scale and organize large agricultural producers’ cooperatives completely socialist in nature. These steps are designed to raise steadily the socialist consciousness of the peasants through their personal experience, to change their mode of life step by step, and so minimize any feeling that their mode of life is being changed all of a sudden.

  [Mao, Guanyu nongye hezuohua wenti; trans. adapted from Schram, The Political Thought of Mao Tse-tung, pp. 343–346]

  MAO ZEDONG: “ON THE CORRECT HANDLING OF CONTRADICTIONS AMONG THE PEOPLE”

  This speech, popularly known by the catch-phrase “Let a Hundred Flowers Bloom,” is one of Mao Zedong’s most important theoretical statements after the consolidation of Communist power on the mainland of China and after the death of Stalin left Mao the senior Communist theoretician. It was occasioned in part by the shock of the uprising in Hungary late in 1956, which showed the degree of pent-up dissatisfaction possible under even a seemingly well-established Communist regime. If Mao’s gesture was meant to encourage the “letting off of steam,” those who took advantage of the offer found, after a brief period of forbearance by the Party, that they would be subjected to severe attack and penalized for their outspokenness.

  In long-range terms the significance of this statement lay not in any liberalization or loosening of Communist ideological control but precisely in its reaffirmation of the importance that Mao attached to unity in matters of theory and doctrine. As we have seen, for Mao and for Liu Shaoqi, the principal means of preserving that unity as a dynamic force had been ideological struggle. Yet under conditions of Party dominance, the threat of stagnation was always present. Consequently for Mao, always concerned to keep his cohorts in battle-readiness, the question was how to stimulate the airing of contradictions without allowing them to become antagonistic.

  Mao continued to wrestle with this problem, hoping to find a use for “nonantagonistic” criticism as an outlet for discontent. However, with the Party standing as sole judge of what was antagonistic or not, and making an object lesson of those who unknowingly overstepped the invisible line, this particular contradiction could not be easily resolved.

  Mao’s speech was originally delivered on February 27, 1957, before a large audience at the Supreme State Conference. When finally published at the end of June, it had been substantially revised and probably represented a much more guarded statement of policy than the original lecture. The purpose was now less to encourage “fragrant flowers” and more to identify “poisonous weeds.”

  Two Different Types of Contradictions

  Never has our country been as united as it is today. The victories of the bourgeois-democratic revolution and the socialist revolution, coupled with our achievements in socialist construction, have rapidly changed the face of old China. Now we see before us an even brighter future. . . . Unification of the country, unity of the people, and unity among our various nationalities—these are the basic guarantees for the sure triumph of our cause. However, this does not mean that there are no longer any contradictions in our society. . . . We are confronted by two types of social contradictions—contradictions between ourselves and the enemy and contradictions among the people. These two types of contradictions are totally different in nature. [pp. 14–15]

  The contradictions between ourselves and our enemies are antagonistic ones. Within the ranks of the people, contradictions among the working people are nonantagonistic, while those between the exploiters and the exploited classes have, apart from their antagonistic aspect, a nonantagonistic aspect. Contradictions among the people have always existed, but their content differs in each period of the revolution and during the building of socialism.

  In the conditions existing in China today, what we call contradictions among the people include the following:

  Contradictions within the working class, contradictions within the peasantry, contradictions within the intelligentsia, contradictions between the working class and the peasantry, contradictions between the working class and peasantry on the one hand and the intelligentsia on the other, contradictions between the working class and other sections of the working people on the one hand and the national bourgeoisie on the other, contradictions within the national bourgeoisie, and so forth. Our People’s Government is a government that truly represents the interests of the people and serves the people, yet certain contradictions do exist between the government and the masses. These include contradictions between the interests of the state, collective interests, and individual interests; between democracy and centralism; between those in positions of leadership and the led; and contradictions arising from the bureaucratic practices of certain state functionaries in their relations with the masses. All these are contradictions among the people; generally speaking, underlying the contradictions among the people is the basic identity of the interests of the people.

  In our country, the contradiction between the working class and the national bourgeoisie is a contradiction among the people. . . . The contradiction between exploiter
and exploited that exists between the national bourgeoisie and the working class is an antagonistic one. But, in the concrete conditions existing in China, such an antagonistic contradiction, if properly handled, can be transformed into a nonantagonistic one and resolved in a peaceful way. But if it is not properly handled—if, say, we do not follow a policy of unity, criticizing and educating the national bourgeoisie, or if the national bourgeoisie does not accept this policy—then the contradictions between the working class and the national bourgeoisie can turn into an antagonistic contradiction between ourselves and the enemy. [pp. 16–18]

  There were other people in our country who took a wavering attitude toward the Hungarian events because they were ignorant about the actual world situation. They felt that there was too little freedom under our people’s democracy and that there was more freedom under Western parliamentary democracy. They ask for the adoption of the two-party system of the West, where one party is in office and the other out of office. But this so-called two-party system is nothing but a means of maintaining the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie; under no circumstances can it safeguard the freedom of the working people. . . .

  Those who demand freedom and democracy in the abstract regard democracy as an end and not a means. Democracy sometimes seems to be an end, but it is in fact only a means. Marxism teaches us that democracy is part of the superstructure and belongs to the category of politics. That is to say, in the last analysis it serves the economic base. The same is true of freedom. Both democracy and freedom are relative, not absolute, and they come into being and develop under specific historical circumstances.

  Within the ranks of the people, democracy stands in relation to centralism, and freedom to discipline. They are two conflicting aspects of a single entity, contradictory as well as united, and we should not one-sidedly emphasize one to the denial of the other. Within the ranks of the people, we cannot do without democracy, nor can we do without centralism. Our democratic centralism means the unity of democracy and centralism and the unity of freedom and discipline. Under this system, the people enjoy a wide measure of democracy and freedom, but at the same time they have to keep themselves within the bounds of socialist discipline. All this is well understood by the people. [pp. 21–22]