Three Speeches: An Analysis of the New Course of the Chinese Communist Party

[p011] THREE SPEECHES An Analysis of the New Course of the Chinese Communist Party Michael Banda THis article is based on three speeches made by three leading members of the Chinese Communist Party. They are, in order of importance: 1) Mao Tse-tung’s ‘On the Correct Handling of Contradictions among the People’, made at the Seventh Session of the Supreme State Conference (February 27, 1957). 2) The political report of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party to the Eighth National Congress, given by Liu Shao-chi (September 15, 1956). 3) Chou En-lai’s report to the Fourth Session of the National People’s Congress (June 27, 1957). These three speeches, taken as a whole, constitute the basic line of the new trend in the policy of the CCP. It is not possible to deal with every aspect of these speeches in a single article; but it does seem necessary, in view of what is being said not so much against but for the speeches, that an attempt should be made to explain their motivation, summarize their major ten- dencies and indicate their probable implications. The revolution in permanence The development of the productive forces of world capitalism within the Procrustean bed of capitalist pro- perty relations has made the transition to socialism on a global scale not only possible but also imperative. The breakdown of the capitalist system in its imperial- ist phase, however, has followed a complex and unique course unforeseen by the pioneers of scientific social- ism. Marx and Engels, although they did understand and formulate the idea of the permanent revolution during the German revolution of 1848, nevertheless did so on the assumption that capitalism would break down first of all in its metropolitan centre. The uneven and combined development of capitalism determined an altogether different course for the socialist world re- volution. The collapse of capitalism, as Russia and China have shown, proceeds from the more backward, less developed and weaker peripheral regions to the more advanced and well developed centre, not the other way round. But, as Trotsky forecast in 1903, the historical belatedness of these countries, their back- ward agricultural economies, makes the transition to socialism infinitely more difficult and more protracted, and makes them greatly dependent on the prospects of the proletarian revolution in the West. Continued iso- lation from the resources of world economy can only lead to bureaucratic degeneration and to ‘the hellish logic of the police State’. _ China can in no way claim exemption from this historical prognosis. 103 What has been achieved China today stands on the threshold of a new and higher stage of development in her revolution. The last vestiges of imperialist domination on the mainland have been shattered, the bureaucrat-comprador bour- geoisie has been smashed, the landlords have either been physically eliminated or ‘reformed through lab- our’, the middle and liberal bourgeoisie have been partially expropriated and the power of the rich peas- ants has been severely curtailed. The liberation of China, the carrying through of the land reform programme, the State ownership of the mines, factories, railways, banks, insurance businesses, wholesale trades and the predominance of the co-op- erative form of production in the countryside have laid the basis for the planned utilization and systematic development of China’s national resources. All these things were done, however, not on the basis of a ration- ally conceived theory of development but on the basis of empirical adjustments and improvisations. Con- sequently the overhead cost-was high and the dizziness produced by the initial successes even higher. Never- theless the changes in the State, industry and agricul- ture—despite the Stalinist miseducation and backward- ness of the leadership—provide striking proof of the correctness of the theory of the permanent revolution, which states that the victory of the democratic revolu- tion in a backward country is conceivable only in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat leaning upon the peasantry—and the overthrow of capitalist pro- perty relations. Industry and agriculture Whether we take cement production, steel produc- tion, newsprint consumption or output per man hour we see that China comes at the bottom of the inter- national ladder. China (says Chou in his address) is an agricultural country, a poor country, economically and culturally backward, with a large population and a small area of arable land. This being so our living standards are very low compared with those of highly industrialized coun- tries. Though our industry and agriculture have been rapidly rehabilitated and developed since the Liberation, the increase in output per capita is still rather slow .. . Between 1952 and 1956 our output of consumer goods increased on the average each year by about 3,000 mil- lion yuan. If we deduct the small amount to be kept in reserve and the part consumed by the increased popula- tion each year, only four yuan per head per year could be used to improve the people’s livelihood. These figures indicate that the improvement in living standards each year is limited. . Added to her industrial backwardness and the low productivity in agriculture China is also beset with enormous demographical problems and smitten by re-

[p012] gular natural calamities. A progressively increasing population, a shortage of arable land and the recur- rence of droughts, famines, floods and - windstorms places an enormous burden on Chinese economy—a burden which can be lightened only by access to the capital reserves and the agricultural surpluses of West Europe and North America. This, however, has not been possible. Up till quite recently China has had to rely exclusively on the meagre aid of the Soviet Union: : Russian loans to China in 1956 did not amount to more than 2.3 per cent of the budgetary revenue! Wa's it for this that the Chinese leadership supported the rape of Hungary? China’s industrial development, despite the suc- cesses of her first Five-Year Plan leaves much to be desired. Not even Liu Shao-chi denies this: We have not been able to make heavy and precision machinery ourselves, and therefore cannot ourselves sup- ply many major projects with the main equipment they need. In the case of home-made steel products, we have not been able to keep up with demands, in terms of either quantity or variety; there are many kinds of high grade alloy steel which we cannot yet produce; the non-ferrous metals industry has only a limited range of products; our radio-engineering industry is still very weak; and we have practically no organic synthetic chemical industry to speak of. . . . With regard to fuels, the output of petro- leum falls far short of demand. The situation in industry is further aggravated by the huge appropriations for defence and administration which consume 32 per cent of all State expenditure. raw materials and market permitting, appropriate atten- tion to the development of light industry will not hamper but on the contrary, will benefit the building up of heavy industry. , ° This departure from Soviet methods will undoubt- edly have repercussions in the Stalinist world—the as- sertions of Mao and Co. to the contrary notwith- standing. The third and final blow to Stalinist theory was - the expropriation of the ‘national bourgeoisie’. For In order to be a strong and sovereign nation China: © must industrialize. This means the simultaneous and planned development of heavy and light industry with priority for the latter. The first attempt of the Peking régime to imple- ment the ‘theory’ of socialism in a single country by an exaggerated emphasis on capital construction proved a flop. ‘In . . . the second and third quarters of 1956 . . we began to discover the tense situation in the supply of certain materials resulting from excessive in- vestments in capital construction.’ Thus spoke Chou En-lai. As a result capital construction in 1957 will be 20 per cent less than in 1956. The second blow to the utopian ‘theory’ of Stalin- ism came when the régime modified its policy in re- lation to light industry. The point is made in Mao’s speech, but is more fully elaborated in Liu’s speech where he warns the party of what Trotsky once figura- tively termed the ‘scissors crisis’ (i.e., a growing dis- crepancy between agricultural and industrial prices leading to a rupture between the working class and the peasantry): There are .. . comrades who . ... want to lower the rate of development of light industry.and other branches of the national economy. . . They do not realize, firstly, that with the people’s demands for consumer’s goods growing day by day, a shortage of commodities may vesult if there is no adequate development of light in- dustry, and this, in turn will affect the stability of com- modity prices and of the market. In the countryside in particular, if there is not a sufficient supply of industrial products to exchange at stable and reasonable prices for agricultural produce, the consolidation of the worker- peasant alliance as well as the development of agricul- tural production may be adversely affected. Secondly, ‘light industry needs comparatively small investments and enterprises in their field can be established in a relatively short time. So the turnover of capital is relatively quick, and funds can be accumulated relatively rapidly. Further- more we can use those funds accumulated by light indus- try to help develop heavy industry. This shows that funds, 104 many years the national bourgeoisie was considered a constituent element of the ‘national revolutionary front’—first under Chiang in 1926-27, then under Wang Chin-wei, and finally under nobody in particu- lar. The extreme weakness of this class has enabled the régime to expropriate it without much danger to itself. The lack of trained administrators and man- agers hampered the take-over and it had to be done in stages. In industry the transformation was carried through by a form of joint State and private operation of enterprises. In commerce the State converted private commercial firms into commission agents and retail distributors for State-owned products. As bait for the capitalists the régime offered redemption in the form of apportioned profits and, at a later stage, fixed in- terest payments on investments. The bourgeoisie how- ever exert pressure on the régime in a thousand and one ways. During the Korean war the régime was forced to undertake a series of purges in order to curtail the operations of this class. Again, during the Hungarian revolution the bourgeoisie used the justified anger and resentment of the masses to undermine the State. Their pressure finds reflection in the Communist Party too. ‘The Right-wing elements,’ says Chou, ‘have taken their stand on bourgeois democracy to attack our State system. ... They attempted to set up, apart from the National Peoples’ Congress—the supreme organ of State power in our country—certain other organs of State power, such as what they called a “Political Planning Council”, a “Rehabilitation Committee”, and such like.’ This statement flatly contradicts the assertion of Mao that the antagonism between the capitalists and the workers if ‘properly handled’ (?) can ‘be resolved in a peaceful way’. Bureaucracy Potentially the most sinister and evil phenomenon in China today is the prolific growth of bureaucracy in the State and party apparatuses. The further growth of this cancerous formation threatens to separate the party and the State from the people. Such a state of affairs would inevitably lead to a new Hungary on a much vaster scale. The Chinese leaders are not unaware of the lessons of the Stalin era and the bloody precedent of Rakosi and Geré. Their speeches are motivated by the fear of history repeating itself on their own soil! That is also the meaning of the new ‘rectification’ cam- paign in China, which has already unleashed a spate of denunciations concerning the excesses of party cadres in Government posts. One such denunciation from a Peking University lecturer seems ominous. Writ- ing of the scandalous extravagance and the luxurious living standards of certain government workers he warned the régime that unless real changes were ushered in soon ‘the masses will beat you down, kill you, over- throw you’. Mao makes a belated acknowledgment of this fact in his speech. Speaking of disturbances and

[p013] strikes in factories, farms and universities he states: ‘A more important cause was bureaucracy on the part of those in positions of leadership.” And he recommends: ‘In order to get rid of the root cause of disturbances, we must stamp out bureaucracy, greatly improve ideo- logical and political education . . - Liu is even more explicit: ‘Since our party came to power, however, the tendency to corruption and degeneration, violation of laws and moral degenera- tion has developed to a certain extent. We must re- solutely put an end to this grave state of affairs. The growth of bureaucracy has already created a serious situation in the relations between the State ‘and the peasantry. Liu says: ‘Over-estimation of the present economic capacity of the agricultural cO-Op- eratives by many party organizations and organs of State authority and their abuse of the so-called con- venience” brought about by co-operation have given rise once more to a tendency towards bossiness in village work.’ In an attempt to prevent further bureaucratic plundering of the villages the Government, according to Mao, is ‘prepared to stabilize the total amount of the grain tax and the amount of grain purchased by the State at approximately something over 80,000 million catties a year’. Bureaucracy also manifests itself in the adminis- tration of the national minorities, who constitute six per cent of the total population but occupy fifty to sixty per cent of the total land area. Tibet 1s the major worry for the régime. The Greater-Han chauvinism of the Chinese administrators and colonizers provoked a number of local rebellions. The régime has since made a retreat on the minorities front. Referring to the projected reforms in Tibet, Mao says: ‘We should not be impatient. When this will be done can only be decided when the great majority of the people of Tibet and their leading public figures consider it practical.” Democratic reforms have been postponed till the third five-year plan. Chou—who could not recognize bureaucracy in Hungary when he saw it—is forced to describe and explain the same apparition in his own country: ‘Bureaucratic ways still exist, even to a serious degree, in our administrative organizations at various levels _ . 2 Then follows a sad admission: ‘The people’s level of literacy and culture is still not a high one and this inevitably limits in one degree or another their exer- cise of the right to take part in the management and supervision of State affairs. For these reasons, it 1s pos- sible for bureaucracy to develop in our governmental offices... The growth of functionarism and bureaucratism can be combatted only by relying on the initiative and supervision of the working masses, This is not in itself a guarantee of success—but it certainly is an indispen- sable condition for struggling against bureaucracy until the revolution in Japan and Western Europe comes to the rescue. The widest and fullest possible application of proletarian democracy means first of all the legaliza- tion of all socialist trends and groups in the working- class movement and a recognition of their right to put forward their own policy before the masses of the peo- ple, to contest all elections to the People’s Congresses at all levels, etc. 105 Secondly, it means the right to form factions in- side the CP and the right of minorities to struggle to transform the policy of the party and change the lead- ership if necessary, within the framework of democratic centralism and without fear of administrative reprisals. Thirdly, it means the adoption of the principle of social management through workers’ councils in all en- terprises, and the strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat and its alliance with the semi-proletarian masses. This requires producers’ councils and _ the granting of greater powers in administration and man- agement to local assemblies. Lastly, it means a conscious orientation of the foreign policy of the workers’ State in an anti-Stalinist and anti-imperialist direction. A socialist foreign policy must not passively reflect the struggles of the colonial and metropolitan workers, nor must it lull the con- sciousness of the workers at home with the soporific of “peaceful co-existence’. On the contrary a socialist for- eign policy must consciously help the struggles of the workers of foreign lands for international socialism. The greatest thing about Lenin and Trotsky was their internationalism, no moralizing sentimentality, no cheap shibboleths. It was a very practical considera- tion for them. That was why they formed the Com- munist International—as an instrument for the pro- secution of the world proletarian revolution. That too was why they waged a merciless struggle against the League of Nations and all those who supported it. Do the record and policies of the Chinese Com- munist Party meet these qualifications? Not even half way. The CCP tolerates all forms of bourgeois and petty-bourgeois leagues, parties and associations, but its record in relation to opposition groups in the working-class movement has been—and still is—an extremely macabre one. I refer specifically to the per- secution and repression of Chinese Trotskyists and the liquidation of the entire organization in the Kwangtung province in 1951. What was their crime? They consist- ently fought for a proletarian socialist China and op- posed the reformist policy of the Comintern under Stalin! The acid test for the policy of letting ‘all flowers bloom’ will be the recognition and legalization of Trotskyism in China. Freedom, as Rosa Luxemburg once observed, is always freedom for the man who thinks differently. For the first time since its foundation thirty-six years ago the Chinese Communist Party has granted a certain licence to opposition minorities. Says Liu: It is provided in the draft constitution that-the party members have the right to give full play to their creative ability in work, and, while unconditionally carrying out party decisions, have the right to reserve and submit their own views to a leading body of the party, in case they should disagree with them. This is an extremely limited definition of inner- party democracy. While it is sufficiently explicit to justify dissent it nevertheless does not indicate what forms dissension can take. Moreover the bureaucratic fashion in which the Kao-kang-Jao Shu-shih faction were dealt with brings into question the bona fides of the leadership. Even now there is no explanation of the Kao-Jao affair. Only a vague and unsubstantiated claim that they ‘tried to seize the leadership of the State and party by conspiratorial means’. At the Eighth Congress the question of workers’

[p014] councils was not even broached. There was much talk of strengthening the supervision of the State through the party, the people’s congresses, etc., and of the neces- sity to readjust the administrative powers and functions of the central and local authorities. Mao too does not mention anywhere the role of workers’ councils. Yet in Chou’s speech the following statement appears: To encourage the mass of workers and staff to take an active part in managing enterprises and in exercising supervision over administrative work, we are promoting a system of workers’ councils in the enterprises. In agri- cultural co-operatives, we are instituting a system of gen- eral meetings of members and management committees in accordance with the policy of democratic management of co-operatives. Having attacked Tito and the Yugoslav commun- ists in the most nauseating manner during the Hun- garian events Chou adopts a specifically Yugoslav con- tribution without even acknowledging it! If it needed a revolution to teach the Chinese Communist Party the value of workers’ councils how long will it be before they recognize the virtues of producers’ councils? It is in the sphere of foreign affairs that the prag- matic and eclectic nature of the Chinese Communist Party leadership reveals itself. The foreign policy of the Peking régime is a direct reflection of its trade policy. On the one hand it seeks to appease the Soviet bureaucrats as it did during and after the Hungarian revolution; on the other hand it seeks to neutralize the colonial bourgeoisie and exploit the rivalries of the imperialists in a purely opportunist way. At Geneva it helped to sell the Indo-Chinese revolution to imperial- ists by cynically agreeing to the division at the 17th parallel. At Bandung it proclaimed the non-revolution- ary theory of ‘peaceful co-existence’ and Panch-Sila. In place of a revolutionary foreign policy we get in- stead an emasculated policy of ‘co-existence’ to be achieved by means of a ‘summit’ conference! The European workers might well say: ‘Tell me what your foreign policy is and we will tell you what you arel’ Where is China going? By broaching the question of contradictions under socialism Mao has opened a new and important discus- sion in the Stalinist world—a discussion whose danger- ous logic is already beginning to have effects in Eastern Europe and perhaps even in the USSR. Its sympto- matic significance cannot be denied—no matter what the subjective desires of Mao may be. It constitutes a new factor in the disintegration of Stalinist ideology, which has always denied that contradictions exist, be- tween the State and the people and between the work- ing class and the peasantry. Now all the tenets of Stalinism are being brought into question almost im- mediately after Stalin himself was downgraded! Stalin- ism has always recognized the legitimacy of only one school of thought: Stalinism. By posing the question of letting ‘a hundred schools of thought contend’, Mao implicitly challenges Stalinist orthodoxy. Already the literary opposition in the USSR is being nurtured by the debate on artistic and literary freedom in Peking. So far the Kremlin has made no attempt to curb the Peking heresy. But the experience of the Yugoslav revolution proved that the Soviet bureaucracy can co- exist with a living revolution only in so far as the re- volution does not threaten the immediate interests and privileges of the bureaucracy. So far the Kremlin has been able to co-exist because the Peking leadership gave it no offence and because the blockade of China and the threat of imperialist aggression increased the dependence of China on Russia. However the growth of the Chinese working class (from 13 to 24 million in the last six years) and the successes of planned eco- nomy, together with the new international situation characterized by the breaking of the American em- bargo, have not only provided the Peking régime with a leeway it did not possess before but have also placed new strains and stresses upon Sino-Russian relations. This is one contradiction that Mao refuses to acknowledge but it is in fact the most important and decisive. It is a contradiction that can only be resolved by the violent overthrow of the Kremlin oligarchy. A leadership that does not prepare consciously for such a bloody eventuality will end up by cutting its own throat.