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| Letter of Ma Bin and Han Yaxi |
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April 2002
January 2002
November 2001
September 2001
August 2001
July 2001
June 2001
April 2001
March 2001
February 2001
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A Letter to Comrade
Jiang Zemin Dear Secretary General Jiang and the Party’s Central Committee: We listened to your speech on July l, 2001 and have since then carefully read it again in the past few days. We have many opinions in regard to your “July First” remarks. According to the Party’s Basic Statute, as well as the sections on Democrat Centralism of your speech, we feel we should present our comments to you and the Central Committee as well. First of all, we would like to comment on the following passage: To enforce the requirements of “Three Representations,” we must hold on to the essential nature of the Party as the vanguard of the working class, and, from beginning to end, maintain the advanced nature of our Party; in the meantime, in accordance with the reality of the economic development and social progress, we want to constantly empower the class basis as well as broadening the mass basis of the Party and increase its power to influence society. The following are our opinions in the order as set out in your text: First, you confirmed fully the point that we must hold on to the essential nature of the Party as the vanguard of the working class, and evaluated highly the working class of our nation. As you say, we must from beginning to end rely on the working class with heart and soul. Your comment is entirely correct. However, as you state, although some working people’s work positions have changed, the change has not effected the status of the working class in China, and from a long term perspective the change is helpful in raising the overall quality of the working class and taking the full extent of their advantage. Your comments are incomplete. It is correct to say that at present the Party still claims that the working class is the Party’s class base. The first article of the Constitution of the country states that the People’s Republic of China is under the leadership of the working class; this has not been revised. You and the Central Committee also state again and again that the working class is the master of the state and the enterprises, and we want to safeguard the power and mastership of the working class, etc. In saying this, it is true the status of the working class has not formally changed. In reality, however, what remains in the relations between the workers and businesses is a contract relationship between employees and employers. Labor has already become a commodity today. Workers enjoy extremely little of democratic rights in enterprises, and even that little they have are not guaranteed at all. Those sayings of yours contain little practical content. Workers leave their work posts, and their seniority benefits are bought out, all as they are ordered. Nowadays masses of workers have lost their jobs; they can resort to no means to halt the process. After they left, masses of young peasants flow in. As compared with the city workers, except for the fact that the peasants are rather younger and paid less and that they have much looser relations with the enterprises, there is nothing that can result for them in improvement in terms of education, skills, and political vision and individual personality. The conditions of the workers in private businesses of either domestic or foreign investment are even worse, insufferable, and without any guarantee. So under these conditions, how can it be said that the status of the working class has not changed? Nevertheless, this is not the issue we are going to focus on today. You also say, “in the period of democratic revolution, most of the Party members were peasants and other working people ... but ... our Party had her attention focused heavily on its construction of doctrine... Hence, the Party maintained its essential nature as the vanguard of the working class.” These remarks are incomplete. The correct principle concerning our party’s acceptance of new members is to follow the class line, that is, to assess a person based upon his family setting but not only to judge from that family setting. Who can join the Party? - only those members of the working class who are shown to have come to an advanced level. As peasants, or persons of other working background, they have to first come to the class stand of the working class, also ascend to the level of their vanguard, and then become members of the Party. In the period of democratic revolution, an intellectual who had not become a part of the working class was required to accept education by the Party, to consciously transform his worldviews, his views of life, until he really adopted the working class’s stand and raised himself to the level of the vanguard of the working class. Only then could he join the Party. For someone from or of the setting of the exploiting class, first of all he had to rebel against his own class and undergo conscious transformation until he finally came to stand on the side of the working class and was no longer exploiting or enjoying the benefit gained by means of exploitation. In addition, he had to be opposed to exploitation. On such basis, he needed to undergo further testing in the revolutionary practice until he finally lifted himself to the level of the vanguard of the working class. Then he could join the Party and, as a member, enjoy the same rights and perform the same duties of other members of the entire Party without discrimination. It is not true to say that our Party has had the practice of accepting new members with no concerns about their original class setting. Although, as you said, that the Party’s high regard for its construction of doctrine has been historically true, the core of the Party’s construction of doctrine is to require every member to firmly adopt the stand of the working class and constantly make every effort to achieve the rank of the vanguard of the working class. Also, it is right for you to stress that [the Party] guides them in their struggles to accomplish the Party’s program and tasks,” and that a Party member must “struggle to accomplish the Party’s program and tasks,” but all revolutionaries within and outside the Party and the entire people should all struggle to accomplish the program and tasks of the Party. Not only the national bourgeoisie but liberal gentry also assumed struggles for accomplishing the Party’s program and tasks of in the period of democratic revolution. Therefore, it is not enough to impose only on the Party members the requirement to struggle for the program and tasks of the Party. But, still, this is not the issue we are to focus on today. The focus of our letter is on the fact that the purpose of one passage in your speech, that is, “...to enlarge the people’s base of the Party,” is to let the real life newly born bourgeoisie, or the really existing exploiters, join the Party. However, you did not make your point plain but address this in a mix of some irrelevant messages that obfuscate the essence of the issue. You only implied your true intention; this will only cause serious confusions in the mind of the people both within and outside the Party. If you believe that accepting the new bourgeois elements into the Party is an urgent demand of the current situation, and that the issue requires a rapid solution, you ought to put forward the issue plainly. You ought to lay out facts, elaborate on them, and make your argument clearly. Only this way can you reach a general consensus in the minds of the members of the entire Party, the entire working class, and the people of the whole country. Why didn’t you do so? The communists look down upon those who hide their own political agenda. Classic Marxist writers and the leaders of our Party had a tradition of using exact and precise expressions in discourse. In the verse “if there had not been the Communist Party, there would have been China,” Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that it lacked the word -“new” ahead of “China.” What on earth are the reasons for you to employ phrases in your discourse that sound neutral and disguise the essential nature of the issue? To demonstrate that our judgment is not arbitrary, we would like to expound the following: You say: “Since the reform and the opening, new changes have taken place in the social stratum of our country, appearing are social stratum such as founders and technicians of people-run businesses of science and technology, managerial personnel hired by enterprises of foreign investment, individual business household, private business owners, brokers of intermediate entities, and independent professionals. Moreover, lots of people float frequently from and to entities of different ownerships, different factors, and different geographical locations. People’s occupations and status change constantly. The change will continue. Guided by the Party’s directory and policies, the broad masses of new social stratum make their contributions to the development of socialist society and other causes by means of honest labor and work and legal businesses. Together with the workers, peasants, intellectuals, cadres, and P.L.A. officials and soldiers, they are also constructors of the socialist cause of Chinese characteristics. The great and arduous cause of constructing a socialism with Chinese characteristics demands outstanding elements from all walks of life to be loyal to the motherland and socialism and lead the masses with their own actual practice in pushing forward the cause. If one can consciously dedicate oneself in the struggle to accomplish the Party’s line and program that makes a major standard to measure if he satisfies the requirements for membership of the Party and could be accepted as a new member. The Party members from the ranks of workers, peasants, army and cadres constitute the most basic components and backbone forces of the Party. At the same time, we also should accept to the Party the outstanding elements from other social factors who recognize the Party’s program and Constitution, consciously devote themselves in the struggles for the Party’s line and program, and meet the requirements of the Party member through long term tests and heighten constantly the thought and political awareness of the broad masses of the Party members through the great influence of the Party. Hence we can strengthen the power of influence and convergence of the Party throughout the entire society.” As for the two above passages, our comments are: 1. Today, China is still a society of classes. Since the economic reform, in addition to the changes taking place in the components of social stratum, there have been also changes in the components of classes. Among the people you have listed are different groups of the working class plus the bourgeoisie and its agents, which should not be mixed up with one another. In present China, a new bourgeoisie has been reborn. Mr. Jing Shuping published his “Reflections on the Day of July First” in the People’s Daily. He states: “I have direct experience of the speedy development of non-public ownership businesses. To name only private businesses as examples, in the time of the campaign to integrate public and private businesses in 1956, the number of the business people of the national industries and commerce only amounted to 760,000 with a total property of Rmb 2.2 billion while the statistics of of 2000 shows that there are 1,700,000 private enterprises (including 3,500 private group companies) with a total capital investment of Rmb 11 trillion. The number of employees of private businesses is over 24 million. Non-public ownership businesses enjoy the benefits granted by the Party and Government and play a more and more important role in the national economic construction.” As everyone knows, national industrial and commercial business people are indeed national bourgeoisie. Jing compares “the national industrial and commercial business people” of 1956 with the present day private businesses; he frankly admits the re-existence of the bourgeoisie in China and the fact the quantity has expanded many times that of 1956. Are not these facts clear to you? Class analysis and clear thinking about who are enemies, friends, and our own forces, constitutes the core of the basic principles of Marxism, and the basic skills of the communist. However, why, in such an important speech, did you only mention the changes in social stratum and mix up the concepts of stratum with class? 2. You also say that founders and technicians have appeared who are from the people-run businesses of science and technology . This is not a clear statement. What is it that is called “people-run”? It is in fact private-run. It is not precise that “private business” be called “people-run business.” Our country is “the People’s Republic of China.” Our Constitution clearly claims that our country’s economy is under the ownership of the entire people. In the means of production owned by the entire people, every person in this country enjoys a share; this is truly “the people’s ownership” and “the people’s business.” The present day “people-run” business are in fact private business of the capitalist. The broad masses do not have a share. How could you name them “people-run”? Some people call them “people-run”, and term our state “the officials”; they split our state from the people, placing them in contradictory positions. This is a distortion of the nature of the state and its relationship with the people. It is very wrong. Some people want privatization and try to substitute the private economy for the majority status of the public sector economy. But they do not feel they can justify this course openly. Therefore, in order to disguise the true nature of private business and confuse people, they created and employ the term “people-run.” You should not adopt the term “people-run”; it is very unscientific. And yet, what does “founders of the people-run... businesses” mean? Now that we understand “people-run” business to be private business, there are two possible entities that are in question: one is individual technical professionals, or cooperation by a number of individuals; they start businesses with their own skills and finds; they run business with their own labor, not hiring employees. The founders of such businesses are in fact individual workers or collective workers. But if they rely mainly on employees’ labor (more than eight), exploit their surplus values, then the founders are bourgeois. The two natures are very easy to distinguish from each other. Which of the two categories do the “founders” you called belong to? Or both? Why didn’t you distinguish them? As for technical professionals of the “people-run” businesses, if they are hired employees, then they are working class people. As for “the managerial and technical personnel hired by businesses of foreign investment” that you mentioned, if they are chief managerial persons, for instance, chief executive officers, then they are agents of foreign capitalists, belonging to a group within the bourgeoisie. As for ordinary managing persons and technicians, they belong to the working class. The two categories should not be mixed up. As for business of individual households, they are individual workers. You mentioned “the employees of intermediary organizations, individual professionals.” These are all intellectuals in the present time. As long as they do not earn their major sources of living by exploiting their employees, they constitute a part of the working class, even though their labor is mental labor. In summary, among the members of society you listed in your speech, we have no difficulty to tell apart which is which; most of them belong to the working class or to some stratum of the working class. Nevertheless, “private business owners” or “the founders of the people-run business of science and technology,” who hire and exploit employees, and managers of the businesses owned by foreign investment who work as agents of foreign capitalists all belong to the bourgeoisie or the exploiting class. Why did you mix up all these people and treat them as the same “members of other social factors”? In so doing, which part of the people is it your purpose that we can accept to the party? Is it proper that you mix up the working class with the bourgeoisie without any distinction and treat them as the same? 3. You also say: “Moreover, many people float from and to businesses of different ownerships, in different sectors and different geographical locations. The people’s occupations and status change constantly. These changes will continue.” It seems that “floating” and “change” is now an issue in the question of admission of these people to the Party. This is strange. For the working class, it is natural for them to think socialism fortunate and to be thankful to the Party since in the dozens of years after the founding of our country, we basically solved the problem of unemployment. Everyone had a stable job and experienced less movement and change. Since the economic reform, haven’t we started thinking that the previous practice was not good? Haven’t we started advocating “movement” and “change”? Even for we of the old working class, people who suffered exploitation in the old society and sold our labor at any low rate in order to make a living before liberation, we have started not caring about ownership and location as long as we have a chance to earn a bowl of rice. Roaming and change are now the usual phenomena. If we are of the proletariat, why should roaming and change affect us in regard to being admitted to the Party? Again, you use one more term with an obscure essence, that is, “status” (shenfen). We do not understand what the term really means. If it refers to the internal change in the stratum of the working class, for instance, where a physical laborer has unbelievably found a job of mental labor, this change in “status” is not supposed to affect the admission of the person to the Party. However, if a change in status means a shift from the working class to the bourgeoisie, the change of course would affect the person’s admission to the Party. Why didn’t you make this point plainly? 4. You say: “...the broad masses of the new social stratum, ... made contributions to the development of socialist productivity and other causes... They are, too, constructors of the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics.” This statement is entirely correct, but how it is related to the issue of the Party’s acceptance of new members? Nowadays, except for criminals and pure exploiters who do not work but earn profits, all the rest of the more than 1.2 billion people are “constructors of the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics,” and are making contributions to the development of socialist productivity and other things. Nevertheless, this is by no means to say that all constructors can meet the requirements for membership in the Communist Party and are able to join the Party. 5. You announced new specifications as regards the major standard requirements for admitting new Party members, that is, “whether a person can consciously struggle for accomplishment of the Party’s line and program is the major standard to measure if a person satisfies the requirement of the Party members and can be accepted to the Party.” Of course, there is no question that a Party member must consciously struggle for the accomplishment of the Party’s line and program. But this last sentence is more simple; what have you overstated here? You also clearly state: “must meet the requirements of the Party members.” We have to point out, however, there are far more fundamental and clearer specification as regards the requirements for the Party members in the Basic Statute. For instance, under the section regarding Party Members, the second article says that the Party Members are the vanguard soldiers with Communist consciousness of the Chinese working class and that Chinese Communist Party members are always ordinary members of the working people. These two claims specify the class nature that the Chinese Communist Party members must have. You clearly state “private business owners,” “founders of the people-run businesses of science and technology” which possibly includes “private business owners” (although this is not made plain), and managers hired by foreign owned business as agents of foreign capitalists, these present day bourgeois elements, all are persons of “social factors” to be considered as the social stratum for the sources of candidates of new party members. Is this claim possibly agreeable to the requirements specified in the Party’s Basic Statute? How could the current bourgeois elements who hire and exploit employees be “working class people” or “ordinary members of the working people?” They are of two essentially opposite class statuses, how could they belong to the same one individual? The very first sentence of the Party’s Basic Statute states that “the Chinese Communist Party is the vanguard of the Chinese working class” and that “the Party is a class organization”; if the nature of the Chinese working class were to have been obliterated, then there would not have been the Communist Party of China. 6. In summary, first you enumerate intellectuals, technical professionals, ordinary managers, employees of intermediary organizations, independent professionals, and individual workers, who should be categorized as working class, with bourgeois private business owners and the agents of foreign capitalists, then you state: “they unite with workers, peasants, intellectuals, cadres, and officers and soldiers of the P.L.A.” This shows that you have already considered them not workers, nor intellectuals. Private business owners and the agents of foreign capitalists may be glad that you have said so. But how about the people who actually should have categorized as working class and make a majority of those you enumerate? Do they feel happy? By doing so, what kind of people have you won? Who have you distanced yourself from? And does this enumeration do any good to the Party? You state also: “The Party members from the settings of workers, peasants, intellectuals, army men and cadres make the most basic components and backbone forces of the Party’s organization. In the meantime, . . . we should accept to the party the outstanding elements of other social factors that satisfy the requirements of Party members.” These “outstanding elements of the other social factors” mean those outstanding elements you have enumerated, do they? If so, the bourgeois private business owners and the agents of capitalists may on the one hand exploit the working class, and one the other hand be admitted to the Party. Of course, they would be happy about that. However, those intellectuals who should be categorized as working class have been excluded from the category of workers and intellectuals. How should they be happy? Even more important, does what you say imply the possibility that the Party will be divided into two strata? That is, “the most basic components and backbone forces” on one hand, and those who are not on the other hand? Is it possible that the Party can be of two strata? In addition, those who are not “the most basic components and backbone forces include bourgeois elements. How can such a party, which internally contains two stratums who are fundamentally contradictory to each other, still be the Chinese Communist Party which is supposed to be the vanguard of the proletarian class? Previously, the bourgeoisie were a part of the United Front; they can be united under the leadership of the working class in constructing socialism with Chinese characteristics through the Party’s work of the United Front. If, as you state, the bourgeoisie are accepted into the Party and they change the class nature of the Party, will this political Party, which is no longer pure and firm, be able to lead other classes? Will it be able to lead the United Front? Immediately after the two paragraphs cited above, there is the following paragraph: “The theory of labor and labor value in a capitalist society created by classic Marxist authors revealed the operative characteristics and basic contradictions of the capitalist mode of production of that time. Now, we are developing a socialist market economy that is greatly different from the situation the founders of Marxism were facing and studying. Therefore, we should combine the new practice and deepen the research and understanding of the theories of socialist social labor and labor value. The basic aim of our socialist construction is to make the people rich and happy. As the economy develops, the living standard of the vast majority of the people is steadily improving and their private property is also gradually increasing. Under these circumstances, we should not determine if people are politically progressive or conservative based simply on whether they have private property and how much property they possess. They should be judged based on their political thought and practical performance, how they acquire their fortune and how they use the fortune, and how they contribute with their own work to the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Responding to this, we would like to say that you were the first one to propose that “science, technology and management are playing more and more important roles in social production, and we should further our understanding of labor and labor value problem according to the reality of the mode of production,” at the Forum on the Development of Three Northeast Provinces and the Economical and Social Development in the Tenth Five Year Plan held in Changchun on August 8, 2000. After that, the document of the Fifth Plenary Session of the Fifteenth Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party also proposed that “the understanding of labor and labor value theory should be deepened under the new historic conditions.” However, neither you nor the convention document has explained how to understand them. Raising this question has attracted a great deal of attention in the society and provoked heated debate among different opinions. It has been about one year since then. In your speech this time, you emphasized again that the situation we are facing now is greatly different from that which the founders of Marxism were facing. Therefore we need to further study and understand the problem. Although you did not directly say so, you seem to think that the theory of labor and labor value created by the founders of Marxism is no longer applicable to the current situation and should be further developed. However, you did not explain what the difference is between the two situations and how to understand that difference. |
