By Lucian Pye
M.I.T. Press. Cambridge. Mass.
1968, 255 pp., US$8.95
Reviewed by Charles C. Clayton
There is no longer any reason to doubt the existence of an "authority crisis" on the Chinese mainland. The crisis is emphasized by the current headlines, by the continuing reports of violence and executions and by the growing speculation about which faction will wind up in control. This study of the dynamics of the so-called "cultural revolution" deserves the attention not only of the China experts but also of the Western World and Taiwan. It may prove to be one of the most significant books of the year on Asian affairs. As the author concedes in his foreword, there is no major political system about which we have so few meaningful facts.
Many questions about the mainland remain unanswered. Professor Pye lists only a few: "Is it safe to conclude that (Red) China has become an awakened giant? Or could it be that all the sound and fury serve only to cover over deep flaws and continuing impotence? Does (Red) China fit into the conventional mold of an orthodox Communist system, is she in a Stalinist phase, or is she following an untrodden path of her own?"
It is difficult, if not impossible, to compare Communist China with any other political system. For one thing there is her size. Never before, the author points out, has any government aspired to rule directly so many subjects. Twice the size of the British Empire at its height, and 15 times larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest extent, China's population is the biggest of any nation in history. Then there is the intensity of mainland control. Professor Pye writes that the Mao Tse-tung regime "would rule more completely, control more facets of their subjects' lives, and leave fewer aspects of society untouched than any other ruling group in history".
Expressed in psychological terms, Professor Pye says, the fundamental crisis of Red China lies in the fact that its exposure to the modern world has "revolved around, first, a breakdown in the cultural concept of authority, and second and more fundamentally, a disruption of the mechanism by which the Chinese personality traditionally handled unconscious aggressions". One of the reactions was the discovery of hate. This reaction, the author emphasizes, is in conflict with Chinese political culture, which is rooted in a psychic sense of identification with greatness. It may be the key to understanding recent developments on the mainland.
The anger of Red China, in Professor Pye's opinion, "is the anger of moral indignation and of impotence". The Chinese (Communists) like to believe that their impotence is caused by the immorality of others. It is also a confession of weakness. When they complain constantly that their air space has been violated by U.S. planes, it is an admission they can do nothing to prevent it.
In the concluding chapter, entitled "Perspective on the Future", the author points out how the mistakes of recent years tend to compound the difficult problems confronting the Communist regime. Professor Pye believes that "the profound upheavals of 1966 and 1967 will inevitably weaken the authority of Communism, and thus revive the old problem of the authority crisis". He points our that totalitarianism is a product of the modern industrial world. The concept and practices of totalitarianism are possible only after the emergence of industrialized societies provide the capacity for large-scale and highly disciplined forms of human organization. Any pre-industrialized society achieves the aura of being more developed than it is. The fatal error of Red China, then, has been its attempt to create an extreme form of totalitarianism in an agrarian and loosely structured society. Witness both the "great leap forward" and the "cultural revolution".
Another serious error, in the author's judgment, is that Red China has achieved the appearance of development by drawing heavily on accumulated capital without generating new capital. For example, the work of the previous generation produced a modernized educational system and trained the scientists and technicians. To date, the Chinese Communists have not only been unable to expand the vital supply of skilled personnel but have not even been able to replenish it.
In both areas the contrast between Red China and the Republic of China is striking, just as it is in a third important area. Professor Pye makes this significant comment:
"Peking has treated casually whatever reservoir of friendship it may have had, not only outside of the Communist world, but also within what was once the bloc. In first making an enemy of the United States and then of both its ideological sponsor, the Soviet Union, and the leading neutralist and middle power, India, the Chinese (Communists) have succeeded in cutting themselves off from all possible help and have isolated themselves more completely than any power in modern times."
To make the situation worse, the author points out, the population is disproportionately youthful, with more than 40 per cent under 17 years of age. This statistic means that a large percentage is consuming and not producing, and in fact will be reproducing itself before it can produce much.
Peiping's problem, the author emphasizes, is not only that the powers of revolution have been lost but also that liabilities are compounding. For example, in the years immediately after World War II, China had a disciplined labor force and the capability of developing as Japan did in the 1920s and 1930s. But in the 1960's, it is too late for Red China. Other claimants to the role already exist and world standards are much higher now.
Professor Pye puts it this way: "The pressure of events and the realities of life, particularly the emotional limitations of an already tired population, suggest that Mao's ambitions will not be realized ... The trend must be away from a tautly mobilized system toward one in which there are increasing accommodations with the harsh realities of China's limited resources and regionally diversified society."
Professor Pye is the senior staff member of the Center for International Studies of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and professor of political science. He was born in China, received his secondary education there and has traveled extensively in Asia. He has written a number of books on Asian politics and national development.
HO CHI MINH
By Jean Lacouture
Random House, New York
303 pages, US$5.95
Reviewed by Geraldine Fitch
With the opening paragraph of Jean Lacouture's political biography of Ho Chi Minh, the reader may assume that a fulsome eulogy of the North Vietnam leader is to follow, rather than an analysis of character or critique of his leadership. It reads:
It is now almost half a century that Ho Chi Minh has been fighting, secretly and valiantly, as guerrilla leader and as President. Almost half a century during which, at the heart of the Third International and for the cause of the Leninist revolution and the Vietnamese nation, he has carried on a battle which is without precedent because of the diversity of tactics and situations, the versatility of the game, the risks run, the sacrifices made, the fantastic superiority of the arms pitted against him by his adversaries─this small man, with a face the color of tea, a beard the color of rice, a piercing look beneath a forehead crowned by a somewhat absurd lock of hair, and with a rather ridiculous silhouette in a jacket of brown cloth. This is a man so fragile that he seems to survive only by the sheer force of his imagination in the midst of a battle fought by a people as frail, as frugal and as stoic as he.
However, the references to his "absurd lock of hair" and a "rather ridiculous silhouette" indicate the author's effort to be objective and not wholly eulogistic. Throughout most of his 300 pages, the author tries (sincerely, I believe) to be objective in his approach to his subject, so much so that his personal ideology does not intrude until he is drawing conclusions at the end.
Lacouture reveals the course Ho Chi Minh has tried to steer between Russian "revisionism" and Chinese "dogmatism" so as to maintain the "Vietnam way". Not that he has failed in loyalty to the Comintern, for at one time─much against his will─he changed the name of his party from "Vietnam Communist Party" to that of "Indochinese Communist Party". After the Geneva Conference of 1954, it was only natural that he should turn to the Chinese Communists for support. There was at that time no apparent rift between Peiping and Moscow. But in leaning on Peiping, the Hanoi regime repeated some of Red China's blunders, especially in land reform and the "great leap forward". By undue haste in implementing the land reform policy, bloody excesses led to an uprising in Ho's own native province of Nghe An and probably cost tens of thousands of peasants their lives. The author refrains from judgment but states the cold fact that these excesses were catastrophic and nearly severed the ties between the masses and their new leaders. Meanwhile, the "hundred flowers" campaign gave the intellectuals the illusion that they might express their opinions freely, resulting in a real challenge to the regime. This following of the Chinese line brought about a second crisis and bloody reprisals.
At the time Ho Chi Minh was born, this French author concedes, the French colonial rule in Indochina was far from good. The mood of the people was one of bitterness. Good things done by the French administration, such as the building of roads and bridges and the opening of schools, were overshadowed by what appeared to the elite and to many ordinary people as cruel oppression that violated their national integrity and undermined a civilization of which they were justly proud.
After some years in France, Ho journeyed to Moscow. In both countries he did much writing and attained a remarkable position in the Comintern. At first he had seemed an inconsequential figure without the dash and presence of the Indian Communist Roy, but he had a note of simplicity, an air of innocence (though he was more clever than he let on), and his whimsy and humor endeared him to those who came to know him well. He was not given to doctrinal debates; he was an empiricist, a man of action, who avoided internal conflicts and grew in prestige. He had great power to move an audience, and from the early years put emphasis on the peasantry long before Mao espoused the peasants. In recent years some foreign visitor said to Ho: "Mao Tse-tung writes books and articles and poetry. Why don't you publish more?" Ho replied, "It is true that Mao has written on almost every subject in the world. If you can suggest something he has not written, I will try to fill in the gap."
After some years in France and Moscow, Ho had 20 years in China. He was sent by leaders in Moscow to assist Borodin in Canton. That city and Yunnan province had many Vietnamese rebels. One of them threw a bomb at the car of Governor General Merlin of Indochina when he visited Canton. It was not successful, but Ho decided that assassinating governors was not the best way to end colonialism. He saw the need for a powerful political party and later organized the Vietminh. He had the clear aim of achieving national emancipation via international revolution. His activities in organizing Vietnamese Youth (Thanh Nien), training guerrillas, indoctrinating troops and organizing in Canton the first Communist cells to infiltrate his own country. He was also an adviser to the KMT and Borodin. In 1927 Chiang Kai-shek discovered a Communist cell within the army in Nanking and cracked down on the Chinese Communists, sending Borodin and other Russican advisers back to Moscow.
Ho later tried to cross the border into China but was arrested and spent some time in a Yunnan prison. He was 30 years away from his own country, then went back to "liberate" first a zone, then several areas and then more and more territory. Even after fighting' the French for the independence of his country, Ho Chi Minh remained friendly with some Frenchmen. He was never above seeking the help of the French in opposing the Chinese takeover of Vietnam from the Japanese down to the 15th parallel or in fighting the Japanese. Victory at Dien Bien Phu was saddened by a disastrous famine which took perhaps 2 million lives.
In the final pages we come to the present war of North against South and America's involvement. Lacouture's favoring of Ho and Communism becomes quite obvious. He bears down heavily on America's bombing of the North without reference to the rockets and missiles used against Saigon. He writes of U.S. killing of civilians (accidentally, as in most warfare), but makes no mention of the deliberate murder of teachers, village chiefs and other leaders in the South. This loss of objectivity is the principal weakness of the book.