On December 7, the Chinese Communist newspaper People's Daily created a worldwide sensation with a front-page commentary titled "Theory and Reality." It proclaimed recognition at long last that Marxism-Leninism is outdated and cannot solve mainland Chinese problems—a bold and unprecedented repudiation of the ruling Communist Party's ideological underpinnings.
"Marx passed away 101 years ago; his works are more than a century old," the paper said, adding: "Some were his visions of that time, after which the situation changed greatly. Some of his ideas are not necessarily appropriate. There are many things that Marx, Engles, and Lenin never experienced or had any contact with. We cannot expect the works of Marx and Lenin to solve our modern day problems."
According to news agency reports from Peking, party officials later revealed that the commentary was based on remarks by party secretary general Hu Yao-pang during a late November conference attended by Red China's provincial-level propaganda chiefs. The conference focused on ideological questions surrounding Red China's recent economic reforms.
The very next day, after the world headlines proclaimed the repudiation, the newspaper ran a three-line correction, altering a key line of the original commentary to read: "We cannot expect the works of Marx and Lenin to solve all of our modern-day problems." In the original version the word all was omitted.
Chinese Communist Party Central Committee spokesman Wu Hsing-tang, on December 11, added that Marxism could not be fundamentally separatedfrom Red China.
A 17th Century Japanese scholar once wrote that trying to analyze China is like ''gazing into jade," the object of one's contemplation is at once clouded and translucent, mottled and clear, and fascinating withal. Not so Communist China.
A Free China Review interview with Dr. King-yuh Chang, government spokesman for the Republic of China, following, puts Peking's motives into a fish bowl. Unfortunately, the "fascination" is left largely to those who now take on the job of undoing that initial global media impression of a Chinese Communist Party without a Communist ideology.
▪ Dr. Chang, what is the message in Communist China's on-again, off-again public repudiation of Marxism?
▫ It contains multiple messages. First, the announcement that Marxism is outdated actually acknowledges that Marxism has failed, that Peking's Marxist programs are bankrupted. Over the past 35 years, Communist Chinese policies have achieved only poverty and backwardness across the mainland, stagnant industrial development, an obsolete military compared with the Western and Soviet bloc nations, and a serious internal triple crisis of faith, trust, and confidence. Struggling with this situation, Teng's reform faction is trying to cast off the Marxist-Leninist straitjacket in favor of a practical, innovative, and indigenous Chinese strategy for modernization.
Although the recent initial announcement was direct and startling, it was not unprecedented. History reveals that prophets of years past raised the issue. Dr. Sun Yat-sen pointed out, in a joint manifesto with the Soviet official A.A. Joffe in 1923, that because of the non-existence of conditions favorable to their successful application in China, it would not be possible to carry out Communism or create a Soviet System in China. And our late President Chiang Kai-shek came to the same conclusions after his three-month-long visit to the Soviet Union that same year. He became convinced that Soviet political institutions were instruments of tyranny and terror, and, as such, basically incompatible with the Kuomintang's political ideals.
The recent Chinese Communist multiple-statement indicates that the Chinese Communists are caught in a major dilemma: They cannot oppose Marxism and Leninism, but neither can they afford not to oppose them. In order to respond effectively to the mainland economic crisis, the more pragmatic Teng faction has no alternative but to use some market economic prescriptions to cure socialist illness via a policy of "opening the door to the outside world and revitalizing the domestic economy."
Such efforts have, of course, encountered intense opposition from anti-Teng, pro-Mao factions, who quote teachings of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism to criticize Teng's departure from classical Marxism and rebellion against Communist orthodoxy. This heavy pressure is forcing Teng to resort to repudiations of Marxism-Leninism.
Also, of course, it all vividly highlights the growing signs of structural discord as a result of the contradictions within the Communist Party.
▪ Would you please identify significant contradictions?
▫ One is the growing conflict between the pro and anti-Teng factions, the latter including two distinct forces:
—Those who obtained benefits via the Cultural Revolution: Although Hwa Kuo-feng and the "Little Gang of Four" have already lost power, there are about eighteen million Communist Party members who joined the party during the cultural revolution period. They naturally favor Mao's egalitarian and radical policies and strongly oppose any reforms.
—Such senior, conservative Communist leaders as Yeh Chien-yin, Lee Hsien-nien, Chen Yun, and Peng Chen: They accuse Teng of tilting toward capitalism to win Western support in technology, science, and investment. They claim that even though Teng may be bringing successful development to some areas, the great part of the mainland continues to lag far behind, creating a tremendous imbalance.
And the Teng faction exhibits significant internal contradictions as well. Peking now emphasizes a modest open economic policy, the abolishment of people's communes in some areas, and adoption of the so-called economic responsibility system, effected now in most rural areas. But politically, the Tengists are still very much confined by Marxism-Leninism and "Mao Tse-tung Thought"—a significant failure in matching ideology and reality.
▪ What were the direct internal and external purposes of the recent declaration.
▫ It was, internally, an attempt to take advantage of a partial withdrawal from Marxism to safeguard the intrinsic nature of Marxism. Peking still confirms Marxism for the purpose of protecting Teng—to ideologically promote what he tries to do.
This variant expression of Marxism tries to pass the message to both pro-Teng and anti-Teng factions, that they should not make a fetish of Marxism—a contrivance of a man living one hundred years ago. Teng wants ideological permission for new interpretations so his economic programs can face reality.
Actually, since last year, the so called Marxism theorists of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences have begun to reinterpret Marxism. Chou Yang said: "Marxism is a developing theory." Yu Kuan-yuan likened Marxism to a long river that has continuously to take in various tributaries.
Externally, they seek an image of flexibility and of pragmatic strategy in Peking—a false image for the international community, intended to create an illusion of continuous basic change. It is a deception concerned with attracting foreign confidence and external political, economic, military, and diplomatic support.
By tempering the democratic community's vigilance against Communist strategy, especially against that of Chinese Communism, it seeks to diminish our dedication to anti-Communist policies. "Now," they wish us to believe, "we have changed, so why do you still stand against us?" But notably, with the possible exception of Albania, the world knows no greater Communist dictatorial tyranny than that in Peking.
▪ Does all this mean that Red China is, underneath, on its way to giving up the Communist system?
▫ No, categorically. Red China lists Marxism-Leninism and "Mao Tse-tung Thought" in its constitution as the sacred ideological base of the land. No one would dare to actually repudiate Communism on the mainland because Marxism-Leninism is the heartbeat of the dictatorship of the proletariat. A non-mandatory Marxism would end the Communist Party—it would mean a complete negation of their own regime. Clearly, this involves only tactical effort to eliminate dogmatic resistance to Teng's rule.
▪ Then it is connected directly with the economic reforms launched by Teng?
▫ It is. The 11 years of Cultural Revolution brought the mainland economy to the brink of collapse. Since Teng Hsiao-ping's return to power in 1978, he has gradually implemented a series of economic reforms, for instance, the establishment of special economic zones and the opening of 14 seaports, all, incidentally, testifying to the superiority of a free economy and, consequently, aggravating Communist China's internal crisis of faith. The recent introduction of the overall Teng policy document "Decision on Reform of the Economic Structure" (Editors's Note—See our ANALYSIS section) at the 3rd Plenary Session of the 12th Communist Party Central Committee has deepened the acute ideological contradictions within the party. Confronted with the ever-increasing counter-pressures, Teng has to find theoretical justifications.
▪ Will Red China's new open economic policy and other economic reforms succeed?
▫ It will not succeed. History provides us ample parallels. Influenced by the invasion of Western civilization after the Opium War in 1839-1840, China struggled hard in successive phases of its modern revolution. The Self Strengthening Movement (a program to strengthen the Chinese nation by imitating Western mechanisms, launched by such leading officials of the time as Tseng Kuo-fan and Lee Hung-chang), the general reform movement promoted by Kang You-wei and Liang Chi-chao, and the attempts to set up constitutional rule during the Empress Dowager's final year, all posited on the attractive doctrine of "Chinese learning as the fundamental structure, Western learning for practical use," and all failed to solve the major Chinese problems.
It was only with the 1911 Revolution, when Dr. Sun Yat-sen first initiated a simultaneous solution of Chinese problems via a comprehensive approach based on nationalism, democracy, and the people's general well-being, that China began to achieve its modernization, pointing the way for our current development in Taiwan.
Obviously, the Soviet Union, the oldest Communist nation, the model since its founding in 1917, has also failed to solve its own problems. British history is also instructive. They have come a long way from Magna Carta—that miniature of democratic politics—through the industrial revolution, and onward in a step-by-step development.
True development should include coherent and simultaneous progress in legal protection of basic human liberties, political participation, social openness, cultural evolution, and economic growth. Failure to progress in any of the above areas will result in a deformed development, doomed to fail.
▪ Have you been saying that Peking will tilt toward the revisionist road?
▫ No Communist country has ever been able to implement Marxism. The goal of Communism is for people to do what they can and take what they need. No Communist regime can claim to be entering what the ideology identifies as a Communist phase, because they cannot generate sufficient productivity and they cannot create the selfless moral man.
Truly, the Communist strategy may often change, but not the party's intrinsic nature. It will continue to resort to materialism, class struggle, and the concept of the state as the machine of dictatorship. This is its philosophical ground for continuing leadership via suppression of the people at large. I don't expect any change in this respect.
▪ Many people in international academic circles and mass communications may now have undue hope for prospects of change in Red China. How are they to know what and whom to believe?
▫ Facts speak louder than words. The Western countries used to indulge in the illusion that talks and contact would lead to peaceful co-existence with the Soviet Union and heavy pressure for change on its system. Indeed, Communism has some change possibilities, but never in connection with the party dictatorship, party control of social resources, and the end goal of communizing the world. Over the decades, the Communist system has demonstrated that it is a tool primarily for power struggle—a tool to seize, preserve, and expand power.
We all bear a responsibility to reveal to people around the world the true facts of Communism, especially Chinese Communism. We must ask opinion leaders abroad to base their judgments on open-minded analysis and reality, and not on desirable illusions.