The Chinese Communist Party new expertise: reincarnations

Padma Choling showing his knowledge about 'reincarnation'

On the sideline of the National People’s Congress in Delhi, Padma Choling, (alias Pema Thinley), Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Tibet Autonomous Regional People's Congress and only ‘ethnic’ Tibetan member of the CCP’s Central Committee, created a flutter when he said:“It's not up to the Dalai Lama [to decide about his own reincarnation].”
Though Padma Choling also stated that the door for a dialogue with the 14th Dalai Lama is ‘always open’, he added: "how the dialogue would be held and what to discuss [will] totally depend on the Dalai Lama's attitude.”
The Tibetan official objected to the Dalai Lama’s announcement that ‘his traditional religious role should cease with his death’. Padma Choling affirmed that it was against “the Tibetan Buddhism tradition as the soul of a senior lama is reincarnated in the body of a child on his death. …[as] the move is expected to upset the reincarnation system that has been honored for hundreds of years in Tibet and destabilize the Buddhist region.”
The Central Committee member added that the process: “should follow strict historical conventions and required religious rituals of the Tibetan Buddhism …and be approved by the central government.”
For him, “it's not up to the Dalai Lama [to decide].”
For Beijing, it is for the all-powerful Communist Party of China to do so.
An atheist Party, which has unexpectedly become expert in ‘religious matters’, believes that the Dalai Lama’s claims to stop his lineage (more correctly the institution of the Dalai Lamas) “is blasphemy against the Tibetan Buddhism.”
It is clear that Padma Choling has no clue about ‘reincarnation affairs’; it is logical as he is only a Marxist politician (perhaps with a great knowledge in Karl Marx’ theory).
Don’t you thing that Marx must have turned in the tomb, if he heard the uttering of his Tibetan follower?
When Padma Choling speaks about ‘soul reincarnation’, isn’t it a Marxist blasphemy?
The minimum that Beijing should have done was to file their Panchen Lama to speak about ‘reincarnation’; it would have sounded more logical, even if not very plausible.
The issue of reincarnation is complicate, it has too many ‘inner’ intricacies that a Communist leader to can’t really understand; therefore Padma Choling and his colleagues should have the modesty not to argue about it.
The problem for Beijing is that Gyaltsen Norbu, their designated Panchen Lama is perhaps not ready to speak against the Dalai Lama, as he may have some clue about Buddhist philosophy.
In any case, how can the complexed issue of ‘reincarnation’ be rigidly ‘regulated’ by a political Party?
Take the case of Tsangyang Gyatso, the 6th Dalai Lama, born in India (Tawang district of Arunachal Pradesh).
On June 28 1706, Lhazang Khan, a Mongol leader deposed the young Dalai Lama and enthroned another person, Ngawang Yeshe Gyatso as the ‘true’ Sixth Dalai Lama; while Tsangyang Gyatso was arrested, the usurper was installed in the Potala Palace.
Suddenly, at the behest of Lhazang Khan, Tsangyang Gyatso received an invitation to the Imperial Palace in Beijing; he was therefore taken away from Lhasa under Mongol escort, to China.
According to the official history, Tsangyang Gyatso died from fever on the way, at Kunganor on November 15, 1706.
But according his ‘Secret Biography’, he escaped the Mongols, who had planned to kill him and secretly left for Mongolia where he first became a wandering monk and then settled in Alashan, today located in Inner Mongolia.
His ‘Secret Biography’ said that Tsangyang Gyatso passed away in 1746, forty years after his official death. He built a large number of monasteries and had thousand of disciples. Only a very few knew who he really was.
A website 'Treasury of Lives’ explains:

In Alashan, one of the Sixth Dalai Lama's principal patrons was Gushri Khan’s grandson Abo who, with his wife, also became one of his most constant lay students. From this connection, he developed good relations with representatives of the Manchu Emperor, who were keen to have him occupy a position of importance within the Buddhist hierarchy. In addition to his involvement with Jakrong, he became the abbot of thirteen monasteries.

The Dalai Lama's last poem before his presumed death is known by all. It announced his return as the VIIth Dalai Lama.

Oh White Crane!
Lend me your wings
I shall not fly far
From Lithang, I shall return

Two years later a young boy Kalsang Gyaltso was born in Lithang (Eastern Tibet) who would soon be recognised as the VIIth Dalai Lama.
And the story goes on...
The Thirteenth Dalai Lama once told Sir Charles Bell, the British Political Officer in Lhasa: "He (the Sixth) did not observe even the rules of a fully ordained monk; he drank wine habitually. And he used to have his body in several place at the same time, e.g. in Lhasa, in Kongpo (a province seven day's journey east of Lhasa), and elsewhere. Even the place whence he retired to the Honourable Field (i.e. died) is uncertain; one tomb of his is in Alashan in Mongolian where there is another in Drepung monastery. One if his bodies used to appear in the crowd in the Reception Hall of the Seventh Dalai Lama. One is said to appear also at my receptions, But I am unable to say whether this is true or not".
I am recounting this story just to say that ‘reincarnation’ has many esoteric aspects that a Communist Party’s cadre can’t grasped and even less regulate (he can only understand the political aspect like Lhazang Khan).
Unfortunately, Beijing sees only the latter aspect of the issue.
Presume that one day The Communist Party would ‘discover’ its own ‘Dalai Lama’, does it mean the spirit of the Tibetan people will be tamed?
Certainly not, on the contrary!
Tibetans are no fools!
Their only alternative for Beijing is to deal with the present Dalai Lama, who is the most reasonable person that can be found and if the Party is really interested in a long-lasting solution to the Tibetan issue.
But the problem of the leaders in Beijing is that they don’t know what is good for them.

Two Distinct Views on Tibet?

Zhu Weiqun (left) in a previous 'avatar'
as United Front Work Department's official

I recently received an interesting write-up by Thubten Samphel, who is Director of the Tibet Policy Institute in Dharamsala.
Samphel argues that there are different views on  the role that the Dalai Lama could play in what Beijing calls 'China's Tibet'.
He quotes Prof. Jin Wei of the Central  Committee's Party School and Zhu Weiqun, a former United Front Work Department's official.
The Zhu Weiqun piece which appeared on June 10 in the 'China News Weekly' was reprinted by the Wen Wei Po and finally made it to the official Chinese press a few days later.
Zhu repeats some of his arguments published last year in an article “Seeking Truth Through Facts.”
His main point is that Party members must leave the Party, if they wish to embrace a religion.
In his opinion, religion could only divide and break up the Party.
Zhu believes that: "The world view of the Party relies on the Marxist strands of dialectical materialism and historical materialism, which form the foundation of all party theory and practice. By contrast, all world religions are driven by idealism and theism, meaning if party members practice religion it would create two contrasting world views that will undoubtedly rock the guiding position of Marxism and cause Party philosophies and theories to fracture."
Though Zhu agreed that a party-wide prohibition on religion would infringe on fundamental religious freedoms, he believes that "if a person volunteers to join the Communist Party, then they are also choosing to forgo religion. People have every right to believe in a religion — but not when they are a Party member."
He severely criticizes local Communist officials who promote religious symbols and religious history to increase tourism and make money.
He also mentions foreign forces using religion to bring instability in China with the ultimate objective of toppling Communist Party rule. As an example he speaks of China’s Christians who are about 23 million.
The former United Front official puts the number of believers in China at about 100 million (the same old figures from Mao's days).
It is in this context that he looks at Buddhism which he also sees as an outside threat, mainly because of the Dalai Lama and his followers.
Regarding the restive regions of Tibet and Xinjiang, Zhu has strong views, he said: "If party members in the Tibet autonomous region are allowed to be influenced by the teachings of the Dalai Lama, for instance, this would be bound to result in the party's organizational fragmentation".
He points out: "It is no coincidence that in Tibet and Xinjiang, where religious disputes are most frequently seen, Party members are prohibited from religious activities."
Zhu adds that for ethnic minorities, the Party may allow some religious activities but the philosophical arguments against religion within the party must stand.
It is in this context that he criticizes the Dalai Lama’s Buddhist credentials on three grounds:
1) the Dalai Lama and his group’s support for self immolation,
2) the Dalai Lama’s refusal to accept 'history and traditions' (i.e., the golden urn) as they are related to his own future reincarnation,
3) the Dalai Lama’s belligerent denunciation of Dorjee Shugden adherents within his own Gelug school which demonstrates little, if any, respect for his predecessors in history.
Thubten Samphel's piece should open up a debate amongst China watchers. Are there different perspectives on the Tibet issue in China today? Are Zhu Weiqun's views outdated?
It has to be noted that The Economist mentions the same topic in its current issue.

In China Two Distinct Views on Tibet
Thubten Samphel
If recent public comments on Tibet made by Chinese academics and officials are anything to go by, two sharply differing views are developing in China on how it should deal with the issue of Tibet.  How these views play out and which view will emerge as actual policy will determine China's attitude to how the issue of Tibet should be resolved, with ramifications for the future of all China.

Prof. Jin Wei of the CCP's Party School

A softer and perhaps a much more sophisticated argument on what medicine China should take to cure its perennial Tibet headache is advanced by Jin Wei, a professor at the Party School of the Central  Committee of the Chinese Communist Party  based in Beijing.   In comments made to Asia Weekly, a Chinese language publication in Hong Kong, on 12 June, Jin Wei said that treating the Dalai Lama is an "enemy" is alienating all six million Tibetans who believe him as "the living Buddha." She said "The Dalai Lama is the key to the issue of Tibet" and recommended that China should re-start its stalled dialogue with him.
On asked what the proposed new round of talks should focus on, Jin Wei suggested that big issues like the Middle-Way Approach should be set aside for the time being. Instead she suggested that the Tibetan spiritual leader be allowed to visit Hong Kong or Macau with the aim of his taking up permanent residence in the former British colony. According to Professor Jin Wei, China's final aim should be to avoid the "embarrassment" of a situation which throws up two Dalai Lamas. Jin Wei says that if China is able to gain control of selecting the reincarnation of the next Dalai Lama the Party will succeed in winning the goodwill of all Tibet and destroy the strength of Tibetan independence forces working outside the country.
The Central Party School at which Jin Wei is the deputy director of minority issues and director of ethnic religious studies trains China top future leaders. The president of the school is Liu Yunshan, a member of the standing committee of the Politburo, one of the seven leaders who run China.  The current President of China, Xi Jinping, was the president of the school from 2007 to 2013. The background of the party school and its importance should be reasons enough for observers to pay close attention to Jin Wei's Tibet comments.
There is another reason for paying close attention. The party academics in China  are well tuned to the thinking of the party on all core issues. They would not dare speak out on their own without some vigorous nods from above. This is an assumption. It could be wrong. Professor Jin Wei might have voiced her own opinion on Tibet. But if she spoke out of tune with official policy on Tibet and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, there is no indication yet of any adverse effect on her academic career. There is no news yet that she has been fired from her post.
The official Chinese hardline reaction to Professor Jin Wei's seemingly conciliatory remarks was not long in coming. Zhu Weiqun, who was the principal interlocutor in talks with the envoys of His Holiness the Dalai Lama from 2002 to 2010 as the executive vice-minister of the United Front warned against changing the Party's attitude to the spiritual Tibetan spiritual leader. In an interview to China News Weekly of 16 June, Zhu Weiqun, who is now the director of the ethnic and religious affairs of the Chinese People's Political Consulatative Conference, an organ of the party, made these remarks: "When we refer to Mr. Tenzin Gyatso as the Dalai Lama we are recognising his spiritual rank. However, in the course of time, he has acquired another label which we should never forget. Because of his efforts to split China he has become a political refugee. "
For Zhu Weiqun there can be no talks on Tibet. He said, "The future of Tibet, since 1951 with the peaceful  liberation to 1959 with democratic reforms, has been decided by the Tibetan people themselves. The Dalai Lama cannot change this situation."
In the past, on Tibet and all other issues, China spoke with one voice.  Either in writing or orally, policy statements on sensitive issues like Tibet carried the same turn of phrase or tone of voice. The party, state and military carried the same coherent message.
For observers, the question is why is China's previously internal Tibet debate now out in the open? Which view will prevail? How should Dharamsala respond?

Leadership’s control of thought is the most important

The Chinese Communist Party lives in another world or in another time.
The ideologues still dreams of a Great Socialist Revolution. They quote Comrade Mao: "the leadership’s control of thought is the most important leadership control."
The author of this article translated by Chinascope tells us: "Our Party has attached great importance to strengthening its position as the sole leader in the field of ideology ...For the Party to lead politically in the field of ideology, it must use the scientific theory of Marxism and the Party's strategies, principles, and policies to guide the development of socialist ideology; for the Party to maintain its leadership over thoughts in the field of ideology, it must vigorously promote socialist ideology, resist and criticize all erroneous thoughts, and ensure that socialist ideology gradually occupies the entire field of ideology."
The question is what is 'socialist ideology' in practice?
The Wall Street Journal recently reported about Chinese princelings: 

One evening early this year, a red Ferrari pulled up at the U.S. ambassador's residence in Beijing, and the son of one of China's top leaders stepped out, dressed in a tuxedo. Bo Guagua, 23, was expected. He had a dinner appointment with a daughter of the then-ambassador, Jon Huntsman.
The car, though, was a surprise. The driver's father, Bo Xilai, was in the midst of a controversial campaign to revive the spirit of Mao Zedong through mass renditions of old revolutionary anthems, known as "red singing." He had ordered students and officials to work stints on farms to reconnect with the countryside. His son, meanwhile, was driving a car worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and as red as the Chinese flag, in a country where the average household income last year was about $3,300.

This is probably was is known as 'socialism with Chinese characteristics'. 
Whether or not, Bo Xilai is be able to make it to the Standing Committee of the Politburo (one of the nine bosses of China) in 2012, the problem will remain the same. 
As we have seen in my previous posting, China is in turmoil and it is not ideology that will convince the people of China that their leaders are not sincere.
It is like in India, ministers exploiting mines in Jharkand, Goa or Karnataka, telling the people: "Anna Hazare is not representing the people. We are the legitimate representatives".
Who believes them?

Maintaining Tight Control over Ideology    
22 November 2011
Chinascope
[Editor’s Note: Qiushi Journal republished an article from the Contemporary World and Socialism magazine on the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) control over ideology work, which includes establishing, deciding on, shaping, and disseminating ideology. [1] The author, Wang Yonggui, is a scholar at the School of Marxist Studies at Nanjing Normal University. In the article, Wang stressed that the Party’s control over ideology “cannot be loosened for a single moment” and that “strengthening the Party’s sole leadership over work in ideology is an important weapon for the CCP’s success.” The following are excerpts from the article.]

I. Emphasizing the Strategic Importance of Ideology Work and Tightly Controlling Its Direction
Managing ideology work has always been a very important function for our Party. Missteps in managing the economy will cause big problems. Missteps in managing ideology will also cause big problems. Therefore, we should not slacken in our work on ideology while focusing on economic development. Strengthening the Party’s sole leadership over ideology, firmly controlling the direction of that ideology, and strengthening our motivation and foresight are important magic weapons for our continued victories.

1. Establish a central standing organization and strengthen the Party's control over ideology. Back when the Chinese Communist Party was first established in 1921, our Party created a propaganda agency responsible for propaganda and agitation and for promoting revolutionary development. After the Sixth CCP Congress, the Central Propaganda Department became a permanent branch (of the government) and assumed its responsibilities and functions as the supreme organization for propaganda, for the education of the whole country, and for the political thought education of CCP cadres and the general public. In July 1942, Comrade Mao Zedong stressed that "the leadership’s control of thought is the most important leadership control."

2. Strengthen the development of the CCP organization and consolidate the Party's leadership over ideology. Our Party has attached great importance to strengthening its position as the sole leader in the field of ideology, which has been achieved mainly through the Party's political leadership, leadership over thoughts, and its organizational leadership. For the Party to lead politically in the field of ideology, it must use the scientific theory of Marxism and the Party's strategies, principles, and policies to guide the development of socialist ideology; for the Party to maintain its leadership over thoughts in the field of ideology, it must vigorously promote socialist ideology, resist and criticize all erroneous thoughts, and ensure that socialist ideology gradually occupies the entire field of ideology; for the Party to execute its organizational leadership  in the field of ideology, it must establish Party organizations in all ideology sectors. These organizations will be responsible for publicizing and implementing the Party's strategies, principles, and policies, especially the establishment of the propaganda departments from the central to the local Party committees at all levels. …
Because of the extreme importance of ideology, we must regard the improvement of the CCP’s ability to lead in ideology as the keystone to improving our ability as a ruling Party, and we must firmly control the Party’s leadership over ideology. This is the key to maintaining the invincible position of our Party and our socialist cause.

II. Responding to Confrontation between Ideologies and Scientifically Controlling the Correct Direction of the Development of Ideology
We must carry out a clear-cut battle between the two opposing ideologies (socialist ideology vs. the capitalist ideology) to provide a powerful guarantee that the direction of our reform and opening-up policy will be correct. Since the reform and opening-up, our Party has attached great importance to the confrontation and struggle between ideologies, actively responded to domestic and overseas challenges, and scientifically led in the development of ideology. Deng Xiaoping stressed that "liberalization itself is bourgeois; there is no such thing as proletarian or socialist liberalization. ... Promoting liberalization will lead us to the capitalist path." This suggested that fighting bourgeois liberalization is a long-term task. … Since the beginning of the 21st century, in responding to some erroneous thoughts and views questioning the current reform and the Party's basic policies, the Central Propaganda Department and other departments have edited “The Six Whys - the Answers to Several Major Issues," "Seven ‘How to Understand,’" and the "Learning Guide on Drawing ‘Four Major Boundaries’" to help cadres and the general public clarify some major issues and consciously resist the infiltration of erroneous ideas.

III. Actively Moving the Development of Ideology Forward with Innovative Styles and Methods
We should use propaganda, education, and scientific indoctrination to enhance the attractiveness and fighting power of Marxism-Leninism. Lenin once pointed out that, in the course of the proletarian revolutionary struggle, "socialist consciousness is something instilled from outside of the proletarian class struggle, rather than spontaneously generated from the struggle itself." Using Lenin's "concept of indoctrination" as our guide, our Party has actively promoted positive education, vigorously disseminated Marxism and the theory of the new democratic revolution, and strongly accelerated the process of democratic revolution.

IV. Consolidating the Social Foundation for Developing Ideology
We need to combine the sole leadership over socialist ideology with the concept of the diversity of cultural development. Since the reform and opening up, the development of social thoughts has been very active, and social consciousness has become diversified. This requires us to handle the relationship between the sole leadership over socialist ideology and the diversity of cultural values.
We should combine the development of socialist ideology with our efforts to expand the opening-up and development of the socialist market economy. Since the reform and opening-up began, we have adhered to the development of socialist ideology. At the same time we also expanded the opening-up and development of the market economy. As a whole, we correctly handled the relationship between the development of ideology and the expansion of the policy of opening-up and developing the socialist market economy. In fact, we prevented the ideology "centralization" and "enforcement" theories, and also paid attention to guarding against the ideology "useless" and "dilution" theories.
In all, since the establishment of the CCP 90 years ago, our experience and history in controlling  ideology tells us that the strategic position and function of managing ideology should not be neglected and that the Party's leadership over ideology cannot be relaxed. We must unswervingly adhere to Marxism as our guide in the field of ideology and scientifically educate and correctly guide the changes in people's moral and value systems.

Source: Qiushi Journal, “The Chinese Communist Party’s 90 Years of Experiences in Managing Ideology Work,” September 5, 2011.
http://www.qstheory.cn/zz/zgtsshzyll/201109/t20110906_108391.htm.

When the Party lost Stalin’s Knife

Twenty-one years ago, the tanks rolled on Tienanmen Square. Old Deng had used Stalin's knife once more.


China is not an ordinary country.
China is one of the last two States in the world strictly adhering to the Marxist Theory while engaged on a seemingly wild capitalist path (‘with Chinese characteristics of course). But for the past 60 years, the Communist Party of China (CCP) continues to rule supreme over the Middle Kingdom.
From time to time, China watchers have predicted the ideological and economic collapse of the Chinese empire, but despite many prophesies, Beijing continues its ‘peaceful rise’ and has now reached the Number 2 economic slot after the United States of America.
Unlike Indians, the Chinese like to analyze the future; they like to be prepared for any eventuality. An Indian friend recently explained to me that this is not really required in India which has 33 crores of gods and goddesses and above all, the Supreme Grace always ready to intervene. So, why bother!
Not having the ‘Grace’ advantage, Chinese rulers have to bother about the future of the Communist Dynasty. They are aware that, in the past, Heaven has withdrawn its Mandate to many dynasties, bringing disasters, famines, floods or earthquakes to different parts of the Empire and dethronement for the Emperors.
It is probably the reason why the State Council ordered in June 2006 an eight-episode TV research entitled Preparing For Danger in Times of Safety – Historic Lessons Learned from the Demise of Soviet Communism.
The project was given to no less than the Academy of Social Sciences, the prime Government think tank.
Later CCP’s party members were requested to watch the series and carefully study and ‘discuss’ the conclusions offered by the Chinese President himself. Hu Jintao affirmed: “There are multiple factors contributing to the disintegration of the Soviet Union, a very important one being Khrushchev throwing away Stalin’s knife and Gorbachev’s open betrayal of Marxism-Leninism.”
In China, as earlier in the Soviet Union, the Party is the foundation stone of the entire nation; if one day the CCP collapses, like in Soviet Union in the early 1990’s, the Apparatchiks in Beijing believe that Chaos will prevail and a new Dynasty may take over.
The matter is so serious that in 2000, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences created two special research groups: one to study the strength and decline of the Soviet Communist Party and the other the rise and fall of the Soviet Union. It was designated as “fundamental national social science research topic”.
Arthur Waldron in a paper entitled Chinese Analyses of Soviet Failure: The Party in the China Brief of the Jamestown Foundation mentions the film: “The message is that the Soviet party failed because it gave up the dictatorship of the proletariat, ceased to practice democratic centralism, criticized Stalin, was beguiled by western concepts such as democracy, and also tripped up by Western propaganda and other operations.”
Indeed the film praised Lenin’s Theory [i.e. the dictatorship of the proletariat led by a revolutionary vanguard party]: “After the victory of the October Revolution, Lenin led the Bolshevik Party in implementing the War Communism and the New Economic Policy, and conducted a painstaking exploration on how to build socialism in underdeveloped countries such as Russia,” but also Stalin’s Work.
Though acknowledging the ‘excesses’ of Stalin, it states that his realizations will remain in history: “The Soviet people who had personal experiences of Stalin’s times fully affirmed Stalin's great historic feats, but they also experienced the expansion of his purges, as well as the bitter fruit from his autocratic working style and the mistakes caused by his abusive manner. However, as time goes by, when we brush off the dust of history, people feel more than ever that Stalin's errors should never tarnish his position as a great Marxist and a proletarian revolutionary in history.”

But then came the Destroyer of the Party.
On February 14, 1956, the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of Soviet Union (CPSU) was held in Moscow. At night, the delegates were suddenly summoned back to the Kremlin by Khrushchev, the first secretary of the Central Committee who presented the famous ‘secret’ report entitled On Personal Worship and its Consequences. The Chinese film says: “In the secret report, Khrushchev exaggerated Stalin's errors and expressed sharp criticism of Stalin. After the 20th Congress of the CPSU, the Soviet Union launched a nationwide campaign criticizing Stalin.”
This was the beginning of the end. The Party was condemned to death; as Mao Zedong said “the CPSU had lost the knife of Stalin”.
Without a ‘knife’, the Soviet Union could not survive.
The script explains: “Young people in the CPSU grew up under Khrushchev’s ideological influence [after the 20th Congress] …They were unfamiliar with the Party's revolutionary tradition, and lacked firm beliefs in socialism. They were later known as the ‘the babies born at the 20th Congress’. After the mid-80s of the 20th century, it was exactly these people who became the backbone that disintegrated the CPSU and buried the socialist system”.
In the early 1990’s, Gorbachev, probably considered as a ‘baby of the 20th Congress’ put the last nail in the coffin of the Soviet Union and the Party.
The film regretted: “A party that Lenin personally created; a party that led the Russian working class in overthrowing the reactionary rule of tsarist Russia and successfully established the first socialist state under the dictatorship of the proletariat; a party that resisted the armed intervention of 14 countries and successfully defended the fruit of the revolution; a party that defeated Nazi Germany in the great patriotic war, and made great contributions to victory in World War II; a party that has made brilliant achievements in socialist development and was the first to send satellites into space; why, after 74 years in power, did it actually lose its ruling position?”.
The lessons are crucial for China. Deng Xiaoping who wore the Emperors’ Mantle after Mao’s death knew it only too well. He cleverly set up an Open Policy at the end of 1978 as the only way to save the Party. He knew that by opening the door to foreign businesses, he was offering the Chinese people the ‘glory of becoming rich”. He could thus pacify the masses’ frustrations after the Cultural Revolution and this, without encroaching on the supremacy of the Party.
In the early 1980’s, one leader could have been a Chinese Khrushchev; it was Hu Yaobang, the then Secretary General of the CCP. When Deng realized the danger of democratic ‘opening’, Hu was quickly tackled from within the Politburo and sidelined.
When Hu died in April 1989, students gathered spontaneously on Tiananmen Square to mourn his demise. What started as an expression of grief, quickly turn into the massive pro-democracy demonstration. Tens of thousands occupied Tiananmen Square till the fateful night of June 3-4, 1989.
The knife had to save the Party. Deng decided to send in the tanks and massacre the students.
When one looks at the last 20 years of the history of the People’s Republic of China, the ‘knife’ has been the Party’s instrument for keeping its predominant position.
Take the unrest in Tibet in March/April 2008. Beijing could have tried to understand the motivations behind the protests (it is what several Chinese think-tanks suggested), but the leadership decided to use disproportionate force and not take any chance. The Part could not afford to lose control. It is what Hu Jintao had already done in March 1989 when he quelled unrest in Lhasa. A few hundred Tibetans were killed.
The knife was again used in Xinjiang in July 2009 for the same reason; were the Party to show weakness, it may have been wiped out from ‘minorities’ areas’.
In the film, the script mentioned: “In June 1988, at the 19th National Conference of the CPSU, [Gorbachev] for the first time, clearly stated that the goal of reform is to establish a ‘humane and democratic socialist’ society, fundamentally different from the current socialism (which he called ‘authoritarian socialism’. …To reform the party’s guiding ideology according to the ‘humane, democratic socialist’ theory is to use the old theories of western social democratic parties to replace the party’s Marxist theoretical basis.”
This destroyed the Soviet Union. The present leadership does not want to fall in the same trap. It is the reason why the brutal regime of North Korea will continue to be supported, even at the cost of Beijing’s image as a responsible world power.
Now, Beijing is front of a serious dilemma: the ‘proletarian’ strikes in a Honda factory in Foshan. As reported by Xinhua: “The assembly plants of Japan's second-largest automaker Honda in China have been forced to halt production as workers at a parts maker went on strike demanding higher salaries. Hundreds of workers, wearing white uniforms, red-and-white caps and even masks, rallied at the compound of Nanhai Honda Auto Parts Manufacturing Company in Foshan, southern Guangdong Province Thursday, asking for an increase of $118-$147 in monthly pay.”
Will the Politburo use the knife against protesting proletariat? The Party has never walked on a tighter rope, caught between different slogans, ‘not giving up the dictatorship of the proletariat, not dropping the knife and a ‘humane society’?
The question is, how long can a ‘harmonious society’ use Stalin’s knife to survive? In the Middle Kingdom, many are asking today this question.