The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model 9629372401, 9789629372408

Citation preview

Use of Mao

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

edited by Joseph Y. S. CHENG

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©2015 City University of Hong Kong All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, Internet or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the City University of Hong Kong Press. ISBN: 978-962-937-240-8 Published by City University of Hong Kong Press Tat Chee Avenue Kowloon, Hong Kong Website: www.cityu.edu.hk/upress E-mail: [email protected] Printed in Hong Kong

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Table of Contents

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Detailed Chapter Contents

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Preface

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About the Contributors

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List of Illustrations

xvii

Acronyms and Abbreviations

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1 Introduction Joseph Y. S. CHENG



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2 Mao Zedong in Contemporary Chinese Official Discourse and History Arif DIRLIK

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3 Business, Protest, Repression— The Eclectic Uses of Mao in Contemporary China Jean-Philippe BÉJA

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4 The Maoist Revival and the Conservative Turn in Chinese Politics Willy LAM

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5 Repackaging Mao in Times of Uncertainty Ben XU

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

6 The Mao Generation at the Helm— What Difference Could It Make? Will They Still Make Use of Mao, and How?

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Michel BONNIN 7 Maoism and the Quest for Democracy in China Torbjörn LODÉN 8 The “Chongqing Model”— What It Means to China Today Joseph Y. S. CHENG 9 In The Red 2.0— Online Reactivation of Maoist Mobilization Methods and Propaganda

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181

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Émilie TRAN 10 Propaganda and Pastiche— Visions of Mao in The Founding of a Republic, Beginning of the Great Revival and Let the Bullets Fly Sebastian VEG 11 Renegotiating the Traumatizing Experiences— Reemploying Images of Mao in Contemporary Art Minna VALJAKKA

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Detailed Chapter Contents

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1 Introduction



2 Mao Zedong in Contemporary Chinese Official Discourse and History

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Introduction

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Reform and the Reinvention of Mao Zedong Thought

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Mao in Official Historiography

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A Spectral Presence: Mao and the Party

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Conclusion

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3 Business, Protest, Repression— The Eclectic Uses of Mao in Contemporary China

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Commercialization and “Religionization”: Establishing a Modern and Traditional Icon by Betraying Mao’s Ideas

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An Instrument in the Hands of the Leadership

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A Resource for Resistance against the Present Leadership

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4 The Maoist Revival and the Conservative Turn in Chinese Politics

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Introduction

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The Genesis and Major Contours of the Maoist Restoration

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Deeper-Level Factors behind the Maoist Revival

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Maoist Revival and Hawkish Turn in Foreign Policy

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Is the Ouster of Bo an Indication of the End of the Maoist Campaign?

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Conclusion: Preserving the Status Quo at All Costs

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

5 Repackaging Mao in Times of Uncertainty

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What is a Regime and the Regime in China?

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Mao’s Relevance to the Features of Today’s Regime

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The Limitation of Uses of Mao Today

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Conclusion

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6 The Mao Generation at the Helm—What Difference Could It Make? Will They Still Make Use of Mao, and How? 119 The Generational Factor in Chinese Elite Politics

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The Mao Generation, the Cultural Revolution Generation and the Lost Generation

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The Cultural Revolution Generation: What It Is and What It Is Not The Cultural Revolution Generation: Fringes and Internal Division The Cultural Revolution Generation and the “Fourth Generation”

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124 127 132

The Cultural Revolution Generation and High-Level Politics

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Political Stars of the Lost Generation

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What Can Reasonably Be Expected from the New Leaders with a Cultural Revolution Background?

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A New Style, up to Which Point?

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The Significance of the Recent References to Mao

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7 Maoism and the Quest for Democracy in China

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Mao Zedong and Democracy

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Deng Xiaoping’s Reform Program and Democracy

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What is Democracy?

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The Reform Programme and Today’s Problems

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Maoism a Good Prescription?

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The Need to Come to Terms with the Past

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Detailed Chapter Contents

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8 The “Chongqing Model”—What It Means to China Today

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Introduction

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Attractive Elements of the “Chongqing Model”

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“Singing Red” and “Strike Black” Campaigns

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The “Chongqing Model” in China’s Ideological Spectrum

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An Evaluation of the “Chongqing Model”

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Conclusion: The Political Significance of the “Chongqing Model”

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9 In The Red 2.0—Online Reactivation of Maoist Mobilization Methods and Propaganda

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China’s Top Models: The Dead, the Living and the Virtual

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Reviving the Mass Line

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Reasserting Democratic Centralism

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Conclusion—Long Live Mao: From the Online Reactivation of Maoist Mobilization Methods and Propaganda in China to Worldwide Digital Maoism

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10 Propaganda and Pastiche—Visions of Mao in The Founding of a Republic, Beginning of the Great Revival and Let the Bullets Fly

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Introduction

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Repositioning Mao

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Post-Mainstream Culture

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The Founding of a Republic: Returning to Mao via New Democracy

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Beginning of the Great Revival: A Charming but Ubiquitous Mao

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Mainstream Socialist Culture

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Conclusion: The Legitimizing Power of Parody

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11 Renegotiating the Traumatizing Experiences— Reemploying Images of Mao in Contemporary Art

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The Official and Unofficial Use of Mao’s Visual Images

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Contemporary Art and Mao

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The Importance of Mao’s Visual Images Today

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Reflecting A Traumatizing History

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Conclusions

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Preface

This book is the product of a conference organized by the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China (CEFC), the Department of Government and International Studies of the Hong Kong Baptist University, and the Contemporary China Research Project of the City University of Hong Kong in June 14–15, 2012. The theme of the conference “The Uses of Mao in Contemporary China: The Meaning and Purposes of an Icon” was chosen because the organizers believed that Mao still occupies significant place in the current intellectual and cultural debates in China. Mao has also been adapted and exploited in different contexts by various groups in the pursuit of their respective interests. Considering the uses of Mao will certainly contribute to a better understanding of the changing values in China today and its political, economic, social and cultural scene. The fruitful discussions in the conference led to the decision to publish this volume. As editor, I must thank Sebastian Veg and his colleagues at the CEFC as well as Jean-Pierre Cabestan of the Hong Kong Baptist University for their superb efforts in the planning and organization of this conference. My gratitude also goes to those who presented papers and actively participated in the discussions at the conference. In the publication of this book, the City University of Hong Kong Press and especially Edmund K. Y. Chan have offered valuable assistance. I alone should be responsible for the inadequacies.

Joseph Y. S. CHENG City University of Hong Kong June 2015

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About the Contributors

Joseph Yu-shek Cheng is the retired Professor of Political Science and Coordinator of the Contemporary China Research Project, City University of Hong Kong. He is the founding editor of the Hong Kong Journal of Social Sciences and the Journal of Comparative Asian Development. He has published widely on the political development in China and Hong Kong, Chinese foreign policy and local government in southern China. Volumes on China he has recently completed include China’s Japan Policy – Adjusting to New Challenges. He served as the Convener of the Alliance for True Democracy in Hong Kong in 2013–2014. Arif Dirlik lives in Eugene, Oregon, in semi-retirement. He most recently (fall 2011) held the the Rajni Kothari Chair in Democracy at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies in Delhi, India. In fall 2010, he served as the first Liang Qichao Memorial Distinguished Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University, Beijing. He will hold a brief appointment as Green Professor at the University of British Columbia in February 2016. A historian of China, Dirlik has written on a broad range of subjects. His works have been translated into Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Bulgarian, French, German and Portuguese. Jean-Philippe Béja graduated from Sciences Po Paris, Paris VII University (Chinese), du Centre de Formation des Journalistes (CFJ), Liaoning University (Chinese Literature), and received his Ph.D in Asian Studies from the Ecole pratique des hautes études (6ème Section) and doctorat en Paris VII University. He was the Scientific Director of the Centre d’Etudes Français sur la Chine Contemporaine (Hong Kong) and the editor of Perspectives Chinoises from 1993 to 1997. He co-founded China Perspectives in 1995. He has been a Research Director at CNRS since 1994. He is a member of the editorial boards of East Asia: An International Journal, and Chinese Cross Currents.

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

Willy Wo-Lap Lam is an Adjunct Professor at the History Department, the Centre for China Studies, and the Master’s in Global Political Economy Programme at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. With 35 years of experience writing and researching about China, he specializes in elite politics, political and economic reforms, and foreign policy. Dr. Lam has just published Chinese Politics in the Era of Xi Jinping: Renaissance, Reform or Retrogression? (New York and London: Routledge, 2015). Ben Xu is Professor of English, Saint Mary’s College of California. His publications include Situational Tensions of Critical Intellectuals, Disenchanted Democracy, Towards Post-Modernism and Post-Colonialism, For What Do Human Beings Remember, Public Life of Human Dignity, Between Fools and Heroes, Transparent Conversation, etc. Michel Bonnin is Professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris. During the 1990s, he was the director of the French Research Centre on Contemporary China and of the journal China Perspectives, which he both founded in Hong Kong. In 2004, he published in French a book offering a global presentation of the rustication movement of China’s educated youth. It had two Chinese editions published in Hong Kong and Beijing and an English edition entiled: The Lost Generation: The Rustication of China’s Educated Youth (1968–1980) (“Choice Outstanding Academic Title, 2014”). His main research interests are the social and political issues in the People’s Republic of China. He has written mostly on the rustication movement of urban educated youth during the 60s and the 70s, on employment questions, on popular history and memory as well as on the question of generations in contemporary China. Torbjörn Lodén is a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Stockholm, Professor emeritus of Chinese language and culture at Stockholm University, and member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities. He served as Cultural

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About the Contributors

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Attaché at the Swedish Embassy in Beijing 1973–1976 and was a visiting professor at City University of Hong Kong 2011–2014. In his research he has dealt mainly with various aspects of China’s intellectual history, from ancient times to the present, but he has also written about Chinese history, literature and politics. His latest books are Kinas vägval – från himmelskt imperium till global stormakt (China’s choice of road – from celestial empire to global great power, 2012) and Tolv lektioner i kinesiska. (Twelve Chinese lessons, 2013; the latter with Wan Xinzheng. Émilie Tran is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Administration and Leadership and the Coordinator for the Department of Government Studies at the University of Saint Joseph in Macao. She obtained her Ph.D in History and Civilisations from the École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS) in Paris. Her research interests pertain to contemporary Chinese politics and society, and in particular the training of political elite and the social impact of the development of Macao’s gaming sector. Sebastian Veg is Professor at the School of Advanced Studies in Social Science (EHESS), Paris, currently posted as Director of the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China, Hong Kong. His research interests are twentieth-century Chinese literature, political debates, and intellectual history; and he has written about and translated Lu Xun, as well as contemporary writers and intellectuals. Minna Valjakka is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Helsinki, Finland. She has been specializing in Chinese visual arts; and in her doctoral dissertation, Many Faces of Mao Zedong, and she examined contemporary Chinese art depicting Chairman Mao Zedong. Currently, her research interests are broadened to urban creativity in East Asia; and she is working on her postdoctoral research project “East Asian Urban Art – self-expression through visual images in Hong Kong, Tokyo and Seoul”, funded by the Academy of Finland.

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List of Illustrations

Tables Table 10.1

Five Top Grossing Chinese Films

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Figures Figure 11.1 Heng, Caricature of Bo Xilai

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Figure 11.2 Liu Anping, Couterrevolutionary Slogan, 1992

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Figure 11.3 Interactions of the visual and mental images produced both during Mao's lifetime and posthumously 290 Figure 11.4 Yue Minjun, Chairman Mao Goes to Anyuan, 2005

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Figure 11.5 Yin Zhaoyang, Chairman Mao Going to An’yuan, 2005

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Figure 11.6 André Eichman, General Gu Yuping, 2004

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Figure 11.7 Shao Yinong and Mu Chen, The Assembly Hall—Changting, 2002–2006

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Figure 11.8 Shao Yinong and Mu Chen, The Assembly Hall—Pukou, 2002–2006

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Figure 11.9 Hu Yang, Shanghai Living, Sun Bingchang, 2005

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Figure 11.10 Hu Yang, Shanghai Living, Claude Hudelot, 2005

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Figure 11.11 Zhang Hongtu, Front Door, 1995

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Figure 11.12 Zhang Hongtu, Front Door, detail, 1995

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Figure 11.13 Mei Dean-E, Three Principles Reunited China, 1990/91 311

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Figure 11.14 Gao Brothers, Family Memory A, 1969/1999

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Figure 11.15 Gao Brothers, Family Memory B, 1999

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Acronyms and Abbreviations

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ARM

Anti-Rightist Movement

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CASS

Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

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CCP

Chinese Communist Party

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CCLPA

Central Commission on Legal and Political Affairs

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CFG

China Film Group

239

CIIRC

The China Internet Illegal Information Reporting Centre

227

CPC

Communist Party of China

182

CPPCC

Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference

252

CPS

Central Party School

81

CR

Cultural Revolution

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CYL

Communist Youth League

141

LSG

Leading Small Group

238

NPC

National People’s Congress

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PBSC

Politburo Standing Committee

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PLA

People’s Liberation Army

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PRC

People’s Republic of China

11

SARFT

State Administration of Radio, Film and Television

238

SOEs

State-Owned Enterprises

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1 Introduction Joseph Y. S. CHENG Chair Professor of Political Science Department of Public Policy, City University of Hong Kong

Bo Xilai’s campaign of “praise the Red and strike down the Black” in Chongqing when he was the municipality’s Party secretary once again reminds people of the influence of Mao and Maoism. After all, Mao’s portrait continues to adorn the Tiananmen Gate. Bo Xilai’s promotion of the “Chongqing model” was an attempt to exploit the legacy of Mao to advance his own political career, and his challenge of the Party’s leadership finally led to his downfall. Bo’s popularity, however, reveals that a segment of the population who has not benefitted from the rapid economic growth in the era of economic reforms and opening to the external world are dissatisfied, and they resent the values of developmentalism. This dissatisfaction and resentment are not unique to China; they existed in Eastern Europe in the mid-1990s too, which supported the electoral success of former Communist parties. The Chongqing’s experiments attracted the praise of many Chinese intellectuals who are often categorized as the New Left or its sympathizers because the present development strategy has its obvious deficiencies, and the Maoist model retains some ideological appeal. Mao Zedong Thought naturally may be subjected to many interpretations as it has evolved through many decades. For example, Mao’s concept of New Democracy was promoted by Zhang Musheng and firmly endorsed by Liu Yuan, Liu Shaoqi’s son and an important princeling serving in the People’s Liberation Army.

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The Chinese authorities’ cautious handling of the Bo Xilai trial in August 2013 reflects their concern regarding the ideological challenge of Maoism, and the potential adverse impact of the trial on Party solidarity. Both the prosecution and the defendant avoided implicating any more senior leaders in the trial. Since the stepping down of Hua Guofeng, Deng Xiaoping and his successors too were very reserved in their criticisms against Mao, as demonstrated by the 1981 “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China.” In view of Mao’s significance in the history of the Party, Chinese leaders whose top priority has been the maintenance of political stability do not want to rock the boat and risk the grave dangers of splitting the Party and adversely affecting the legitimacy of the regime. This reluctance has led to Mao being exploited by various groups ranging from the Party leadership and the New Left to entrepreneurs seeking profits. Under such circumstances, it is perhaps a duty of Chinese scholars outside the country to offer an objective assessment of the use of Mao today and of the Bo Xilai case. This volume attempts to fulfill the task by enlisting a team of academics who are ready to offer their initial evaluations. Arif Dirlik notes that the post-revolutionary regime in China has been trying to recruit Mao Zedong in support of “reform and opening” instead of repudiating his legacy. Under the guidance of Deng Xiaoping, China’s official historiography since 1978 has drawn a distinction between Mao’s role during the Cultural Revolution and Mao as the architect of “Chinese Marxism” — a Marxism that integrates theory with the actual circumstances of Chinese society. The essence of the latter is encapsulated in Mao Zedong Thought, which is viewed as an expression not just of Mao the individual but of the collective leadership of the Communist Party of China. In the most recent representations, “Chinese Marxism” is viewed as having developed in two phases: New Democracy which brought the Party to power in 1949, and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” inaugurated under Deng Xiaoping and further developed by his successors. The latter is officially perceived to be a continuous development of

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Mao Zedong Thought. The Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao administration had made an aggressive effort to portray “Chinese Marxism” as the most advanced development of Marxism which might also serve as a model for others. These interpretive operations have salvaged Mao for the national revolution and the legitimacy of the Party. But it also represents a predicament in keeping alive memories of Maoist policies which the Party leadership is not always able to control political memory, as has been illustrated in the Chongqing model in recent years. Professor Dirlik considers that the continued uncertainty over the future seems inevitably to play out a discursive terrain in which Mao is ever present in one form or another. In its appropriation by the Party regime, Mao Zedong Thought guarantees that Mao and Maoism will have a phantom existence imminent in Chinese socialism both in its achievements and anxieties. According to Jean-Philippe Béja, the dilemma that Mao’s successors faced was the following: how was it possible to keep the image of the regime’s founder untouched while completely reversing his policies? The new leadership understood that a thorough criticism of the Great Helmsman would deeply undermine the regime’s legitimacy. While Khrushchev could denounce Stalin’s crimes and appeal for a return to Leninism, this was impossible in China as Mao was both the regime’s Lenin and Stalin. Denouncing his crime would lead the people to question the very legitimacy of the People’s Republic. The solution was to invent the Gang of Four that was supposed to have plotted against the Red Sun, and to accuse Mao only of insufficient firmness in his struggle against them. Since the early 1980s, Mao’s position in the minds of the Chinese people and of the Party leaders has been through ups and downs. Mao has been put to multiple uses such as a pop icon, a tutelary personality for disgruntled workers, a “maitre á penser” for New Left intellectuals, etc. However, his thought, no matter how re-interpreted, has remained the ideological cornerstone of the regime and it is still part of the Four Cardinal principles (Marxism–Leninism–Mao Zedong Thought, socialism, dictatorship of the proletariat, and Party leadership) created by Deng Xiaoping in 1979 to put an end to serious reflections on the regime

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legitimacy. Mao’s image has been used by the Party and it has also been used by the people. The multiplicity of these uses tells a lot about relations between the state and society in present China. The nostalgia for Mao Zedong is kept alive by the refusal of the Party to launch a discussion about the 27 years of his rule. Commercialization of his image, while contributing to the demythification of his ideas, has allowed the Party to make him an idol for the youth. The combination of these two trends, argues Béja, has prevented questioning of the historical role of Mao, and has contributed to the reinforcement of his position both in the official discourse and in the hearts and minds of the population. The chapter by Willy Lam studies the background and significance of the Maoist revival that began in Chongqing in late 2008 and spread across the nation in the ensuing years. The Maoist revival, Lam argues, is aimed at promoting “spiritual civilization,” which was a concept raised by Deng Xiaoping to counter the materialism arriving in the wake of the country’s market reforms and accumulation of wealth. Lam thinks that there is also a “materialistic” side to the Maoist revival: A re-emphasis on the values of egalitarianism and social equality that a sizeable segment of the population associates with the Maoist era. There was also a reaction to the increasing polarization of rich and poor. At a deeper level, the author sees the quasi-Maoist renaissance as a political movement on the part of the Party leadership to uphold political stability and weed out challenges to the regime. While Hu Jintao seldom talked about Maoism, he vigorously propagated ideological orthodoxy and the uniformity of thought through the campaign of “Sinicizing and popularizing Marxism.” Lam discussed in some detail how the Maoist revival helped strengthen the “Gang of Princelings” and the legitimacy of the “red aristocrats.” The Maoist revival was also linked to the hawkish turn in Chinese foreign policy. According to Willy Lam, the main factor behind Bo Xilai’s ouster seemed to be the animosity between the ambitious Bo and the Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao leadership, as well as the bitter power struggle between the princelings and the Chinese Communist Youth League faction. Lam believes that the obsession of Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping with preserving the Party’s

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1. Introduction

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monopoly of political power might likely leave them ill-disposed and illequipped to rekindle the economic, administrative and political reforms which have been neglected in the past two decades. Mao is still serving as a foundation of the regime legitimacy to the Chinese leadership today, argues Ben Xu. Hence when one considers the possibility of regime change in China in the future, one has to answer the basic question about the founding of its political institutions. Political institutions in China were established along with the historical establishment of Mao’s paramount leadership. According to Ben Xu, there are three defining characteristics of the Mao regime: class struggle, socialism and one-party rule, but only class struggle has been abandoned. It has been replaced by new variations of the old rhetoric of single-party dictatorship, such as “three represents” and “social harmony.” Socialism, on the other hand, has been discredited and has lost control of consumption and consumer culture. Repackaging Mao as a tactic of delaying or averting democratic reform may serve the short-term purpose of disguising the legitimacy deficit; but China simply cannot move forward by going back. Ben Xu thus believes that the strategy of limited and uneven economic reform in the absence of political change may be reaching its limits. Michel Bonnin analyzes the impact of the Mao generation at the helm by trying to answer the following two questions: What are the main features of this generation? And is the generational factor influential in the Party leadership? Bonnin wants to remind his readers that the impact of the “situation of generation” and the consciousness of generation are not equally distributed in the age bracket considered. Further, even when the new leadership elected by the Eighteenth Party Congress comprises many members of the Cultural Revolution generation, it is still multi-generational. Finally, while the princelings are prominent and were among the first members of the Cultural Revolution generation to reach a relatively high level of leadership, they are not as numerous as they could have been.

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According to Bonnin’s observations, the specificities of the political elites among the Cultural Revolution generation do not bode well for its inventiveness and boldness in the political realm. Now that a regular renewal of the political leadership has been institutionalized, state politics should be less dependent on the whims of any one leader, though each new team could bring its “generational style.” This new style could only make a difference in case of new challenges requiring brand new solutions, but such challenges are quite possible in the not too distant future. Torbjörn Loden looks at the phenomenon of New Maoism in relation to the quest for democracy in China. He believes that while with or without real threats of national demise, Chinese Communists have generally held a very negative view of the basic democratic rights and freedoms; Chinese society has during the past three decades moved in the direction of greater pluralism, more freedom for more people, and, indeed, toward democracy in several important ways. They include economic growth leading to the rise of a middle-class embracing largely universal values. At the same time, the control of the Party-state over the lives of the Chinese has shrunk and is much less totalitarian. China’s opening up to the external world, as well as improvements in the judicial system and the media are significant trends. The impact of grassroots elections, especially elections of village heads and the Party’s present discourse on democracy are not to be underestimated either. At this stage, Loden considers that New Maoism seems to offer both a diagnosis of the situation in China in the reform era and a prescription for improving the situation. However, the former’s attempts to identify neoliberal policies as an essential cause of China’s serious problems today may contain a grain of truth but still appear largely misleading. Professor Loden also believes that only when there is open discussion with no taboos about China’s modern history will it be possible to explode the myth nourished by New Maoism that Mao’s China was a more equal and just society than China today. The editor’s chapter examines the Chongqing model and its meaning for China today. He argues that the Chongqing model reflects the challenges

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1. Introduction

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of the present stage of China’s development. The basic policy program of Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao based on economic growth, a fundamental social security net covering the entire population, and good governance in the absence of democracy were found inadequate. Grievances have been accumulating, and an increasing segment of the population wants to see changes and reforms. Former Premier Wen Jiabao’s appeals for liberal democratic reforms encountered strong resistance; and the ambitious Bo Xilai tried to offer an alternative. The ideological and policy debate became more significant partly because of the leadership succession process finalized at the Eighteenth Party Congress in the autumn of 2012 and partly because of the perceived domestic and international challenges. The former includes the economic slowdown in the aftermath of the global financial tsunami; and the latter mainly involves the Barack Obama administration’s “return to Asia” position and its exploitation of the hedging strategies of China’s neighbors in response to its increasingly assertive posture in the territorial disputes since 2010. Chinese leaders normally have more tolerance for the leftists because they do not challenge the Party’s monopoly of political power, whereas the rightists (liberals) demand democracy. The Bo Xilai case was one of the rare cases when a severe challenge came from the left and the central leadership became seriously concerned. Perhaps this revealed the inadequacies of the present achievements in economic development. Bo Xilai’s departure from the political scene has reduced the appeal of the New Leftists, but it does not represent a victory or even a significant opportunity for the Rightists (liberals). There are no signs of any significant political reforms yet from the new leadership headed by Xi Jinping. When the Chinese leadership put a stop to the “Red culture movement,” actual signs (posters and inscriptions on walls) and online testimonies were removed practically overnight. In a heavy atmosphere of suspicion, people in Chongqing behaved as if nothing had happened, observes Emilie Tran. Her chapter shows how the Web 2.0 has actually enabled the Party regime to put into practice on certain Maoist methods of mobilization and propaganda. Modern technology certainly helps.

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

Instead of waiting for issues to create a buzz on the Internet and to react thereafter, the Chinese authorities since the late 2000s have adopted a proactive approach by encouraging citizens to denounce the malpractices on websites. In fact the Party regime has been using different methods to assert its control: from enacting laws and regulations, including licensing systems and enforcing real name registration, to online censorship, Internet police, Internet firewall devices, closure of websites, and physical intimidation of activists. The authors argue that cleansing the Internet of its bad elements while praising the virtue of websites which “uphold the System of Core Socialist Values” may well be a modern application of Mao’s “Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art.” However, despite the ongoing online reactivation of Maoist mobilization methods and propaganda, the broad picture of Chinese netizens is not very different from that of social media users from other parts of the world, i.e., the vast majority of them are much more driven by depoliticized pastimes. Sebastian Veg considers that the two films on Mao released in 2009 and 2011 set a new standard in the confluence of commercial and propaganda productions in terms of scale; and he argues that they contributed to defining the new “mainstream socialist culture” established as a cultural policy goal by Hu Jintao. At the same time, they redefined the figure of Mao and the role of the Communist Party of China in an attempt to stake out a popular consensus on the contemporary Chinese polity. Veg observes that the image of Mao that the Party would like to present today is very restricted in time. In fact both movies entirely sidestep any engagement with the history of the People’s Republic of China after 1949, and this probably reflects the absence of a consensus on the interpretation of that segment of history even within the present Party leadership. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, however, there were two interesting trends concerning the repositioning of Mao: the commodification of the icons of Chinese socialism and of the figure of Mao himself; and the depoliticization of the Red Nostalgia, i.e., how “red” culture came to be “relieved” and subsequently theorized as an object of nostalgia distinct

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from the official political arrangements. As the mainstream Party culture cannot let go of the Revolution and of Mao, Veg believes that the two Mao films in fact try to reconstruct a consensual figure of Mao as the centerpiece of the new emerging national narrative of “the great revival of the Chinese nation.” This demonstrates that the centrality of Mao’s role ensures that any critique of the present state of affairs that might venture to take propaganda discourse remains framed within the limits of his allencompassing persona. Minna Valjakka discusses how Mao’s images have been renegotiated and questioned in the realms of contemporary art by both Chinese and EuroAmerican artists since the 1970s. Furthermore, collecting Mao has become extremely popular among Chinese and non-Chinese alike. For instance, for some Chinese collectors promoting their nationalism in this way can be a calculated method to earn more respect and influence in China. Nonetheless, completely opposite sentiments are also expressed among Chinese, and the ultimate examples are the two attacks on Mao’s official portrait at Tiananmen Square on May 23, 1989 and May 12, 2007. Valjakka demonstrates well that visual images related to Mao include much more than his mere likeness. Portraits are just one limited form of Mao’s visual images, although without question, portraits are the most familiar and prominent ones. The presence of Mao can be implied with varying methods, without depicting the likeness of Mao at all. For example, similar to the original visual images created during Mao’s lifetime, contemporary artists can use visual signs, such as the red sun or slogans by Mao to refer to him. Mao’s handwritten calligraphic poems, slogans and writings have been enormously important representations of him in the visual culture in China. While art works depicting Mao are primarily created for representing, invoking and questioning the traumatizing past, some are also made in order to appeal to the audiences, both foreign and Chinese. Disneyfication and commodification emerge when the Party creates amusement parks and tourist attractions relating to the revolutionary past, and when tens of thousands of entrepreneurs establish Mao restaurants and supply a myriad

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of Maoist souvenirs for both foreign and domestic tourists. Hence Valjakka considers it quite hypocritical to criticize only contemporary artists for the commodification of Mao’s visual image, when many artists are actively employing visual art to prevent historical amnesia by deconstructing and reconstructing the historical narratives.

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2 Mao Zedong in Contemporary Chinese Official Discourse and History1 Arif DIRLIK Kai Feng Scholar (2010), Tsinghua Academy of Ancient Chinese Studies

Introduction Mao Zedong is once again back in the news. He was resurrected around 2008 by the now discredited Chongqing Party Secretary Bo Xilai to lend cultural and ideological weight to the experiment Bo planned with a socialism that would combine Mao-style populist egalitarianism with tighter party-state control over the economy; this time around within the context of global capitalism of which the People’s Republic of China (PRC)

1. My use of “official” in the title of this chapter needs some explanation as it determines the coverage of the discussion. In a sense, all discourse and history in China are official, as they are closely watched and censored by the authority. There is a considerable leeway within limits, but the limits matter. The most important of such limitations concerns sensitive matters relating to the leaders. I was personally acquainted with those limits when my book—Anarchism in China—was banned and collected almost immediately upon the publication of its Chinese edition, apparently on the grounds that “it insulted our leaders.” My use of the word “official” here is limited to the coverage of officially-produced works that establish those official limits to interpretation that provide a guide for the interpretation that is permissible for society at large but most importantly for the Party—at least that is the intention. Also excluded from the discussions are works produced by officials after they have left office, some of whom have been quite harsh in their departures from the official line. For a brief but useful general survey on recent Mao scholarship, see, Xiao Yanzhong, “Recent Mao Zedong Scholarship in China,” in Timothy Cheek (ed), A Critical Introduction to Mao (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 273–287

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is an integral component, if not a motor force. The search for answers to apparent disagreements over Bo’s recent dismissal by those suspicious of his challenge to the existing state-capitalism controlled by the Party seems only to have intensified speculation over the strength of Maoism in the Party. So deeply is Mao identified with the Cultural Revolution in contemporary consciousness that observers of recent developments rarely draw a distinction between a Mao revival and a cultural revolutionary revival. Symbolic it may have been, but Bo’s revival of Red Culture was most importantly reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution which, despite some relaxation, is still a taboo in the PRC. Whether or not it was directed at Bo, the warning by Premier Wen Jiabao of a possible recurrence of the Cultural Revolution unless problems of development—mainly political and economic inequality and corruption—were resolved offered a tacit recognition of at least one important reason for the anxiety that is usually ignored these days in discussions of the Cultural Revolution: the Cultural Revolution as an attack on the inequalities created by the Party whose reason for existence theoretically was to abolish inequality.2 To recall the Cultural Revolution if only symbolically is to draw attention to a problem that is far more severe presently than it was in the 1960s. And that is not permissible—as talk of class difference and division has been largely silenced in the PRC as it has in other contemporary societies, and perhaps for more easily understandable reasons. The same, however, is not the case with Mao—not the Mao of the Cultural Revolution but the Mao of the Chinese revolution and founding of the PRC. I argue in this chapter that salvaging Mao from the Cultural Revolution to appropriate him for “socialism with Chinese characteristics” has been one of the strategic ideological concerns of the post-Mao leadership from Deng Xiaoping to the present. My analysis is based on the

2. “China’s Wen Jiabao calls for ‘urgent’ political reform,” The Telegraph, March 14, 2012, www. telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/9142333/China’s-Wen-Jiabao-calls-for-urgentpolitical-reform.html.

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contemporary construction of Party history and its ideological articulation in a “Chinese Marxism,” structured around a distinction between “Mao of the New Democratic Revolution” and “Mao of the Cultural Revolution.” These texts condemn Mao the Cultural Revolutionary but assign to the Mao of New Democracy a foundational historical role, and to Mao Zedong Thought as expression of collective Party identity a living historical significance. The distinction is ideological and made possible by the denial of the history that links the two Maos. The texts point to a contradiction that may be essential to grasping the political and ideological dynamics of the Party. The appropriation of Mao for the reforms (to the point at the popular level of making him into an object of consumption) suggests the possibility of the return of the more radical Mao should the reforms run into trouble. This may very well be the significance of the Chongqing experiment, as well as what Wen Jiabao had in mind in his observations on a possible return of the Cultural Revolution kind of disorder. What Wen did not say was that the contradiction is inherent in the ideology that keeps Mao alive in the legitimation of the Party, therefore risking the return of the radical Mao should lose its ability to sustain the distinction upon which it has gambled its ideological credentials.3 Being products of Party culture, Chinese leaders are quite aware of the risks, even if the same

3. There is a resonance between my argument here and some of the contributions to the recently published (and suggestively titled) volume, Mao’s Invisible Hand: The Political Foundations of Adaptive Governance in China, ed. Sebastian Heilman and Elizabeth J. Perry (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011). The contributors to this volume demonstrate the persistence of practices developed during the revolutionary years in contemporary political practices— from “guerilla policy style” to mass campaigns to willingness to experiment and learn from experience. With the exception of one essay, the volume does not deal with issues of formal ideology, which is my concern here. It is also in the realm of ideology that the contradictions of the regime are most sharply visible.

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culture might hold them back from doing anything about it.4

Reform and the Reinvention of Mao Zedong Thought Contrary to the impression left by radical transformations since 1978, the Chinese Communist Party has never officially repudiated Mao. Despite the demotion he has suffered over the past three decades both within and outside of the PRC, Mao continues to occupy a central place in official and officially sponsored histories of the Chinese Revolution, its past and present. Whatever the personal feelings they may harbor, Chinese leaders officially propagate the line that the Party continues the work that Mao started: to build a strong socialist state informed by a Marxism that has been adjusted to national circumstances in keeping with the demands of the times. As might be expected, they view this work as having started sometime in the 1930s, gone astray for more than two decades from the mid-1950s to the late 1970s with the left-extremism of the Cultural Revolution, and to have been revitalized since then by Mao’s successors. This official line has shown remarkable consistency since the post-Mao regime reversed the policies of the Cultural Revolution, although it has undergone elaboration and consolidation. Attitudes toward Mao have undergone shifts as well among the public, along with what officialdom has deemed appropriate in celebrating Mao. But the basic line, and the justification given, has remained much the same.

4. In the 1980s, a distinguished literary critic coined the term “Mao style” to refer to a kind of writing that characterized Party discourse, whether or not the writer sought to emulate Mao. This “mechanical solidarity” may well be a manifestation of Party culture that persists. Frank Pieke is one scholar who has explored this Party culture, with its contemporary transformations as well as its persistence. See, Frank Pieke, The Good Communist: Elite Training and State Building in Today’s China (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009). For an interesting discussion of the persistence in language, see, Zhao Yuezhi, “Sustaining and Contesting Revolutionary Legacies in Media and Ideology,” in Mao’s Invisible Hand, ed. Heilman and Perry, pp. 201–236. Zhao argues that new public relations methods are superimposed on Maoist language and controls. For “Mao style,” see Li Tuo, “Resisting Writing,” in Politics, Ideology and Literary Discourse in Modern China: Theoretical Interventions and Cultural Critique, ed. Liu Kang and Xiaobing. (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993), pp. 273–277.

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Continued fealty to Mao’s legacy despite the reversal of his radical policies may be attributed at the most obvious level to the legitimacy needs of the Communist Party, which no doubt is not far from the truth, but calls for more in-depth exploration for what it may have to say about the Party’s ideological self-representation. The Party claims the mantle of the revolution. Given the prominent part Mao played in the revolution as its leader and chief theoretician, it would be rather a difficult task to uphold the historical significance of the revolution and its achievements while repudiating his legacies. The examples of Russia and Eastern Europe provide ample testimony to what happens to legacies of socialist revolutions once their founding leaders have been discredited. The postMao leadership in China has avoided this mistake despite, or perhaps because of, the upheaval experienced during the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s which made Party loyalty an overwhelming consideration. As Deng Xiaoping would warn in 1980, “when we write about his mistakes, we should not exaggerate, for otherwise we shall be discrediting Chairman Mao Zedong, and this would mean discrediting our Party and state.”5 Deng himself would lead the effort to reconstruct Party history to appropriate Mao for the reforms. Representations of Mao in the PRC and abroad dominated by memories of the Cultural Revolution overlook that there is more than one Maoist legacy available to the Party in the legitimation of the revolutionary past: not only that of Mao the Cultural Revolutionary but also of Mao the leader of the national revolution who gave voice to the theoretical formulations of Marxism in defense of the pursuit of national aims: a “Chinese Marxism” growing out of the historical experience of the Chinese Revolution. The current leadership projects its own undertaking—and the 30 years of “reform and opening” under the successive leaderships of Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin (but not Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang)­­—as further developing the policies of New Democracy that had brought the Communist Party to power in 1949

5. Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks on Successive Drafts of the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China”(hereafter, “Drafts”), in Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, 1975–1982 (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984), pp. 276–296, p. 287. Hereafter, SWDXP.

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under Mao’s leadership. In this historical reconstruction, “socialism with Chinese characteristics” as formulated by Deng Xiaoping and enriched by his successors, represents a second stage in the unfolding of “Chinese Marxism” of which New Democracy under Mao was the inaugural phase. The Cultural Revolution, sandwiched in between, serves in the new history of “Chinese Marxism” as a period when the ideology went astray (and a “negative example” from which to learn what not to do), but it leaves Mao’s “true” legacy intact for his successors to follow up on once this temporary deviation had been overcome. The reinterpretation of Mao’s “correct” thought was especially important at the beginning of the reform period, when there still were Maoists powerful and popular enough to torpedo an abrupt reversal of the policies of the Cultural Revolution and the ideological orientation that had guided them. This consideration would gradually fade after the Tiananmen tragedy of 1989. As reforms gained speed in the 1990s, now stimulated by a new awareness of globalization, Mao was no longer the threat he had been earlier. This was suggested by the regime’s mostly tolerant response to the “Mao fever”(“毛澤東熱, Mao Zedong re”) that accompanied the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Mao’s birth in 1993. It was also right around this time that a serious rewriting of the first three decades of PRC history got under way, to culminate in the Party history published only in 2011, in time for the 90th anniversary of the Party’s founding.6 This

6. Central Party History Ofice of the CPC, History of the Communist Party of China (in Chinese), 2 vols. (Beijing: Zhongyang dangshi yanjiu shi, first vol, 2002; second vol. 2011). The first volume, edited by Hu Sheng and Hu Qiaomu, was based with revisions on a 1991 volume of the same title. It covered the years before 1949. It was published as a two-part set, covering respectively 1921–37 and 1937–49. In addition to new materials utilized, its main revisions were prompted by post-1991 speeches by Deng Xiaoping and, more significantly, the new leader Jiang Zemin’s “important thought of three represents.’”(see, “Afterword,” Part 2, pp. 1051–1055). The second volume of 2011 was also published as a two-volume set, each roughly 500pp. covering, respectively, the years 1949–58 and 1958–78. See the interview with a former Vice-director of the Office, Zhang Qihua, who oversaw successive revisions of the text, in China News Weekly, excerpted in “CPC Party History acknowledges deaths of More than 10 million during the 3-year Diaster,” Cenews.eu January 14, 2011, www.cenews/?p=28441. Hereafter, Zhang Qihua.

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history, and works on Chinese Marxism that have appeared only during the last few years, have brought into focus an interpretive effort that goes back in its origins to the reforms that put an end to Mao’s radical policies. Mao, it may be recalled, was never officially repudiated. Indeed, the overthrow of the “Gang of Four,” the termination of the Cultural Revolution, and the turn to “reform and opening” with the historic Third Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee in December 1978 was viewed by the Party leaders as the restoration of “the correct path of Marxism–Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought.”7 “Marxism–Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought” were enshrined in 1979 as one of the four “cardinal principles” guiding the Party (in addition to “the socialist road,” “dictatorship of the proletariat,” and “leadership of the Communist Party”). The final verdict would be provided in the “Resolution on certain questions in the history of our party since the founding of the People’s Republic of China,” which was endorsed by the 6th Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee in late June 1981.8 This document, and the discussions that attended it, were in hindsight among the foundational documents of “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”9 Supplemented

7. Deng Xiaoping, “Uphold the Four Cardinal Principles” (March 30, 1979), in SWDXP, pp. 166–191, p. 167 8. “Chinese Communism Subject Archive,” www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/cpc/ history/01.htm 9. In an essay published in 1986, Brantly Womack suggested that the 1981 Resolution was comparable in significance to a similar document produced in 1945, “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party.” The latter provided an account of the Party’s history since 1921, foregrounding the role of Mao, who in the Seventh Party Congress in 1945 was anointed undisputed leader of the Party, and emblem of Mao Zedong Thought. The 1981 Resolution, which in its concluding paragraph did indeed refer to the 1945 Resolution as its antecedent, laid the groundwork for the writing of Party history for the 1949–1978 period. His suggestion is confirmed in recent historical work which consistently refers to this document as their primary guideline. See, Brantly Womack, “Where Mao Went Wrong: Epistemology and Ideology in Mao’s Leftist Politics,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs No. 16 (July 1986): 23–40. In his speech on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of the founding of the CPC on July 1, 2011, Hu Jintao once again referred to the two resolutions as storehouses of the Party’s “experiences and lessons.” Hu Jintao, “Speech at CPC Anniversary Gathering,” http:// news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-07/01/c_13960505_6.htm.

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by pronouncements from Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao whose policies are viewed as further developments of Chinese Marxism, they have served as a template for writing the history of Marxism in China—and Mao into that history. The Resolution of 1981 held Mao directly responsible for the leftist errors of the Cultural Revolution, but concluded nevertheless that, “Comrade Mao Zedong was a great Marxist and a great proletarian revolutionary, strategist and theorist. It is true that he made gross mistakes during the ‘cultural revolution’ but, if we judge his activities as a whole, his contributions to the Chinese revolution far outweigh his mistakes. His merits are primary and his errors secondary. He rendered indelible meritorious service in founding and building up our Party and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, in winning victory for the cause of liberation of the Chinese people, in founding the People’s Republic of China and in advancing our socialist cause. He made major contributions to the liberation of the oppressed nations of the world and to the progress of mankind.”10 Deng Xiaoping’s account of the successive drafts of the Resolution leaves little question that this conclusion was reached after considerable disagreement and deliberation within the Party.11 How the Resolution maneuvered its way through the Cultural Revolution, weighed Mao’s errors against his achievements, balanced the mistakes of the Cultural Revolution against past achievements have been discussed by other scholars.12 What is of interest in the document for our purposes here is its

10. “Resolution,” p. 34 11. Deng, “Drafts,” is an invaluable testament to inner-Party negotiation in producing this important document. As I shall note below, the Party history published 30 years later went through as similar negotiation, this time extending over 15 years. 12. Womack, “Where Mao Went Wrong,” op.cit.; John Bryan Starr, “‘Good Mao,’ ‘Bad Mao’: Mao Studies and the Re-Evaluation of Mao’s Political Thought,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs No. 16 (July 1986): 1–6; Nick Knight, “The Form of Mao Zedong’s ‘Sinification’ of Marxism,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs No.9 (January 1983): 17–33.

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historical delineation of Mao as the Party’s leader, and its relationship to Mao Zedong Thought and Chinese Marxism. Mao Zedong’s achievements as leader from the mid 1930s to the mid 1950s were indisputable. He led the Party to victory in the New Democratic Revolution, opened up a new historical era by liberating China, and oversaw the transition to socialism that was completed by 1956. Even after his radical left-turn shortly after the 8th Party Congress in 1956, Mao continued to make important contributions to China’s development, which continued through the Cultural Revolution when his mistakes reached their most destructive. Throughout, he continued to produce theoretical work that was quite significant in contributing to socialist reconstruction. As the quotation above indicates, there was no questioning the role of Mao as the leader of the Chinese revolution. The most interesting part of the Resolution is related to Mao Zedong Thought. The Resolution reaffirmed the distinction between Mao’s thought and Mao Zedong Thought that had been part of Party ideology since the origins of that formulation in the early 1940s.13 The former referred to the thinking of an individual leader, while the latter to the crystallization of the collective wisdom of the Party’s revolutionary experience as it was articulated by the leader of the Party. What it had to say is worth quoting at some length because of its implications for placing Mao in the ideological reconstruction not just in the past, but in the part Mao Zedong Thought would play in the unfolding of “socialism with Chinese characteristics”: “The Chinese Communists, with Comrade Mao Zedong as their chief representative, made a theoretical synthesis of China’s unique experience in its protracted revolution in accordance with the basic principles of Marxism–Leninism. This synthesis constituted a scientific system of guidelines befitting China’s conditions, and it is this synthesis which is Mao Zedong Thought,

13. See, Raymond F. Wiley, The Emergence of Maoism: Mao Tse-tung, Chen Po-ta and the Search for Chinese Theory, 1935–1945 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1980)

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the product of the integration of the universal principles of Marxism–Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution. Making revolution in a large Eastern semi-colonial, semi-feudal country … cannot be solved by reciting the general principles of Marxism-Leninism or by copying foreign experience in every detail. The erroneous tendency of making Marxism a dogma and deifying Comintern resolutions and the experience of the Soviet Union prevailed in the international communist movement and in our Party mainly in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and this tendency pushed the Chinese revolution to the brink of total failure. It was in the course of combating this wrong tendency and making a profound summary of our historical experience in this respect that Mao Zedong Thought took shape and developed. It was systematized and extended in a variety of fields and reached maturity in the latter part of the Agrarian Revolutionary War and the War of Resistance Against Japan, and it was further developed during the War of Liberation and after the founding of the People’s Republic of China. Mao Zedong Thought is Marxism–Leninism applied and developed in China; it constitutes a correct theory, a body of correct principles and a summary of the experiences that have been confirmed in the practice of the Chinese revolution, a crystallization of the collective wisdom of the Chinese Communist Party.”14 The identification of Mao Zedong Thought with the collective wisdom of the Party rather than Mao the individual suggested not only that it was possible for Mao the leader to transgress against Mao Zedong Thought, but also that Mao Zedong Thought was a work in progress, “still in the process of development” after the passing of Mao the leader.15 There was

14. “Resolution,” pp. 34–35 15. Deng, “Drafts,” p. 282. The “Resolution” stated that the “erroneous ‘Left’ theses, upon which Comrade Mao Zedong based himself in initiating the “cultural revolution,” were obviously inconsistent with the system of Mao Zedong Thought, which is the integration of the universal principles of Marxism–Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution,” p. 19

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a danger here, too, that the Party might be culpable for the wrong turn that the ideology had taken during the two decades of deviation, which was indeed conceded by the document.16 On the other hand, Mao Zedong Thought as the expression of the collective leadership of the Party has been elevated to a plane where it leads an unblemished existence beyond the errors of individual leaders, having demonstrated repeatedly its ability to correct its mistakes. Making mistakes was inevitable for living people, Mao himself had stated in 1945, adding that only the unborn and the dead do not make mistakes. He had admitted to the many mistakes he and others (including Marx and Engels) had made in the course of revolutionary activity. But when Mao Zedong Thought was enshrined in the 7th Party Congress of that year, those mistakes were excluded. Likewise, in the present the mistakes Mao had made in his later years must be excluded from Mao Zedong Thought to preserve the latter’s status as the infallible guide to socialist reconstruction.17 To recall a distinction Franz Schurmann has drawn in his study of ideology in the PRC, Mao Zedong Thought is given an abstract existence and a longevity in these discussions that raises it almost to the status of an “ideology” of universal significance rather than a “thought” that represents

16. See also Deng, “Drafts,” p. 281 17. Zhonggong gongyang dangshi yanjiu shi yishi(ed), “‘Zhongguo gongchandang lishi(shang juan)’ ruogan wenti shuoming” (“中國共產黨歷史[上卷]若干問題說明) (Explaining Some Questions in the First Volume of the “History of the Communist Party of China)(Beijing: Zhonggong dangshi chuban she, 1991), pp. 211–213. This interesting volume, published as a companion volume to the Party history published in 1991, was devoted to clarification of unresolved problems in the History. The clarifications were used also to comment on contemporary issues. In addition to this explication of the relationship between Mao and Mao Zedong Thought, the volume also drew attention to the Communist Party’s struggles with bourgeois thinking in the 1920s, and its parallels with the struggles against advocates of bourgeois economics and politics since the beginning of Reform and Opening” (pp. 20–21). See, also, Mei Rongzheng(梅榮政)(chief editor), Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua shi (馬克思主義 中國化史) (History of making Marxism Chinese) (Beijing: Social Sciences Publication Press, 2010), p. 633, where the author cites Deng Xiaoping to the effect that “Mao Zedong’s mistakes late in life do not belong in Mao Zedong Thought.”

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the concrete practice of the ideology.18 As the 1981 Resolution framed it, “Mao Zedong Thought is the valuable spiritual asset of our Party. It will be our guide to action for a long time to come … While many of Comrade Mao Zedong’s important works were written during the periods of new democratic revolution and of socialist transformation, we must still constantly study them. This is not only because one cannot cut the past off from the present and failure to understand the past will hamper our understanding of present-day problems, but also because many of the basic theories, principles and scientific approaches set forth in these works are of universal significance and provide us with invaluable guidance now and will continue to do so in the future … Mao Zedong Thought has added much that is new to the treasurehouse of Marxist–Leninist theory. We must combine our study of the scientific works of Comrade Mao Zedong with that of the scientific writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin.”19 The greatest achievement of Mao Zedong Thought was its integration of universal Marxist theory and concrete Chinese practice. In 1980, Deng Xiaoping insisted that “it is precisely Mao Zedong Thought that the present Central Committee upholds, only we have given it concrete content.”20 The statement elevates Mao Zedong Thought to an ideological plane comparable to that of Marxism–Leninism, but at the same time evacuates it of any substantial content, which also increasingly has come to characterize the relationship of Chinese Marxism to Marxism. The development of the Chinese Communist Party beginning with Mao’s leadership in the 1930s has become at one and the same time the historical unfolding of “Chinese Marxism,” with even fewer references to the theoretical sources it claims as its ancestral origins. In other words, its

18. Franz Schurmann, Ideology and Organization in Communist China, new, enlarged edition (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1968), esp. pp. 24–58. 19. “Resolution,” p. 45 20. Deng, “Drafts,” p. 283

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Marxism has become increasingly self-referential.21 In addition to the example it provided in the appropriate handling of Marxism in the national revolution, the reaffirmation of Mao Zedong Thought under Deng Xiaoping had a second, more concrete, significance. Mao Zedong Thought was formulated and reached its fullness in the course of the New Democratic revolution, of which it was the ideological expression. Hence its evocation also invoked the question of the relevance of its policies following the elimination of the leftist zeal of the Cultural Revolution. I have suggested elsewhere that there was much in common initially between reform policies after 1978 and policies of New Democracy that had brought the Communist Party to power: a coalition government under the leadership of the Communist Party and the “dictatorship of the proletariat;” a mixed economy blending private national capital and state management and direction (bureaucratic capital); a culture policy that sought to integrate a new Communist culture with native legacies, especially popular culture.22 Theoretically speaking, reforms after 1978

21. For a cogent summary of the ideological process from the origins of Mao Zedong Thought to Hu Jintao, see, Zhiyue Bo, “Hu Jintao and CCP’s Ideology: A Historical Perspective,” Journal of Chinese Political Science vol. 9, no. 2 (Fall 2004): 27–45. Bo suggests that with Hu Jintao ideology has become “an asset” of the Party with the Party Secretary as its institutional interpreter. So far, we might add, the process has been cumulative, with each Secretary referring to and building on the previous interpretation—in other words, filling in new content as circumstances dictate, with only symbolic gestures toward theory. For a discussion of successive leaders’ contribution to theory, see, Xiao Dongbo and Nie Yueyan, et.al., Investigation of the Historical Experience of the Communist Party of China in Theory Building (in Chinese) (Beijing: Party Building Reading Materials Publishers, 2005), Introduction, pp.1– 12. This work, written at the beginning of the Hu Jintao leadership, is mostly an elaboration of Jiang Zemin’s contributions. It also suggests that the systematization and institutionalization of theory production got under way in earnest with the Jiang leadership. 22. Arif Dirlik, “Mao Zedong and ‘Chinese Marxism,’” in Arif Dirlik, Marxism in the Chinese Revolution (Lanham, MD: Rowman&Littlefield, 2005), pp. 75–104, and, “Back to the Future: Contemporary China in the Perspctive of Its Past, circa 1980,” boundary 2, 38.1(Spring 2011): 7-52. The inspiration of New Democracy also links the reforms to Sun Yat-sen’s ideas on Chinese economic development, as New Democracy was very much entangled in ideological competition with the Guomindang to appropriate Sun Yat-sen for the Communist Party. For a recent discussion, see, Huang Zhigao (黄志高), Sanmin zhuyi lunzhan yu Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua (三民主義論戰與馬克思主義中國化) (The Controversy over the Three Peoples Principles and Making Marxism Chinese) (Beijing: Shifan daxue chuban she, 2010)

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picked up where the 8th Conference in 1956 had left off, when the transition to socialism had been completed. As the “Resolution” of 1981 stated in the section just quoted, however, that while New Democracy belonged to an earlier phase of the revolution, it was the foundation of Mo Zedong Thought, and its documents would retain their significance for the foreseeable future. It is quite clear in hindsight that the reforms initiated in the 1980s would ultimately go back past 1956 to the mixed policies of New Democracy, especially in economic policy. Cultural policy has abandoned Mao’s stress on popular culture as the source of a new culture except in its more theatrical forms, and there has been a revival of elite traditions reminiscent of Guomindang policies in the 1930s. It is only in the consolidation of Communist Party rule and “the dictatorship of the proletariat” (albeit independently of the latter) that reform policies would go beyond the provisions of the 1956 conference. In an essay published in 1999, distinguished historian (and head of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences between 1985 and 1998) Hu Sheng pointed out that New Democracy was very important for understanding “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”23 Hu at the time (until his death in 2000) was also in charge of the group working on the official History of the Communist Party of China since 1949 published in 2011.24 The re-evaluation of Mao Zedong Thought in 1980 and 1981 set the stage for the part Mao was to play in official historiography from then onwards. It is worth stressing here two dimensions of this reevaluation. On the one hand, Mao Zedong Thought was associated intimately with the policies of New Democracy that had prevailed for two decades between the mid 1930s and mid 1950s, and therefore belonged to the past of the Party. On the other hand, as the foundation for a Chinese Marxism that would continue to develop for the foreseeable future, Mao Zedong Thought transcended its times, and lived on in Party ideology as a guide to the future of socialism.

23. Hu Sheng, “Re-evaluation of Mao Zedong’s ‘On New Democracy,’ ” Chinese Social Sciences (in Chinese) No. 3 (May 1999): 4–19. 24. Zhongguo gongchandang lishi Vol. 2, “Afterword,” pp. 1070–1074

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In his 90th anniversary speech in 2011, Hu Jintao reiterated this double temporality of Mao Zedong Thought when he stated that, “The Party has consistently integrated the basic tenets of Marxism with the specific conditions of China, and it has made two great theoretical achievements in the historical process of adapting Marxism to China’s conditions. One is Mao Zedong Thought, which represents the application and development of Marxism–Leninism in China. Mao Zedong Thought has resolved in a systematic way the issue of how to accomplish the newdemocratic revolution and socialist revolution in China, a big semi-colonial and semi-feudal country in the East, and made painstaking effort to explore the issue of what kind of socialism China should build and how to build it, thereby making new and creative contributions to enriching Marxism. The other theoretical achievement is the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics. This is a scientific theoretical system consisting of Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important thought of Three Represents, the Scientific Outlook on Development and other major strategic thoughts … The system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics represents the continuation and development of Mao Zedong Thought.”25 Mao Zedong Thought represented the integration of Marxist theory with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution. It was not merely the application of Marxism to the Chinese revolution, it added “new content” to Marxism and enriched it theoretically.26 Reference to Marxism has remained a basic tenet of the Party’s practice, but Mao Zedong Thought itself has come to represent “a new stage of Marxism” for the Party to refer back to as a theoretical basis for practice in the new circumstances that it faces. It is also worth noting that however strenuously the Party sought to distinguish Mao and Mao Zedong Thought, it could not (or would

25. Hu Jintao, “Speech at Anniversary Gathering,” p. 4 26. Guo Dehong (ed.), History of the Development of Chinese Marxism (in Chinese) (Beijing: Central Party School Publications, 2010), preface, p. II.

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not) take Mao the person out of the thought so long as it insisted on that particular formulation.

Mao in Official Historiography Over the last three decades, official histories of the revolution have followed closely the line established in the Resolution of 1981. The editors of a three-volume Party history written for the required course on Marxism–Leninism at the Party School, published in 1990 (preface dated 1987) wrote that, “This book follows the correct line established at the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee, and has been written according to the spirit of ‘The Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Part since the Founding of The People’s Republic of China’ at the Sixth Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee. It applies the viewpoints of dialectical and historical materialism, is based on historical facts, and seeks truth from facts.”27 Ideological requirements in the composition of Party history would become more complicated in ensuing years with the addition to Deng Xiaoping’s “theory” of Jiang Zemin’s “important thought of ‘Three Represents’” and Hu Jintao’s “scientific outlook on development” but the basic line has remained unchanged. The first volume of the most recent official Party history, published in 2002, repeated its faithfulness to the same principles, but added to it Jiang Zemin’s take on the revolution. The second volume published in 2011 additionally bears the stamp of Hu Jintao. But since every leader has reaffirmed the 1981 Resolution as a fundamental document of reform, the Resolution has been basic to their

27. Li Jianwei (chief editor), History of the Communist Party of China (in Chinese), 3 vols (Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1990), preface, p. 1. The volumes covered, respectively, 1919–1937, 1937–1949, 1949–1956.

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evaluations of the past as well. Zhang Qihua pointed to the Resolution of 1981 as the primary guide to the writing of the second volume of the Party history published in 1911. In the words of the editors, the guiding principles in the writing of the volume were: “Marxism–Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important Thought of ‘Three Represents,’ deep and comprehensive pursuit of the scientific outlook on development; grasping important historical questions on the basis of the ‘Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China,’ decisions of important meetings of the Party, and important directives of leading comrades of the Party Center.”28 The guidance was not just theoretical. While all officially sanctioned work acknowledges an arduous production process, this volume was particularly significant because of the sensitive issues it addressed of the post-New Democracy turn to the left in the transition to socialism and its culmination in the Cultural Revolution. It took nearly two decades to complete. Work on it began immediately after the publication in 1991 of volume 1 (subsequently revised to be republished in 2002),29 which covered the period from the founding of the Party in 1921, to the victory of New Democracy in 1949. According to the editor’s account, it was vetted repeatedly by relevant scholars and Party leaders, and went through numerous revisions before it was finally approved for publication in 2011, in time for the Party’s 90th anniversary.30 These works are based on documentation that is unavailable to outsiders. What they have to say about specific historical matters in Mao’s life and activities may be taken up by specialists on those matters. What is of interest here is the delineation of Mao’s place in the revolution and

28. Zhang Qihua, “Interview”; Zhongguo gongchandang lishi Vol. 2, p. 1070 29. See note 3 30. Ibid., pp. 1071–1073. Even then, according to Zhang Qihua, the investigators were not allowed access to all records.

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Chinese Marxism. From the 1981 Resolution to the production of the histories of the revolution and the Communist Party, a generally accepted periodization of the revolution has come into focus: A New Democratic phase when Mao played a leading role in coalition politics, economic flexibility, and military strategy as “representative”31 of the collective leadership of the Party; a Cultural Revolution phase (of over two decades) when Mao’s leftist inclinations to hasty development, socialist purity and class struggle led the revolution astray; and a third phase when, under the successive leaderships of Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, a regime of “socialism with Chinese characteristics” has been established to guide the country through the initial phase of socialism that is likely to last over a century.32 This periodization is evident with greatest clarity in discussions about Mao Zedong Thought. A recently published volume,33 also intended as a textbook for the required course on Marxism at the Party School, organizes the development of Chinese Marxism in two stages, with the first stage serving as the foundation for the second: New Democracy from the mid 1930s to 1950s, with Mao as its moving spirit, and “socialism with

31. “Representative” is the preferred term in describing Mao throughout the period of New Democracy lasting through 1952. See, “The basic overall conclusion on the Party during the period of New Democracy,” Zhongguo gongchandang lishi Vol. 2 (1990), pp. 436–445 32. Guo Dehong (chief editor), History of the Development of Chinese Marxism (in Chinese), p. 384 33. Ibid. It is important that the usage in the title of the book, “Chinese Marxism,” has become prevalent in recent years, pointing to a new attitude toward Marxism. That this is the intended use is indicated in the title of chapter 3, which juxtaposes “Marxism in China” (“馬克思主義 在中國, Makesi zhuyi zai Zhongguo”) with “Chinese Marxism” (“中國馬克思主義, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi”). I will say more on this below by way of conclusion. As for periodization of Mao Zedong Thought (or Chinese Marxism), some texts do insert a third phase, “the transition to socialism” (1952–1956, but it is commonly accepted that New Democracy and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” represent ideological “great leaps.” The transition is treated quite understandably more like a closure on New Democracy that was prematurely aborted. As Mao began to turn to the left in response to the contradictions created by New Democracy, the “transition,” expected to continue for at least 15 to 20 years, quickly began to take a radical direction that would eventuate in The Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution The interpretation does not refer to these contradictions, instead attributing the turn to the beginnings of Mao’s erroneous tendencies.

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Chinese characteristics,” theorized most importantly by Deng Xiaoping after 1978 but with subsequent accretions. Mao Zedong Thought, the emblem of Chinese Marxism and the product of the Party’s revolutionary practice, emerged during the first period in the Party’s integration of Marxism–Leninism with the concrete realities of revolutionary practice in a “semi-feudal, semi-colonial” Chinese society. It was not merely an application of theory to the Chinese society; it opened up a new theoretical vista on Marxism in economically and politically backward societies suffering from colonialist aggression.34 Mao Zedong Thought was betrayed during the Cultural Revolution by Mao himself when in his left turn he began to ignore the circumstances of the Chinese society, broadened the scope of class struggle, and turned the masses against the Party.35 But Mao continued to make contributions to Mao Zedong Thought in areas of development and international relations. It was most importantly the Party and the people, however, who kept it alive, and restored it to its rightful place after 1978. The restoration of the correct line of Mao Zedong Thought was accompanied by a second “great leap” in Chinese Marxism equal in significance to the emergence of Mao Zedong Thought that produced “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” The latter began with Deng Xiaoping’s theory and proceeded through Jiang Zemin’s “Three Represents” and Hu Jintao’s scientific outlook on development. It is still a work in progress in “the continuation and development of Mao Zedong Thought.”36 This interpretation of Mao in the history of the revolution is a far cry from that of the Cultural Revolution which had rendered Mao “the helmsman” of the revolution, and class struggle into the core principle

34. Guo Dehong, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi, p. 382, and Song Shichang and Nong Fang , A Comprehensive Discussion of Making Marxism Chinese (in Chinese), 2 vols (Jinan: Shandong People’s Publication Press, 2010), p. 23, also emphasize the influence of the New Democratic Revolution and Mao Zedong Thought around the world. I think it would be more accurate to say that it was more the Cultural Revolution and the radical Mao that brought attention to the Chinese Revolution in the then Third World. 35. Ibid., chapter 12. 36. Hu Jintao, “Speech at the CPC Anniversary Gathering,” p. 4

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of Mao Zedong Thought (and Marxism). If, under the new historical regime, Mao Zedong comes anywhere close to the revolutionary sagacity attributed to him earlier, it is for the first phase of the revolution before 1949. Even then, the emphasis presently is on Mao “the representative” of the Party, who kept class struggle in moderation and recognized the significance of the forces of production to keep the revolution moving forward. At the same time, Mao is now held to account for what happened during the Cultural Revolution. Volume 2 of History of the Communist Party of China, and a number of officially sanctioned works on Chinese Marxism and Mao Zedong Thought published during the last few years, usually under the rubric of “Makesi zhuyide Zhongguohua” (making Marxism Chinese), have broken the taboo on the discussion of the Cultural Revolution now that some agreement has been reached in the Party over the appropriate verdict that does the least damage to the Party.37 Previous histories, such as the 1990 history mentioned above, either stopped short of the turn to the left in the late 1950s, or simply blanked out the period between 1952 and 1978, as in the film produced on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic in 1999, or in the current historical display at the New Museum of National History.

37. Guo Dehong, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi, op.cit.; Song Shichang and Nong Fang (chief editors), Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua tonglun, op.cit.; Mei Rongzheng, Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua shi; Bi Guoming and Xu Luzhou, Chinese philosophy of making Marxist philosophy Chinese (“中國哲學與馬克思哲學中國化, Zhongguo zhexue yu Makesi zhuyi zhexue Zhongguohua”) (Beijing: People’s Publication Press, 2010). I have explained elsewhere why I think “making Marxism Chinese” is a better translation for Zhongguohua than the conventional term “sinicization,” with its traditionalist “China-centered” assimilation implications. Zhongguohua in Communist Party usage since the 1940s has implied not just assimilating Marxism to a Chinese cultural sphere, as the term “sinicization” does, but also transforming China and Chinese culture in accordance with Marxism. As Bi and Xu state in their preface, the goal is both “to Zhongguohua Marxism and modernize Chinese philosophy,” p. 1. The term should be understood dialectically. See, Arif Dirlik, “Mao Zedong and ‘Chinese Marxism,’” op.cit. The proliferation of such work is the fruit of the Marxism Project initiated by the Party in 2004 under Hu Jintao’s direction which will be further discussed below. For this relationship, voiced by the head of the Propaganda Bureau, Li Changchun, see, Mei Rongzheng, Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua, p. 26

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The gap is now being filled through historical work more open to confronting sensitive issues in the Party’s past. What is genuinely new in these recent texts is not so much the overall interpretation, which largely follows the decisions of the 1981 Resolution, but the discussion in some detail of the period from the mid 1950s to 1978, and Mao’s leading role in the developments surrounding the Cultural Revolution. Mao, the individual, does not fare well in this account, although criticism of his “left-deviation” after 1952 is much more measured than that to be found in some of the more incriminating works published outside of China. Beginning with the “transition to socialism” after 1952, Mao began to ignore the circumstances of the Chinese society which were nowhere close enough to fulfilling the conditions for socialism, but also wrongly shifted emphasis in his reading of Marxism from the primacy of the forces of production to continued class struggle. His anxieties about capitalist restoration led to the persecution of so-called “revisionists” that did immense harm to the Party. In the verdict of the new Party history, “As the important leader of the Party and the state, Mao Zedong cannot but bear the major responsibility for the serious and comprehensive errors of ‘the cultural revolution.’ The power of the Party was excessively concentrated in one person, Mao Zedong’s erroneous ‘leftist’ leadership replaced the collective leadership of the Party, the worship of the individual reached an insane level, undermining the possibility of the Party and the state to prevent and control the initiation and development of “the cultural revolution.’”38 The authors continue to observe, nevertheless, that the perpetuation of the Cultural Revolution for 10 year provides prima facie evidence that it should not be blamed solely on one individual. Not only did many in the Party support Mao’s line, but so did the people at large, who were still under the sway of the feudal practices of the past.

38. Zhongguo gongchandang lishi Vol. 2, p. 979

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This is indeed the general approach to the evaluation of Mao Zedong in recent histories: he was responsible for what happened, but the responsibility must be shared by others, including other leaders in the Party. This was the case also with the communization and Great Leap Forward movements between 1958 and 1960, which are officially acknowledged for the first time to have a cost of more than 10 million lives. As the Party history puts it, “In launching ‘The Great Leap Forward,’ Mao Zedong’s hope initially was to change as quickly as possible the visage of poverty and backwardness, truly advance and strengthen China, to establish its place among the world’s nations. This was at one with the hopes prevalent among large numbers of cadres and the people. The problem was that it went against the line of seeking truth from facts that the Party promoted … exaggerated the uses of subjective will and effort, advocated frog-leaping over historical stages in purpose and policy, created in practical work a situation that went against natural and economic laws. This kind of hot-headedness was not restricted to Mao Zedong, it was a prevalent attitude among central leaders and many cadres …”39 If others shared in Mao’s errors, Mao himself was not completely given to the leftist line he had let loose, but made repeated efforts to correct his mistakes—as in the retreat from the communes after 1960, his purge of Lin Biao, his criticism in the 1970s of Jiang Qing, and the move forward during the same decade to a moderate modernization program (“The Four Modernizations”). China did register economic and technological achievements during the Cultural Revolution, and there were important achievements in foreign relations. Mao continued to contribute to these advances through his theoretical writings. But the greatest credit for these achievements must still go to the Party and the people who preserved their loyalty to Mao Zedong Thought against all adversity.40

39. Zhongguo gongchandang lishi (2011), p. 502 40. Guo Dehong, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi, pp. 212–227

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Admitting the Party’s spiritual and political complicity in Mao Zedong’s policies is from everything we know true to the spirit and the politics of the times, but it is not therefore easily acceptable to those who had suffered from his policies personally, or to those who for one reason or another would discredit Mao. The latter probably were the ones Deng Xiaoping in 1980 repeatedly enjoined not to exaggerate Chairman Mao’s shortcomings, and those whose disagreements may account for the nearly two decades it took to bring the recent Party history to its final form. The admission makes the Party and many Party leaders complicit in the leftist zeal that culminated in these deplorable events. And yet this is very much in line with the Party’s intentions in choosing from a variety of representations of the past: not to condemn Mao, and jeopardize the legitimacy it draws from the revolutionary past, but to provide “lessons” with which to guide the Party into the future. The account of Party history is replete with struggles against the “right” and the “left,” more with the latter than with the former. The lessons of New Democracy are drawn out to stress the present day importance of the united front line, a mixed economy, respect for the past, etc. The Great Leap Forward provides the occasion for stressing the priority of the forces over the relations of production—in other words, class. The Cultural Revolution in its disorderliness provides proof of the centrality of unified Party leadership to national progress and welfare. It even had a bright side in preparing the Party for “socialism with Chinese characteristics” after 1978. The conclusions drawn in the texts after every major episode of Party history are not just summaries but also guides to the reading of the text and the correct “lesson” to be drawn from it. The recently published history concludes with a chapter, “The Great Achievements and Basic Experiences of Socialist Revolution and Construction Led by the Party,” that outlines the lessons to be drawn from the six decades of Party history covered in the text. The achievements range from finally unifying the country and bringing together the various nationalities to live in peace to poverty alleviation to the establishment of foreign relations and national defense to secure the safety of the nation. Of the lessons to be drawn from the experience, the centrality of economic

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development and advancing the forces of production take top priority. There is a reminder that sovereignty and self-reliance are preconditions of opening up to the world. In either case, a stable and consolidated Party leadership remains as the guarantee for the country’s future.41

A Spectral Presence: Mao and the Party Mao Zedong leads a double existence in post-revolutionary China. Mao the individual remains a national icon for the role he played in national liberation and consolidation. This is the most widely shared image of Mao. In the official line, he is portrayed as the representative of the collective leadership that achieved the victory of the New Democratic revolution in 1949, and initiated the transition to socialism which was completed between 1952 and 1956. It is also the pervasive popular image of Mao. It is propagated in popular consciousness through education and the popular media.42 It is likely that these days the majority of the population knows Mao mostly by the endless series of movies on television on the national revolution and the Anti-Japanese War in which Mao figures prominently. There is also the Mao who was responsible for the Cultural Revolution, who is apparently still controversial. In the official line since 1978, Mao has been held responsible for the Cultural Revolution although it took 30 years for this responsibility to be spelled out in any detail. A decision was made under Deng Xiaoping not to repudiate Mao as Joseph Stalin had been repudiated in the Soviet Union in 1956, perhaps because Mao was more like Lenin and Stalin wrapped into one in stature, and could not be repudiated without damaging the revolution and the Party irreparably. The official line remains ambivalent in stressing the “good” sides of Mao even during the Cultural Revolution. Mao had made serious leftist errors, but they were exacerbated by behind-the-scenes machinations of the Jiang

41. Zhongguo gongchandang lishi (2011), pp. 1062–1069 42. See, for instance, the high-school texts for required courses published by the Ministry of Education, vols 3 and 4, dealing respectively with history and world personages, pp. 82–85 and 96–103 respectively (Beijing: People’s Education Press, 2010).

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Qing and Lin Biao cliques. Mao was not above recognizing and trying to rectify his errors. He played some part in the progress during those years in the economy, in technology and foreign relations, in addition to producing theoretical documents of lasting value. The Party has been quick to suppress any expression of excessive zeal for Mao and his policies. But it also has been cautious in condemning Mao even as it has reversed his radical policies. Even more so than in the popular celebrations of Mao referred to above, this ambivalence has been apparent in renewed experiments with “redness” among which the so-called Chongqing Model led by the “princeling” Bo Xilai is the most prominent (see below, note 43). Rather than repudiating Mao, the current interpretation seeks to appropriate his image for its own “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” This is apparent in two important ways. One is the historical linkage between New Democracy and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” that was foregrounded with the bracketing of the Cultural Revolution as an episode in socialist development. The other is the institutionalization of Mao Zedong Thought. In official ideology Mao Zedong Thought occupies a crucial role as the fountainhead of “Chinese Marxism.” Interestingly, since Mao Zedong Thought emerged in the midst of the New Democratic revolution, it bears upon it the stamp of both the policies and the theoretical achievements of that phase of the revolution. I have referred above to what these policies generally implied, and how the considerations that had given rise to them would also provide the reform leadership with its initial inspiration. That they were now premised upon a post-socialist situation called for further elaboration of Mao Zedong Thought in keeping with the times. According to the current interpretation, there have been two important periods in the making of Chinese Marxism, the New Democracy period and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” which represented another “revolutionary great leap” in making Marxism Chinese. The Mao Zedong Thought restored by the Party in 1978 returned it to its “true” spirit, that of New Democracy, premised upon class alliance (united front) and development of the forces of production as the primary goals. This was the Mao legacy Deng Xiaoping drew upon to formulate “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” One author writes more strongly that “Deng Xiaoping theory was nourished within the womb of Mao

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Zedong Thought” (“孕育於毛澤東思想中, yunyu yu Mao Zedong sixianzhi zhong”).43 The appropriation of Mao for the reforms was a much more astute move than repudiating Mao Zedong Thought. According to Maurice Meisner, the 8th Party Congress in 1956 presided over by Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping deleted “the phrase ‘guided by the thought of Mao Tsetung’” from the new Party Constitution in order “to reinforce the new principle of collective leadership.”44 The deletion has been viewed by cultural revolutionaries subsequently as one more piece of evidence of Deng Xiaoping’s underhanded opposition to Mao. This time around, Deng recruited Mao for the reforms, while alleviating the anxieties of those within and outside the Party who continued to be loyal to the revolution Mao had represented. More to the point here, by claiming Mao for his innovations, Deng incorporated Mao into his theory, which has then been passed down to “the important thought of ‘three represents’” and “the scientific outlook on development.” In other words, New Democracy was one phase in the formulation of Chinese Marxism, but this first phase has been both a foundation and a paradigm for its subsequent development.45 These are the two temporalities of Mao Zedong Thought: one that relegates it to the past, as an expression of New Democracy that now has been superseded; the other is a longterm reference for Chinese Marxism. In this perspective, there is hardly anything ideologically radical about the recent call by the prominent Party intellectual (and another “princeling”) Zhang Musheng to return to the social and political policies of New Democracy to resolve contemporary

43. Song Shichang and Nong Fang, Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua tonglun Vol. 1, p. 19. It is difficult to say if there is an analogy here to what Marx had to say about the dialectics of one mode of production growing out of another. If there is, it would suggest that Deng Xiaoping Theory was a product but also a negation of Mao Zedong Thought, which would make more sense in terms a non dialectical reading of the discourse as product of Mao Zedong Thought but negation of the Mao elements in it. 44. Maurice Meisner, Mao’s China: A History of the People’s Republic (New York: The Free Press, 1977), p.182. This was in the midst of the criticism of Joseph Stalin and hero worship in the Soviet Union, and conflicts within the CCP over agrarian reform policies. It is also indicative of the intimate link between Mao Zedong Thought and Mao’s thought which defies efforts to depersonalize the former. 45. Mei Rongzheng, Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua shi, pp. 4–5

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problems of development. At the same time, if there is an affinity between New Democracy and “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” as the leadership has claimed, it is unlikely that New Democracy would resolve problems presented by a developmental trajectory of its inspiration. Indeed, as I observed above, ignoring the part contradictions created by New Democracy may have contributed to the radical turn of the mid 1950s is a significant shortcoming of Party histories anxious to represent the Cultural Revolution as an irresponsible deviation.46

46. The reference here is to Zhang Musheng, Reforming Our Cultural Historical Outlook (“改 造我們的文化歷史觀, Gaizao womende wenhua lishi guan”) (Beijing: Military Science Publications, 2011). For the stir created by the book’s call to New Democracy, see, David Bandurski, “Turning back to ‘New Democracy’?” China Media Project, posted May 19, 2011, http://cmp.hku.hk/2011/05/ 19/12486/, and, Chris Buckley, “Exclusive: Party insider maps bold path for China’s next leaders,” Reuters, Aug 18, 2011, www.reuters.com/assets/print?aid= USTRE77H11R20110818. See, also, the interview with Zhang, “Once again raise the great banner of New Democracy”(“張 木生：再舉新民主主義大旗, Zhang Shengmu: zai ju xin minzhuzhuyi daqi”), Southern News Network, October 31, 2011, http://nf.nfdaily.cn/nfrwzk/content/2011-10/31/content_32350892. htm, p. 9. Zhang is firmly committed to Communist Party leadership, advocates intra-Party democracy, and greater democratization of politics with an emphasis on homegrown democracy, which he argues is to be found in New Democracy. It seems to me that the controversialness of Zhang’s ideas may be due not to his advocacy of New Democracy as such but a version of the latter that stresses the revolutionary spirit of “the Yan’an Way” against the reigning Party “orthodoxy” preoccupied with the development of the forces of production, its call for the Party to reground itself in the worker and peasant classes, its criticism of inequality, its condemnation of the Party for having turned away from these principles of New Democracy beginning in the 1990s (corresponding to the Jiang Zemin leadership which brought capitalists into the Party), and its advocacy of contentious politics. These issues are also entangled in conflicts among Party “princelings”(the descendants of prominent revolutionaries) as well as between the “princelings” and those who have worked their way up from the bottom. Indeed, the Chongqing experiment and Zhang’s call for a return to New Democracy may be viewed as variant responses to the same problems, the one advocating greater role for the public in politics, the other repoliticization under Party leadership with closer attention to socially equitable development. Despite its Cultural Revolutionary appearance, the Chongqing experiment would seem to be a highly controlled affair to avoid the dreaded chaos stirred up by the former. Zhang Musheng, who expresses a preference for “Chongqing exploration” or “Chongqing road” over “Chongqing Model,” notes its affinity to cultural practices in Yan’an (“Interview, p.8). It also has affinities to New Democracy, and through it, to developmental ideas going back to Sun Yat-sen in its emphases in using capitalism for socialist ends, the priority it gives to people’s livelihood, and public ownership of land as a developmental resource. See, Philip C.C. Huang, “Chongqing: Equitable Development Driven by a ‘Third Hand’” Modern China, 37(6), 2011: 569–622. This experiment is presently in jeopardy due to a still unclear split in its leadership. For the revival of the Yan’an Way, see, Geremie R. Barme, “The Children of Yan’an: New Words of Warning to a Prosperous Age,” China Heritage Quarterly No. 26 (June 2011), www.chinaheritagequarterly. org/features.php?searchterm=026_yanan.inc&issue =026.

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Similarly in discussions of Chinese Marxism, Party leaders continue to refer to Mao for their theoretical and policy innovations. A vague but potentially quite significant development in recent discussions of Chinese Marxism is their self-referentiality. Recently published studies on Chinese Marxism read mostly as histories of policy innovations by successive generations of Communist leaders that are now endowed with theoretical status in the formulation of a Chinese Marxism. There is little visible concern in these texts for theoretical discussions that critically engage issues of Marxist theory with reference to Deng Xiaoping’s theory, “the important thought of ‘Three Represents,’” or “the scientific outlook on development.” Rather, each references predecessors in its ancestral lineage, “building” on them to further develop Chinese Marxism and Mao Zedong Thought. Mao’s theoretical corpus from New Democracy days and even some produced after his deviation to the left are part of the theoretical corpus of the Party. Theory itself endlessly changes in response to the times and national needs. In the words of Hu Jintao in his 90th anniversary speech to the Party, “The development of practice, cognition of the truth, and innovation of theories know no boundary. The practice of the Party and the people keeps progressing, so should the theories guiding it. The path of socialism with Chinese characteristics will definitely be expanded through the innovative practice of the Party and the people, and the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics will surely continue to improve as we deepen reform and open up wider. This process will certainly open up broad prospects for theoretical innovation. In upholding Marxism under the new historical conditions, it is important to promptly address new issues emerging in practice and thus provide scientific guidance for practice. We should have a correct understanding of the global development trend and China’s basic condition of being in the primary stage of socialism, find out more about the features of China’s development at the current

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stage, review the new experience gained in a timely manner by the people led by the Party, and create new theories with the focus on major issues concerning economic and social development, so as to ensure the vitality of scientific theories.”47 This endless development of theory in response to changing needs of practice suggests that theory no longer serves as a check on, or even guide to, future developments which are to be determined solely by their efficacy in securing the developmental goals of the regime. It is not that there is no longer any concern for Marxism. On the contrary, the Party repeatedly stresses its loyalty to the essence of Marxism as the thread that runs through the development of Chinese Marxism. Official publications express considerable concern over ignorance of Marxism, indifference to it for no longer being relevant, or feigning interest while undermining it, clearly referring above all to Party cadres.48 Hu Jintao was responsible for initiating in 2004 a “Marxism project” intended to produce an interpretation of Marxist classics appropriate to contemporary circumstances. One of the basic goals of the project was to provide theoretical, historical and educational material that would give coherence to Party policies, and revitalize the study of Marxism—Chinese Marxism.49 The project is important for understanding the regime’s attitude toward Marxism and Mao’s place in it. The primary purpose of the project was to establish an unfolding Chinese Marxism on firmer theoretical ground by uncovering in the Marxist classics evidence that Marx and Engels at least in theory had anticipated developments in Chinese socialism; in

47. Hu, “Speech at CPC Anniversary Gathering,” p. 6 48. Guo Dehong, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi, p. 382 49. “Xiao Dongbo and Nie Yueyan, Zhongguo gongchandang lilun jianshede lishi jingyan yanjiu, pp. 228–231.See, also, “At least 2 million yuan to be spent on each volume of the teaching materials of the Marxism project” (“馬克思主義工程教材每本至少投入百萬元, Makesi zhuyi gongcheng jiaocai meiben zhishao touru liangbaiwan yuan”), Liaowang East Asia Weekly (in Chinese), October 26, 2004. No pp. Author’s personal collection. I am grateful to the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau, especially the Vice Director, Dr. Yu Keping, for making materials on the project available to me while I was a visiting scholar there in 2006.

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other words, by articulating texts to policies that had guided the course the Chinese revolution had taken, as well the policies of the leadership of “socialism with Chinese characteristics” from Deng through Jiang to Hu. As the authors of Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi write, “The only Chinese Marxism is Marxism that has been integrated with Chinese realities. Only by answering to the needs of the Chinese revolution and reconstruction can Chinese Marxism take shape and advance.”50 This is a theme that in a basic way runs through the corpus of Mao Zedong Thought from Mao during New Democracy to Hu Jintao as the most recent representative of “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” What is new about it is ruling out or downgrading certain fundamental features of Marxist theory—notably class analysis—from any consideration in the formation of Chinese Marxism. The issue of class is dismissed as having been exaggerated in the days of New Democracy, abused during the Cultural Revolution, and irrelevant under the socialist regime. While vigilance is called for against both the “right” and the “left,” it is the “left” that represents the more important threat to the Party’s policies and the country’s security and welfare.51 The problem is that leaving out those aspects of Marxist theory that contradict the regime’s policies obviates the need to engage Marxist theory in its wholeness, and suffers from the same tendentiousness in the reading of theory as its Cultural Revolution predecessors. Sweeping aside the issue of class also glosses over the contradictions of New Democracy that produced the conflicts of the 1950s, and the contradictions that mark the Chinese society today. Marxism is obviously too important for the regime’s legitimacy to be simply cast aside. It is however instrumentalized in the service of policies that accommodate capitalism, which is in the process of transforming the Chinese society— and not in any direction recognizable as socialism. What the future may bring is another matter, of course, but then judging by what the regime says, Marxism in the future may serve any and all policies that suit the

50. Ibid., p. 381 51. Guo Dehong, Zhongguo Makesi zhuyi fazhan shi, pp. 384–385

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needs of China as the regime perceives them. The gap between promise and reality may be an important reason that many in and out of China remain skeptical of the regime’s Marxism or socialist commitments. On the other hand, the claims to Marxism need to be taken seriously for what they suggest. Chinese Marxism is a Marxism that is rooted in the Marxist tradition going back to Marx and Engels—the “ancestors,” as Deng Xiaoping described them.52 But it is also Marxism that has been integrated with Chinese circumstances in keeping with the history of Marxism which has taken national form everywhere. And as the circumstances change, so does the synthesis of theory and practice. What is implied here is that Marxism is a work in progress and needs to be reinvented on an ongoing basis if it is not to degenerate into a dogma.53 It is not a matter of following texts, but of creating new Marxism out of them. Hence the insistence in the new texts on Chinese Marxism that both New Democracy and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” opened new eras in the unfolding of Marxism. They are most relevant to China, but they have implications for other societies as well at a time when socialism is a retreat. Two considerations guide the project. First, however fundamental the principles and methods of Marxism, Marx and Engels could not have foretold the course socialism would take once it had been established. Second, theoretical development to answer to contemporary needs can no longer rely on the mediation of Soviet interpretations as in the past, but requires independent investigation of the texts.54 The investigation of texts has been international in scope as Chinese researchers comb libraries for

52. Ibid., p. 383 53. The preferred term is “innovate”(“創新, chuangxin”), which has become a very popular term in the Party lexicon especially since Jiang Zemin. 54. Interview with Yang Jinhai, Deputy Secretary of the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau, August 2006. Yang has been one of the foremost interpreters of the philosophical basis of Hu Jintao’s “Scientific Outlook on Development.” See also, Yang Jinhai, “The contemporary condition and the future of studies of Marxist classics” (“馬克思主義經典著作研究的現狀和 未來, Makesi zhuyi jingdian zhuzuo yanjiude xianzhuang he weilai”). Unpublished discussion paper. I am grateful to Yang Jinhai for providing me these materials.

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Marxist texts, in some ways assuming leadership in such research. There is a suggestion in some discussions that the project of making Marxism Chinese has assumed an even broader scope than in the past. One text points to four dimensions to making Marxism Chinese: “concretization” (“具體化, jutihua”) of theory, “nationalization” (“民族化, minzuhua”) of its form, “modernization”(“現代化, xiandaihua”) of the classics, and “practicalization”(“實踐化, shijianhua”) of its theoretical form.55 Especially significant is the modernization of the classics. Whether or not these new departures point to aspirations to leadership in global Marxism commensurate with the regime’s newfound power in the world as the foremost success story of socialism, or better still a socialist version of capitalism, there is not much question about the immediate goals of refurbishing Chinese Marxism theoretically and giving it canonical status. What is less obvious but even more significant is that it is the Chinese present—the standpoint of an unfolding Chinese Marxism—that provides the guide to reading the classics and, in a manner of speaking, retheorizing the theory. What will remain of Marxism by the time they are finished remains to be seen. Mao’s successors have arguably gone beyond anything he claimed in making theory on their own, subservient to the practices of national development within a context of global capitalism. Ironically, the more they change Marxism to respond to contemporary circumstances, the less connected they seem to be an environment in which Marxism carries little weight among the population at large. But they may legitimately claim, as they do, that they are following the example of the Chairman—both in making Marxism Chinese and silencing critics from the left who would suggest that the more the theory becomes “Chinese,”

55. Song Shichang and Nong Fang, Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua tonglun, Vol. 1, pp. 2–3

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the less is left that may be viewed as Marxist in any sense of that term.56

Conclusion Mao has both an ancestral and a phantom existence in texts on Party history and Chinese Marxism. Like Marx, Engels and Lenin, Mao is an ancestor to the present, and a source of valuable lessons and principles to draw upon as necessary or appropriate. As the founding ancestor of Chinese Marxism, he commands an even greater immediacy than Marx and Engels as an example in rendering theory meaningful for practice. On the other hand, it is obviously no easy task to depersonalize Mao Zedong Thought, or to retire Mao’s policies safely to a receding past, while upholding the “thought” named after him as an exemplary principle of theorizing the Party’s changing practice. Continued uncertainty over the future—whether in calls for a return to New Democracy or renewed experiments with “redness,” among others—seems inevitably to play out on a discursive terrain in which Mao is ever present in one form or another. In its very appropriation by the Party, Mao Zedong Thought guarantees to Mao and Maoism a phantom existence that is immanent in Chinese socialism both in its achievements and its anxieties.

56. This applies even to Party elders critical of the turn Marxism has taken under the regime: “In July 2007, even the ‘Maoflag’ Website was temporarily shut down when it posted an open letter by 17 former high level CCP officials and Marxist academics accusing CCP policies of making a mockery of Marxism and taking the country ‘down an evil road.’” Zhao, “Sustaining and Contesting Revolutionary Legacies in Media and Ideology,” p. 228. Party elders, who seem to wait until retirement to go public with their criticisms, are routinely censored regardless of the nature of their criticism. This includes Premier Wen Jiabao who has not waited until retirement to go public. For a more recent general shut down of “leftist” sites, see, Keith B. Richburg, “China shuts leftis Web sites as political strife continues,” Washington Post, April 6, 2012, www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/china-shuts-leftist-web-sites-aspolitical-strife-continues/2012/04/06/gIQAnJLUzS_story.html. For an interesting theoretical discussion of continuities with Maoist language that presently have different consequences for communication with the people than they did earlier, see, Maurizio Marinelli, “The Historicity Beyond the Appearance of Words: The Treachery of Images in Chinese Political Language,” conference paper, www.hichumanities.org/ AHproceedings/Maurizio%20Marinelli.pdf

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model I am grateful to Yige Dong, Sebastian Veg, Wang Guo and Wu Yiching for their comments. I am especially grateful to Sebastian Veg for his assistance in acquisition of sources without which this essay would not have been possible. I am also grateful to an anonymous reader of China Perspectives for a careful reading and astute suggestions. These colleagues and friends helped enrich the argument but bear no responsibility for its shortcomings.

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3 Business, Protest, Repression The Eclectic Uses of Mao in Contemporary China Jean-Philippe BÉJA Research Director, French National Centre for Scientific Research

When Prime Minister Zhou Enlai died in January 1976, crowds of ordinary people cried in the streets of Beijing. Wearing black armbands, they seemed to be sincerely overcome with sorrow. In the first days of April, hundreds of wreaths were deposited in front of the Monuments to the People’s heroes on Tiananmen Square. And when the militias took them away during the night of the fourth, tens of thousands of people demonstrated on Tiananmen Square to mourn the “beloved” Prime Minister and denounce the “feudal dictatorship of Qin Shihuang.” As one author puts it, this April Fifth Movement signaled the “first death of Mao Zedong.”1 When, a few months later, the Great Helmsman passed away, the mourning that took place in all Chinese cities was much less spontaneous. When, on October 6, Mao’s widow and her closest allies were arrested, no spontaneous popular movement erupted to protect the legacy of the Red Sun that was best represented by her. How can this be explained, when Mao was the object of the biggest personality cult of the twentieth century? If one compares it with the hysteria that surrounded Stalin’s death in 1953, the reaction of the Chinese people was particularly low key. In fact, Mao’s demise was greeted with relief, and the coup against

1. Cadart, C. and Y. Cheng. (1977). Les deux morts de Mao Tsé-toung (The two deaths of Mao Tse-tung). Paris: Ed. du Seuil.

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his most fanatical partisans was actually supported by a great majority of the populace. The dilemma that Mao’s successors faced was the following: how was it possible to keep the image of the regime’s founder untouched while completely reversing his policies? The new leadership understood that a thorough criticism of the Great Helmsman would deeply undermine the regime’s legitimacy: whereas Khrushchev could denounce Stalin’s crimes and advocate the return “to Leninism,” this was impossible in China as Mao was both the regime’s Lenin and Stalin. Denouncing his crimes would lead the people to question the very legitimacy of the People’s Republic. The solution was to invent the “Gang of Four” that was supposed to have plotted against the Red Sun, and to accuse Mao only of insufficient firmness in his struggle against them. In order to legitimize the new political line that took the upper hand in 1978, Deng Xiaoping needed to rehabilitate the cadres that Mao had condemned as revisionists, for they were to play an essential part in the implementation of his policies. He therefore had to denounce the Cultural Revolution as a plot by the “Gang of Four” who had succeeded in manipulating the Great Helmsman. In order to accelerate this criticism, a debate on the legacy of the Gang was opened both inside the Party and in society. At the same time, it was decided to build a mausoleum on Tiananmen Square where, like that of Lenin on the Red Square, Mao’s corpse would be kept and offered to the reverence of the public. The paradox continued as the dazibao denouncing his rule were posted on the fences surrounding the building site of the mausoleum, symbolizing the leadership’s contradictory approach to the Red Sun. After often heated discussions, whether at the Central Party work conference which followed the third plenum,2 or on the “democracy walls” of the main cities, the Party reached a conclusion presented in the 1981 “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s

2. On the Central conference on theoretical work, see Ruan Ming, Deng Xiaoping: Chronicle of an Empire (Boulder, CO:Westview Press, 1994); and Merle Goldman, From Comrade to Citizen (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005).

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Republic of China.”3 Mao’s contribution was essentially positive, but he made mistakes during the last 20 years of his rule, especially by launching the Cultural Revolution. Mao Zedong Thought remained an essential part of the official ideology of the Communist Party, on a par with Marxism–Leninism, but it was redefined as the collective wisdom of the Party leadership. Ever since, Mao’s portrait has remained on Tiananmen, whereas the images of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin have been taken away. His mausoleum still stands in the middle of the Square, but, unlike Lenin’s in the Soviet Union, it is not open to the public every day and there are no long lines of admirers in front of it. However, since the early 1980s, Mao’s position in the minds of the people and the Communist Party leaders has been through ups and downs. Since 1949, criticism of Mao has remained a taboo: when, during the 1989 prodemocracy movement, three demonstrators from his natal province of Hunan spilled ink on his portrait on Tiananmen Square, the rebellious students seized them and consigned them to the police.4 They were sentenced to long prison terms after June 4th. After something of an eclipse, portraits of the Great Helmsman have reappeared in some demonstrations.5 During the 38 years that have elapsed since his death, Mao has been put to multiple uses such as a pop icon, a tutelary personality for disgruntled workers, and a maître à penser for New Left intellectuals. However, his thought, no matter how reinterpreted, has remained the ideological cornerstone of the regime and it is still part of the four cardinal principles (Marxism–Leninism–Mao Zedong Thought, Socialism, Dictatorship of the proletariat and Party leadership) created by Deng Xiaoping in 1979 to put an end to reflection on the regime’s legitimacy. Mao’s image has been used by the Party, but it has also been used by the people, and the multiplicity of these uses tells a lot about relations between the state and society in present day China.

3. “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China” at http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/66095/4471924.html. 4. See, for example, John Gittings, “The Price of Dissent,” The Guardian, May 31, 1999 at www. guardian.co.uk/theguardian/1999/may/31/features11.g2. 5. For example, during the anti-Japanese demonstrations in September 2012.

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Commercialization and “Religionization”: Establishing a Modern and Traditional Icon by Betraying Mao’s Ideas A New Popular Religion? In the heyday of Mao’s rule, every home had a portrait of the great leader. In the countryside, it was often set in the place where the ancestors’ portrait would customarily stand. After the fall of the “Gang of Four,” and during the enlightenment that characterized the 1980s, the practice became less widespread, especially in the cities. Therefore, it was quite surprising to see Mao’s portrait reappear everywhere on the hundredth anniversary of his birth in 1993. At the beginning of that year, Mao pendants flourished on the rear-view mirrors of trucks, taxis, and cars. When asked, the drivers would reply that Mao’s image protected them from accidents.6 And in effect, the pendants were designed on the model of the images of the Buddha that in many Buddhist countries adorn cars rearview mirrors. It is quite common in Chinese popular religion to transform historical characters into gods. Most Chinese temples display a great number of generals and emperors who have become the object of a cult.7 Therefore, it is not so strange that Mao, who deeply influenced the history of contemporary China, and who, during his lifetime, had already been the object of a fanatical cult, should join Zhuge Liang, the Yellow Emperor, Qu Yuan and the like. The process of deification was even accompanied by a “miracle”: in 1993, a statue of the Great Helmsman was erected in Shaoshan, the Chairman’s birthplace. Six days before Mao’s birthday, on December 20, General Secretary Jiang Zemin went to Shaoshan to inaugurate the statue. He tried in vain three times to remove the red cloth that covered it, but could not. Only when he took three steps backward and bowed three

6. On the postmodern cult of Mao, see Geremie Barmé, Shades of Mao, New York, M.E.Sharpe, 1996. 7. Vincent Gossaer and David Palmer, La question religieuse en Chine, Paris, Ed. du CNRS, 2012.

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times could he take off the cloth.8 Others say that when he did remove it, the rain which had been coming down without interruption stopped and a sunbeam illuminated the face of statue. The fact that atheist and materialistic communists contribute to diffuse these “facts” shows how much the Party is now at a loss. Transforming Mao into a traditional godlike figure is quite paradoxical, as it goes completely against his ideas. Recall that the Great Helmsman launched the “Smash the Four Old” movement (old habits, old customs, old culture and old ideas) at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, started a campaign against Confucius (pi Lin pi Kong “批林批孔”) in 1974, and, in general, waged war against “superstition” (mixin “迷信”) and all the aspects of traditional Chinese culture that should have been replaced with his thought. Therefore, this reappropriation of Mao’s image and its transformation into a popular god can be regarded as the greatest possible betrayal of his legacy, and could be interpreted as a token of the failure of his attempt to build a new socialist person. In a sense, the cult that has developed in 1993 shows that a certain degree of demaoïfication has actually been achieved, the mythification of the character resulting in a demythification of his ideas. But the meaning of this cult is dual, as it also allows Mao to escape the fate of Stalin: indeed, if he is a god, how could his historical role be discussed, analyzed, put into perspective and denounced by historians? Such a critical discussion would only amount to blasphemy. The Commercialization of Mao’s Image Together with the deification of the Red Sun, a wave of Maophilia has engrossed the urban hip youths. Pictures of Mao on Tshirts, army caps, bags with the inscription “Serve the People” (wei renmin fuwu “為人民 服務”), Mao buttons and poker cards with his image have made their

8. Wu Zhong, “Tough Times Breed Nostalgia for Mao,” Asia Times, May 6, 2009 at www.atimes. com/atimes/China/KE06Ad02.html.

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ways to the most fashionable streets of most big cities.9 The customers, far from being middle aged or elderly people displaying nostalgia for the enthusiasm of their youth, were actually youngsters who were barely born when the Great Helmsman ruled. Of course, sitting in disco clubs in quasi-Red Guard attire does not necessarily mean adhesion to the ideals of their 1960s counterparts. On the contrary, these young enthusiasts are rather fashion victims who are following the latest trend in urban life. They constitute the bulk of the audience of the revolutionary songs of the 1960s remixed in disco beat. They sing them in Karaoke parlors and dance to a “decadent music,” behavior that, under Mao’s rule, would have led them to labor camps. So why do these youngsters, who were groomed in admiration for the West, who often dream of leaving the country to study in the U.S., wear Red Guard clothes and sing Red Guard songs instead of the more critical couplets of the new rock stars such as Cui Jian? This new fashion has not been condemned by the officials, to the contrary of what had happened during the 1983 campaign against spiritual pollution when the “decadent attire” was criticized; on the contrary, it has been encouraged as it helps, albeit in a tortuous way, to enhance the regime’s legitimacy among the new generation. If Mao can be repackaged as a pop star, his image’s appeal to youth can be renewed. The commercialization wave does not stop with music or attire. The early 1990s also witnessed the widespread development of “nostalgia” restaurants, from the Mao family restaurants (“毛家餐廳”), which served the Hunanese food the Great Helmsman was supposedly fond of—where huiguorou “回鍋肉” is a must—to the places where waitresses dressed as Red Guards addressed customers with quotations from Chairman Mao. Whereas many intellectuals were starting their companies (xiahai) in a struggle for enrichment, it became very fashionable to wine and dine in restaurants decorated like the farms in the Great Northern Wilderness (Beidahuang) where educated youths had been sent down to be re-educated by the poor and middle peasants—or rather by the Army in this case—in

9. Barmé, Shades of Mao, op.cit.

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the 1970s. This phenomenon might be interpreted as a demonstration of nostalgia for a revolutionary period when youth had an ideal and people were ready to sacrifice their lives to achieve it. But it can also be seen as a way to evacuate the sufferings that they endured in the backward countryside—a way to prevent reflection on a very sombre period of history? At the same time as this new commercial fashion was growing, a ban was being imposed on open discussion of the Maoist past. The debates which had taken place in the wake of the fall of the “Gang of Four,” and had been brutally interrupted by the 1981 resolution,10 did not capture the attention of the youths who stood in line to buy the enamel cups that their fathers had used while in the countryside. On the other hand, the derogatory inscriptions which ridicule the grandiloquent slogans of this revolutionary period (“serve your wife” wei laopo fuwu“為老婆服 務” instead of “serve the people” wei renmin fuwu “為人民服務”) show a considerable distancing from the official discourse of the time. So did the “Remembering the bitter past to appreciate the sweet present” (yiku sitian “憶苦思甜”) restaurants,11 where customers would spend a lot of money to eat ant soup and wild vegetables. This phenomenon may be interpreted as the paroxysm of postmodern commercialization and as a way to deride the official discourse that emphasizes the Party’s success in emancipating the peasantry. This commercialization of the images of Mao and the Maoist period helps erase the most dramatic aspects of a bloody historical past. By embracing the Mao fashion, the 1990s youths both paid their respects to the legitimacy of the regime, and expressed some distance from the ideology on which it is based. For what could be more intolerable to the Great Helmsman than to become a source of the profit he fought against his whole life? What is more contrary to Mao Zedong Thought than this

10. “Resolution on some problems …” 11. On the nostalgia restaurants, see Michel Bonnin, “Nostalgia for the Bad Old Days: Peking’s Theme Restaurants,” China Perspectives, no. 4 (March–April 1996).

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delirious love of consumption? And how would the Great Helmsman appreciate becoming a source of profit for private entrepreneurs whom he loathed and sent to prison when he was ruling the country? On the one hand, making the epitome of opposition to commerce and to bourgeois mentality a commercial icon represents a serious violation of the sacred character of the Red Sun. On the other, thanks to the commercial wave, he has become a symbol of the hip and the cool, and this has helped prevent younger people engage in serious reflection on his historical role. This adds up to the official silence on the detailed history of the various political movements that Mao launched during his reign to make most Chinese youths completely ignorant of the dramas the country went through during its first 30 years of history. Therefore, deification and commercialization must, to borrow the words of the Chairman himself, be divided into two (“one divides into two”, yi fen wei er “一分為二”): on the one hand, they constitute a betrayal of his ideas, showing that they no longer shape Chinese society; on the other hand, by making him either an idol or a benevolent godlike figure, they help put him on a pedestal from which he could hardly be removed. This may help Mao avoid the destiny of Stalin, for gods and icons are rarely subject to any kind of criticism.

An Instrument in the Hands of the Leadership As we have seen above, in contrast to the Soviet Union under Khrushchev, there was no secret report—nor a public report—denouncing the crimes of the Great Helmsman as the Party could not afford to denounce the regime founder. Therefore, Mao’s portrait still adorns the Gate of Heavenly Peace, his mausoleum is still on Tiananmen Square, and his thought is still the official ideology. But his presence runs much deeper, and pervades the mode of functioning of the political system. Any political program or pronouncement has to be expressed within the framework of Mao’s ideological discourse. Most leaders continue to refer to him. An example was provided at the 18th Party congress, when Xi Jinping, who did not

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mention Mao Zedong’s thought in his concluding speech, nevertheless emphasized the inseparability of the 60 years of history of the People’s Republic. His numerous references to the work style of the cadres as a way to curb corruption was reminiscent of the calls of the late Chairman who insisted on the necessity for the leaders to “serve the people.” Xi Jinping’s emphasis on the cadres’ duty to keep communist idealism alive as a way to make their leadership more efficient also shows that the new generation is still influenced by Mao’s thought—a generation which, according to some observers, has been unable to make a clear break with the ideas that shaped its youths.12 His recurrent emphasis on the necessity to enforce the “mass line” confirms this fact. As noted by Joseph Cheng in the Introduction, “the entire Standing Committee of the Party Political Bureau visited the Mao Mausoleum on the 120th anniversary of his birthday in late 2013.” And in his speech, he declared that “we shall forever hold aloft the flag of Mao Zedong Thought and highly evaluated Mao’s contributions.” Cheng adds that shortly before the 18th Party congress, Xi went to “Shaoshan, Hunan to pay respects to Mao.” This appears as a strong rupture with the leaders of the 1980s who had called for institutional innovation to fight the abuses of power by the cadres.13 It shows that Mao’s thought and style still shape the Party leaders’ political culture. The Absolute Power of the “Number One” (“一把手說了算”) One important characteristic of this political culture is the paramount importance of the leader of the Party committee. At both the central level and the township level, the opinion of the main leader (the number one, yibashou “一把手”) cannot be criticized. Despite Deng Xiaoping’s

12. Interview with Xu Youyu broadcast on France Culture, La grande traversée, August 2013. 13. Cf. for example Zhao Ziyang’s Thirteenth Party Congress report which called for the separation of the Party from the state.

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recurrent calls at the beginning of the 1980s for an end to the “patriarchal” leadership style, the latter has not disappeared during the last 30 years. The criticism of the Cultural Revolution as expressed in the 1981 resolution on the Party’s history did not put an end to this phenomenon; on the contrary, it reinforced Mao’s position and the system he had created, treating the Cultural Revolution as an isolated phenomenon and did not put an end to the supremacy of the Party.14 And very often, the Party is represented by the secretary, whose opinion is never questioned by ordinary members, not even committee members. Another aspect of the persistence of Mao’s practices can be seen in the various campaigns against “bourgeois liberalization”15 that occurred frequently during the 1980s. They showed that Mao’s conceptions were still playing a large part in shaping the Party’s political culture. They continued into the 21st century when Jiang Zemin launched his campaign against the Falungong, a qigong group which had come to claim tens of millions of participants. The way this campaign was carried out was very similar to the ones launched during Mao’s reign: the press carried innumerable denunciations of the “evil cult” by repentant Falungong members; work colleagues exerted strong pressure on the practitioners to make them renounce their faith; neighborhood committee activists searched their homes; and “representative members” of the various social groups came out to denounce the evil cult. This movement showed that, despite China’s opening to the world, despite Jiang’s call for businesspeople to join the Party, the instruments shaped by Mao Zedong were still at the leaders’ disposal, and that they were ready to use them in case they deemed it necessary.

14. Guo Daohui, 〈警惕文革元素的復活〉 (Jingti yuansu wengede fuhuo; Let’s be vigilant against the resurrection of elements of the Cultural Revolution)，《炎黃春秋》，(Yanhuang Chunqiu), no. 6, p. 21. 15. Deng denounced bourgeois liberaliation in 1980, launched campaigns in 1981, one against “spiritual pollution” in 1983, and another movement against bourgeois liberalization in 1987.

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The Case of Chongqing Raising the banner of Mao has also been a tool in the hands of politicians who wanted to take some distance from the negative consequences of the mainstream leadership’s policies. Populist leaders who wanted to build their image were particularly keen to do so. The most representative case is that of Bo Xilai. Appointed Secretary of the Chongqing municipality in 2007 after having failed to enter the Standing Committee of the Politburo at the 17th Party Congress, Bo Xilai adopted a new policy consisting of reviving the enthusiasm of the Cultural Revolution period. This took the form of the official encouragement of a vogue for “Red songs.” The gathering of elderly people in parks to sing the songs from their youth16 had appeared when many workers of state-owned enterprises were laid off. Bo Xilai saw the profit he could make out of this new fashion, especially because laid off (xiagang) workers were particularly numerous in a municipality where firms managed by the military had proved unable to adapt to the new market economy. He therefore decided to support and institutionalize this movement: from June 2008 to the end of 2011, there were 235,800 “concerts” involving 287 million attendances.17 These culminated on the eve of the ninetieth anniversary of the foundation of the CCP on June 29, 2011 when 100,000 people from across the country gathered in Chongqing stadium to sing revolutionary songs in the presence of Henry Kissinger, who did not spare his praise for the great leader of the municipality.18 The Red song campaign was a form of propaganda work which prepared the ground for Bo to launch quasi-Maoist movements, rounding up his adversaries accused of belonging to the “mafia” (da hei “打黑”), and sending them to prison without much respect for the due process of law.

16. See infra. 17. Guo Daohui, jingti yuansu wengede fuhuo (Let’s be vigilant against the resurrection of elements of the Cultural Revolution), p. 21. 18. “Kissinger attends Chongqing ‘red song gala’,” Chongqing wanbao, June 30, 2011, http://news. xinhuanet.com/2011-06/30/c_121602838.htm

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It was a kind of war against cadres and businessmen who were accused of having accumulated fortunes illegally to the detriment of ordinary people. This was reminscent of the “Five anti” campaign against capitalists and of the “Three anti” movement against corrupt cadres in the early days of the People’s Republic.19 Instead of upholding the “rule of law” advocated by the leadership under Hu Jintao, Bo sent the police led by his stooge, Wang Lijun, to arrest those who were accused of profiteering. The investigations were very sketchy, the trials were expeditious, and the lawyers who tried to present a defense of their clients were accused of being accomplices.20 Those who criticized the illegality of this campaign were either accused of being accomplices of the “triad leaders” or sent to re-education through labor for criticizing the wise decisions of Bo Xilai.21 Although the campaign against the “mafia” triggered violent criticisms among the emerging middle class, especially among lawyers who denounced Bo’s campaign as a “black campaign”(“黑打”) reminiscent of the darkest period of the Cultural Revolution, it cannot be denied that this policy was supported among the disgruntled citizens who were dissatisfied by a system which had created a new class of rich people and excluded them from the benefits of the reform. In this sense, Bo Xilai’s populist neo-Maoist policies had a undeniable degree of efficiency. The fact that six (out of nine) members of the Standing Committee of the Politburo visited Chongqing and praised its leader show that this Maoist revival was considered with a certain benevolence at the top. However, perhaps because Bo Xilai was becoming too formidable a personality, he was finally denounced by the central leadership. During his last press conference as Premier, Wen Jiabao declared “Without the success

19. The Three-anti campaign targeted the cadres guilty of corruption, waste and bureaucratism, while the Five-anti campaign was directed at capitalists (bribery, theft of state property, cheating on government contracts, tax evasion, and stealing economic information). 20. Ng Tze-wei, “Lawyer’s trial has fraternity riveted,” SCMP, April 20, 2011, www.scmp.com/ portal/site/SCMP/menuitem.2af62ecb329d3d7733492d9253a0a0a0/?vgnextoid=3eb7cc9cc2e6f 210VgnVCM100000360a0a0aRCRD&ss=China&s=News 21. “Former prisoner welcomes China labour camp reform,” SCMP, January 9, 2013, www.scmp. com/news/china/article/1123207/former-prisoner-welcomes-china-labour-camp-reform

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of political structural reform ... a historical tragedy like the Cultural Revolution could occur again ... Each party member and cadre should feel a sense of urgency.”22 But except for this declaration, Bo Xilai was never denounced for having implemented neo-Maoist policies. He was demoted for having taken bribes and accumulated a huge fortune, while his wife was accused of murder. This shows that the present Communist Party leadership is reluctant to denounce neo-Maoist policies which are, after all, based on the thought of the founder of the regime whom they continue to praise.

A Resource for Resistance against the Present Leadership If commercialization and the return of religion are two important features of present day China, the politics of resistance have also occupied a prominent place during the last 30 years. Workers and Peasants As economic reform and opening up deepened, the situation has become more complicated: whereas in the first years of reform, an immense majority of the population benefited from the new policies, things have changed since 1989. The dismantling of part of the large socialist factories under Zhu Rongji’s rule has resulted in large-scale redundancy in stateowned enterprises (SOEs). From 1995 to the early 2000s, it is estimated that about 40 million workers and employees were laid off, which means that sometimes they retained some of their benefits and a minimum income after losing their jobs. This, of course, created discontent. Therefore, as the reform policy was deepening, benefitting the emerging middle class, the new capitalists and party cadres (especially at the local level), it also created masses of disgruntled citizens. State-owned factory workers whose factories were privatized and laid off workers demonstrated behind portraits of Mao.

22. Shi Jiangtao, “Premier Wen chides Chongqing,” SCMP, March 15, 2012.

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The nostalgia for Mao, sincere or tactical, is quite widespread among this social group. The organizers of the Liaoyang protests in 2003 sometimes used Maoist period discourse to legitimize their opposition to the closure of their factory. They insisted that their protest was meant to defend their position as “masters of the country” and to defend their right to have a say over the decisions that concerned them. The same was true when the workers of the Daqing oil fields went on strike the same year.23 They openly reminded the present leadership of Mao’s slogan, “Let the industry study Daqing!” which had been prevalent during the 1960s and 1970s. In a sense, waving Mao’s portrait became a “weapon of the weak”24—the Chairman, whose mausoleum sits on Tiananmen, whose thought remains the ideological basis of the Communist Party, can be used to protect the victims of the Party’s policies. While the sincerity of the protestors’ belief in the Chairman’s words remains to be seen, it does not matter much. His image is a resource for resistance. As the political field is still strictly controlled by the Communist Party, and as, in the wake of the Tiananmen massacre, the apparatus has been very careful not to authorize the emergence of any alternative political discourse, the disgruntled masses naturally turned toward the Great Helmsman for protection. And as Mao Zedong thought is still enshrined in the Party charter, it is embarrassing for the present leadership to violently repress citizens waving the flag of the Red Sun. However, SOE workers were not the only category affected by the new capitalist turn imprinted by Deng Xiaoping in 1992. The peasants were deeply affected too. The new policy led to the creation of innumerable “development zones,” and to a boom in construction which resulted in the transformation of large tracts of agricultural land into development land for the greatest benefit of the cadres’ family networks. This process occurred without giving sufficient compensation to the peasants who were

23. Frédéric Bobin, “A Daqing les ouvriers chinois résistent à la modernisation sociale” (In Daqing, Chinese workers resist social modernization), Le Monde, March 19, 2002. 24. James C. Scott, Weapons of the Weak (Newhaven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008).

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deprived of their main resource, i.e., the land. This also led to discontent.25 We recently witnessed an example of Mao nostalgia. Hongren village in the municipality of Kunming, Yunnan province, has been resisting a destruction order by the municipal authorities for years. Most of the villagers have tried to prevent the demolition team from doing their job and in 2010 clashes occurred between villagers and the employees of the development company. This resulted in the arrest and conviction of four villagers. However, after the story appeared in the media, the municipal authorities backed down. But another conflict occurred in late 2012, the company sent excavators to destroy a tract of land which it had bought but had been retaken over by the villagers who started to till it. Once again, the villagers resisted and the company thugs had to back out, leaving two excavators on the scene. Ever since, old people have put up two tents in the field and have been keeping a round-the-clock watch to prevent the thugs from coming back. As I was talking with one of the volunteers, he told me that “when Chairman Mao was ruling the country, this would never have happened. Although he made mistakes, he was on the side of the peasants. Not like the new bureaucrats who think only of making money.”26 The egalitarian discourse which was pervasive during the last 20 years of Mao’s rule has become increasingly popular among the victims of new policies, and it is not only the case in Chongqing. Mao’s image, the revolutionary songs which had galvanized the youth from the 1950s to the 1970s, have resurfaced during the last decade. Since the middle of the first decade of the present century, pensioners have regularly met in public parks to sing what have come to be called “Red songs.” They are often former SOE workers or employees whose pension barely suffices to survive, who are presented by the official media as obstacles to reform, and who, generally, have difficulty adapting to the

25. The case of Taishi village in Guangdong is quite representative of these resistance movements. See, for instance, “One hundred on hunger strike over land dispute, corruption”, SCMP, August 31, 2005 26. Interview conducted in Hongren, February 8, 2013.

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new era. After they have finished singing, they like to talk about the good old days when people were equal, when cadres served the people, when corruption was nonexistent, etc. At the time, they said, China was governed by a great leader who cared about the life of ordinary workers, and mobilized society to fight the emerging bourgeoisie. They tend to forget that life was difficult, that there was a scarcity of consumer goods, and that they had to cultivate the cadres in order to access the services provided by the State. But they were young and healthy at the time, whereas now, at the dusk of their lives, they have to scrimp and save in order to be able to afford medical care. As we have noted above, this nostalgia for the “good old Maoist days” was instrumented by Chongqing leader Bo Xilai. The New Left Workers and peasants are not the only categories to be tempted by the image of the Great Helmsman. Since the second half of the 1990s, young intellectuals, some of whom had been involved in the 1989 pro-democracy movement, turned toward Mao’s thought to solve the problems of 21st century China. This movement started paradoxically among scholars who received their PhDs in the United States, some of whom were teaching in the country. MIT professor Cui Zhiyuan was one of the leaders of this current. For him, since Deng Xiaoping’s 1992 journey to the South, the Communist Party has abandoned many of its fundamental principles— society has become increasingly polarized between a small bureaucratic capitalist class which is getting increasingly rich and powerful, and the workers and peasants who have not benefited from the reform. The latter are now exploited and do not have a say in the management of the new factories. For Cui, the denunciation of the excesses of the Maoist era, especially of the last 20 years of Mao’s rule, explain the “Great leap backward.” Cui thinks that a return to the sound principles of Maoism would help solve the problems of the workers. He proposes a return to Mao’s Anshan charter, adopted in 1960, which stipulated that the workers take part in the management of the factory, and that the cadres take part in manual labor. Cui Zhiyuan also refuses to admit that the Cultural Revolution was only negative, as stated in the Resolution. For him, it was

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an innovative attempt in creating a social and economic democracy. Of course, he admits that there were excesses in the repression, but he refuses to throw the baby out with the bath water. During that period, ordinary workers and peasants were in a position to curb the power of the cadres, and the regime had been able to eliminate corruption, a disease that had plagued all the regimes which had ruled China since Qin Shihuang. For Wang Hui, another leader of the New Left, the new leadership has done all it could to go back into the fold of global capitalism. The ideas of the New Left find support among intellectuals and they have created websites that analyze the innovative aspects of Mao’s political line. Reviving the mass line, denouncing the new bourgeoisie engendered by the practice of revisionism are widespread in the columns of Utopia, the most famous of these websites. For the neo-Maoists of the New Left, Mao’s ideas on the Cultural Revolution and on the elimination of the New Bourgeoisie inside the Party are actually a specifically Chinese political theory and practice. They are shocked by the influence of Western political ideas such as “rule of law” and “market economy” and want China to follow its own political line, thus showing the way to the rest of the world. This mixture of modern nationalism and revolutionary Maoism makes the New Left appear as a kind of political mutants. The Party leadership has been rather tolerant of its discourses, and repression against its proponents has been much less rash than toward liberal intellectuals. Cui Zhiyuan and Wang Hui teach at Tsinghua University, one of the most prestigious learning institutions in China, while Hu Angang frequently publishes books advocating the reinforcement of the state economy. Once again, the Party leaders cannot turn against intellectuals who praise the ideas of the founding father of the regime whom they consider to be their ideological beacon. Nanjie Cun Finally, the case of Nanjie village in Henan province shows that the fascination for Mao and hardcore Maoism is not limited to nostalgic intellectuals and peasants and workers who long for the positions they lost

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in the late 1990s. Whereas the whole Chinese countryside was engaged in de facto decollectivization, a few rural leaders decided to continue practicing orthodox Maoist policies. Nanjie is the most famous example. On Dongfang hong (The East is Red) Square, a huge marble statue of Mao Zedong flanked by the portraits of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin greets busloads of tourists. Slogans from Mao Zedong’s quotations, such as “Serve the people” and “Politics in command” are posted everywhere.27 The system put in place by Party Secretary Wang Hongbin in 1984 realizes the dreams of the Great Helmsman. The inhabitants of the village receive free medical care, and enjoy free distribution of basic foods (cooking oil, eggs, etc.) when they show the booklet which is distributed to each of them. They live in tidy apartments28 where their furniture and kitchen apparatus are provided by the government. They do not pay for gas nor electricity, and schooling is free. There are no private enterprises or shops, all the villagers work in government firms and receive a regular income of ¥2,500 per month.29 The inhabitants of the village have to be able to repeat the slogans, the Party leader is uncontested, and individualism is frowned upon.30 The prosperity of the village is based on factories that produce instant noodles and other similar products. The problem is that there are more than 7,000 migrant workers in these factories who do not enjoy the benefits granted to the 4,400 local residents.31 Therefore, the egalitarianism professed by the Maoist leader of Nanjie is based on a profound inequality. The interesting fact is that the village attracts great numbers of tourists who are ready to believe in the efficiency of such policies. Like the foreign visitors who praised the great success of Mao’s rural policies in the 1970s,

27. “Nanjie village promotes values of past,” People’s Daily Online, July 1, 2011, http://english. peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90783/91300/7426300.html 28. “Chinese village still in Mao era,” BBC News, November 19, 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/ asia-pacific/2488905.stm 29. Alan Taylor, “The last Maoist village in China,” www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2012/10/the-lastmaoist-village-in-china/100378/ 30. Abel Segrétin, “Le bourg dans le rouge” (The village in the red), Libération, September 22, 2009, www.liberation.fr/monde/0101593882-nanjie-le-bourg-dans-le-rouge 31. Ibid.

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they do not try to understand the reality that portends the “magnificent success” of collectivization. This shows that the absence of reflection on Mao’s role in contemporary Chinese history, the official amnesia on the excesses of the movements he launched, and especially on the huge famine that followed the collectivization of the Great Leap Forward, contribute to make the population naïve about the past, to say the least. The nostalgia for Mao Zedong is kept alive by the refusal of the Party to launch a discussion about the 27 years of his rule. It also helps keep discussions in the realm of the official ideology as many opponents of the present policies tend to express their claims within the framework of the Great Helmsman’s thought. Commercialization of his image, while contributing to the demythification of his ideas, has allowed the Party to make him an idol for the young. The combination of these two trends that have prevented questioning the historical role of Mao has contributed to reinforce his position both in the official discourse, and in the hearts and minds of the population.

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4 The Maoist Revival and the Conservative Turn in Chinese Politics Willy LAM Adjunct Professor in the History Department and Center for China Studies, Chinese University of Hong Kong

Introduction According to the former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, in an interview with the BBC in 2011, Nikita Khrushchev’s 1956 denunciation of Stalin had a pivotal impact on his new thinking, including the germination of the ideas of perestroika and glasnost.1 Yet in China, nobody—and no political force—has the guts, integrity and vision to publicly unmask and denounce Chairman Mao Zedong, who, many believe, was responsible for more deaths than Stalin. Since the Cultural Revolution, the closest that Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities have come to evaluating the mistakes of Mao Zedong was the famous “Resolution on Certain Historical Questions of the CCP since the Establishment of the People’s Republic” (hereafter Resolution), which was passed by the CCP Central Committee in 1981 under the close

1. Cited in “Gorbachev—The Great Dissident,” BBC World Service, August 2011, www.bbc. co.uk/news/world-europe-14507036

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supervision of Deng Xiaoping. The Resolution pointed out unequivocally that Mao’s “contributions to the Chinese revolution far outweighed his shortcomings” and that “his contributions were primary, his mistakes secondary.”2 Moreover, the document’s criticisms of Mao centered on tactical issues, mainly errors of judgment during the Cultural Revolution. Not one word was spoken about the irrational and non democratic nature of Maoism or Mao’s feudalistic governance. As Deng said at the time, “We must affirm the historical position of comrade Mao Zedong, and uphold and develop Mao Thought. We must hoist high the flag of Mao Thought not only today but in the future.”3 Fourth-generation leader President Hu Jintao was equally effusive in eulogizing the demigod. In a speech marking the Great Helmsman’s 110th birthday in late 2003, he declared Mao to be a “great proletariat revolutionary strategist and theorist.” While Deng at least cited “leftist” errors committed by Mao, Hu’s hagiographic address made no mention of his manifold blunders.4 This chapter studies the background and significance of the Maoist revival that began in Chongqing in late 2008—which spread across the nation in the ensuing years. On March 15, 2012, Bo Xilai, the prime progenitor of the crypto-Maoist revival, was relieved of his position as Chongqing party secretary. Soon afterward, his membership of the Politburo and Central Committee was suspended. However, there is no indication that the resuscitation of Maoist norms has been halted due to Bo’s downfall. What, then, are the factors behind the quasi-Maoist renaissance, which has manifested itself in phenomena and campaigns ranging from “changhong” (singing “red songs”) to the apparently new fad of constructing “red GDP”? The relationship between the

2. “Resolution on Certain Historical Questions of the Party since Nation-Building,” Xinhua News Agency, June 27, 1981, http://news.xinhuanet.com/ziliao/2002-03/04/content_2543544.htm 3. Cited in Deng Xiaoping, “Opinions on Drafting ‘Resolution on Certain Historical Questions Of The Party Since Nation-Building’,” Xinhua News Agency, June 22, 1981, http://news. xinhuanet.com/ziliao/2005-02/04/content_2548121.htm. 4. “Hu Jintao’s speech at the forum commemorating the 110th birthday of Mao Zedong,” People’s Daily, December 26, 2003, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/69112/70190/70193/14286125.html.

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rekindling of Maoist norms and the Hu Jintao leadership’s top agenda of upholding political stability is examined. Also discussed are the factional dynamics behind the rehoisting of Maoist banners. For example, are the princelings—who seemed to be at the forefront of the political movement—singing Mao’s praises so as to consolidate the political fortune of the so called Gang of Princelings? The policy implications of changhong and other Maoist rituals are also studied. This chapter will also look at the significance of the restitution of Maoism particularly with reference to the party’s potentials for reform after the pivotal 18th CCP Congress of late 2012.

The Genesis and Major Contours of the Maoist Restoration Revival of Maoist Statues, “Red Songs” and Maoist Quotations The revival of Maoism started in 2008 and culminated in festivities surrounding the 19th birthday of the CCP on July 1, 2011. The epicenter of the revitalization of Maoist norms is the western metropolis of Chongqing, which was the base of then Party Secretary Bo Xilai, the ambitious and charismatic son of party elder Bo Yibo (1908–2007), who was transferred there in late 2007. Mao statues—which were feverishly torn down all over China soon after late patriarch Deng Xiaoping initiated the reform era in 1978—were put up again by government offices, factories and universities in this city of 34 million people. A newly constructed seven-storey statue of the demigod in Chongqing’s college district dwarfed nearby halls, libraries and classroom buildings.5 The Maoist fever soon spread elsewhere. Not far from the Helmsman’s birthplace in Juzhizhou village, Hunan Province, the latest tourist attraction was a skyscraping, 32-meter torso of the young Mao. Moreover, the long-forgotten slogan “Long Live Mao Zedong Thought” was resuscitated in October 2009 after banners bearing this

5. Cited in “Biggest Mao Zedong statue unveiled in China: report,” Agence France Presse, October 26, 2006, www.sinodaily.com/reports/Biggest_Mao_Zedong_statue_unveiled_in_ China_report_999.html.

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battle cry were held high by college students and nationalistic Beijing residents during parades in Tiananmen Square that marked the 60th birthday of the People’s Republic.6 Yet the most vivid—and telling—symbol of the restitution of Maoist standards is the changhong campaign, which became a near-universal phenomenon in the run-up to the July 1, 2011 celebration of the Party’s 90th birthday. Song-and-dance troupes that specialized in red songs, whose participants ranged from high-school students to old-age pensioners, were sprouting like bamboo shoots in the spring.7 Bo, a high-profile princeling (a reference to the offspring of party elders), asked all residents to learn by heart 36 Maoist-era “revolutionary songs.” Radio and television stations nationwide were running these “red ditties”—which sing the praises of the larger-than-life exploits of national heroes and “proletariat paragons”—at regular intervals.8 Bo (born 1949) was also adept at using the new media to spread his “red” messages. He often asked his assistants to message sayings by Mao to the city’s netizens. Bo’s favorite Mao quotations include: “The world is ours; we must all take part in running [public] affairs:” “Human beings need to have [a revolutionary] spirit:” “The world belongs to young people. They are like the sun at eight or nine in the morning:” and “Once the political line has been settled, [the quality of] cadres is the deciding factor.”9 The Cultural Revolution-era practice of dispatching students to

6. Cited in “Crowds celebrating the PRC’s 60th birthday surprised to see the slogan ‘Long Live Mao Zedong Thought’,” Forum.Xinhuanet.com, September 28, 2009, http://forum.home.news. cn/thread/70661938/1.html. For a discussion of the erection of Mao statues and other symbols of Maoism, see, for example, Li Jing, “The legacy of Chairman Mao,” China Daily, July 31, 2011, www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-07/31/content_13017541.htm 7. For a discussion of the “red songs” campaign, see, for example, Brice Pedroletti, “China sings the old red songs again,” The Guardian, August 9, 2011. See also Barbara Demick, “‘Red song’ campaign in China strikes some false notes,” Los Angeles Times, June 3, 2011, http://articles. latimes.com/2011/jun/03/world/la-fg-china-red-20110604 8. See Lan Shiqiu, “Chongqing asks all citizens to sing and to pass along 36 red songs,” Chongqing Daily, April 20, 2011, http://politics.people.com.cn/GB/14562/14432278.html 9. For a discussion of how Bo popularized Mao quotes by using text messages, see, for example, Hong Xuefeng, “Bo Xilai has sent out his first red text message,” People’s Daily Online, April 29, 2009, http://politics.people.com.cn/GB/113795/9216543.html.

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the countryside to “learn from the masses” was revived, first in Chongqing and then in other cities. Nationwide, millions of Chinese flocked to “revolutionary bases” such as Yan’an, Jinggangshan, and Shaoshan, the birthplace of the Great Helmsman.10 Most importantly, the rehoisting of Maoist standards has signified a conservative turn in Chinese statecraft. Repeated appeals have been made by ideological and propaganda departments to party members and college students to steep themselves in the works of Mao and related Marxist canons. Such exhortations are much more emphatically made than, for example, similar calls issued by President Jiang Zemin during his so-called san jiang or “Three Emphases” campaign in the early 2000s.11 As the following sections will make clear, the CCP leadership has been reviving with gusto many of the values and policies that are unmistakably Maoist in nature. Meaning of the Maoist Revival and Changhong Movement What exactly lies behind the Maoist resurgence? “Some people say we are going ‘left,’ and that we are returning to the period of the ‘Cultural Revolution’,” Bo said in mid-2011. “This is totally groundless.”12 According to Deputy Director of the CCP Propaganda Department, Wang Xiaohui, changhong and related rituals “have nothing to do with the national ideology and psyche moving to the left or to the right.” Wang claimed that while changhong activities proved to be popular, there were also large

10. Cited in Jessie Jiang, “Party time: China pushes ‘Red Tourism’,” Time Asia Edition, August 30, 2011, www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2090876,00.html 11. For a discussion of the san jiang or “Three Emphases” Campaign (“emphasis on studying [the Marxist canon], on politics, and on righteousness”), which Jiang Zemin started in 1995, see “Jiang Zemin: Putting emphasis on studies, on politics and on righteousness (1995),” www. BKPCN.com, December 25, 2008, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/33837/2535045.html. It should be noted, however, that when Jiang asked party members to study the Marxist canon, there was no specific effort to revive Maoist norms and practices. 12. “Bo Xilai: Changhong doesn’t mean a return to the Cultural Revolution,” Chongqing Daily, June 30, 2011, http://news.wenweipo.com/2011/07/01/IN1107010056.htm

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number of Chinese who favored popular music and even rock and roll.13 The reality, however, is that there was a self-conscious effort by CCP authorities to introduce policies that would do the Great Helmsman—and his fervent fans—proud. (a)   A Paean to Patriotism—and Loyalty to CCP Orthodoxy At the very least, the Maoist revival is a salvo toward promoting “spiritual civilization,” a concept that was raised by Deng Xiaoping to counter the materialism that would come in the wake of the country’s market reforms and accumulation of wealth. As then Party Secretary Bo said, “Singing the praise of ‘redness’ means supporting what is right.” “A city must do a good job in nurturing spiritual civilization,” he added. Bo indicated that cadres who are obsessed with GDP rates but lack spiritual values may “go down the road of corruption and degeneration.”14 For most Chinese ideologs and officials, a key part of spiritual civilization is stirring up patriotic— which can also be put as nationalistic—pride. As Bo put it, changhong is equivalent to “a theoretical foundation for finding one’s roots in history, the return of ideals, the revival of [the Chinese] race, and the rise of the nation.”15 And since, according to the long-standing orthodoxy, it is the CCP that has made possible the advancement of China, changhong also means singing the praises of the CCP. Apart from changhong, aficionados also “read [red classics], tell [red] stories and pass along [orthodox] axioms.” Again according to Bo, most of these songs, classics, stories and axioms have to do with “saving the

13. “The Propaganda Department: Changhong has nothing to do with a leftward or rightward shift in ideology,” China News Service, June 23, 2011, www.chinanews.com/gn/2011/0623/3132123.shtml. 14. For Bo’s views on the values of “spirit,” see for example, “Bo Xilai: We want the law of prices but we also require the [human] spirit,” Chongqing Daily, October 27, 2010, http://forum.home. news.cn/detail/79659526/1.html. 15. Cited in Yang Fan, “Commentary on the Chongqing model — the biggest controversy in China in the past two years,” in www.wyzxsx.com, January 1, 2011, www.tqohw.com/mrdjh/1869. html.

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country [from the brink of collapse], nation-building, and constructing a strong and prosperous China.”16 Songs featured in changhong concerts nationwide included well known ditties popularized during the anti Japanese war of 1937–45, as well as songs from the 1950s and the 1960s. Among them were “March of the Volunteers” (which doubles as the national anthem); “March of the Big Knives” and “Protecting the Yellow River” (both anti Japanese songs); “Sing a Song about the Motherland;” “Song of Lei Feng” and the more contemporary “My Chinese Heart.” Very often the singing sessions ended with the de rigueur “There won’t be a New China without the Chinese Communist Party.”17 “When we sing ‘My Chinese Heart,’ we are demonstrating the cohesiveness, the centripetal tendency of the Chinese race,” Bo noted. “We must unambiguously uphold artistic works that can hold tight the hearts of the people, and that are healthy and righteous.”18 “Revolutionary tourism”—which is yet another offshoot of the revitalization of Maoism—also carries immense symbolic significance. According to Vice President Xi, who has toured most of the “red” shrines in provinces including Hunan, Jiangxi and Shaanxi, meccas like Shaoshan, the birthplace of Mao, were “resources of revolutionary tradition” and “valuable spiritual treasures of our party.” “Red tourist spots are a vivid classroom for studying the tradition and learning new things,” he said while touring Shaoshan in early 2011. “They contain rich political wisdom and moral nutrients.”19 Even though Bo’s “red campaign” never received any official imprimatur

16. For a discussion of the contents of the “red songs,” see, for example, “Why are red songs red? Use a tolerant attitude to look at a specific manifestation of the times,” China News Service, June 6, 2011, www.chinanews.com/cul/2011/06-06/3091459.shtml 17. Cited in “Bo Xilai and Wang Qifan meet the domestic and foreign media,” Chongqing Daily, March 8, 2011, http://cq.qq.com/a/20110308/000005.htm 18. Cited in “Bo Xilai: A great people must have lofty cultural pursuits,” Chongqing Daily, July 1, 2011, http://www.cnnz.gov.cn/bbxq_content/2011-07/01/content_1507024.htm. 19. Cited in “Xi Jinping visits and conducts research at Shaoshan, Hunan Province,” China News Service, March 23, 2011, www.chinanews.com/gn/2011/03-23/2926435.shtml

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from top central Party organs such as the Politburo or its Standing Committee, a number of Politburo Standing Committee (PBSC) and Politburo members began visiting Chongqing in the second half of 2010 to show their support for this conservative crusade. These top cadres included Wu Bangguo, Zhou Yongkang, Xi Jinping and Li Yuanchao. The official Xinhua News Agency quoted Vice President Xi, who toured Chongqing in December 2010, as “affirming the practice of singing red songs and studying [Maoist] classics ... as a means of pursuing education in [Marxist] ideals and beliefs.”20 Li, who is a Politburo member and Director of the CCP Organization Department, did not give an excessively ideological interpretation of the changhong fad during his trip to Chongqing. Nonetheless, he agreed that reinstating the “red” tradition was a laudatory patriotic experience. While in Chongqing in April 2011, Li joined Bo in a changhong concert. Li said that changhong activities were “conducive to propagating a [morally] uplifting social atmosphere.” “A large quantity of ‘people’s songs’ that reflected the heart and soul of the people emerged during the times of the revolution, the war and the construction of the New China,” Li said. “We must all sing these good songs together.”21 Given that Li is a protégé of President Hu and a senior member of the supremo’s Communist Youth League Faction, this was clear proof that a lot of the values behind Bo’s Maoism-related activities were shared by other cliques in the CCP. Indeed, many Chinese remember Mao as the larger-than-life founder of the Republic and the “pride of the Chinese race.” The contributions of Mao were played up in the blockbuster movie The Founding of a Republic, which was specially commissioned by party authorities to celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the establishment of the People’s Republic of

20. See “Xi Jinping affirms changhong activities in Chongqing,” Xinhua News Agency, August 12, 2011, http://china.huanqiu.com/roll/2010-12/1327317.html 21. “Li Yuanchao: Chongqing’s reforms have provided a new way of thinking for solving China’s difficult problems,” Chongqing Daily, April 19, 2011, www.chinanews.com/gn/2011/0419/2981427.shtml

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China.22 Central Party School theorist Li Junru, who first gained fame for his exposition of Deng’s reform programs, characterized Mao as a titan who “led the Chinese people in their struggle against the reactionary rule of imperialism and feudalism, so that the Chinese race [could] stand tall among the people of the world.”23 Moreover, according to conservative theoretician Peng Xiaoguang, the enduring enthusiasm for Mao Zedong Thought particularly among the young testified to the intelligentsia’s search for an “ultimate faith that could speed up China’s rise in the wake of the global financial crisis.”24 It was Zhang Quanjing, a former Director of the CCP Organization Department, who perhaps gave the most eloquent explanation of the relevance of Maoism to 21st-century China. In a 2011 article entitled “We Must Unswervingly Continue To Uphold Mao Thought,” Zhang said the Great Helmsman’s ideas consisted of the “paradigm of synthesizing Marxism–Leninism and revolution and construction in China.” “Mao Thought has incorporated the wisdom of China and the world during different historical periods,” Zhang asserted. In areas including ideology, military affairs, politics, economics, culture, technology and sports, the ideolog indicated, Maoism was “the crystallization of the intelligence of the whole party and all Chinese.”25 (b)   Celebrating Red GDP and Egalitarianism There is also a “materialistic” side to the Maoist revival: a re-emphasis on the values of egalitarianism and social equality that a sizeable sector of the

22. For an explication of the significance of the film The Founding of a Republic, see, for example, “Star-studded blockbuster The Founding of a Republic,” CCTV, September 14, 2009, www. china.org.cn/video/2009-09/14/content_18585357.htm 23. Li Junru, “Mao Zedong, The People’s Hero,” People’s Daily, October 23, 2009, http://theory. people.com.cn/GB/10242116.html 24. Cited in Willy Lam, “Power Struggle behind Revival of Maoism,” Asia Times, November 24, 2009, www.atimes.com/atimes/China/KK24Ad01.html 25. Zhang Quanjing, “We must unswervingly continue to uphold Mao Thought,” People’s Daily, March 30, 2011, http://theory.people.com.cn/GB/11253085.html

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population associates with the Maoist era. This was also a reaction to the increasing polarization of rich and poor—and the increasing stratification of Chinese society based on money and privileges—that was regarded as a result of 30 plus years of Deng Xiaoping-style reform. The specter of “class antagonism” was exacerbated by Jiang Zemin’s decision in 2001 to allow private entrepreneurs, professionals and members of the middle-classes into the CCP. This has resulted in the social downgrading of the “lower classes” of workers and peasants, who used to be pillars of the party.26 One of the key factors behind the so-called “scientific theory of development” of the Hu–Wen administration is to rectify many of the ill effects of Deng and Jiang’s policies. There is significant measure of neoMaoism behind some of Hu’s slogans, such as “Putting people first.” By the late 2000s, however, it had become clear that the rich-poor gap—as well as the discrepancies between eastern and western China—was yawning wider and wider.27 Bo apparently seized the opportunity to revive a kind of crypto-Maoist “red GDP,” a supposedly non exploitative growth model that would be populist and, in a way, egalitarian. As the disgraced princeling put it, “The most important basis of a harmonious society is [winning] the hearts of the people.” “It’s not enough to win the support of 10% or 15% of the people; we have to let more than 90% of the people feel satisfied,” he noted.28 Red GDP is a codeword for economic development that is geared toward the needs of the masses—and not dictated by the greed of privileged classes

26. For a discussion of how Jiang Zemin’s “Theory of the Three Represents” has exacerbated “class differences” in Chinese society, see, for example, Willy Lam, Chinese Politics in the Hu Jintao Era (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 2006), pp. 65–68. 27. For a discussion of the growing rich-poor gap in China, see, for example, Dexter Roberts, “China’s growing income gap,” Businessweek, January 27, 2011, www.businessweek.com/ magazine/content/11_06/b4214013648109.htm; Chris Buckley, “Is Wen’s ‘new socialist countryside’ working?” Reuters, February 22, 2011, www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/22/uschina-labour-rural-idUSTRE71L1EN20110222 28. “Bo Xilai: “The most important basis of a harmonious society is winning the hearts of the people,” Chongqing Evening Post, August 19, 2011, http://news.xinhuanet.com/local/201108/19/c_121880571.htm

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such as the country’s estimated 30 million millionaires.29 For example, while real estate prices in cities ranging from Shanghai and Shenzhen were going through the roof, Chongqing cadres pledged to ensure that at least one third of all apartments in the metropolis were affordable to workers and farmers. Chongqing has also been hailed as a pioneer in providing socalled “social security housing”—or subsidized flats for the lower classes.30 This idea was picked up in the Twelfth Five-Year Plan (2011–15), in which the Wen cabinet pledged that some 36 million units of social-security housing would be provided nationwide during these five years.31 Chongqing has also attracted nationwide attention for its experiment in the partial solution of the hukou (residence permit) system—which has since the 1950s prevented rural-born Chinese from moving to and settling in the cities. Urban-rural segregation is set to be abolished within the municipality by the mid-2010s, when all Chongqing residents can live and work within the confines of the municipality.32 Yet Bo’s most attentiongrabbing policy was his crusade against the triads (or Chinese mafia)—the so-called “dahei” (“strike the dark forces”) campaign—in 2009. Within a period of six months, Chongqing police arrested 24 major crime bosses, who coughed up 1.7 billion yuan of ill-gotten gains. In addition, more than 200 mid-to-high-ranking officials in Chongqing’s law enforcement and judicial departments were disciplined for taking bribes from criminals. These “bad apples” included the former head of the Chongqing Judicial

29. For a discussion of the “Red GDP phenomenon,” see, for example, Ji Shiming, “In search of the red GDP whirlwind in Chongqing,” Yazhou Zhoukan (Asia Weekly), Hong Kong, November 6, 2009, http://wen.org.cn/modules/article/view.article.php/1711 30. For a discussion of low-cost housing in Chongqing, see, for example, “Chongqing will overfulfil its quota of social-security housing by the year 2015,” Chongqing Daily, June 6, 2011, www.cq.gov.cn/today/news/321076.htm 31. Cited in “China promises 4 million units of affordable housing in 2011,” People’s Daily (English edition), July 13, 2011, http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90778/90862/7439066.html. Also see “China speeds up low-rent housing,” China.org.cn, March 17, www.china.org.cn/ china/2011-03/17/content_22159081.htm 32. For a discussion of the hukou reforms in Chongqing, see, for example, Cui Zhiyuan, “Chongqing’s innovation in hukou reforms,” Expo2010.cn, September 10, 2010, www. expo2010.cn/a/20100910/000025.htm

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Bureau Wen Qiang. Wen, who is also a former police chief, who admitted to taking bribes and gifts totaling nearly ¥100 million.33 In addition, Bo sought to placate the petitioners—“lower-class” Chinese who want to present senior officials with their grievances—by asking some 200,000 municipal employees to meet regularly with residents who claim to be victims of bureaucratic and other forms of injustices.34 Bo and the mayor of Chongqing, the master bureaucratic fixer Huang Qifan, indicated that the key to the CCP maintaining its perennial ruling-party status was “whether it is tightly linked with the people and the masses.” “Chairman Mao put it best: we must serve the people with all our hearts and minds,” Bo noted. “The party will become impregnable if cadres from top to bottom are tightly bonded with the masses.”35 There are critics galore, however, who think that Bo’s so-called Red GDP concept is but a regurgitation of bits and pieces of the Hu–Wen administration’s “scientific theory of development.” Several central and provincial cadres had, as early as 2008, propagated concepts including “attaining GDP without blood” or “Green GDP.”36 Appeals to a more egalitarian society have also repeatedly been made by Premier Wen, who said famously at a National People’s Congress (NPC) conference in 2010 that “social equality and justice should shine even brighter than the sun.” Moreover, one of the earlier pioneers of social-security housing was PBSC

33. For a discussion of the anti-triad operations in Chongqing, see, for example, Jaime FlorCruz, “China cracks down on Chongqing’s gangsters,” CNN, October 21, 2009, http://articles. cnn.com/2009-10-21/world/china.corruption_1_chongqing-drug-trafficking-corruption?_ s=PM:WORLD; Geoff Dyer, “China executes former Chongqing official,” July 7, 2010, www. ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/48180956-898a-11df-9ea6-00144feab49a.html#axzz1WfQBGUEm. 34. Cited in “Bo Xilai and Wang Qifan meet the domestic and foreign media.” 35. “Bo Xilai proposes building a moral high ground in Chongqing,” Chongqing Morning Post, July 25, 2011, www.chinanews.com/gn/2011/07-25/3205619.shtml 36. Regional cadres such as Guangdong Party Secretary Wang Yang and Shanxi Party Secretary Zhang Baoshun indicated as early as 2008 that they did not want to achieve “GDP that is tainted with blood.” See, for example, “Zhang Baoshun: We resolutely do not want GDP that is tainted with pollution and blood,” People’s Daily Internet Edition, October 17, 2010, http://leaders. people.com.cn/GB/8188892.html.

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member and Hu Jintao protégé Li Keqiang when he was Party Secretary of Liaoning Province from 2004 to 2007.37 Ironically, Bo had neglected the issue of housing for the poor when he was governor of Liaoning from 2001 to 2004. However, the charismatic princeling’s ability to generate publicity—and to garner plaudits—by repackaging others’ ideas as his own certainly testified to his political skills. But this also demonstrates that talk about egalitarianism and social justice by the crypto-Maoists was often a public-relations exercise geared toward boosting the political fortunes of individual cadres.

Deeper-Level Factors behind the Maoist Revival On a deeper level, the quasi-Maoist renaissance is a political movement undertaken by the CCP leadership to uphold political stability and weed out challenges to the regime. Factional dynamics is also involved. The party’s much attenuated liberal wing—which consists of the remnant of followers of the late titans Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang—has been dealt a body blow. And the taizidang, or Gang of Princelings, of which Bo is a well known leader, is cynically using the changhong crusade to enhance the political fortunes of cadres with “revolutionary bloodlines.” The Mainstream Factions’ Views about the Maoist Restoration A perennial problem for the post-Cultural Revolution mainstream ruling factions—including the Deng Xiaoping Faction, the Shanghai Faction led by ex-president Jiang Zemin, and the Communist Youth League (CYL) Faction headed by President Hu Jintao—is how to strike a balance between

37. For a discussion of the clearing up of squatters in Liaoning, see, for example, “Liaoning’s ‘No. 1 people’s livelihood project’ allows 1.55 million people to say goodbye to squatters’ area,” CNTV.cn, January 11, 2011, http://news.cntv.cn/20110111/100943.shtml; Li Keqiang: “Let’s save on other expenses so as to transform the squatters’ district,” Xinhua News Agency, March 12, 2006, www.xinhuanet.com/chinanews/2006-03/12/content_6446248.htm. See also “Wen Jiabao meets the foreign media,” Xinhua News Agency, March 14, 2011, http://news.xinhuanet. com/politics/2010-03/14/content_13169432.htm

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leftists (ultra-radical crypto-Maoists) on the one hand, and rightists (“proWest liberals”) on the other. The leftists fully acknowledge the precept of one-party dictatorship under the CCP. But they are opposed to marketoriented reforms begun by Deng Xiaoping in the late 1970s—and followed by Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao—especially privatization and China’s integration with the global marketplace. Leftists, who are also called the New Leftists, have also criticized the unholy alliance between senior party cadres and big business which has resulted in the emergence of superrich clans within the party’s upper echelons.38 Being successors of Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, rightists advocate no-holds-barred adoption of international values, including Western-style political reforms. At least in the eyes of leaders who favor the status quo, ranging from Deng Xiaoping to Hu Jintao, the rightists’ hidden agenda is to emulate Mikhail Gorbachev by “changing the nature of the party” through political liberalization.39 For leaders including Deng, Jiang and Hu, leftists or Maoists are considerably easier to handle than rightists. The rule of thumb is to ignore the neo-Maoists’ criticisms of market reforms as well as capitalist-style corruption. However, aspects of Maoism that dovetail with the goals of the regime—especially the glorification of nationalism as well as national heroes such as Mao—have been incorporated into the Hu leadership’s programs of promoting stability through means such as harsh suppression of dissidents who support the “rightist” goals of political liberalization.40 Thus even though President Hu, up to mid-2012, has never made any

38. For a discussion of China’s “New Left,” see, for example, Ariana Eunjung Cha,“For China’s new left, old values,” Washington Post, April 19, 2009, www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/ content/article/2009/04/18/AR2009041801939.html; also see Pankaj Mishra, “China’s new leftist,” New York Times, October 15, 2006, www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/magazine/15leftist. html 39. For a discussion of the CCP leadership’s attitude toward “rightists,” see, for example, Jian Jubo, “China at a crossroad: Right or left?” Asia Times, April 24, 2009, www.atimes.com/atimes/ China/KD24Ad01.html 40. For a discussion of the Hu leadership’s measures to uphold political stability, see, for example, Willy Lam, “Beijing’s blueprint for tackling mass incidents and social management,” China Brief, March 25, 2011, www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_ news%5D=37696

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pronouncement on the changhong movement, he and his Politburo allies are happily tailoring the Maoist campaign to their particular needs. Their tactics include hitting out at dissidents such as Liu Xiaobo and Ai Weiwei, in addition to members of the CCP’s remnant liberal faction.41 (a) Weeding out “Bourgeois-Liberal” Values and Imposing Tighter Ideological Control Irrespective of the controversial reputation of Mao Zedong, Maoism represents Communist Party orthodoxy, the sacrosanct heirlooms of the CCP’s 90 years of struggle to become not only China’s “perennial ruling party” but also the largest and most powerful political party in the world. Playing up Maoism is a handy way for the CCP leadership to prevent the spread of “bourgeois-liberal” westernized—and potentially destabilizing— values. This is particularly significant in light of the fact that, beginning with the riots in Tibet and neighboring provinces in March 2008, “anti Beijing” sentiments and activities have been on the increase. In 2010, there were an estimated 180,000 counts of “mass incidents,” a euphemism for riots, disturbances and other instances of social unrest.42 The “color revolutions” that began in Tunisia and Egypt in early 2011 have raised the specter that a “Jasmine Revolution” might one day sweep the CCP into the dustbin of history.43

41. For a discussion of Beijing’s treatment of dissidents in 2010 and 2011, see, for example, Ariel Zirulnick, “Five famous jailed dissidents in China: Ai Weiwei to Liu Xiaobo,” Christian Science Monitor, April 12, 2011, www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2011/0412/Five-famousjailed-dissidents-in-China-Ai-Weiwei-to-Liu-Xiaobo/Ai-Weiwei; see also, Ku Yang, “Beijing Intensifies Pressure as Jasmine Smile Hits China,” Human Rights in China (New York) Briefing, www.hrichina.org/crf/article/5420 42. Cited in “China’s spending on internal police force in 2010 outstrips defense budget,” Bloomberg News, March 6, 2011, www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-06/china-s-spending-oninternal-police-force-in-2010-outstrips-defense-budget.html 43. For a discussion of the authorities’ tactics toward a possible “Jasmine Revolution,” see, for example, Ian Johnson, “Calls for a ‘Jasmine Revolution’ in China persist,” New York Times, February 23, 2011, www.nytimes.com/2011/02/24/world/asia/24china.html; also see Chris Hogg, “China’s security tsar warns over ‘Jasmine revolution’,” BBC news, February 21, 2011, www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12522856

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From 2008 onward, the Hu-led Politburo began to underscore the imperative of a “yiyuanhua” (one-dimensional or monolithic) guiding principle in ideology and policies of state. This was made clear by President Hu’s speech in December 2008 marking the 30th anniversary of the start of the Era of Reform. The supremo vowed that the CCP would uphold the “Four Cardinal Principles” of stern party control—and that the authorities would do whatever it took to “boost its ability to guard against changes [to a capitalist system] and to withstand risks” such as sociopolitical instability. Hu also delivered a stern warning to liberal cadres who favored the adoption of at least some form of international values such as elections and the rule of law. The CCP, he said, “will never take the deviant path of changing the flag and standard [of party orthodoxy].”44 Hu’s message has been repeated by top officials such as NPC Chairman Wu Bangguo and the president of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), Chen Kuiyuan. In March 2011, Wu shocked even Chinese intellectuals by enunciating his “Five No’s” principle, including the fact that the CCP would never “undertake the diversification of [the party’s] guiding principle.”45 In a major article released at about the same time, Chen, as president of CASS, pointed out that the CCP and all Chinese can only follow one principle—Marxism. All CCP members must “believe in Marxism and be resolute Marxists,” he said. “Both the party charter and the Constitution have clearly stipulated that Marxist theory is the theoretical basis of the guiding principle of our party and state,” he said. “Marxism” of course, is an omnibus term that incorporates allied creeds such as Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought, all of which are part of the sacrosanct “four Cardinal Principles.” As Chen said, “We have to study the theoretical system of socialism with Chinese characteristics; we have to

44. “Hu Jintao’s speech at the Meeting Marking the 30th Anniversary of Reform and Opening Up,” China.org.cn, December 18, 2008, www.china.org.cn/archive/2009-05/11/content_17753659. htm. 45. Cited in Michael Bristow, “Chinese leader rules out democracy,” BBC news, March 10, 2011, www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12697997

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synthesize the study of Maxism, Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought.”46 Supremo-in-waiting Xi Jinping (who is the son of former Vice Premier Xi Zhongxun) has also played a sizeable role in the propagation of the yiyuanhua or monolithic approach to ideology. Since becoming President of the CCP Central Party School (CPS) in 2007, he has been stepping up old-style Marxist—and Maoist—indoctrination. For example, at the opening of a CPS semester in April 2011, Xi urged students to “pay attention to the Marxist canons,” especially Mao’s classic writings. “Cadres must seriously study Marxist theory to ensure that they can maintain political resoluteness,” he said. Xi added that since Marxist classics were voluminous, “we should focus on the salient points, and concentrate on studying the quintessence—particularly the important works of Mao Zedong.”47 Indeed, the heir-apparent to Hu likes to sprinkle his homilies to CPS students with Mao’s words of wisdom. Xi’s repeated emphasis on recruiting and grooming neophytes who are “both politically upright and professionally competent” echoes Mao’s dictum on picking officials who are “both red and expert.” While talking about “party construction,” or ways to ensure the ideological purity of CCP cells, Xi noted that the leadership must learn from the “great party-construction engineering project that was successfully pioneered by the First-generation leadership with comrade Mao Zedong as its core.”48 When he was touring the provinces, Xi liked to celebrate “proletariat paragons” first lionized by Chairman Mao. Thus, while inspecting the Daqing Oilfield in Heilongjiang Province in late 2009, the Vice President eulogized the “spirit of the Iron

46. Chen Kuiyuan, “Have faith in Marxism, and become a resolute Marxist,” People’s Daily, April 29, 2011, http://theory.people.com.cn/GB/14513063.html 47. Li Zhangjun, “Xi Jinping talks about attaching importance to classic works during ceremony to mark new semester at the Central Party School,” People’s Daily, May 14, 2011, http://politics. people.com.cn/GB/1024/14635203.html 48. Cited in Xi Jinping, “Looking back and thinking about party construction in the past 30 years of reform,” China.com.cn, September 8, 2008, www.china.com.cn/policy/txt/2008-09/08/ content_16410998.htm

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Man of Daqing,” a reference to the well nigh super-human exploits of Wang Jinxi, the legendary oilfield worker. Xi has also heaped praise on “heroes of the masses” such as the self-sacrificing firefighter Lei Feng and the altruistic county party secretary Jiao Yulu.49 While Hu seldom talks about Maoism, he has been vigorously propagating strait-laced orthodoxy and the uniformity of thought through the campaign of “Sinicizing and Popularizing Marxism.” As far back as 2006, Hu earmarked more than $10 million to set up a new Marxism– Leninism Academy. Its function was to churn out up-to-date—and Sinicized—works of Marxism.50 At a 2010 forum on “promoting popular contemporary Chinese Marxism,” the director of the CCP Propaganda Department, Liu Yunshan, pointed out that cadres should “deeply grasp the laws of Marxist development, and to better arm the entire party—and educate the people—with the theoretical system of Chinese socialism.” “We must take hold of the people through better [use of] the latest fruits of the Sinicization of Marxism,” said Liu, a conservative commissar who often acted as Hu’s spokesman.51 (b) Using Maoism to Attack “Rightist” Intellectuals The Maoist campaign has also constituted a potent attack on efforts by the Party’s much weakened liberal faction—and intellectuals in general—to spread Western or international values. It is not surprising that Wen Dao and Ning Yunhua, both frequent contributors to the leftist Utopia website (wyzxsx.com), the Maoist camp’s main Internet vehicle, thus characterized the changhong campaign: “These red songs, soaked with the bright red

49. Cited in Willy Lam, “The CCP’s disturbing revival of Maoism,” China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Washington, DC, November 19, 2009, www.jamestown.org/programs/chinabrief/ single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=35746&cHash=2097a3de2c 50. Cited in Jane Macartney, “China plans to profit from Marx,” The Times of London, January 3, 2006, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chinalist/message/179 51. Liu Yunshan, “Use the newest products of the Sinicization of Marxism to take hold of the masses,” People’s Daily, March 29, 2010, http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2010-03/29/ content_13265766.htm.

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blood of revolutionary martyrs, are the spiritual medicine people need to free themselves of the poison of Western class society and spiritual opium.”52 The partial restoration of Maoist practices has thrown light on the perennial struggle between crypto-Maoist conservatives and pro-West intellectuals. Take for example, the ferocious ideological battle between a group of liberal intellectuals led by Mao Yushi and Xin Ziling on the one hand, and the New Left, or quasi-Maoists, represented by the Utopia website, on the other. Xin, a rebellious intellectual who had served in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), published his The Fall of the Red Sun in early 2011. The book, which chronicled Mao’s horrendous blunders, is in some ways comparable to the best-selling tome Mao, the Untold Story written by Zhang Rong and Jon Halliday.53 In his review of The Fall of the Red Sun, well known economist Mao Yushi (not related to the Great Helmsman) wrote: “Since [Mao] was not a god, he will be removed from the altar, divested of all the myth that used to shroud him, and receive a just evaluation as an ordinary human being.”54 Peking University’s He Weifang, an internationally famous legal scholar and human rights activist, has thrown his support behind the deMaoification movement. In a series of articles in 2010 and 2011, Professor He pointed out that the “new China” built by Mao “has inherited the trappings of feudalism.” “The unlimited power of the deified leader has exceeded even that of dynastic emperors,” he wrote, adding that “the totalitarian control over the spirit and thoughts was the most classic” example of Maoist tyranny. While talking about the Cultural Revolution,

52. Cited in Wen Dao and Ning Yunhua, “The campaign of singing red songs and targeting the triads has won the people’s hearts,” www.wyzxsx.com, May 8, 2011. 53. Cited in Didi Kirsten Tatlow, “Mao’s Legacy Still Divides China,” New York Times, May 5, 2011, www.nytimes.com/2011/05/06/world/asia/06iht-letter06.html 54. Ibid.; see also Ed Zhang, “Rising resentment at the mass campaign to spread red songs,” South China Morning Post, July 3, 2011, www.scmp.com/portal/site/SCMP/menuitem.2af62ecb329d 3d7733492d9253a0a0a0/?vgnextoid=208f57d4bcae0310VgnVCM100000360a0a0aRCRD&ss =Columns+%26+Insight&s=Opinion

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Professor He indicated that Chinese must raise their guard against recent efforts to revive Mao’s authority. “Chinese ignorance about the Cultural Revolution and efforts by certain political forces to exploit this ignorance has constituted a barrier to the deepening of China’s reform and opening up.”55 Xin and Mao’s call for ending a Mao-style personality cult drove Maoists into a rage. On wyzxsx.com and other conservative forums, Mao Yushi was labeled a “capitalist running dog,” a “cow ghost” and a “snake demon.” One New Left group even collected 10,000 signatures to support its demand that police arrest the liberal economist for alleged subversion and libel.56 While the police and state security apparatus are unlikely to go after opponents of the reinvigoration of Maoist values, the authorities are more than happy to let leftist forces put pressure on progressive intellectuals represented by Mao Yushi and Xin. It is also significant that figures such as Mao Yushi and Xin represent the CCP’s remnant liberal wing—followers of Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang who suffered a devastating blow in the wake of the massacre of June 4, 1989. Fighting the Mao-style personality cult is but part of the liberals’ agenda: their main goal is to introduce internationally recognized political norms, including multiparty politics, and freedom of the media and religion. The outbursts of Mao and Xin were the latest manifestations of a line of thinking that started with such illustrious contemporaries of Hu Yaobang as deputy editor of the People’s Daily, Wang Ruoshui and theorist Li Honglin.57 Wang, author of the much acclaimed The Newly Discovered Mao Zedong, was the first intellectual who dared propose that Mao’s

55. He Weifang, “On the 45th anniversary of the Outbreak of the Cultural Revolution,” He Weifang’s blog, May 16, 2011, www.21ccom.net/articles/lsjd/lsjj/article_2011051735607.html 56. Cited in Kent Ewing, “Mao’s army on the attack,” Asia Times (Hong Kong), June 4, 2011, www.atimes.com/atimes/China/MF04Ad01.html 57. For a discussion of the ideas of Wang Ruishui and his fellow liberals, see, for example, Elisabeth Rosenthal, “Wang Ruoshui, 75, liberal who was shunned in China,” New York Times, January 14, 2002, www.nytimes.com/2002/01/14/obituaries/14WANG.html; also see Bill Brugger, “From ‘Revisionism’ to ‘Alienation,’ from Great Leaps to ‘Third Wave’,” China Quarterly, no. 108 (December 1986): 643–51.

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portrait be removed from the rostrum of Tiananmen Square. In the early days of Deng’s reform, Li gave a vastly influential internal speech entitled “Leaders and the People,” in which the avant-garde theorist castigated the mentality behind Mao worship. “It is not true that the people should be loyal to leaders; leaders should be loyal to the people,” he said.58 Among senior cadres, Premier Wen Jiabao is considered by a sizeable number of intellectuals to be a keen proponent of political reform—as well as international norms. At an article he wrote for Xinhua News Agency in early 2007, Premier Wen openly pressed for the adoption of “pushi jiazhi,”or “universal values.” “Democracy, a [fair] legal system, freedom, human rights, egalitarianism . . . are not unique to capitalism,” Wen indicated. “They are values that all humankind is jointly going after.”59 The premier continued to make propaganda for political reform during his much noted tour of Shenzhen in the summer of 2010. Without the “guarantee” of political reform, Wen said in that Special Economic Zone, “the fruits of the reform of the economic structure may be lost, and it will be impossible to realize the goal of modernization.”60 It is probable that the conservatives were targeting Wen in addition to less prominent figures such as Mao Yushi. (c) Using Maoist Tactics against Dissidents— and the Fast Deterioration of the Rule of Law Gradually but inevitably, China has taken on the traits of a police state. Human rights conditions have deteriorated even as the law enforcement apparatus is committed to “nipping all destabilizing forces in the bud.” In

58. Cited in Li Honglin, Tianya Sanyi (Three Snapshots from My Life) (Hong Kong: Cosmos Books, 2011), p. 73. 59. Cited in Wen Jiabao, “On the several questions relating to the historical tasks of the early stage of socialism and China’s foreign policy,” Xinhua News Agency, February 26, 2007, http://news. xinhuanet.com/politics/2007-02/26/content_5775212.htm 60. Cited in Willy Lam, “Premier Wen’s ‘Southern Tour’: Ideological rifts in the CCP?” China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, September 10, 2010, www.jamestown.org/single/?no_ cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=36809

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the days of Jiang Zemin, the police and state security personnel just locked up dissidents; but in the past few years, they have even incarcerated the spouses and close relatives of public intellectuals such as Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo. And even after a human rights lawyer or NGO activist such as Gao Zhisheng is released, he or she is still subject to either house arrest or round-the-clock surveillance.61 The Hu administration’s determination to emasculate all potential sources of opposition, which include NGOs and the media—was reflected in the budget being allocated for the purpose of “weiwen” or “upholding stability.” In 2012, the NPC approved outlays worth US$111.4 billion for public security departments. By comparison, the PLA budget was only $106.5 billion. This was the second time in a row that weiwen expenditures had exceeded those of the military. Regional weiwen budgets for provinces and cities including Liaoning, Guangdong, Beijing and Suzhou, also went up by an annual average rate of at least 15 percent in the late 2000s.62 Maoism—and Mao’s well recorded penchant for smashing all opposition mercilessly—has provided perhaps the best justification for this scorchedearth policy toward dissent. It was after all the Great Helmsman who instituted the largest-scale pogroms against dissidents and freethinkers— the Anti-Rightist Movement (ARM)—in the 1950s. Deng Xiaoping was a key executor of the ARM crusade.63 It was not surprising that when Deng rolled out the Four Cardinal Principles in the early 1980s to ensure that his economic reform would not spawn bourgeois liberalization, he was again

61. For a discussion of the plight of dissidents such as Gao Zhisheng, see, for example, Andrew Jacobs, “China’s intimidation of dissidents said to persist after prison,” New York Times, February 17, 2011, www.nytimes.com/2011/02/19/world/asia/19china.html?pagewanted=all 62. Cited in “China boosts domestic security budget to face growing unrest,” Mercopress.com, March 6, 2012, http://en.mercopress.com/2012/03/06/china-boosts-domestic-security-budgetto-face-growing-unrest; See also “China internal security spending jumps past army budget,” Reuters, March 5, 2011, http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSTOE72400920110305?ca=rdt 63. For a discussion of Deng’s role in the Anti-Rightist Movement, see, for example, “Bao Tong on the 50th anniversary of the Anti-Rightist Campaign,” Radio Free Asia, June 15, 2007, www. rfaunplugged.org/2007/06/15/bao-tong-on-the-50th-anniversary-of-the-anti-rightist-campaign/

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resorting to the Maoist tactic of imposing “dictatorship of the proletariat” on oppositionists including Wei Jingsheng, Guo Luoji and Liu Bingyan.64 The Hu leadership has in particular taken inspiration from the Maoist tradition of “wufa wutian” (“no law, no heavenly justice”) in hitting out at real and potential enemies of the regime. The years 2007 and 2008 marked a pronounced deterioration of the legal system as the Party’s “zhengfawei,” or Central Commission on Legal and Political Affairs (CCLPA), was given more authority than ever to closely supervise the operations of judges and lawyers. Hu pointed out at a national conference on legal and judicial matters in late 2007 that the foremost task of judges and law enforcement cadres was to “uphold party leadership” and to “serve the party’s interests.” The Party chief also mentioned goals such as “serving the people” and “safeguarding the sanctity of the Constitution and the law;” but these two objectives paled beside that of subserving the CCP.65 In March 2008, Wang Shengjun, a former police officer and CCPLA bureaucrat who does not have a law degree, was appointed President of the Supreme People’s Court, China’s equivalent of Chief Justice. Ridiculed as a “famang” (legal ignoramus) by liberal legal scholars, Wang has used his office to urge the nation’s judges to fulfill political missions such as “promoting stability” and “ensuring social harmony.” Wang also called upon judges to “ensure the correct political direction of the people’s courts” and to rally behind the leadership of the “party central authorities

64. For a discussion of the CCP’s treatment of liberal party members such as Liu Binyan, Wang Ruoshui and Guo Luoji, see, for example, Merle Goldman, Sowing the Seeds of Democracy in China: Political Reform in the Deng Xiaoping Era (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994), pp. 62–112; also see Kalpana Misra, “Deng's China: From Post-Maoism to PostMarxism,” Economic and Political Weekly 33, No. 42/43 (1998): 2740–48, http://web.me.com/ mconway/DPHistory/page1/page13/files/Deng%20and%20China.pdf 65. Cited in Willy Lam, “The Politicization of China’s Law-Enforcement and Judicial Apparatus,” in The Impact of China’s 1989 Tiananmen Massacre, ed. Jean-Philippe Beja, 125–41 (London: Routledge, 2011).

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with comrade Hu Jintao as general secretary.”66 It is interesting that in his talks to judges, Wang often admonished them to “deeply study the ‘two major theoretical systems’ of Mao Zedong Thought and socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Like other senior cadres, the chief justice liked to engage in “red tourism.” While visiting the “revolutionary mecca” of Ruijin, Jiangxi Province, in 2010, Wang praised the contributions of the CCP founders such as Mao, Zhu De and Zhou Enlai. “Ruijin is the cradle of the People’s Republic of China,” he said. “It is also the place of origin for people’s justice, as well as the root of the people’s courts.”67 It is also significant that princeling Bo was subjected to repeated attacks by liberal lawyers and law professors for imposing “rough justice” on Chongqing. In the course of his anti triad campaign, as Party Secretary Bo was said to have put pressure on local judges to expedite convictions. Renowned defense attorney Li Zhuang, who acted for alleged triad boss Gong Gangmo, was convicted by the Chongqing court of perverting the course of justice. This caused such a great uproar in the Chinese legal community that Li was released unconditionally in 2011. The former Chongqing party boss was also accused of harassing residents who did not agree with his crypto-Maoist campaigns. For example, blogger Fang Hong, a 45-year-old retired forestry bureau official, was sent to reformthrough-labor for daring to point out in his microblog that Bo had been manipulating the legal system for political ends in early 2011.68

66. Cited in “Wang Shengjun urges the strong development of superior tradition and the assiduous implementation of scientific development,” Legal Daily, July 1, 2011, http://news.163. com/11/0701/20/77TGR5VK00014AEE.html 67. Cited in “President of the Supreme People’s Court Wang Shengjun inspects Ruijin, Jiangxi Province,” www.sach.gov.cn, August 8, 2010, www.sach.gov.cn/tabid/297/InfoID/25798/ Default.aspx 68. For a discussion of Bo’s lack of respect for the rule of law, see, for example, Kathrin Hille, “Dissent lands Chinese blogger in labor camp,” Financial Times, June 7, 2011, www.ft.com/intl/ cms/s/0/01ff9fa0-9114-11e0-acfd-00144feab49a.html#axzz1XAHnV07W. Also see Willy Lam, “Chongqing’s mafias expose grave woes in China’s legal apparatus,” China Brief, November 4, 2009, www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=35689; Ian Johnson, “Trial in China tests limits of legal system reform,” New York Times, April 20, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/20/world/asia/20china.html?src=me

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How the Maoist Revival Helps Strengthen the Gang of Princelings and the Legitimacy of the “Red Aristocrats” As with most political trends in China, the resuscitation of Maoist norms is intricately related to factional intrigue. Jockeying for position between the two major CCP cliques—the Gang of Princelings and the CYL faction—intensified in the run-up to the 18th CCP Congress. At this critical conclave which took place in 2012, the 14th-generation leadership under President Hu and Premier Wen was due to yield power to the Fifthgeneration leadership, or cadres born in the late 1940s to mid-1950s. As we saw in earlier sections, Bo Xilai and Vice President Xi Jinping, two prominent princelings, were among the most ardent architects of the quasiMaoist renaissance. Implicit in the princelings’ rehoisting of the Maoist flag is a veiled criticism of the policies undertaken by Hu and his CYL faction, which seem to have exacerbated the polarization of rich and poor, and spawned a kind of crass commercialism that runs counter to Maoist spiritual values.69 Much more significantly, the princelings are using the Maoist crusade to lobby for more clout and authority in the polity. The political fortune of the Gang of Princelings suffered quite a blow during the first decade of the Era of Reform. Deng Xiaoping was against allowing too many princelings to monopolize party and government posts. In the early 1980s, Deng reportedly indicated in an internal party meeting that the proportion of taizidang Central Committee members should be limited. Instead of seeking a political career, princelings were encouraged to go into business.70 It was no accident that both of the patriarch’s sons, Deng Pufang and Deng Zhifeng, were successful, if not also controversial businessmen. The same

69. For a discussion of the internecine bickering between the Gang of Princelings and Hu Jintao’s Communist Youth League Faction, see, for example, Qiu Xiaotong, “Bo Xilai’s campaign of hitting the triads and singing red songs has led to a schism within the CCP leadership,” Frontline monthly (Hong Kong), September, 2011. 70. For a discussion of Deng Xiaoping’s views toward the princelings, see, for example, Qin Hui, “On certain questions about the Cultural Revolution,” China-Review.com, January 19, 2011, www.china-review.com/sao.asp?sid=206&id=26597

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goes for the children of Third- and Fourth-generation leaders including Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji, Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao.71 The political careers of many princelings were affected by Deng’s stricture. Bo, for example, did not get into the Central Committee until 2002, even though he had years earlier established himself as a formidable “warlord” in industrialized Liaoning Province. A number of high-profile princelings, including Xi Jinping, Wang Qishan (son-in-law of the late Vice Premier Yao Yilin) and Deng Pufang made it into the Central Committee also at a relatively late stage of their careers. The trio were first elected into the Central Committee in 1997 as alternate, or second-tier and non voting, members. Moreover, Xi got the least—and Deng and Wang respectively the second and seventh lowest—number of votes among the 151 alternate members.72 By the 2000s, however, the princelings had made a strong comeback. Bo’s fairly successful Maoist campaign was widely seen as a Machiavellian maneuver to enable him to secure a slot on the new PBSC that will be established at the 18th Party Congress. Wang, who became Vice Premier in March 2008, was heavily tipped to get into the PBSC at this crucial congress.73 Moreover, the princelings’ clout is particularly pronounced within the PLA. Several dozen major-Generals, lieutenant-Generals and full generals boast distinguished pedigrees. The following princeling generals are considered to have a high chance of making the policy-setting Central

71. For a discussion of the business activities of the taizidang, see, for example, Catherine Tai, “The ‘Princelings’ and China’s Corruption Woes,” Center for International Private Enterprise, August 5, 2009, www.cipe.org/blog/?p=2844; see also Michael Sheridan, “China snaps at its junior princelings,” The Times of London, June 6, 2010, www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2528715/ posts 72. See “List of members and alternate members of the 15th CCP Central Committee,” Xinhua News Agency, July 11, 2008, www.gov.cn/test/2008-07/11/content_1042275.htm 73. For a discussion of the prospects of Bo and the princelings at the Eighteenth CCP Congress, see, for example, Lin Heli, “The political conspiracy behind the changhong campaign,” Apple Daily (Hong Kong), June 23, 2011; Willy Lam, “Heir apparent showing his stripes,” Asia Times, December 22, 2010, www.atimes.com/atimes/china/ll22ad01.html; Kathrin Hille and Jamil Anderlini, “China: Mao and the next generation,” Financial Times, June 2, 2011, www. ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/eb239472-8d48-11e0-bf23-00144feab49a.html#axzz1XAHnV07W.

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Military Commission that will be formed at the 18th Party Congress: Air Force Commander Xu Qiliang, Deputy Chief of the General Staff Ma Xiaotian, General Logistics Department Political Commissar Liu Yuan, Political Commissar of the Second Artillery Corps Zhang Haiyang, and Shenyang Military Region Commander Zhang Youxia.74 “We must develop the ideals and enthusiasm of our forebears; to forget them is tantamount to betrayal.” 記住前輩的理想和熱血，忘記就是背叛。

The princelings are cunningly using the Maoist restitution drive to further exploit their advantages of having an illustrious lineage. After all, as the famous Chinese proverb goes, “He who has won heaven and earth has the right to be their rulers.” This was the basis of the “revolutionary legitimacy” of the First- and Second-generation leadership under Mao and Deng respectively. As the sons and daughters of veterans of the Long March, princelings regard their “revolutionary bloodline” as a prime political resource.75 Thus, while visiting the “revolutionary mecca” of Jinggangshan in Jiangxi Province in 2008, Xi paid homage to the “countless martyrs of the revolution who used their blood and lives to win over this country.” “They laid a strong foundation for the good livelihood [we are enjoying],” he said. “Under no circumstances can we forsake this tradition.”76 Similarly, while marking the National Day on October 1, 2008, Bo urged Chongqing’s cadres “to forever bear in mind the ideals and hot-blooded [devotion] of our elders.” “Forsaking [their revolutionary tradition] is tantamount to betrayal,” Bo instructed.77

74. For a discussion of the princelings in the PLA, see, for example, Willy Lam, “The power of Xi Jinping has become consolidated,” Apple Daily (Hong Kong), August 24, 2011. 75. For a discussion of the rise of cadres with “revolutionary bloodlines,” see, for example, Chen Pokong, “The CCP has elevated a large number of princelings,” www. Chinesepen.org, December 9, 2007, www.chinesepen.org/Article/hyxz/200712/Article_20071209210450.shtml 76. Cited in “Xi Jinping emphasizes the need to develop the villages through reform and innovation, and to strengthen party construction by developing our superior tradition,” CCTV, October 15, 2008, http://tv.people.com.cn/GB/61600/8179126.html 77. “Bo Xilai: We must remember forever the ideals and hot-bloodedness of our elders,” Chongqing Daily, October 2, 2008, http://club.china.com/data/thread/1011/2344/86/22/3_1.html

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It is also not surprising that the military offspring of party elders and Long March-generation generals have since 2010 been a strong force behind the changhong movement. Take, for instance, the high-powered group called the “Singing Troupe of One Hundred Offspring of Generals.” Senior members of the troupe include the sons and daughters of Marshals Chen Ye, Nie Rongjun, Luo Rongheng and He Long, respectively Chen Haosu, Nie Li, Luo Dongjin, and He Xiaoming.78 Owing to the aura of respectability attached to their fathers, these military taizidang feel a sense of pride in singing “revolutionary songs,” many of which were associated with the Great Helmsman. Like their civilian counterparts such as Xi Jinping, military princelings want to play up the symbolic value of their pedigree—and their fitness to play a major role in Chinese military and political affairs.79

Maoist Revival and Hawkish Turn in Foreign Policy Particularly for liberal Chinese academics and thinkers, Mao’s foreign policy consisted largely of a series of misjudgments: the decision to go into the Korean War; the simultaneous confrontation with the American “imperialists” and the Soviet “revisionists:” and the claim to being the leader of the Third World, which meant hefty foreign aid to poor African and Asian countries even as the country was fighting famine and allied problems in the 1950s and the 1960s.80 The Great Helmsman’s diplomatic blunders, however, have all but been forgotten in the ongoing quasi-Maoist renaissance.

78. For a discussion of the activities of the Singing Troupe of 100 Offspring of Generals, see for example, “Offspring of the generals sing red songs; their enthusiasm spreads throughout the land,” Dazhong Daily (Shandong), June 26, 2010, www.dzwww.com/shandong/sdnews/201006/ t20100627_5679023.htm 79. For a discussion of the “military princelings,” see, for example, Lin Heli, “Factors behind Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power,” Apple Daily (Hong Kong), August 24, 2011. 80. For a discussion of Chinese foreign policy under Mao Zedong, see, for example, Chen Zhimin, “Nationalism, Internationalism and Chinese Foreign Policy,” Journal of Contemporary China, 14(42) (2005): 35–53, www.irchina.org/en/pdf/czm2.pdf

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Maoist diplomacy appeals to a new generation of nationalistic academics, officials, generals and fenqing, or “angry young men and women” who routinely spew xenophobic messages on Internet chatrooms. A number of conservative theorists have heaped high praise on the Great Helmsman for the so-called “three major dictums” he put forward in the heady months before October 1, 1949. They were “Setting up a separate stove,” “Put our house in order before inviting guests” and “One-sidedly favoring [the Soviet Union].” According to Zhang Baijia, deputy director of the CCP Research Office of Party History, the first two principles “enabled new China to seize the strategic initiative in foreign affairs” by “banishing the influence and impact of imperialism in China.” The third principle, Zhang said, “enabled China to join the international pacifist camp.”81 Major-General Luo Yuan, who is well known for his hawkish views, praised Mao for daring to confront the “American imperialists” by entering the Korean War in 1950. Mao’s decision, Luo noted, “has served as an inspiration for the Chinese race as well as for all the suppressed peoples in the world.”82 Indeed, popular commentator Luo Zonghua said China’s current leaders should learn from Mao’s “principled stance” against the U.S. despite the threats coming from the “imperialistic” power. “China was poor and resourceless [in the 1950s], yet Mao Zedong never retreated half a step in the fact of American intimidation,” said Luo in an article in the People’s Daily’s popular “Strong Country Forum” entitled “China needs a ‘Mao-style’ hardline policy so as to say ‘no’ to Americans.”83 Mao’s apparent readiness to confront the imperialists has been cited by a host of rightwing opinion makers to discredit Deng Xiaoping’s famous 16-character dictum on diplomacy, which was formulated in the aftermath

81. Cited in Xiong Zhengyan, “The difficult start of China’s foreign policy,” Xinhua News Agency, June 10, 2011, http://news.xinhuanet.com/2011-06/10/c_121515728.htm 82. Cited in “Major-General Luo Yuan: Long live the great spirit of fighting the Americans and Aiding the Koreans,” www.wyzxsx.com, October 6, 2010, http://www.wyzxsx.com/Article/ Class14/201010/186698.html 83. Luo Zonghua, “China needs Mao-style toughness to say no to Americans,” People’s Daily Website, October 18, 2010, http://msn.people.com.cn/GB/170494/12977568.html

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of the massacre of June 4, 1989 to placate the U.S. and the West. The dictum began with “taoguang yanghui” or “assuming a low profile and never taking the lead.”84 However, for Major-General Zhang Zhaozhong, who thinks that “Mao Thought is absolutely correct,” the late Chairman’s pugilistic policies toward the West worked much better than the taoguang yanghui stance.85 Similar attacks against Deng’s “soft” posture were made by Li Qingping, who writes for the New Left Utopia website. Contrasting Deng’s pacifist persuasion with Mao’s “resoluteness,” Li asserted that followers of Deng were like “an ostrich burying its head in the sand.” He contended that taoguang yanghui was a “self-deluding principle that will also fail to trick our enemies.” For Li, a key component of Mao’s military thought was “daring to wage military struggles and daring to claim victories.” Like other ultraradical theorists, Li admired Mao’s insistence that the quality of fighters—not weapons—is the key to victory. He cited this familiar quote from Mao—“We won’t bend even if the entire Mount Tai were to crush us.”86 Li in particular praised Mao’s “gung-ho” approach to tackling the U.S. imperialists and Soviet revisionists: “Throw away your illusions and prepare for war.” Despite the apparent atmosphere of global peace, Li zeroed in on efforts by the U.S. to exacerbate its “anti China containment policy” by trying to coopt countries including Japan, South Korea and Southeast countries that harbor sovereignty disputes with China.87

84. For a discussion of the taoguangyuanghui philosophy, see, for example, General Xiong Guangkai, “China’s Diplomatic Strategy: Implication and Translation of ‘Tao Guang Yang Hui’,” Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs Publications, Beijing, No. 98, Winter 2010, http://www.cpifa.org/en/q/listQuarterlyArticle.do;jsessionid=6417BA6022EF817C1B312F3217 2CA4AF?quarterlyPageNum=18 85. “General Zhang Zhaozhung says: Mao Zedong Thought is Very Correct,” Club.China.com, July 22, 2008, http://bbs.rednet.cn/thread-21359803-1-1.html 86. Li Qingping, “Jettison illusions and prepare for struggle: Use Mao Zedong Thought to defeat American imperialism,” Wyzxsx.com, July 14, 2010, www.wyzxsx.com/Article/ view/201007/165844.html 87. Ibid.

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The name of the Great Helmsman has also been invoked as justification for more resources—human, financial or otherwise—for national defense. This may reflect the fact that, as noted above, the Gang of Princelings in the party-state apparatus are hand-in-glove with the PLA’s “princeling generals.” For example, while former Politburo member Bo has never been a soldier, he has used his changhong campaign to lobby for a largerscale system of mobilizing ordinary citizens at times of national crisis. He pointed out that in order to raise the “defense consciousness” of Chinese, “the priority is to mobilize their thoughts, so that [Chinese] can understand the importance of national-defense mobilization.”88 One way to instill in the Chinese a spirit of patriotism and national defense is to encourage them to participate in changhong. “Half of the red songs are military songs,” Bo said. “These ditties are full of martial spirit, high-spirited, overflowing with righteousness, and [encouraging people] to march forward with bravery.” He called red songs, red classics and mottos “the best embodiment of [the spirit of] national mobilization.” “We must not let the younger generation forget the arduous roads taken by their forebears,” he said. After changhong campaigns, Bo added, “young people will inherit [revolutionary heroes’] ideals and beliefs.”89 Given that his portfolio since elevation to the PBSC in 2007 has been party affairs, Xi has not had many opportunities to express his opinions on military or foreign policies. However, the “crown prince” is a keen supporter of funneling more national resources toward military modernization. Xi is an advocate of Chairman Mao’s theory of “the synthesis between [the requirements of] peacetime and war.”90 This means that civilian sectors should also play a major role in military construction. While being party secretary of Zhejiang from 2002 to 2007, Xi doubled

88. “Bo Xilai discuss[es] national defense while citing the Marxist canon,” Chongqing Daily, July 18, 2010, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64093/64094/12175430.html 89. Ibid. 90. Cited in Willy Lam, “The Military Maneuvers of Xi Jinping,” Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2011, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704698004576103513580674214.html

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as the party secretary of the Zhejiang provincial military district. In a remarkable speech to Zhejiang-based PLA officers in 2007, Xi pointed out that “we must implement [Mao’s] strategic concept of attaining ‘unity between soldiers and civilians,’ and both the army and regional [civilian authorities] should assiduously pool our resources in the preparation for military struggle [against China’s enemies].”91 It is thus not far-fetched to forecast that with Xi at the helm of diplomatic and military policymaking, the country might pursue a more assertive approach to hard-power projection.

Is the Ouster of Bo an Indication of the End of the Maoist Campaign? Things began to fall apart for Bo Xilai before Chinese New Year in January 2012, an intriguing course of events that led to the “suspension” of his Politburo membership in April, the indictment of his wife Gu Kailai for “intentional homicide” in August and Bo’s loss of his party membership in September. Given that Beijing has been reluctant to release critical evidence regarding this mammoth case, the following account has been pieced together from reports from the foreign and Hong Kong press—as well as other credible sources from Beijing. Bo the regional “warlord” began to fall out with one of his closest aides, then Chongqing vice mayor and head of public security Wang Lijun. Wang, known as a “national anti triad hero” for his role in smashing triad gangs, told his boss he was investigating Bo’s wife, the high-powered lawyer Gu Kailai, for possible involvement in the death of British businessman Neil Heywood. Bo was so angry that he relieved Wang of his police duties and instead put the vice mayor in charge

91. Cited in Xi Jinping: “Push forward the good and fast development of the construction of the capacity of the army and the reserves,” People’s Daily, January 8, 2007, http://leaders.people. com.cn/GB/70110/70111/5256386.html

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of higher education and the environment.92 Seeing the writing on the wall, Wang, who is believed to also have been under investigation for corruption offences during the long years that he served in Liaoning Province, tried to seek political asylum at the Chengdu Consulate General on February 6. One day later, Wang emerged from the consulate and was taken to Beijing by senior officials from the Ministry of State Security. At least publicly, Bo seemed unfazed. He attended the annual National People’s Congress which opened on March 5. At an NPC press conference, the princeling admitted that he had made the mistake of “yongrenbucha” or “hiring officials without careful consideration.” But he defended himself against innuendo that his wife and kin were involved in improper economic dealings. On March 15, however, Xinhua announced in a terse statement that Bo had been relieved of his duties as Chongqing party secretary. And on April 10, the party leadership suspended Bo’s Politburo and Central Committee membership on account of “serious discipline violations.” It was clear to all that the political life of Bo was finished. Beijing was even awash with rumors that Bo had tried to hatch a plot against Hu and Xi, who was due to take over the post of Party General Secretary at the Eighteenth CCP Congress.93 The main factor behind Bo’s ouster seemed to be the animosity between the ultra ambitious princeling on the one hand, and Hu and Wen on the other. There was also a bitter power struggle between the Gang of

92. For an account of the Wang Lijun case, see, for example, Chris Buckley and Sui-Lee Wee, “Chinese official takes ‘leave’ in blow to ambitious Bo Xilai,” Reuters, February 8, 2012, www. reuters.com/article/2012/02/08/us-china-official-idUSTRE8170B920120208; Michael Bristow, “Chongqing policeman Wang Lijun mystery deepens,” BBC news, February 9, 2012, www.bbc. co.uk/news/world-asia-china-16958981 93. For an account of the myriad charges levied against the Bos, see, for example, Sharon LaFraniere and John F. Burns, “Briton’s wanderings led him to heart of a Chinese scandal,” New York Times, April 11, 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/04/12/world/asia/bo-xilai-scandaland-the-mysterious-neil-heywood.html?pagewanted=all; for a description of the business operations of the Bos, see, for example, Jeremy Page, Brian Spegele and Steve Eder, “‘Jackie Kennedy of China’ at center of political drama,” Wall Street Journal, April 8, 2012, http:// online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303299604577327472813686432.html?mod=WSJ_ hp_us_mostpop_read

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Princelings and the CYL faction. Of the nine PBSC members, only Hu has not visited Chongqing since Bo was transferred there in late 2007. Premier Wen was briefly in the metropolis in December 2008—mainly to assess the impact of the global financial crisis on western China. But he said nothing about the anti triad or the changhong movements that Bo had just launched.94 As we saw in the above sections, while there were major differences between the philosophies and ideology of Bo and Wen, Bo’s crypto-Maoist ideals and statecraft were not significantly different from those of either Hu or other BPSC members such as Xi Jinping, Li Changchun or Zhou Yongkang. It thus seems evident that Bo’s disgrace will not necessarily mean the end of either the “Chongqing model” or the Maoism movement. It is true that at Wen’s penultimate NPC international press conference just one day before Bo’s dismissal as Chongqing chief, the liberal premier indirectly criticized Bo by warning against “a return of the Cultural Revolution.” In his meeting with veteran Hong Kong-based NPC member Wu Kangmin in 2011, Wen also decried the possible resuscitation of “the remnant poison” of the Cultural Revolution.95 Immediately after Bo’s downfall, there were signs that the party leadership was reining in the crypto-Maoist excesses associated with Bo and the Chongqing model. For example, several websites that used to sing the praises of Bo’s ideas— wyzxzx.com and Redflag.net—were closed down for “maintenance.” Yang Fan, an economics and politics professor at the China University of Politics and Law who had eulogized the Chongqing model, said he would have to

94. For a discussion of Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao’s views on Bo and his Chongqing experiments, see, for example, Willy Lam, “Hu Jintao draws blood with the Wang Lijun scandal,” China Brief, March 2, 2012, www.jamestown.org/programs/chinabrief/single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_ news%5D=39092&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=25&cHash=4c9b60e4f8bf8dd6bc9f171a1e2a 5e8c; see also “Premier Wen Jiabao inspects Chongqing,” People’s Daily, November 23, 2008, http://paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/2008-12/23/nw.D110000renmrb_20081223_9-02.htm 95. For a description of Wen’s attitude toward the Chongqing affair and the Cultural Revolution, see, for example, Jamil Anderlini, “Wen lays ground for Tiananmen healing,” Financial Times, March 20, 2011, www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/13c6fcb2-7285-11e1-9be9-00144feab49a. html?ftcamp=published_links/rss/home_uk/feed//product#axzz1prUo5XIv

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take a second look at the track record of Bo and his associates. There was also speculation that Wen had taken advantage of Bo’s political demise to push for his longtime goal of changing the official verdict of the 1989 prodemocracy student movement.96 However, it was evident that the bulk of the political maneuvers and ideological campaigns undertaken by the Hu leadership in the wake of the Wang Lijun and Bo Xilai incidents were geared toward upholding stability and political conformism among civilian and military officials. Apart from the Mao-oriented websites, dozens of liberal blogs and websites were also put out of action. Several netizens were arrested for “spreading rumors” on the information superhighways. Cyberpolice departments also launched a nationwide campaign to clear the Internet of criminal and politically incorrect elements. The treatment of dissidents and human rights activists including Ai Weiwei, Gao Zhisheng and Chen Guangcheng remained extremely harsh. Chen was forced to seek refuge in the American Embassy in Beijing in late April, after which he was allowed to leave for the U.S.97 A number of Chinese intellectuals saw Bo’s political demise as a vindication of Premier Wen’s advocacy of reform—and a possible harbinger of some form of political loosening up to come in 2013. For example, Wang Kang, a Chongqing-based scholar and documentary filmmaker, said that, “Bo’s ouster marks a turning point in China’s history and gives China an opportunity.” Yet Wang was clear-headed enough to note that the victory scored by the likes of Wen was “still very fragile.” Other intellectuals are less sanguine about what Bo’s fall may portend. For example, Wu Si, a

96. See Shi Jiangtao, “Maoist sites closed over Bo support,” South China Morning Post, April 7, 2012, www.scmp.com/portal/site/SCMP/menuitem.2af62ecb329d3d7733492d9253a0a0a0/?v gnextoid=f173002d0f786310VgnVCM100000360a0a0aRCRD&ss=China&s=News; Author’s telephone interview with Yang Fang, April 8, 2012. 97. For a discussion of new constraints put on the Internet, see, for example, Josh Chin and Brian Spegele, “China reins in Bo Xilai chatter online,” Wall Street Journal, http://online.wsj. com/article/SB10001424052702303812904577295462500007558.html. For a discussion of China’s treatment of dissidents in recent months, see, for example, Chris Buckley, “China parliament unveils dissident detention powers,” Reuters, March 8, 2012, www.reuters.com/ article/2012/03/08/us-china-npc-law-idUSBRE8270BP20120308

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famous public intellectual associated with the liberal journal Yanhuang Chunqiu, told foreign media he was disappointed that the Bo incident had not resulted in any policy liberalization. “On first look, I think it’s a good thing,” Wu said with reference to the impact of Bo’s downfall on political developments. “But on second look, I think, not necessarily.”98 Actually, the loyalty drives implemented after Bo’s ouster seemed to tally more with the Maoist ideal of the yiyantang or “one voice chamber” rather than political reforms advocated by the likes of Premier Wen. Emblematic of these calls for uniformity of thinking and unquestioned loyalty to the party leadership was the Campaign to Learn from Lei Feng that was organized in different provinces and PLA units.99 “Proletariat paragon” Lei Feng was lionized by Mao Zedong in the 1950s for his unreserved fealty to the Party central authorities. For example, in a speech marking the Learn from Lei Feng Campaign in Hunan Province, Party Secretary Zhou Qiang pointed out that “the Lei Feng spirit has clear-cut contemporary traits.” “The Lei Feng spirit will never become obsolete; it is eternal in nature,” said Zhou, a notable 16th-generation tuanpai politician who is rumored to be a post 18th Congress candidate for the post of Chongqing party boss.100 PLA units at headquarters and regional levels underwent a propaganda exercise entitled “We must inherit Lei Feng’s gun.” According to CMC Vice Chairman General Xu Caihou, CMC Chairman Hu instructed officers “to push forward the Lei Feng spirit with a strong sense of political

98. Cited in Michael Wines, “A populist’s downfall exposes ideological divisions in China’s ruling party,” New York Times, April 4, 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/04/07/world/asia/bo-xilaisouster-exposes-chinese-fault-lines.html; Keith Richburg, “With Bo Xilai’s ouster, China’s premier pushes more reform,” Washington Post, April 27, 2012, www.washingtonpost.com/ world/with-bo-xilais-ouster-chinas-premier-pushes-reform/2012/04/26/gIQAvhoCkT_story. html 99. For a description of a typical Lei Feng spiritual campaign, see, for example, Feng Chunmei, “Going along with the spirit of Lei Feng,” People’s Daily, March 22, 2012, http://military. people.com.cn/GB/17453870.html 100. Cited in “Zhou Qiang: The core of the Lei Feng spirit will never be obsolete,” Human Daily, February 15, 2012, http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2012-02/17/c_122718804. htm?prolongation=1

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responsibility and a high degree of self-consciousness.”101 One week after Bo’s disgrace, the Liberation Army Daily ran a commentary entitled “Opposing and Getting Rid of Liberalism.” It cited Mao Zedong’s article “In Opposition to Liberalism,” which was written 75 years ago. The Great Helmsman pointed out at the time that “liberalism within the collective organs of the revolution is very detrimental” because this would foster problems such as “weak organization” and “divergence of views.”102 The new line on political rectitude and conformism was laid down by Politburo member and CCP Organization Chief Li Yuanchao. In the wake of the Bo scandal, Li asked officials to “seriously implement all regulations regarding clean government and discipline.” “Cadres must under all circumstances be able to uphold their sense of morality, maintain good behavior, and not succumb to corruption,” Li warned. Li added on another occasion that in picking cadres for senior positions, the Organization Department “must first scrutinize their political standpoint … and political morality.”103 In other words, what matters most is a cadre’s total obeisance to instructions from on high. A similar note was struck by Xi Jinping in a long article in the Party’s theoretical journal Seeking Truth. The “crown prince” called upon officials to “safeguard the purity of the party.” “We must resolutely stop and combat any wrong political tendencies that veer from the party’s basic lines,” he indicated. “Leading cadres must resolutely uphold the party’s principles, charter, goals and policies.”104 There seems little doubt that these homilies were issued to rein in centrifugal tendencies that were exposed by the Bo Xilai affair.

101. Cited in “Senior PLA officers issue the demand of ‘taking over the gun of Lei Feng’,” Wen Wei Po (Hong Kong), March 18, 2012, http://news.wenweipo.com/2012/03/18/IN1203180002.htm 102. Cited in, “Countering and abolishing liberalism,” Liberation Army Daily, March 21, 2012. 103. Cited in “Li Yuanchao: Selecting virtuous cadres should first examine their political standpoint,” Wen Wei Po (Hong Kong), April 6, 2012. http://news.wenweipo.com/2012/04/06/ IN1204060006.htm 104. Cited in “Xi Jinping talks about upholding the party’s purity,” Seeking Truth (Beijing journal), March 16, 2012, http://china.huanqiu.com/roll/2012-03/2528962.html

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The powers-that-be, then, did not seem to realize that the Bo affair— including rumors that he was contemplating the moral equivalent of a coup d’état against the Hu–Wen leadership—was a testimony of the Maoist elements in CCP politics, particularly the rule of personality. It seems clear that the only way to prevent a recurrence of the Bo disaster—as well as the Cultural Revolution—was to press ahead boldly with real political reform. It is therefore unfortunate that the reaction of the Hu leadership was to put an even tighter squeeze on liberalization, including the possibility of a higher degree of free thinking among cadres and intellectuals.

Conclusion: Preserving the Status Quo at All Costs For many intellectuals, changhong and other manifestations of the Maoist resurgence are a contradiction in terms. As He Bing, a top law professor at the China University of Political Science and Law, put it: “In this absurd time, they encourage you to sing revolutionary songs, but they do not encourage you to wage a revolution.” For Renmin University political scientist Zhang Ming, the ditties featured in changhong performances could at most be called “pink songs.” “Red songs are mostly about revolution and violence,” he said. “Now they only use red songs to praise the party and the party members; so it’s pointless.”105 Indeed, the Maoist revival says much about the CCP’s top priority of preserving the status quo, especially, its status as “perennial ruling party.” Beijing’s nervousness about the loss of “yiyuanhua”—or “monolithic”— control over ideology and politics is fully reflected by the authorities’ elaborate studies of the reasons behind the fall of the USSR and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Most mainstream theorists attribute the CPSU’s demise to Soviet leaders’ failure to preserve “purity of thought” by sticking to Marxism and Stalinism. Senior ideolog Zhang

105. Cited in Edward Wong, “Repackaging the revolutionary classics of China,” New York Times, June 29, 2011, www.nytimes.com/2011/06/30/world/asia/30redsong.html?pagewanted=all

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Quanjing said it well when he put the blame of the CPSU’s collapse on deStalinization. “The first major reason behind the death of the CPSU is the negation of its leadership and negation of party history,” he said. Turning to China, Zhang indicated: “Since the era of reform, the West has sped up the pace of westernizing and dividing up China. One of their main methods is to besmirch and vilify Mao Zedong.”106 In the same vein, CASS Vice President Li Shenming pointed out that the dissolution of the USSR stemmed from Soviet leaders’ “getting away from and eventual betrayal of Marxism and socialism.”107 Moreover, Li asserted, the Soviet state security apparatus failed to put the lid on dissent. The ideolog pointed to three forces as playing a pivotal role in chipping away at the CPSU’s authority; underground publications, dissidents and NGOs.108 As discussed above, the resuscitation of Maoist practices has served the purpose of promoting the uniformity of thought—and weeding out dissidents as well as bourgeoisliberal intellectuals and organizations. While it is not the purpose of this chapter to discuss China’s future policies, it is probable that the obsession of the Hu Jintao—and Xi Jinping—leadership with preserving the CCP’s monopoly on power could leave them ill-disposed and ill-equipped to rekindle those economic, administrative and political reforms that have been put on the back burner for the past couple of decades. As pointed out above, Xi, who will be the PBSC member in charge of the CCP’s overall ideological orientation, is a firm believer in the relevance and viability of Maoist thinking. Internationally, the financial and debt problems encountered by the U.S. and the E.U.—and China’s “white knight” role in purchasing American and European bonds—will render the CCP even more confident of its longstanding policy of upholding one-party authoritarian rule. Pressure from

106. Zhang Quanjing, “We must unswervingly continue to uphold Mao Thought.” 107. Cited in Li Shenming, “The fundamental reason of the break-up of the Soviet Union is the degeneration of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,” People’s Daily, March 25, 2011, http://theory.people.com.cn/GB/14239005.html 108. Cited in Li Shenming, “Lessons from ideological work in the Soviet Union,” Global Times, August 29, 2011, http://opinion.huanqiu.com/roll/2011-08/1954412.html

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abroad regarding the CCP’s human rights and related abuses is also set to decrease. The possibilities are reasonably high that, Bo Xilai’s downfall notwithstanding, much of the restitution of Maoist norms will continue into the Xi Jinping era. While a kind of spring of democracy has swept large swathes of the Middle East and North Africa from early 2011, the Middle Kingdom seems destined to be shrouded in deep winter for the foreseeable future.

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5 Repackaging Mao in Times of Uncertainty Ben XU Professor, Department of English St. Mary’s College of California

To the Communist government in China today Mao is still serving as a foundation of the legitimacy of the regime. The current regime is a continuation of the Mao regime. Mao was the first-generation leader, Deng the second generation, Jiang the third, Hu the fourth, and so on. The legitimacy of the regime is like that of a political dynasty. The Mao regime, as any other regime, consists of two aspects; political system and social culture. Under the Mao regime these two aspects were integrated. Mao provided three distinctive features to his regime, namely; class struggle, socialism, and a single-party system. These three were the characterizing features of both the political system and the social culture when Mao was alive. These three features were combined and expressed in the ideology of Communism. The current regime has lost the distinctive features of the Mao era regime. It has also lost the confidence in legitimacy and the appeal of the Mao regime. Its political system and social culture have been disassociated from each other and this has affected and transformed all the three characterizing features of the Mao regime.

What is a Regime and the Regime in China? Broadly speaking, a regime indicates a form of government. The regime is defined by how people are governed and how public offices are distributed

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by election, by birth, by party affiliation, by outstanding personal qualities and achievements, and what constitutes people’s rights and responsibilities. Regime is also known as constitution (politeia). According to Aristotle, the most important task for nation builders, in the role of lawgivers (nomothetês), is to frame the appropriate constitution for the city-state. This involves enduring laws, customs, and institutions (including a system of moral education) for the citizens. Aristotle defines the regime as “a certain ordering of the inhabitants of the city-state.”1 He also speaks of the regime as “the form of the compound” and argues that whether the community is the same over time depends on whether it has the same constitution.2 The regime is not a written document, but an immanent organizing principle, analogous to the soul of an organism. Hence, the regime is also “the way of life” of the citizens.3 The regime is that which gives form (eidos) to the particular political community. The particular form of a regime will by definition imply a different telos or end, which that regime will hold as its authoritative way of life, which leads in turn to its understanding of justice. The form of a regime allows an access to the telos of the regime. Therefore, different regimes will have different forms and, because of different forms, they will have differing ends. The political world, however, does not present itself as simply an infinite variety of different shapes. It is structured and ordered into a few basic regime types. Aristotle divides regimes into three basic types according to whether it is ruled by one, a few, or many (or as more common, some mixture or combination of these three ruling powers). These may be labeled tyranny, oligarchy, and democracy, respectively. It seems that we do not yet have agreement on how to understand the Chinese regime. Is it totalitarian, one-party dictatorship, socialism of Chinese character, or whatever? Just to mention a few terms we are familiar with. I think the one we would most probably

1. Aristotle, Politics, III.1.1274b32-41. 2. Aristotle, Politics, III.3.1276b1–11. 3. Aristotle, Politics, IV.11.1295a40-b1, VII.8.1328b1-2.

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agree on is “One-Party rule” or “single-party dictatorship,” which I will come back to later. Although we need a general name to call a regime, the regime is always something particular. It stands in a relation of opposition to other regime types, and as a consequence, the possibility of conflict, tension and war is built into the very structure of politics. The Chinese regime, for instance, is hostile to democracy, often labeling it as the “Western democracy.” The regime is now also marked by a strained relationship between the Partystate and the people. Regimes are necessarily partisan, that is to say they instill certain loyalties and passions. In Mao’s times, the politically correct loyalty and passion were articulated through the so-called “class struggle.” With the demise of the rhetoric of class struggle, nationalism has replaced it and become prevailing and often fiercely expressed passion of loyalty in China. Fierce loyalty or partisanship is inseparable from the character of regime politics. These passionate attachments are not merely something that takes place between different regimes, but also within them, as different parties and groups with loyalties and attachments contend for power, for honor, and for interest. Henry Adams once cynically reflected that politics is simply the “organization of hatreds” and this may apply very well to Mao’s use of class struggle and the struggles of two lines within the Party. The current regime emphasizes social harmony and stability. It attempts to rechannel and redirect inner-social hatreds and animosities towards something like a social good common to the whole nation. This raises the question whether it is possible in China to transform politics, to replace enmity and factional conflict with friendship, to replace conflict with harmony, given the political system that breeds huge disparity between the privileged and underprivileged, the powerful and the powerless, the rich and the poor. Nationalism is helpful to such a transformation of politics in China. It helps redirect internal tensions and conflicts toward external threats and enmity. The popularity of “say no” books seems to indicate that the use of nationalism has been quite successful. “Say no” books are represented by China Can Say No, a nonfiction bestseller by a group of

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writers, expressing Chinese nationalism strongly.4 As Peter Hays Gries observes in his study of Chinese nationalism, the “say no” nationalism is both useful and threatening to the Party state, “The Party first praised China Can Say No as ‘fully reflecting popular opinion’, but then criticized the book as ‘irresponsible’ interference with the State’s conducting of foreign policy.” “Say no” books articulate the “say no sensation” of China’s popular nationalism. “The ‘say no’ sensation,” writes Gries, “involved a complex interplay between Party and popular actors. The Chinese state sought to use ‘say no’ nationalists, but ‘say no’ authors also use the Chinese state.”5 It is nationalism that provides a rare opportunity for the state and popular sensation to join force. A regime is more than simply a set of formal structures and institutions. It consists of the entire way of life, the moral and religious practices, the habits, customs, and sentiments that make a people what they are. The regime constitutes an ethos, that is to say a distinctive character that nurtures distinctive human types. Every regime shapes a common character, a common character type with distinctive traits and qualities. The study of regime politics in China is thus in part a study of its distinctive national character traits that constitute a citizen body. What does the Chinese society find most praiseworthy, what does it look up to? When we raise this kind of questions regarding the Chinese people, the picture becomes much less clear and much murkier than Tocqueville’s observation of people in America. Why? This is because it is hard to tell what people really think when they are not allowed to speak their minds openly. As Havel would say, if people live in lies and are led by lies, lying could become a way of life for them. This is one of the worst kinds of corruption that can happen to a people. All kinds of cheatings and deceptions are rampant in China and many of them can be traced back to

4. Zhang Zangzang, Zhang Xiaobo, Song Qiang, Tang Zhengyu, Qiao Bian and Gu Qingsheng, China Can Say No. Zhonghua gongshang lianhe chubanshe, 1996. 5. Peter Hays Gries, China's New Nationalism: Pride, Politics, and Diplomacy. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004, p. 125.

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the corruption of the regime. It consists of the entire way of life, the moral degradation that penetrates into the habits, customs, and sentiments that make a people what they are. Thus it is accurate to say that a regime that often resorts to lies is responsible for a degraded and corrupted national character. This is the socio-cultural aspect of the Chinese regime. In today’s China many people are unhappy with the regime’s corruption. However, as is typical of people with no political freedom, their unhappiness is expressed in moral rather than political terms. Their anger, frustration, and condemnation of the widespread corruption and moral degeneration have turned many of them into easy prey to the propaganda of “Praise the Red and crack down on the Black,” which is steeped in Maoreferences. Not everyone believes that “Praise the Red and crack down on the Black” is the remedy for China’s diseased regime. There is a rising demand for political reform, which has recently been echoed by Premier Wen Jiabao. His cautious call for political reform reflects a serious concern for regime legitimacy and the uncertainty widely felt about legitimacy in China. People do not all demand political reform for the same purpose; while some want to change it completely, others want to save it. Uncertainty about the regime’s legitimacy has caused sectarian conflicts in society as well as tensions among intellectuals, who have been divided into the neo-leftists and the liberals.

Mao’s Relevance to the Features of Today’s Regime Any discussion of the institutional and socio-political culture in China cannot avoid questions such as: How was the regime founded? What brought it into being and sustained it over time? These are questions about regimes in general. For thinkers like Tocqueville, for example, regimes are embedded in the deep structures of human history that have determined over long centuries the shape of political institutions and the way people think about them. Yet other voices within the tradition—Plato, Machiavelli, Rousseau come to mind—believed that regimes can be self-consciously

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founded through deliberate acts of great statesmen or founding fathers as we might call them. These statesmen—Machiavelli for example referred to Romulus, Moses, Cyrus—are the founders that can never be replaced in history. We might think of men like Washington, Jefferson, Adams and the like as shapers of the people and institutions in America. We might also think of men like Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. In China the Communist regime was founded by Mao; nobody can replace Mao as a regime founder. This has remained the same for the past four decades after Mao died in 1976 and has since warranted the continuity of Maoist single-party dictatorship. As a regime founder, Mao is still essential to the regime in China today. When we consider any possible regime change in China in the future, we have to answer the basic question about the founding of political institutions: are they created, as Alexander Hamilton puts it, by “reflection and choice,” that is to say by a deliberate act of statecraft and conscious human intelligence, or are regimes always the product of accident, circumstance, custom, and history? In China the political institutions were founded along with the historical establishment of Mao’s paramount leadership. It is still known as the Mao-style Communism just as when he was alive. The Mao-style Communist theory and practice have been replaced by new ruling tactics of a totalitarian regime, for which we do not yet have a name. We can try to understand the new regime features and Mao’s relevance to it from the perspective of its legitimacy crisis and uncertainty, raising questions such as: is Communism (Maoism) now irrevocably discredited and discarded as an ideology? If not, how much of it is or can be rescued and how? If so, what ideological convictions and commitments, if any, will replace it in the hearts and minds of the people? The answers to these questions are of crucial importance for anticipating future developments that will affect the lives of people in China and China’s role in world affairs. Of the three charactering features of the Mao regime—class struggle, socialism, and one-party rule—only class struggle has been abandoned. However, it is replaced not by a new belief in democracy, but rather by

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new variations of the old rhetoric of single-party dictatorship, such as “three representatives” and “social harmony.” These new slogans put emphasis on the common good rather than what is good only for the proletariat or the working class. However, even with the demise of the class struggle, the siege mentality and the deep-rooted hatred of “the other” have not died away. The constant need to overcome and get rid of the “enemy” is rechanneled into nationalism with Chinese characters, which has great influence on the mass culture and the neo-left academics, who produce “say no” books and defend both the socialism and the party-state system inherited from the Mao era. Socialism, or socialism with a Chinese character, as it is called in China, is now credited to Deng Xiaoping as his ingenious creation. Inheriting a country fraught with social and institutional woes resulting from the Cultural Revolution and other mass political movements of the Mao era, Deng became the core of the “second generation” of Chinese leadership. He is considered the architect of a new brand of socialist thinking, having developed Socialism with a Chinese character and led Chinese economic reform through a synthesis of theories that became known as the “socialist market economy.” Deng opened China to foreign investment and the global market and limited private competition. He is generally credited with developing China into one of the fastest growing economies in the world for over thirty years and raising the standard of living of the people. Such an understanding of socialism with a Chinese character is superficial and not very helpful to understand the importance of “socialism” as a ruling instrument to the regime in China. Socialism means many other things besides a mere economic system. It means everything that can be included in the socio-cultural aspect of a good regime (such as fairness and justice, moral aspiration, and a strong sense of the common good) and good social norms and ethics (such as altruism, solidarity, selflessness, collectivism and serving the people). It is these characteristics of socialism that are essential for the belief that socialism is superior to capitalism. As an economic system, socialism does not justify itself only with faster economic development or greater wealth compared with other economic

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systems. Its justification is based on the belief that it is the foundation of a moral and good society—hence the slogan, “We prefer the socialist grass to the capitalist rice” (寧要社會主義的草，不要資本主義的苗). In the Mao era, the propaganda said that it was better to be poor under socialism than to be rich under capitalism and most people seemed to think that way too. Socialism as a component of regime ideology is essential to the legitimacy of the one-party rule which is the hard core of Maoism and remains so today. Under Mao, socialism and one-party rule were combined to maintain centralized political and economic powers and ensure total social control. This facilitated the penetration of Party ideology into and actual control over every area of social and cultural life, including entertainment, private life, consumption, and consumer culture. Today, socialism has lost control of consumption and consumer culture. It is also tainted by the poorly regulated market economy and a new class of “red capitalists.” The socialist morality the country was once proud of (as an advantage over capitalism) is heavily polluted by widespread corruption and moral decay. Socialism can no longer prove its moral superiority over capitalism. However, socialism is still a useful support to China’s regime legitimacy because Chinese socialism seems to have fared better than capitalism in times of global economic woes since 2008. It has been repeatedly argued by the Chinese government and the neo-left intellectuals that socialism with a Chinese character would not be possible if it were not chosen and maintained by a strong one-party rule. They credit the Communist Party with the rare wisdom to choose the only correct system for China. Therefore the one-party system must be maintained at any cost. However, many people in China are not convinced or impressed by the “economic success” of socialism with a Chinese character. They are not happy with the cost of widespread corruption and moral degeneration. This has caused the crisis of legitimacy and uncertainty about the future. However, most of those who are unsatisfied with the status quo cannot envision an alternative to it. With the road to democracy blocked by political stagnation, Mao has become their source of inspiration. The myth of better days in the Mao era has galvanized people across generations,

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including both those who had direct experiences in the Cultural Revolution and those who have not. It has fuelled the Mao worship and deification in many places. In Mianyan, Sichuan Province, for example, there is a Mao Zedong Temple. The couplets at the entrance read: “打天下，坐天下，人 人都很擁護他(Fighting for and establishing the new world, he is supported by all the people.)；打江山，坐江山，全國人民都喜歡(Fighting for and creating the new nation, he is loved by all the people)。” and above that, “真龍天子天下為公毛主席萬歲”(A real dragon, the world belongs to all the people, long live Chairman Mao) (www.uchinavisa.com/chinese-beliefs. html). This kind of personality cult and worship have turned Mao into a mythical and god-like figure immune to any political criticism. Of the three components of the Mao-style regime, class struggle has been abandoned, socialism has been tainted and discredited, and the only element that seems to remain intact is the single-party rule. It is unrealistic to expect fundamental reform of this single-party system in China today. It is still a taboo to touch on this essential part of the regime. However, dissatisfaction with the abuse of institutional power as well as widespread corruption and moral degeneration has motivated demand for institutional reform, including subtle criticism of the Party’s unyielding monopoly on power.

The Limitation of Uses of Mao Today We can understand the limitation of uses of Mao today also by looking at the three components separately. First of all, it is very hard, if not impossible, to revive class struggle, which was the essential component of Mao regime and the Maoist revolution ideology. The theory of class struggle is the foundation of the Communist revolution. According to this theory, the lot of the working class can only be changed by revolutionary methods and this accounts for the communist ideal of overthrowing the entire capitalist system by abolishing private property. If Mao’s theory of revolution is to be revived, who will become the target of the revolution? Whose private property will be confiscated and who will be deprived of it

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by the next revolution? Secondly, Mao’s socialism once served as a model of moral puritanism. The moral purity of the Mao era was inseparable from scarcity of the material goods which even moral puritans today are unwilling to dispense with. In this gilded age of money worship and consumer materialism, it is hard to imagine that people would want to go back to Mao’s time of material scarcity. China is still in a period of rapid economic growth and technological and social transformation. However, the current era is marked by ostentatious display, crass manners, corruption, and shoddy ethics. The use of Mao to purify people’s spirit and uplift their revolutionary morale was dramatized in what Bo Xilai tried to accomplish in Chongqing. Apart from welfare programs, he sported an elaborate image of going back to the classics, sending quotes from Mao in SMS messages to city residents and encouraging people to sing political songs. However, what strikes most people now is the quirkiness of Bo’s “New Left” politics. The scandal of Bo and his wife suggests a Party elite that is increasingly removed from those it governs, a mafia-like clutch of political families who have enriched themselves through political and social privileges. This leads to the loss of credibility of the Party, which weakens the third component of the regime—the single-party rule. The corruption within the Party threatens to feed dissatisfaction with the Communist regime and cynicism about its hypocrisy. The corruption happens within the Party and the political system of which Mao was the founding father. That could make him the source of the “original sin,” in particular with more and more revelation of Mao’s own privileges and corruption of absolute power. The single-party rule is claimed as the sure guarantee of social stability and economic prosperity in China. Like socialism, the single-party system is never justification in itself, but serves as something absolutely necessary to the common good for all the people in China. The first part of the socalled “Little Red Book,” quotations from Chairman Mao Tsetung, is about “The Communist Party,” which remains the cornerstone of the current regime ideology. The first quotation in that Maoist “Bible” is, “The force at the core leading our cause forward is the Chinese Communist

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Party. The theoretical basis guiding our thinking is Marxism-Leninism.” Several other parts of the little red book are applications of this key tenet, such as “The People’s Army,” “Leadership of Party Committee,” “The Mass Line,” “Political Work,” “Communists,” and “Cadres.” “Our principle is that the Party commands the gun, and the gun must never be allowed to command the Party.” All this, at least in rhetoric, will remain unchanged in the near future. However, all these tenets have been tainted and discredited by their contradiction to people’s empirical experience. For example, the Tiananmen incident of 1989 has rendered it questionable that the Party’s army is the people’s army. “Maintaining stability” by violent means contradicts Mao’s principle of the Party relying on the people and believing in the masses. As a 2010 report from Tsinghua University pointed out, the economic and popularity costs of maintaining stability by all means are high. Also, the downfall of the “working people” has strained the relationship between the Party and the people. According to the ideology of the Communist Party, socialism and communism are the systems in which the working class is the ruling class. What is there to support this cardinal tenet of the Communist theory? What empirical facts point to the rule of the working class under China’s “socialist regime?” Workers work for low salaries, with scarcely any protection of job security, welfare or working environment, and no rights to form labor unions. They are extremely vulnerable to the exploitation of the capitalists. The life situations of peasants are even worse. The Party was founded on principles of moral idealism and voluntarism. The widespread corruption is institutionalized and cannot be changed by Mao’s voluntarism. Mao would have seen such corruption as embedded in capitalism and would never expect to see such widespread corruption in his socialist country or in his Party. None of his doctrines can answer the question of what can be done about the entrenched corruption within the Party and in the ranks of its officials. The systematic corruption among officials reflects the ineffective functioning of the Party apparatus. By carefully selecting cadres who will faithfully follow the Party line, the Party discourages bold and dynamic leadership. Sooner or later it winnows

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such men out, replacing them with cautious, gray record keepers and characterless officeholders. It slows down the making of decisions and leads sometimes to a near paralysis of the decision-making process, which in certain situations can produce disastrous consequences. It is a structural paradox of total control of power that it has total control of the executive apparatus and at the same time it is unable to control the officials closely enough to keep them from corruption. The Party’s efforts to fight corruption are met with skepticism from the people. Mass campaigns featuring anti-corruption slogans, moral exhortations, and prominently-displayed cases of evildoing, are still central to official policy, much as they were in the 1950s. From time to time these crusades are backed up by well publicized prison terms for major offenders, or even executions. Rules and values applying to business and bureaucratic conduct are changing, contradictory, and deeply politicized. Sustained and sophisticated monitoring of economic and administrative practices are the exception. In many other countries, independent trade and professional associations help limit corruption by promoting codes of ethics and imposing limited penalties quickly and on lower burdens of proof than are required in courts of law, while watchdog groups in civil society apply significant social sanctions. In China, these do not exist. Party disciplinary bodies and prosecutorial agencies produce impressive statistics on corruption complaints received from citizens, and on cases investigated and adjudicated. But few Chinese citizens or external observers believe corruption is being systematically addressed in ways that reflect its growing scope and complexity, much less being brought under control.6

Conclusion Repackaging Mao as a tactic of delaying or averting democratic reform may serve the short-term purpose of disguising the poverty of legitimacy,

6. Michael Johnston, “Corruption in China: Old Ways, New Realities and a Troubled Future.” unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/apcity/unpan024539.pdf.

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but China simply cannot move forward by going back. The Mao era serves more as a symbol rather than a blueprint of what the country can be in the future. The existing regime in China thus faces difficult choices. Current anticorruption strategies are ineffective. A return to the pre-reform economy or Mao-style voluntarism is impossible, and would not eradicate corruption in any event. Truly comprehensive political and regime reform, instituting something resembling the recognizable democracies in the world today, requires more than just a set of specific government institutions; it will also rest upon a well understood set of values, attitudes, and practices. Continuing the current policy of maintaining political stability would encourage political stalemate without providing a legitimate political outlet for the mounting discontent in society. But attempting political reform in any but the most superficial ways would entail more fundamental changes than the regime has so far been willing to make. The reform process has reached a critical point. The strategy of limited and uneven economic reform, but not political change, may be reaching its limits. Questions of political reform are being posed with increasing urgency; it is difficult to know now how they will find a place on the official agenda, but equally hard to see how they can be kept off it forever. Rapid growth may continue yet for a number of years. But corruption will increase too, distorting and undermining the credibility of official policies and the legitimacy of the regime. The stalemate in political and regime reform that has existed since 1994 very likely is a consequence of the gravity of the choices now on the table. How that stalemate is broken— and by whom—will be critical questions for China’s future.

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6 The Mao Generation at the Helm What Difference Could It Make? Will They Still Make Use of Mao, and How? Michel BONNIN Professor, School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences

The Generational Factor in Chinese Elite Politics At the 18th National Party Congress, a new team of leaders took the helm of the Chinese political apparatus and will have a decisive role in determining the acts of a powerful state, which has growing leverage on the international scene. Observers wonder what it could mean for the future of China and of its relations with the world. Of course, nobody knows the future and social sciences cannot hope to be able to predict the future actions and decisions of a group of leaders, especially in such a secretive political system as the Chinese one. However, social scientists can try to fathom what is possible and even probable, by establishing a frame for further observation and analysis. Concerning the precise question of the impact of the emergence of a new team of leaders in China on its overall political orientations, I think that two sets of questions need to be addressed. 1. What are the main features of this new generation, and firstly is it a “generation” in the full meaning this concept has acquired in social sciences?

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2. Is the generational factor influential on the actions of a group of high leaders of a Communist Party like the Chinese one? And if it is, what can we expect from the generation whose main features we have determined? I had a first approach at these questions in 2005 in writing a paper for a special issue of Social Research.1 At the time, I was partly motivated by my reading of a book titled China’s Leaders: The New Generation, published in 2001 by Li Cheng.2 Although I acknowledged the important contribution of Li Cheng to our empirical knowledge concerning the Chinese political elite, I dared to differ from his analysis and predictions. I did not accept the fact that Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, among others, were considered as members of the Cultural Revolution (hereafter CR) generation and I expressed strong doubts about Li’s optimistic view that Hu’s team would implement significant political reforms. History has vindicated my strong doubts, which does not mean, of course, that the reason why Hu has not implemented the reforms envisaged by Li was due to what I consider his mistake in the generational characterization of the 2002 Standing Committee of the Politburo. But, I contend that it might be one of the reasons and I still agree with Li on the assertion that the CR generation might not be as politically conservative and orthodox as the previous one. And as members of the CR generation now occupy a significant portion of the highest positions of power since the 18th Congress, I believe that it could have an impact on Chinese politics. However, I am quite conscious that we are not treading on solid and well charted ground on these matters. That is why I will try to answer the two sets of questions I mentioned in as prudent and objective a manner as possible. At the end of this inquiry, I will raise the question of the way this generation of leaders, whose life and conceptions have been so deeply

1. Michel Bonnin, “The ‘Lost Generation’: Its Definition and Its Role in Today’s Chinese Elite Politics,” Social Research 73(1) (2006): 245–74. 2. Cheng Li, China’s Leaders: The New Generation (Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, 2001).

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influenced by Mao, at least in their youth, will make use of Mao. Will they differ in this respect from their predecessors?

The Mao Generation, the Cultural Revolution Generation and the Lost Generation The “lost generation,” or the generation of the Cultural Revolution (CR), has a unique characteristic in world history: it is the result of the demiurgical will of one man—Mao Zedong—to create a whole generation of “revolutionary successors” entirely devoted to the cause of socialism and to the realization of Maoist ideals. Even though Mao’s endeavor ended in complete failure, the mark it left on the young people who experienced it was deep enough to form a very specific and particularly self-conscious generation.3 This is why it can also be called the Mao generation. Awareness of being part of a certain generation is not limited to this particular group and is more widespread in China than in most countries. Articles and books on generational phenomena are also particularly numerous in China and the subject is frequently dealt with among observers and scholars outside the People’s Republic. The criteria used to define different generations are not always clear and well founded, however. Moreover, the definition of the concept of generation itself is disputed and many social scientists, especially in the United States, reject its use outside the realm of kinship. We feel, therefore, obliged to clarify first what we mean by this concept and why it can be useful. The Concept of “Generation:” The Necessary “Rectification of Names” “Generation” is a word commonly used in everyday life, with different meanings. Even in the social sciences, the concept is far from being simple and clear cut. However, theoretical foundations to define it already exist and can be relied upon. In viewing some confusions which plague even

3. I discuss this point in Chapter 14 of my book, The Lost Generation (see note 8 below).

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the best pieces of research on the question of generations in China, and particularly leadership generations, it seems necessary to first “rectify names” (“zheng ming”), as advised by Confucius, in order to avoid adding confusion to an already complex and subtle matter. Mannheim’s Conception Our best guide in this endeavor should certainly be Karl Mannheim, who in the 1920s produced the most systematic and penetrating reflections on the concept of generations, which had already been used in the social sciences for a few decades.4 Almost all western scholars who write on the issue of generations in China continue refer to Mannheim’s work, The Problem of Generations. However, it seems that many of them only pay lip service to this “seminal work” and do not really apply its main findings to their own work. Mannheim inherited Wilhelm Dilthey’s idea that common historical experience during the formative years is what makes a generation. A generation, then, cannot be defined by purely objective and mechanical criteria, as attempted by positivist thinkers like Auguste Comte, but is tied to a subjective experience of time. Mannheim has developed this idea by showing that the time span of a generation cannot be determined by the biological cycle of human reproduction but only by the movement of social change, which in modern history is subject to abrupt changes in rhythm. In certain cases, small differences of age make a big difference in generation belonging, because a sudden disruption has transformed the social experience of youth. Radical disruption of the social continuity is also the foundation stone upon which generation consciousness is built. Generations, then, have varying time spans, according to the tempo of historical change. No universal rule can spare researchers the effort of determining the length of a given generation. Mannheim shows that many

4. First published in 1928 in a German sociological quarterly, “Das Problem der Generationen” was translated into English after Mannheim’s death and included in Karl Mannheim, Essays on the Sociology of Knowledge, 276–322 (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1952).

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authors have tried in vain to define the length of a generation. As for the spatial span of a generation, Mannheim has pointed to the fact that chronological contemporaneousness is not sufficient to shape a “generational whole.” Thus, German and Chinese youths around 1800 did not belong to the same generation. Even the urban youths and the rural youths of Prussia at that time did not share the same “situation of generation,” since “only where contemporaries definitely are in a position to participate as an integrated group in certain common experiences can we rightly speak of community of situation of generation.”5 Even when an event affects a whole people, the whole people will not be transformed into one generation, because only “youth experiences” or “first impressions” have a structuring influence on human conscience and tend to fix in the mind a certain “Weltanschauung” (world vision) and a certain mode of behavior which will exert their influence on the way new experiences are assimilated and interpreted. However, the exact age limits of the “formative years” cannot be defined universally. They depend on the specific context of each society and also on specific historical factors. Many authors suggest an approximate time bracket from the ages of 17 to 25, from late adolescence to early adulthood. It can differ in different societies and especially in case of a breakpoint event with an age-specific effect. The Cultural Revolution is a typical example of this, since it began with the launch of the Red Guards Movement, where students in high school and in university had a decisive role to play. For Mannheim, a “situation of generation” can only produce a “potential generation.” An “actual generation” must realize the potentialities inherent in a situation by creating a new “generation style.” Mannheim explains also that some age groups are so closely packed together that they do not succeed in creating their own “style”—they tend then to attach themselves to an older or to a younger generation. Of course, even if it becomes an “actual generation,” exposing different members of a generation to the same events during the formative period does not mean that the generation

5. Ibid., p. 298.

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will be homogeneous. But, in spite of their divisions (and, in a way, through those divisions), they are also united by their common concern for the same issues and problems of their time, and by their participation in a common destiny. After having roughly determined our theoretical basis, we can proceed to the delicate task of applying it to the delimitation of the CR generation. Of course, this task does not merely consist of a mechanical application of any theory. For me, it is mainly based on years of empirical study of the CR and of the “zhiqing” (educated youth) movement and its consequences.

The Cultural Revolution Generation: What It Is and What It Is Not Ever since Gertrude Stein told Hemingway that he was a member of the “lost generation” of young men who had just fought World War I,6 the expression has been used quite a number of times, in different parts of the world. Concerning China, it seems that it appeared in the 1970s among China-watchers to describe the generation of the CR and was later used unofficially in China.7 Like the young Frenchmen brought up in the optimistic atmosphere of the “Belle Epoque” and whose beliefs and dreams were shattered by the biggest butchery the world had ever seen, the Red Guards experienced during the CR a complete collapse of the ideals and dogmas they were taught at school. Although the price they had to pay to get rid of their naïve illusions was not as heavy as that paid by those who fought in World War I, it was important and is still felt today. The CR belongs to those landmark historical events which found a generation.

6. Ernest Hemingway, “Une génération perdue,” in A Moveable Feast (Ernest Hemingway Ltd., 1964). 7. The term “shiluo de yidai” is probably the best translation of “lost generation,” “shiluogan” being the “sense of a loss,” but two other terms are often used: “miwang de yidai” (the generation which is at a loss) and “kuadiao de yidai” (the collapsed generation).

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Two Definitions of the Cultural Revolution The CR itself calls for terminological clarification, because there are two definitions of it, one being stricter than the other. Strictly speaking, the CR spans the period from May 1966 to April 1969, when Mao toppled most of the higher leadership and brought the Party to near extinction by inciting “the masses” and primarily the urban youths to “rebel.” This period of active and often uncontrolled participation of the masses was brought to an end by the complete restoration of the Party apparatus achieved at the 9th Party Congress, where the “victory” (and therefore the end) of the Cultural Revolution was hailed. During this period, the young Red Guards were able to leave the dull normality of their lives as well as the strict discipline of their socialist education to participate in an extraordinary event, a “revolution,” in which their idol had decided to give them a leading role. They were able to translate into action the heroic idealism in which they had been brought up, and to exert a degree of autonomy in their thinking and in their actions hitherto unknown in any Communist country. But Mao himself brought them back abruptly to reality, when he decided to restore order and to get rid of the turbulent Red Guards. The repression of their groups by the army was strict and in some places bloody. Moreover, the end of this revolutionary period of the CR coincided for all secondary school students with the end of their studies and for a majority of them with their potentially definitive transfer to villages and farms where they were to be reeducated by “poor and lower-middle class peasants.”8 This transfer meant a serious fall in their social conditions, since the “zhiqing” lost their urban “hukou” and all the privileges attached to it in terms of social security, job and salary stability,

8. On this rustication movement (“shangshan xiaxiang yundong”), see T. P. Bernstein, Up to the Mountains and Down to the Villages. The Transfer of Youth from Urban to Rural China (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977); M. Bonnin, The Lost Generation: The Rustication of China’s Educated Youth (1968–1980) (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 2013); Liu Xiaomeng, Zhongguo zhiqing shi. Dachao (1968–1980) (History of the Chinese educated youth. The Big Wave (1968–1980)) (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 1998); Pan Yihong, Tempered in the Revolutionary Furnace. China’s Youth in the Rustication Movement, (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2003).

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as well as access to many benefits including subsidized staple food. This loss in social conditions was also part of the “situation of generation” of the zhiqing. But it was not definitive for most of them, since they were able to recover their urban hukou when they came back home after a rural sojourn ranging from two to 11 years. However, a small proportion of them were not able to come back. Besides that, the “lost generation” did not only lose its illusions and beliefs, but also the opportunity to develop its intellectual and professional capacities,9 and this loss is still affecting to a greater or lesser extent the life of a large portion of its members today. The period from 1969 through 1976—the year of Mao’s death and the arrest of the Gang of Four—was not “revolutionary” and should be clearly differentiated from the preceding one. The power to exert public violence was back in the hands of the state, be it represented by the Army or by the Party cadres at all levels. Unfortunately, the two are often confused because of the official definition of the “Ten years of the Cultural Revolution,” definition established by Deng Xiaoping, for reasons that have more to do with political expediency than with historical objectivity.10 However, there is an objective unity between the two periods, since some of Mao’s ideas brought forward during the CR stricto sensu were translated into established policies during the second period. Those policies were significantly called “newborn things of the Cultural Revolution.” The most important of them for our topic was the “revolution in education,” of which the rustication movement was an essential element. For many Red Guards, the sojourn in the countryside was a period when they pursued and deepened the reflections and questioning concerning the dogmas they had been taught. Moreover, for all of them, the interruption of their studies caused by the outburst of the CR was made definitive when, in 1968–1969,

9. The educated youth sent to the countryside suffered other losses, which we cannot detail here. See the books quoted above. 10. See A. Chan, “Dispelling Misconceptions about the Red Guard Movement: The Necessity to Re-examine Cultural Revolution Factionalism and Periodization,” The Journal of Contemporary China 1(1) (1992): 61–85, and Jonathan Unger, “The Cultural Revolution at the Grassroots,” The China Journal 57, January (2007): 109–37.

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they were declared “graduates” and assigned to a job in the countryside or in a factory, or, for a small privileged elite, into the Army. Under the slogan of “revolution in education” academic learning was depreciated, whereas participation in the study of Mao thought, in political struggles and in manual work was praised. The link between knowledge and career was loosened, and entry into university was possible only after at least two years of manual work and on mainly political criteria. Rustication was a fate which any young urbanite could face and the rustication policy had a deep influence, not only on the “educated youths” actually transferred but also on their siblings, as well as on their parents.

The Cultural Revolution Generation: Fringes and Internal Division For these reasons, the CR generation can be said to include all those people whose formative years were affected by the “revolutionary” period of the CR and/or by the ensuing policy of “revolution in education.” As this policy was abandoned only in 1978, the period concerned should include not only the “Ten years of the Cultural Revolution” but also 1977. As a matter of fact, because of Hua Guofeng’s determination to pursue most Maoist policies, 1977 was a year of important transfers and even the year when the highest number of “educated youths” were present in the countryside.11 Some educated youths were rusticated during the years 1978–1980, but in small numbers and with different conditions. In fact, this period was mainly marked by the return to the cities of almost all the educated youths. Moreover, as a first important measure contradicting the policy of “revolution in education,” the entrance examination for tertiary education was restored at the very end of 1977, which changed radically the education and career opportunities for the new cohorts arriving at the end of high school.

11. There were almost nine million at that time. Altogether, about 16 million people were rusticated between 1968 and 1977.

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For the examinations of 1977 and 1978, the age limit was extended to give the “lost generation” an opportunity to get access to tertiary education. Although most of the students who entered universities during 1977–1978 were members of this generation and not fresh high school graduates, those “rescued” members of the CR generation account for only a very small proportion of their cohorts.12 Many observers have pointed to the very specific character of those older students13 and a particularly high proportion of them have become well known intellectuals, who have shown a strong consciousness of belonging to the CR generation. The CR generation, then, could be considered as including all urban people born approximately between 1947 and 1960. The start date of 1947 corresponds to the standard year of birth of the students who were in the last year of high school (“gao san”) and 1960 to the year of birth of those who reached the end of secondary schooling in 1977, before the rejection of the “revolution in education.”14 Generations are always more or less “blurred and fuzzy at the edges”15 and this one is no exception. Not all students in the same class were born in the same year, not only because the school year began in August and not in January, but also because pupils could move more rapidly or more slowly through the school ladder. For example, a certain number of students born in the second half of 1946 were still in high school in June 1966. They participated in the Red Guard Movement and were sent to the countryside. On the other hand, many urban youths born in 1947–1948 had ended their formal schooling at the

12. This is shown indirectly by the fact that only 4.79% of the candidates passed the exam in 1977, a certain proportion of them being fresh graduates (around 20 to 30%). On these exams, see S. Pepper, “Chinese Education after Mao: Two Steps Forward, Two Steps Back and Begin Again?” The China Quarterly 81, March (1980): 1–65, and J. Unger, Education under Mao (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), p. 214. 13. See, for example, T. E. Barlow and D. M. Lowe, Teaching China’s Lost Generation: Foreign Experts in the PRC (San Francisco: China Books, 1987). 14. By that time, senior high school had been universalized in most cities, but the entire primary and secondary ladder of education had been reduced to 10 years. See Unger, Education under Mao, p. 154. 15. I. Rosow, “What is a Cohort and Why?” Human Development (1978), p. 69.

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end of junior high school (“chuzhong”) and already had a job in 1966 or were students of a technical or professional school which led them to a stable and qualified job right after graduation. They were not affected by the CR as deeply as their coevals who were still in school. Other bright students had already entered university. They became members of a special group, the “laowujie,” which will be discussed later. More fundamentally, the impact of the “situation of generation” and the consciousness of generation are not equally distributed in the age-bracket considered. Generation belonging is particularly clear for the students who were in high school during the CR stricto sensu (the so-called “laosanjie,” or “Old three classes”16) and for the “educated youths” or zhiqing, who were sent to the countryside from 1968 until 1977, the kernel of the generation consisting in the laosanjie who were first Red Guards and then zhiqing. It is obvious from what has just been said and from Mannheim’s theory that the CR generation does not include the rural population, because the Cultural Revolution stricto sensu had little impact in the countryside17 and also because rustication was, by definition, a policy designed for urban youths.18 The situation of quasi-apartheid between rural and urban populations, which, as a consequence of the hukou system, prevailed at that time, explains that we can very clearly limit this generation to the urban population. If the spatial, or sectional, extension of the CR generation is not too

16. They should have graduated in 1966, 1967 or 1968, either in junior or senior high school, which represents a cohort of six years. 17. There were massive killings in the countryside, but mainly during the Cleansing of Class Ranks Campaign, which was a posterior movement of another kind and without Red Guards. Those killings were “highly organized and carried out in the name of the state.” Yang Su, Collective Killings in Rural China during the Cultural Revolution (Cambridge University Press, 2011), p. 7. On this question of the “rural impact” of the (so called) Cultural Revolution, see Unger, “The Cultural Revolution at the Grassroots.” 18. Apart from the “educated youth sent down to the countryside” (“xiaxiang zhiqing”) there were also “educated youth sent back to the countryside” (“huixiang zhiqing”), who had to go back to their village after graduation from a town high school. Both groups, however, lived very different experiences and cannot be considered as members of the same “generational whole.”

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difficult to determine, the time span which it covers requires a more subtle approach because of the complexity and the abrupt contrasts of the situation faced by urban youth from the second half of the 1960s until the end of the 1970s. Whether we look at the “situation of generation” or at the “destiny of generation”—defined as the fate faced by most of its members—it is clear that this generation begins with the young people who were students at the beginning of the CR. We should certainly exclude those who had finished their studies and were already settled in a job. Although the whole urban population was affected by the CR, those who were no longer in formal education should not be considered as members of the CR generation and generally they do not pretend to be. We must acknowledge, however, that if we define the laosanjie as the first and major component of the CR generation, we have to face the problem of the generational belonging of those who were university students in 1966. They are designed by the term laowujie (the “old five classes”), because, as their studies were delayed by the CR, they include all university students who graduated between 1966 and 1970. This group of around 550,000 people constitutes a typical in-between group, which cannot be considered as a generation in itself, but whose belonging to another generation is not obvious.19 Within their cohort, even if it is limited to the urban population, they represent only a very small proportion, since access to tertiary education was the privilege of a small group of elite. This, of course, is not conducive to creating what could be called the “mass effect” of a generation. We have seen that elite groups can have a decisive role in the crystallization of a generation, but they need to be able to express the feelings and aspirations of a large fraction of their coevals. This was not possible for the laowujie because their experience was a mix of those of the preceding and following generations. Like the following one, they were still in their formative years during the CR and, from 1966

19. A number of them do have a sense of belonging to a special group with a specific experience, as is clear from a collection of remembrances published in 1997: Guan Canghai, “Laowujie” sanshinian fengyunlu (“Thirty years of the ups and downs of the ‘Old five classes’”) 3 vols. (Shandong wenyi chubanshe, 1997).

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to 1968, they had the opportunity to participate as Red Guards in this extraordinary political movement. But, like the preceding one, they had received an orthodox communist education in primary school and in high school, and their destiny was not fundamentally affected by the CR. As a matter of fact, their status as university students entitled them to become State cadres as soon as they graduated, exactly as was the case before the CR. Although, by Mao’s will, cadres of all ages were obliged to go to the grassroots (often in the countryside) and to do manual work for a few months or a few years, this did not contradict their status nor the guarantee of a monthly salary. As we have seen, the situation was much different for the zhiqing and even for those who were lucky enough to get an urban job as worker or employee but who were deprived of the possibility to further their studies. Thus, the laowujie should not be considered as part of the CR generation and could be better assimilated to the preceding one. Their specific “situation of generation,” however, must be acknowledged. If we go now in the other direction, i.e., down the time flux, we must also acknowledge the specificity of the young urban Chinese who arrived the end of their secondary studies after the laosanjie and before 1978. Being only in primary school, they were not able to take part in the Red Guard Movement but, because of the revolution in education, their school education was disturbed, they could not get into universities directly and a large number of them were forced to go to the countryside like the zhiqing. Between 1970 and 1972, there was a decrease in the numbers sent to the villages and after 1973, when numbers grew again, the material conditions were somewhat improved and the “educated youths” were mainly sent to rural suburbs of their cities and towns. Thus, the experience of the cohorts born approximately between 1954 and 1960 was not as exceptional as that of the laosanjie. It was, however, similar and most of their members were influenced by the laosanjie, especially because many of them had elder brothers and sisters in this group. They shared the disillusionment of the laosanjie concerning the Maoist ideal and the discontent about the bleak professional prospects offered to them. Politically, they were confronted by the heavy sequels of the “struggle between the two lines” which had broken out during the first phase of the CR. Their situation of generation,

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then, as well as their actual conditions in the 1970s, were basically the same as those of their elders. This is why these “little educated youths” (“xiao zhiqing”) should be considered as the second and last subgroup of the CR generation. As a result of their less dramatic experience, the members of this subgroup do not have the same sense of generational belonging, which triggers, among many of them, a feeling of deprivation or even of envy regarding the former Red Guards.20

The Cultural Revolution Generation and the “Fourth Generation” The spatial and time limits that we have defined for the CR generation should help us put some light onto the issue of the generation belonging of the present Chinese political leadership. On this matter, there is—unfortunately, should we say—an official version devised by Deng Xiaoping in 1989 and hence endlessly repeated and developed, with all the might of the propaganda apparatus of a ruling communist party. According to Deng, speaking on June 16, 1989 at a meeting with other top leaders soon after the Tiananmen crackdown, Mao Zedong was the “core” of the first generation of the leadership collective (“di yidai de lingdao jiti”) of the CCP, Deng himself being the core of the second generation. His aim in this speech was clearly to instill in the minds of his comrades that a leadership collective needed a core and that Jiang Zemin should be respected and obeyed as the core of the third generation, because he was himself too old to retain supreme power.21 It should be clear that the term “generation”

20. One of them, Wang Luxiang, born in 1956, even complains of a “feeling of non belonging” (“wuguishugan”) and describes the members of his age group as “wanderers of history” (“lishi piaobozhe”). Romantic exaggeration apart, his description fits well with Mannheim’s portraiture of a “potential generation” which, being unable to achieve a specific “generation entelechy,” is influenced by the preceding or the following one. See Wang Luxiang, “Shiqu jiayuan de piaobozhe” (Homeless wanderers), in Longnian de beiju (Tragic Year of the Dragon) 178–82 (Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian, 1989). 21. Text of Deng’s speech in Zhang Liang, comp., The Tiananmen Papers (London: Little, Brown & Co, 2001), pp. 426–30.

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(“dai”) used by Deng had nothing to do with the social generations, but was only referring to the successive “leadership collectives” of the CCP, equivalent in fact to the Standing Committee of its Politburo. Moreover, only those collectives which had a strong and stable “core” (i.e., supreme leader) were worth counting and all the top leaders of the Party prior to Mao’s takeover in 1935 at Zunyi, as well as people like Hua Guofeng, Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, were skipped by Deng. In fact, Deng shows in his interpretation of the history of the Party his “imperial” conception of power, which he shared with Mao, and his use of the term “generation” is akin to the term “era” applied to dynasties. Jiang Zemin, as noted by Li Cheng, was “more than ready to identify himself as the ‘core of the third generation’” and had to accept the fact that Hu Jintao would be the “core of the fourth generation” since this was also decided by Deng.22 Today, this division into four generations has the force of dogma. The main problem with Deng’s categorization is not its historical inexactitude, but the fact that it was later developed by people who tried to take it as the basis of a general presentation of political generations in China. In doing so, they confuse the term “generation” used by Deng and the meaning which this term has in social sciences. They use this division into four generations as if it coincided with genuine generations. This kind of mixture can only contradict historical accuracy and the sociological theory of generations. To identify a leadership team (which was the real meaning intended by Deng) with a generation leads to excluding the possibility of having different generations participating in the same team or of having two successive supreme leaders belonging to the same generation, which is a very common occurrence. Among numerous other difficulties entailed by this exercise are Deng Xiaoping’s position (in the second generation according to himself but in the first according to history and to the theory of generations) and the major historical event associated with the fourth generation.23

22. Li Cheng, China’s Leaders, p. 8. It should be noted, however, that it was Deng himself who first decided to promote Hu as number one in his generation. 23. Table 1.1 in ibid., p. 9, is a good summary of this endeavor and of its difficulties.

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According to this conception, the fourth generation is identified as the CR generation.24 From what has been said before, however, it should be clear that the Standing Committee of the Politburo which took the helm in 2002 did not belong to the CR generation, but that it was part of the last batch of the preceding one, which could be called the “socialist generation” or the “orthodox generation.” All members of the 16th Standing Committee experienced their formative years before the launch of the CR. In 1966, all of them had already graduated from university and were young and promising cadres who had followed the golden path for political success in orthodox communist countries at that time: to graduate from an engineering school. In 1966, Hu Jintao, the highest leader of the “fourth generation,” born in 1942, had been a brilliant student in the most prestigious of these schools (Tsinghua University), and had been recruited as a political cadre in this institution after his graduation in 1965. As Li Cheng shows in the excellent chapter in his book devoted to the Tsinghua clique, this university was thoroughly transformed after 1952 by a devoted Communist leader, Jiang Nanxiang, and designed on the Soviet model to train engineers with a dual capacity, technological and political, who were destined to become the future leaders of socialist China. Hu, then, was clearly not a “child of Mao,”25 but a child of Jiang Nanxiang. As noted by Li Cheng, the motto of the school, “Be obedient and efficient,” can summarize and explain Hu’s ascension to the highest post in China’s leadership. There could not be a more striking difference from the experience of the Red Guards, encouraged by Mao to rebel and to be totally idealistic. Hu, for sure, was affected by the CR, but not at all like the Red Guards. First, his weltanschauung and standing in society were already quite stable. His socialization was over, and he was already socializing the younger

24. According to Li Cheng, the fourth generation is the name of the political elite which stemmed from the CR generation (ibid., p. 12). 25. Children of Mao is the name of a classic book on the CR generation: A. Chan, Children of Mao: Personality Development and Political Activism in the Red Guard Generation (University of Washington Press, 1985).

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cohorts. Second, his situation in the CR was the opposite of the Red Guards’ situation. He was then in the same situation as the established cadres of the Party who suffered from the action of the Red Guards and from Mao’s accusations of being “revisionist,” though not as severely as the older and higher cadres. True, in 1968 he was sent to the grassroots in Gansu, a poor western region, where he had to do one year of manual labor. But this was quite normal at the time for cadres and professionals and his experience there was in no way comparable to the experience of the educated youths sent to villages and farms. Not only was he a cadre with a guaranteed monthly salary and urban status, but, as a member of the last batch of well trained engineers and political cadres, he was in fact in a very favorable position for further promotion. As a matter of fact, his career was particularly smooth, even before the period of the reforms. Hu’s experience is representative of that of all members of the 16th Standing Committee and of many other high leaders of China who are members of the “socialist generation.” A striking similarity should be noted between this fourth generation of political leadership and the third one (that of Jiang Zemin): the fact that they were all engineers.26 This shows that both generations share an orthodox socialist training. It is obviously not because they were good at engineering that they were promoted to political leadership, but because the engineer was the ideal of communist elite for a long period, in China as well as in the USSR. All communist leaders wanted their children to become engineers and all the bright students would then strive to enter this most valued career. As Li Cheng shows very convincingly, success at the best engineering schools guaranteed prestige and a capital of “connections” which would be very helpful for a political career. But this was typical of pre-Cultural Revolution China, because it was based on a conception of an equilibrium between “red and expert” which was later vilified by Mao. This is why engineers are not numerous among leaders whose formative years were during the 1970s and after.

26. It is the case for all members of the 16th Standing Committee. In the preceding one, there was only one exception, Li Lanqing.

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The similarities between the third and the fourth generations do not mean that they could be considered to make one generation. People like Jiang Zemin, Li Peng and Zhu Rongji belong to the generation of the SinoJapanese and civil wars. Their situation of generation was different from that of people like Hu, who were socialized in a time of peace and when being a communist was not a challenge to authority but the unique path to a successful career. The similarities, however, show that all the leaders of the third generation were already moulded by an orthodox communist culture, even before the “liberation” of 1949. In this sense, the “socialist generation” seems closer to the “generation of the war” than it is to the “CR generation.” In our view, then, an accurate definition of the existing generations in China today cannot be reached without first getting rid of two obstacles: the conception of fixed length generations and, more importantly, the official categorization of “generations” in Chinese leadership, inherited from Deng and Jiang. The definition of the CR generation presented above is certainly disputable. However, we believe that it has the advantage of being clear and explicit. Too often, on these matters, terms are used without definitions, and problematic equivalences are made without discussion.27 We have spent some time explaining what the CR generation is not, as far as the political leadership is concerned. We should now try to see what it is, what is its political weight and what could be expected from it in the near future.

The Cultural Revolution Generation and High-Level Politics At the 17th National Party Congress, in 2007, two members of the CR generation entered the Standing Committee, Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang,

27. Thus, Cultural Revolution generation, Red Guard generation, Zhiqing generation and Laosanjie generation are often presented as equivalent, without any explanation. See, for example, Yang Guobin, “China’s Zhiqing Generation: Nostalgia, Identity, and Cultural Resistance in the 1990s,” Modern China 29(3) (2003), 289–90.

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and six others entered the Politburo of 25 members. So, we had at that time a multi-generational leadership team, with the “socialist generation” at the helm, but with some CR generation members, who, because of the age limit affecting the older leaders, have now become a significant part of the leadership. Even though the new leadership established by the 18th Congress comprises many members of the CR Generation, it is still multigenerational. At the highest level, that of the Standing Committee, there are still some younger members of the preceding generation: Yu Zhengsheng, born in 1945, and even Zhang Gaoli, and Liu Yunshan, who, although they were born respectively in 1946 and 1947, cannot be considered as members of the CR generation since they were already studying at Xiamen University (Zhang) or Jining Normal School (Liu) in 1966, which helped them become minor cadres very early. Among the seven members of the Standing Committee, we have then a majority of four members of the CR generation, who were all “educated youths” sent to the countryside, and three of the preceding one. On the 18 other members of the Politburo, we have also a majority of 12 members from the CR generation, but the situation is rather different. Only three among them were “educated youths,”28 which means that for the whole Politburo of 25 persons, there are seven educated youths, just 28%, which shows the limits of the expression often employed: “the educated youths in power” (“zhiqing zhizheng”). At the next level of the 205 permanent members of the Central Committee, 65 were educated youths, or 31.7%. 29 Of course, the Standing Committee is more powerful than the rest of the Politburo and the fact

28. Li Yuanchao, Zhao Leji and one of the two representatives of the Army, Fan Chenglong. But Fan was “educated youth” for only one year and was recruited into the Army in 1969. It should be noted that at the time getting into the Army was the best recruitment possible, reserved for people of very good “class origin” and very often sons of military officers. It also became a good avenue for further promotion after demobilization. 29. ＜新一屆中央委員65具有知青經歷＞, original paper by Renminwang reproduced at: news.163. com/12/1122/13/8GTT048N00014JB6_all.html

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that its three highest ranking persons30 were educated youths should not be forgotten. As in the Standing Committee, there are also members of the preceding generation among the eighteen others, like Liu Yandong (born in 1945), a typical representative of the Tsinghua engineers, and Ma Kai (born in 1946), who was already a teacher at the elite Number 4 High School in Beijing in 1966. Concerning the members of the CR generation, it should be noted that they arrived late at the highest central or provincial levels. This is due to the delay they suffered at a younger age. The “lost generation” is also called the “delayed generation” (“danwule de yidai”), because the time spent making revolution and doing manual work delayed their chances for study and for a professional career. However, one group was the most able to “recover” lost time: the children of the high leaders, who had themselves “recovered” their status and privileges after a few years of difficulties due to the CR. Those “princes,” as they came to be known during the 1980s, had the best opportunities, in a very fierce political competition, to become “gongnongbing” students (or “worker-peasant-soldier” students) in the reopened universities at the beginning of the 1970s, and to be able to prepare in good conditions for the reinstated exams of 1977–1978. Moreover, they got clear preference for fast promotion to political posts at the beginning of the 1980s, when the old leaders who had survived the CR decided to nurture rapidly a group of future successors called the “Third Echelon” (“di san tidui”). Then, thanks to “helicopter promotions,” some of these princes and princesses were able to make up for lost time and to get high level posts. Among them, the most prominent were Xi Jinping, Bo Xilai, Wang Qishan and Li Yuanchao. Generally speaking, the time when the CR generation leaders will be at the helm might be rather short, especially since a new generation is now arriving at the highest levels, which I call the Reform generation, who have been able to get good education and career opportunities after the

30. Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang and Zhang Dejiang. The other former educated youths, Wang Qishan, is number six.

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implementation of the Reform and Opening policies. In the new Politburo, there are two members, Hu Chunhua and Sun Zhengcai, who were both born in 1963. This means that the new team of leaders comprises three distinguishable generations. Since the bulk is composed of CR generation leaders, however, let us have a look at the political stars among them, so as to get an idea of their personal experience. It should be noted, first, that, although most of the CR generation has suffered a big deficit in educational opportunities, those who made it to the top political levels have a higher level of education than their predecessors (mostly because they were able to pass the 1977 or 1978 university entrance examination or because they had strong incentives to study by themselves while already working). The difference in the fields of study is particularly striking. Whereas almost all leaders of the Jiang Zemin and later Hu Jintao generations graduated in engineering, those of the CR generation have more diverse diplomas, mainly in the humanities and the social sciences, including economics and law.

Political Stars of the Lost Generation One of the promising stars of the CR generation was Bo Xilai. He is now a fallen star, but his case is worth presenting, because many people still think that he is a good representative of this generation, which in my view is a mistaken conception. The idea that Bo, when leading Chongqing, made people sing red songs glorifying Mao because he was from the CR generation seems to me a total misunderstanding. First of all, the other leaders of this generation have not done this. The CR generation members have more or less reflected upon their experience and they do not want to go back to the Maoist period, which in any case would be impossible after more than 30 years of reform and opening. Bo, born in 1949, is a member of this generation and he himself particularly suffered from the CR. His lifestyle shows also that he was not a proletarian Maoist at heart. He most probably used the red songs and his spectacular fight against the mafia in a very cynical way to try and gain a popular basis, as he felt he had almost

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no chance to get into the Standing Committee. Inside the CR generation, his experience was very atypical, since instead of going to the countryside, a factory or the Army, he spent five years in prison after the CR stricto sensu.31 From 1972 on, he worked in a factory before being admitted, in 1977, to the department of history at Peking University. He is the son of Bo Yibo who was at the beginning of the 1980s one of the most active proponents of the fast promotion of princes. In 1982, Bo Xilai obtained a master degree in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He then joined a government think tank, before beginning a career in the city of Dalian, and climbing the steps to the post of governor of Liaoning province. He became minister of Commerce in 2004, and Chongqing Party secretary in 2007, until March 2012, when he was dismissed and disappeared from public life. His dismissal is probably the result of a pre-Congress political fight, even if certain elements, like the implication of his wife in the murder of a foreigner, were accidental. Bo Xilai, then, was certainly a member of that generation and specifically one of the “princes” in that generation, but at the same time rather atypical in his itinerary and his leadership style. Those who can be considered as the winners in this generation have had a much more classic itinerary. At the level of the Standing Committee, the four members of the CR generation have in common that they were “educated youths.” Xi Jinping, born June 1, 1953, is the son of Xi Zhongxun, also a former Politburo member. Xi spent seven years in the countryside. When he arrived in a poor village in Northern Shaanxi, in the Yanan region, in January 1969, he was just 15. As his father had been purged by Mao even before the CR, he was himself ostracized. It was very hard at the beginning for the young boy, to the point that he got back to Beijing without authorization. But, he was later convinced by a member of his family to go back to Shaanxi, and was able to adapt there, to the point that he became secretary of the Party branch of his production brigade at the age of 20. Apparently, this can be explained by a combination of determination (he

31. The reason for his imprisonment in 1968 is still unclear, different explanations have been given.

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wrote 10 applications to enter the CCP, before he was accepted), and of chance (the cadre in charge of educated youth appreciated him, burnt his black file and convinced the higher authorities that an educated youth would be able to avoid the permanent conflicts that plagued the clan relations in the village). In the story he wrote about his experience32, he also acknowledges that he benefitted from the fact that his father had been the principal leader of the Communist movement in this region, because some cadres were then inclined to protect him. As a cadre, he took part in many activities to improve conditions of life and production. But, he still dreamed of going to university. He got this opportunity in 1975, and entered Tsinghua University as a gongnongbing student in chemical engineering, thanks to a letter written by the factory in which his father was working under surveillance, saying that his father’s problem was a contradiction among the people and not between the people and its enemies. After his graduation, his father was rehabilitated and Xi became, in 1979, a secretary at the Bureau of the State Council and at the Bureau of the Central Military Commission. From 1982, he began a career at district, municipal and provincial levels, in Hebei, Fujian, Zhejiang and briefly Shanghai, before entering directly the Standing Committee of the Politburo. In 2002, he obtained a doctorate degree in law through an onthe-job postgraduate program in Tsinghua from 1998 to 2002. If the number one is a prince, the number two is a member of the Communist Youth League (CYL) faction, which is representative of a relative equilibrium inside the highest leadership. The normal institutional avenue for political success in a communist country is the CYL. Hu Jintao is a good example of this itinerary in the “orthodox generation.” In the CR generation, the most prominent is Li Keqiang, born in 1955. Transferred as an “educated youth” to a village in his native Anhui province in 1974, he entered the Party two years later and became secretary of the CCP branch of his production brigade in 1977, a relatively rare instance of

32. Xi Jinping, 《我是黃土地的兒子》，see among other electronic sources: http://maomaotou. blog.163.com/blog/static/175223656201182491554136/

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local political promotion of an educated youth (but something that happened also to Xi Jinping, as we have seen). If Li was not a member of the privileged political elite as a child (his father was a local cadre), he benefited greatly from the very serious teaching of a friend of his father who, since the beginning of the CR, took him as a kind of disciple and gave him a thorough knowledge in Chinese literature and history at a time when the education was in tatters. This is probably why he was able to pass the exam in 1977 and become a law student at the elite Peking University in 1978. He was a bright student, most interested by relatively “liberal” ideas concerning law and politics, but he was also very active as the head of the university’s student union and as a CYL cadre. After his graduation in 1982, he could probably have been accepted to universities in the U.S. as a student, but he was convinced to accept the post of CYL secretary of Peking University.33 He then climbed the ladder of the CYL to reach the post of Chief Secretary in 1993. From 1998 on, he began a provincial career in Henan and then as Party secretary of Liaoning, before entering directly the Standing Committee of the Politburo in 2007. Among the former educated youths who became high level leaders, Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang have published or allowed to publish stories about their experiences in the countryside. Of course, these texts certainly aim at enhancing their political capital by showing how their rural experience forged their characters and strengthened their link with the people at the grassroots, but both are interesting, particularly that of Xi Jinping, which is written by him, and full of personal remarks. Another member of this generation who was also an educated youth, and whose sojourn in the countryside had a decisive influence in his personal destiny, never published anything about his experience, at least to my knowledge. This is probably because it would be too interesting, almost like

33. To my knowledge, Li Keqiang has not written an autobiographical paper on his youth similar to that of Xi Jinping, but the following Xinhua paper of October 11, 2011 contains many details which were certainly given by him: 〈李克強同志的知青歲月〉（can be accessed at : http:// thf1911.blog.163.com/blog/static/122970010200910495723592/)

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a fairytale. Wang Qishan, born in 1948, is a “prince consort.” The two years he spent in the Yanan countryside apparently changed his destiny. Not unlike the shepherdesses of the fairytales who became princesses after meeting a prince in the countryside, Wang, the son of an intellectual, met a princess (Yao Mingshan, the eldest daughter of high CCP leader Yao Yilin). They fell in love with each other and Wang therefore became a prince. The fact that he became a gongnongbing student in 1973, studying history at the Northwest University is probably related to the fact that his father-in-law was rehabilitated at that time and was appointed Vice Minister of Foreign Trade. But there is still a mystery about the fact that already in 1971, only two years after having gone to the countryside, Wang had been awarded a job at the Shaanxi Provincial Museum in Xian. After having graduated in 1976, he went back to work at the same museum. In 1979, he entered the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, where he was supposed to study modern history, but this is the time when his interest switched to macroeconomics and politics. So when he left in 1982, he joined the highest government think tanks before starting a career in the bank. From 1997 on, he began a career of provincial leader (Guangdong, Hainan and Beijing), entered the Politburo in 2007 and was made Vice Premier in 2008. Li Yuanchao, born in 1950, a prince of lesser rank, worked in a farm near Shanghai for four years as zhiqing before becoming a gongnongbing student in mathematics at Shanghai Normal University. He then became a teacher in Shanghai, before passing the exam to enter the mathematics department of Fudan University. It is significant that a gongnongbing student already graduated passed the exam to attend the same level of study in the same discipline. It shows how the gongnongbing diplomas were devalued after the reinstatement of the academic exams. Li, then, became a leader of the CYL in Shanghai and at the national level. He continued studying while working and got a master’s degree in economics at Peking University, and then a doctorate in law from the Central Party School. Since 2000, he has worked in Jiangsu, becoming its First Secretary, until he became a member of the Politburo and head of the Organization Department in 2007. This is why he was tipped to get into the Standing Committee at the 18th Congress, but this did not happen, partly because

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the number of members was reduced from nine to seven. These princes are prominent and were among the first members of the CR generation to reach a relatively high level of leadership. However, they are not as numerous as they could have been. As a result of strong resistance inside the party, most of the princes have been encouraged to leave politics for a more lucrative and discreet career in business and corporate management. A familial distribution of the tasks between political and economic jobs has been considered as the best strategic option.34 As a consequence, room has been left for non princes in the political elite. Like all leaders, Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao had a tendency to select people made in their own mould. Besides, the necessities of Party survival in post revolutionary times tend to the promotion of careerist bureaucrats, apt to adapt to any political situation, more than leaders with strong convictions. The contrast is striking between Deng Xiaoping, who fell three times and bounced back three times during his career, and Hu Jintao or Wen Jiabao who have proved extremely skillful at following all the political lines encountered during their career and at shifting allegiance at the right time. This adaptability can be considered as a quality, especially when it is coupled with intelligence and pragmatism. However, it is hardly compatible with creativity and boldness. In the CR generation, another rising star, Zhang Dejiang, who became number three of the Standing Committee at the 18th Congress, seems to have been particularly adaptable. In 1968, he was sent to a village in Jilin province, from his high school in Changchun. In 1970, having spent less than two years as an “educated youth,” he became a local cadre at the district level, before getting to Yanbian University as a gongnongbing student in the Korean language. After graduation, he was promoted as a high level cadre in his university. It seems that his good fortune came from being appreciated by a local cadre of Korean nationality, Li Dezhu, who

34. See He Qinglian, Zhongguo de xianjing — The Primary Capital Accumulation in Contemporary China (Hong Kong: Mingjing chubanshe, 1997).

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became his mentor and gave him a hand, while himself climbing the official ladder.35 In 1978, Zhang was sent abroad to study economics at Kim Ilsung University in Pyongyang. As his studies were probably not very useful for developing the Chinese reforming economy, he went back to Yanbian University as a vice president. Then, in 1983, he began a political career, climbing the ladder from municipality to provincial highest level (Jilin in 1995 and Zhejiang in 1998). By then, he had found a more powerful mentor Jiang Zemin. In 2002, he became Party Secretary in Guangdong and member of the Politburo. From 2007, he was back at the center, in Beijing, but in March 2012, when there was an urgent need to find a replacement in Chongqing after the fall of Bo Xilai, he was sent there. During his whole career, he seems to have been very skillful at adapting to the desires of the higher leadership and at showing his loyalty.

What Can Reasonably Be Expected from the New Leaders with a Cultural Revolution Background? Having looked at the profiles of some of the political stars among the CR generation, we can try and answer the question of the characteristics, which they share with the rest of their generation and those which are more specific to them. The leaders of the CR generation have all shared more or less the same experience at the grassroots, especially the countryside, as the other members. They might then have more understanding and more sympathy toward the difficulties met by ordinary people. They have also more or less been through the same disillusions concerning the realities of Maotype socialism, shared the shock brought by the Lin Biao affair and the sinister atmosphere of the end of Mao’s reign in the 1970s, with its endless political movements and empty slogans hiding fierce political infighting

35. See Jia Yumin，Diwudai: Zhonggong Shibada Zhujiao—The Fifth Generation: Main Actor of the Eighteenth Congress (Hong Kong: Mingjing chubanshe, 2010), pp. 163–93.

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within the highest spheres of the Party. Like ordinary members of this generation, they certainly have realized how empty slogans could be useless and even dangerous, making them more pragmatic and less dogmatic. But, can they be said to be representative of the whole generation? If we look closely, we can see some specific features. For example, Xi Jinping’s mental itinerary, as he told it, seems in fact to have been exceptional. He wrote: “At 15, when I arrived in this Yellow Earth region, I was dazed, lost. But, when I left at 22, I had already a firm objective in my life and I was full of self-confidence.”36 But the itinerary of most of the educated youth was exactly opposite: some of them were full of hope when they went; others, the majority were not so enthusiastic but accepted their rustication as something inevitable. Only a minority were “lost” as Xi was, probably because of his father’s problems and of his very young age. But most educated youths became “lost” and dreamt of going back to the city after some time spent in the countryside, while Xi became “selfconfident” during this period. Xi, Li and Zhang, the three highest leaders of today’s China, all became minor political cadres while they were in the countryside, which was also rather uncommon. Xi is clearly someone who decided in difficult circumstances to “play the game” and who succeeded because of his personal qualities and because ultimately things returned to normal. He then could enjoy again the privileges, which he had lost temporarily because of his father’s political problems. Wang Qishan’s experience is also very atypical as we have seen: his going down to the countryside helped him to attain the status of “prince.” This is why I do not think that these leaders can be said to be representative of the whole generation. The CR generation, having experienced dramatic events in its formative years, has produced remarkable personalities, with a strong consciousness of generation belonging, in the arts, literature and social sciences. Many of them have been creative and innovative, often displaying a critical spirit, which even brought a certain number of them to political dissidence. Those

36. Xi Jinping, 《我是黃土地的兒子》.

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who became part of the political elite were remarkable by their adaptability and their capacity to please their superiors. It is true that those who studied at university at the end of the 1970s might have been influenced by the liberal and open atmosphere of that period. This is clear in the case of Li Keqiang, who has acknowledged the influence of one of his teachers, Gong Xiangrui, a specialist and admirer of the British Constitutional tradition.37 Li also had regular contacts with the young democrats at the time of the Democracy Wall Movement.38 It is very difficult in such a system to remain very innovative and open while climbing up the power ladder, though. This is especially true for the members of the Youth League Faction, who are mainly specialists in Party affairs and propaganda, and who have followed all the twists and turns of the Party line, being slowly but surely promoted for their loyalty and obedience. As for the other main group of leaders, that of the “princes,” they should be more intent than any others on protecting the interests of the regime. On the other side, their pedigree could give them enough selfconfidence to try and find new ways to protect these interests, which could lead them to limited innovation.

A New Style, up to Which Point? In spite of these specificities of the political elite among the CR generation, which do not bode well for their inventiveness and boldness in the political realm, it seems clear that the deep difference between their experience in their formative years and that of the orthodox Hu–Wen generation should bring at least some differences in their style of government. This difference will take time to become totally clear. But, of course, what Mannheim called a “new style of generation” should mean more than a less constrained attitude of the leaders when appearing in public and an

37. Xinhua, October 11, 2011. 38. Personal information from two former members of staff of Beijing zhi chun, one of the unofficial magazines published at that the end of the 1970s.

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insistence on frugality during official meals, which were the first obvious differences between the two Standing Committees. It remains to be seen if structural changes will be made, which would help reduce the huge gap between the richest and the poorest, for example, or give some reality to the citizens’ rights which are now only acknowledged in the Constitution. Compared with the huge weight of the interests of the intimately linked political and economic elite, the generational factor seems rather light, too light to permit the breakthroughs which would bring more freedom and social justice to China. In other words, the class factor, as is often the case, should have more weight than the generational one in determining the fate of the country, at least the policies of its leaders. Still, I do think that the generational factor should not be totally neglected, since historical evolution is always complex and some factors which do not seem particularly important can have a decisive influence. One can wonder, for example, what would have happened if Deng Xiaoping had already been dead in 1989. The generational factor can have some influence on the way to react to crises and unexpected events. Deng has himself stressed the historical importance of the fact that the “old comrades” were still around in 1989.39 As a matter of fact, through Mao, Deng and all their “comrades” the same generation ruled China for 43 years, from 1949 until 1992, when Deng, at almost 88, exerted his last significant impact on Chinese politics, his famous “Southern Tour.”40 The influence, which this “‘ginseng’ factor” 41 had on the limitation of the political evolution of the CCP, should not be forgotten. Now that a regular renewal of the political leadership has been institutionalized, state policies should be less dependent on the whims of

39. See his June 9, 1989 speech at the meeting with cadres from Beijing’s martial law troops. 40. This point is stressed in J. Fewsmith, “Generational Transition in China,” The Washington Quarterly Autumn 2002, p. 27. Fewsmith thinks like me that the so-called fourth generation comprises in fact two different generations (ibid., p. 25). 41. See S. Shirk, “The Delayed Institutionalization of Leadership Politics,” in The Nature of Chinese Politics, ed. J. Unger (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2002), p. 302. Of course, Mao’s less massive resort to political killing compared to Stalin was also a determining factor in the political longevity of these leaders.

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any one leader, but each new team could bring its “generational style” even if the whole system is devised to select “reliable successors.” This new style could make only a difference in case of new challenges requiring brand new solutions. But, after 10 years during which structural changes have been systematically resisted, such challenges are quite possible in the not too distant future. For the time being, however, it does not seem that Xi Jinping is ready to make structural changes, and he seems more eager than his predecessor to make use of Mao in his way of ruling.

The Significance of the Recent References to Mao Since he took power, Xi Jinping has made abundant use of Maoist rhetoric (like the “mass line”). He has in many circumstances paid respect to Mao and Mao Zedong thought, and strongly objected to “opposing the two 30 Years” (i.e., the Maoist period and the Reform period). In a way, this is rather surprising, since his father was a dedicated reformist and had been a victim of Mao during and even some time before the CR. Besides, Xi’s protection of Mao’s historical image does not mean a return to Maoist policies in the economic realm. But, Xi’s use of Mao does not come more as a surprise than that of Bo Xilai. Bo’s family and Bo himself have even more suffered from Mao’s CR than Xi and his family. Not only was Bo sent to jail during the CR, his mother died in mysterious circumstances because of the violence of that time. This did not prevent him to rely heavily on Mao’s prestige when he was eager to boost his own. But does it mean that this generation is Maoist? Certainly not. Most intellectuals of this generation are very critical of Mao and the CR, and even those who express nostalgia for his time would not be ready to go back to the policies of that period. No educated youths, for example, no matter how much nostalgia he or she expresses, would be ready to send his or her children to the countryside. Even among the party elite, there are clearly different views on Mao. Xi’s assessment is exceptionally positive, although, of course, everybody is obliged to endorse the position of the number one in public. There are some leaders who favor a political reform, however limited, and who

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would certainly be ready and even obliged to criticize Mao, so as to pave the way for a reform (Wen Jiabao seems to have been one of them). But, since the mainstream consensus, represented by Xi Jinping, is to refuse any significant political reform, a “new” or renewed legitimacy for the Party and its leaders can only come from a resurrection of its original legitimacy. And here, Mao is absolutely indispensable, being at the same time the Lenin and the Stalin of the CCP. Then, by mere cynicism (in the case of Bo Xilai) or pragmatism (in the case of Xi Jinping), the Chinese leaders of the 21st Century are condemned to continue making use of Mao. And, since they were born and grew to adulthood in a very thick Maoist atmosphere, it is rather easy for them to do that, picking old slogans they have recited for years in the big basket of ideology left by Mao. It is all the more feasible that you can find almost everything and its contrary in this basket. Apart from the positive reassessment of Mao by Xi, some people have seen in Xi’s tendency to concentrate all powers in his own hand, an influence of the Mao model. This might be partially true, but it is also probably a consequence of the political system itself. As the legitimacy of the new leaders is no longer guaranteed by the selection by a respected great leader like Mao or Deng, and as there is no electoral legitimacy in view, there will be more infighting, as we have seen between Xi Jinping and Bo Xilai (and also Zhou Yongkang), because it will be more and more difficult for the number one to impose obedience to other would be great leaders. The harshness of the fight against corruption which characterized the first year and a half of Xi’s rule could be seen both as a way to restore the legitimacy of a “pure” Party, as was the cas—supposedly—under Mao, and also as one aspect of the political infighting, since accusations of corruption are the best way to get rid of political enemies, a tradition since the fall of Chen Xitong under Jiang Zemin. In sum, use of Mao by this generation of Party leaders should not be considered as a kind of mechanical and unconscious result of their Maoist upbringing, a posthumous success of the Great Leader, but more as a

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conscious and pragmatic strategy by a generation of leaders who need to confront new challenges unimaginable in Mao’s time, but at the same time are determined to maintain the exclusive domination of the Party which he brought to power 65 years ago.

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7 Maoism and the Quest for Democracy in China Torbjörn LODÉN Professor of Chinese Language and Culture Stockholm University

The ousting and arrest of Bo Xilai in 2012—the Politburo member and party boss in Chongqing—highlighted New Maoism and the New Left as significant ideological and political forces in China.1 For many years there was reason to expect a “de-Maoization” in China, similar to the de-Stalinization that took place in the Soviet Union after 1956. A demaoization would mean the explicit rejection of Mao Zedong’s political line based on a thorough analysis of his rule. For 35 years the Chinese Communist Party has now pursued a political course diametrically opposed to that of Mao in most respects except one-party rule, but the Chinese leaders, from Deng Xiaoping to Xi Jinping, have all refused to break formally with Mao and his legacy. Moreover, both within and outside the Party there have been numerous individuals and groups expressing discontent with the anti-Maoist nature of Deng Xiaoping’s reform programme and advocating a revival of the ideas and policies of Mao Zedong. Together these voices can be taken to define “Neo Maoism”

1. The journal China Perspective (2012/2) contains a number of articles dealing with the position of Mao in China today. Concerning the Bo Xilai incident and New Maoism, see Willy Lam, “The Maoist Revival and the Conservative Turn in Chinese Politics,” in that issue, pp. 5–15.

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in a broad sense, which is thus a multifarious phenomenon, the unity of which consists in the commitment to the core ideas of Mao Zedong.2 In this chapter I would like to look at the phenomenon of New Maoism in relation to the quest for democracy in China. Can New Maoism promote the development towards a more democratic China or should we see it as an impediment to such a development?

Mao Zedong and Democracy To begin with, let us get back briefly to the intellectual roots of New Maoism, that is Mao Zedong and his role in Chinese history.3 Mao Zedong’s consciousness was shaped in an era when the viability of traditional Chinese polity and culture was being questioned against the background of China’s confrontation with the outside world beginning with the Opium War in 1839–42. Recreating a wealthy and powerful China became the main point on the agenda. In order to achieve this, reformers and radicals felt that it was necessary to get rid of major parts of the indigenous cultural legacy, especially Confucianism, and to build

2. Concerning various forms of New Maoism, see China Perspective (2012/2). For an excellent analysis of various strands of thought, including the New Left, see Ma Licheng 馬立誠, Dangdai Zhongguo ba zhong shehui sichao 當代中國八種社會思潮 [Eight currents of thought in contemporary Chinese society] (Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 2012). 3. The literature about Mao Zedong, his ideas and role in history has become quite enormous over the years. For a good general introduction, see Philip Short, Mao: A Life (London: Macmillan, 2001). For interesting insights into his personality, see Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story (London: Ted Smart, 2005) and Li Zhisui, The Private Life of Chairman Mao: The Memoirs of Mao’s Personal Physician (London: Random House, 1994). Concerning Mao’s ideas, see Stuart Schram, The Political Thought of Mao Tse-tung (New York: Praeger. 1969) and David E. Apter and Tony Saich, Revolutionary Discourse in Mao’s Republic (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994). For three studies of the effects of Mao’s policies during the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, see Frank Dikötter, Mao’s Great Famine: The History of China’s Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-62 (London: Bloomsbury, 2010); Roderick MacFarquhar and Michael Schoenhals, Mao’s Last Revolution (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008) and Yang Jisheng, Tombstone: the Great Chinese Famine, 1958-1962 (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012).

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a modern multi-national state to replace the traditional polity with its pretension to rule “all under Heaven.” This was an aspect of the intellectual universe which Mao met as a very young man and which played a decisive role in shaping his values and worldview. The question for Mao, as for so many others, was what kind of ideas and reforms would be the most effective in bringing about renewed wealth and power. This was the measure by which intellectual and political currents were gauged. It was during the May Fourth New Cultural Movement around 1920 that Mr. Sai (Science) and Mr. De (Democracy) were invited, as it were, to save China. Thus, democracy, like any other political system, was conceived of as a means to the end of recreating a rich and powerful China. If it was not really conducive to China’s revival, then democracy was of little interest. Among sections of the Chinese population, not least among the leaders, we have reason to assume that this utilitarian view of democracy has lived on so that today, when China as a state is indeed becoming rich and powerful, democracy may not appear especially interesting. It was also in this light that Marxism was seen. The early members of the Chinese Communist Party—Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao, Zhang Guotao, Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping and many others—all saw Marxism and the communist movement as a powerful and effective means to save China and to recreate a new China. Democracy was part of the Marxist ideology, but the Communists (the word I use to refer to members of the Communist Party and their followers) distinguished between sham, bourgeois democracy and true, revolutionary and proletarian democracy. For the latter, the role of the Party as a vanguard, armed with a “scientific” understanding of the laws of history, was essential. With the help of Marxism as a theoretical tool, the Chinese communists, like their comrades elsewhere in the world, thought that it was possible to identify and act in the true interests of the working people, whether the working people themselves recognized these interests or not. In fact, the dictatorship of the proletariat became the very definition of true democracy. For the Communists, bourgeois democracy was thought of as merely formal, in fact serving the interests of the bourgeois power-holders and

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not the interests of the working people. On the other hand, for those who rather thought of “bourgeois democracy” as true democracy, universal suffrage, the basic human freedoms and rights were the core content of democracy, while the Communist ideas of democracy were considered elitist, collectivistic and oppressive. For Mao Zedong as for most communists, universal suffrage, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and the like were never essential goals to pursue. Mao probably always regarded these ingredients of bourgeois democracy with great scepticism, as not really conducive to realizing the essential goals of the revolution. But which, then, were the essential goals of the revolution? Again, saving China, building a new, rich and powerful China, which would enjoy respect in the whole world was the major goal. But we should also take Mao seriously when he said that he sought liberation for the Chinese people from foreign and domestic oppression. Like so many radicals before and after him, Mao believed that Marxism provided a scientifically certified tool to bring about this liberation, so he and his Party had the right to use this tool—no matter whether those who were to be liberated believed in it or not. We may add another consideration to this. The main priority was the regeneration of a rich and powerful China and, against the background of internal and external threats. Mao probably regarded the essential rights and freedoms as divisive in a situation where cohesion and focus on a main task were essential. So to the extent that he may at all have considered them desirable, he was readily prepared to sacrifice them in the name of national salvation. As we know, this is basically what Professor Li Zehou means by his thesis that “salvation took precedence over enlightenment.”4 However, it is important to keep in mind that with or without real threats of national demise, Communists have generally held a very negative

4. See Li Zehou 李澤厚. Qimeng yu jiuwang de shuangchong bianzou: Wusi huixiang zhiyi 啟蒙 與救亡的雙重變奏：五四回想之一[Duet Variations of Enlightenment and National Salvation: Reflections on May Fourth]. Zou wo ziji de lu 走我自己的路 [Going my own way] (Beijing: Sanlian, 1986).

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view of the basic democratic rights and freedoms. So while the real threats that China faced in the 1930s may have strengthened the focus of Mao and others on strong central leadership and on uniformity and obedience to the authority they exercised in the name of the people, it seems unlikely that Mao would have held very different views in this regard, even if the threats had not existed. “Liberation” (jiefang 解放) was always a key concept in the discourse of Mao Zedong and the Chinese communists, and we have every reason to assume that Mao really thought in terms of “liberation”—from the bullying of foreign powers to the oppression exercised by landlords in China. The communist take-over in 1949 is officially designated as the year of liberation, and in Mao’s time the promise to “liberate Taiwan” was reiterated again and again. Liberation from oppression was part of the core ideas of Chinese Communists from the early years, and in fact “liberation theology” may be a rather apt characterization of Mao’s thought before 1949. By using the word “theology” we draw attention to the fact that Chinese Marxism and Mao’s thoughts were considered to be based on absolute truths, truths that its proponents described as “scientific” but which seen from the outside rather seemed to be based on divine pretensions; for real science there are no absolute truths outside the closed worlds of axiomatic analytical systems such as mathematics and logic. Thus, the road to liberation was supposed to follow a prescription based on absolute truths and not something to be defined by means of democratic majority decisions. The purpose of applying the methods of “democratic centralism” and the “mass line” was really to make the masses see the light and follow the correct line defined by Chairman Mao, or possibly help Mao and other leaders to identify the true course to pursue. As far as I can see, there was no sense of majority decisions being in some way good in themselves by virtue of being democratic. The purpose of democratic decision-making could only be either to anchor a ready-made decision among the masses or to serve as a tool to arrive at the correct implementation of the absolute truths of Marxism Leninism Mao Zedong Thought. Since the establishment of the PRC in 1949 was taken to mark “liberation,” one could have expected “freedom” to become a central

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concept in the new, liberated China. But that did not happen. “Freedom”— (ziyou 自由)—never became an unequivocally positive concept in the Maoist discourse; liberation yes, but freedom no. This is probably significant: liberation from certain kinds of oppression was not supposed to lead to a situation where individual people would be liberated in order to act as they subjectively wished; rather it would lead to a situation where all people would be liberated in order to act in the politically correct way prescribed by the party. It was during the period from the establishment of the PRC in 1949 until Mao’s death in 1976 that it became clear beyond any reasonable doubt that Mao did not intend to transform China into a democracy, if we take democracy to refer to a political system which upholds the basic rights and freedoms of individual people and in which the people can elect and replace their leaders in general and free elections. Mao did make use of his “mass line,” which he called democratic, mobilizing masses of people, sometimes even against the party-state when this suited his own purposes, but his mass campaigns were profoundly undemocratic and often signified extreme oppression and suffering—such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.

Deng Xiaoping’s Reform Program and Democracy For many of us who are old enough to have begun to take an interest in China when Mao Zedong was still alive and in command, Deng Xiaoping’s modernization programme of “reform and opening up” seemed to mean that China would now head towards democracy. This programme did not speak about democracy, but in order to be really successful, democratization seemed, just as Wei Jingsheng argued in his famous wall poster, to be necessary.5 But the response to Wei Jingsheng’s argument was to put him in prison, and during the more than three decades that

5. For an English translation of Wei Jingsheng’s 1978 wall poster, see “The Fifth Modernization: Democracy”, see http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/ps/cup/wei_jingsheng_fifth_modernization.pdf

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have now elapsed since Deng’s modernization programme was adopted, developments in China have again and again ignited our hopes that now, at long last, China is becoming more democratic. However, just as often developments have made us despair. Deng Xiaoping cursed dogmatism and wanted more discussion in order to “seek truth from facts,” but he also introduced “the four basic principles,” which meant that the rule of the Communist Party must not be questioned. The June 4 Massacre in 1989 was his and the Party’s response to the democracy movement of the 1980s, just as the response of Deng’s successors to the well reasoned arguments for democracy formulated in Charter 8 was to ban the document and all discussion about it and to put the main author, Mr. Liu Xiaobo, in prison.6 Thus, anyone concerned with democracy and human rights in China has had occasion again and again to be disappointed, and the reasonable conclusion must be that up until today, for the leaders of the Communist Party the continued rule of the Party has had absolute priority. If they could be sure that democratic reforms would not threaten the continued rule of the Party, they would probably introduce such reforms. Their resistance to democracy largely rests on the belief that independent media and open discussions, let alone general and free elections, would lead to the demise of the Party. In other words, their resistance to democracy is based on a sense of insecurity. Yet, in spite of all disappointments, in spite of the determination of the top leaders of the Communist Party not to give up their one-party rule at any cost, it seems to me that Chinese society has during these past three decades in several important ways moved in the direction of greater pluralism, more freedom for more people and, indeed, towards democracy. To be a little more specific about this, I would like to point to seven different areas of development in post-Mao China in support of this thesis that Chinese society has—in spite of all the disappointments anyone concerned with China’s democratization must feel—moved in this direction.

6. For an English version of Charter 08, see Perry Link’s excellent translation in The New York Review of Books, www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2009/jan/15/chinas-charter08/?pagination=false

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The first aspect is economic growth. During the decades of reform and opening up hundreds of millions of Chinese people have experienced dramatic improvements in their standards of living, and we can now see the emergence of a middle class, in size at least as large as a couple of the largest countries in Europe. This rising standard of living inevitably entails increasing freedoms and greater opportunities to explore individual interests. The rise of the middle class implies the emergence of middleclass values that are largely universal, including the wish to be in control of one’s own life, to seek pleasure and happiness as one sees fit, without the intrusion of a “Big Brother” government. The following six aspects that will be discussed briefly are all connected in one way or another with economic growth. This does not mean that I commit myself to a simple economic determinism; it does not mean that I think that economic development by itself will lead to democracy. But I do believe that economic growth creates conditions that facilitate a democratic transition. I see no point in speaking about inevitability—there are of course examples of countries with a much higher GDP per capita than China, which are not democracies. But again, economic growth does create conditions that facilitate a democratic transition. The second aspect of the changes that have taken place in the era of reform and opening up which has brought China a step closer to democracy is the fact that the sphere in the lives of Chinese people controlled by the party-state has shrunk, while their private sphere has expanded. When I say this, some readers might like to remind me that the Communist Party can still intrude into the privacy of Chinese citizens. I do not dispute this. But still, hundreds of millions of Chinese people do experience that they have a private sphere today, which was inconceivable in the days of Mao Zedong. People have at least largely attained the “right to be absent” (quexi de quanli 缺席的權利), as the philosopher Zhang Zhiyang aptly entitled a book in the 1990s.7

7. Zhang Zhiyang 張志揚. Quexi de quanli 缺席的權利 [The right not to take part] (Shanghai: Shanghai Renmin chubanshe, 1996).

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The third aspect is China’s opening up—in different fields, not only in trade but also in tourism, cultural and student exchange and so on. We can see how this has led to greater pluralism in thought and greater familiarity with different social and political systems. The fourth aspect is the development of the judiciary. Under the rule of Mao Zedong, the judiciary system was only rudimentary and absolutely dependent on the Party. Mao rejected the idea of an independent judiciary, with independent lawyers and the like, which he regarded as profoundly bourgeois. After Mao, the need for legislation, especially in the economic field, has resulted in a rapidly expanding number of laws. We have also seen the emergence of lawyers, practicing with a relative autonomy unthinkable in Mao’s time. There are far too many examples of how the courts are still not independent and how courageous lawyers are harassed, but the fact remains that compared with Mao’s China, we can see great improvements in the judicial system.8 The fifth aspect concerns Chinese media. For someone who had the opportunity to spend some time in Mao’s China—I lived there as a Swedish diplomat from 1973 to 1976—there is no doubt that the Chinese media landscape has undergone dramatic changes. The breadth and depth of discussions, the social critique that we meet in today’s media—think of the courageous Nanfang Zhoumo [Southern Weekly]—was just unthinkable in Mao’s time. And yet today’s media are by no means independent of the Party. If the Party wishes to do so, it can and it will silence newspapers and journals as well as writers and journalists.9 Both the judiciary and the media are examples of areas where we have seen great improvements but which still remain badly in need of further reform. A truly independent judiciary and truly independent media belong to the most urgently needed reforms in China—needed not least to deal with corruption.

8. Concerning the Chinese judicial system, see Randall Peerenboom, China’s Long March towards the Rule of Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). 9. Concerning Chinese mass media, see, e.g., Lee Chin-Chuan ed., Chinese Media, Global Contexts (New York: Routledge, 2003).

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The sixth aspect I have in mind when I say that Chinese society has indeed moved in the direction of democracy refers to the experiments with elections of village heads and, really more importantly, the emergence of brave, truly independent candidates in the elections of members of people’s congresses in various places.10 The seventh and final aspect is ideology. Xi Jinping and his regime have made it clear that they are absolutely against adopting Western style democracy with a multi-party system, general and free elections etc. This is not even a long-term goal. Yet it is noteworthy that in the era of reform and opening up, voices have been heard arguing for democratic reforms. Leaders of the democracy movement, such as Wei Jingsheng and Liu Xiaobo, have been put in prison for being such outspoken advocates of freedom, democracy and human rights. Others have been silenced without being put in prison. Others again, even within the Party, have managed to argue openly for democratic reforms public. For instance, some people have taken Swedish Social Democracy as an example of the possibility to unite democracy and socialism. For example, the late Professor Xie Tao published in 2007 an interesting article “The Model of Democratic Socialism and China’s Future” in which he suggested that the Chinese Communist Party should adopt democratic socialism to replace its socalled revolutionary ideology.11 As compared to the era of Mao Zedong, this signifies, I believe, that democratic ideas are much more widespread today than they were then. The great efforts that the present leaders made to warn against and even ban “Western values” show that these ideas are indeed quite widespread today and considered a serious threat to the

10. Concerning village elections, see State of the Field: Assessing Village Elections in China. Path to Democracy? Special issue of Journal of Contemporary China 18, no. 60 (2009). Cf. also Johan Lagerkvist, “The Wukan Uprising and Chinese State-Society Relations: Toward ‘Shadow Civil Society’?” in State, Governance and Civil Societal Response in Contemporary China: Critical Issues in the 21st Century. Special issue of International Journal of China Studies, vol. 3, no. 3 (2012). 11. Xie Tao 謝滔, “Minzhu shehuizhuyi moshi yu Zhongguo de qiantu” 民主社會主義模式與中國 的前途 [The model of democratic socialism and China’s future]. Yan Huang Chunqiu 炎黄春秋, no. 2 (2007). Concerning the ideas of democratic socialism in general and Xie Tao’s views in particular, see Ma Licheng, Dangdai Zhongguo ba zhong shehui sichao, pp. 82–112.

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present authoritarian one-party rule.

What is Democracy? In order to speak about a society as more or less distant from democracy, one should offer a definition of democracy, to make it clear exactly what it is that a society is more or less distant from. Still it would lead too far in this context to attempt a precise definition of democracy in terms of institutions and procedures that must be present for a political system to be democratic.12 As a rough definition we may use Lincoln’s famous words in his Gettysburg address of democracy as a form of government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” We may then think of a political system as more or less distant from democracy: it can be more or less of the people, by the people and for the people. This approach does not necessarily tie democracy to a specific set of institutions but allows us to see that democratic systems may use different ways to realize the goal of government of the people, by the people, and for the people. A key aspect of democracy is the right of the people to appoint and oust their leaders according to regulated procedures. If there are no such procedures and if a political system allows little or no freedom of expression or freedom of assembly, it still seems impossible to refer to it as more or less democratic. Democracy presupposes the rule of law. Therefore, rather than considering all systems as more or less democratic, we should perhaps think of political systems as more or less distant from democracy. And among countries where there are orderly procedures by which the people can elect and remove their leaders and where the basic freedoms and rights are also guaranteed, we can still distinguish between more or less democratic, or more or less flawed democracies. In recent years there have been attempts to gauge how democratic or undemocratic different countries are. For example, beginning in 2007

12. For an insightful discussion of democracy, see Robert A. Dahl, On Democracy (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000).

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the intelligence unit of the British journal The Economist has compiled a democracy index of more than 150 countries based on 60 different indicators grouped in five different categories: electoral process and pluralism, civil liberties, functioning of government, political participation and political culture. In each of these categories a political system can score between 0 and 10 (a score of 10 fulfilling the requirements for the respective category). This index distinguishes between four kinds of regimes: full democracies, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes, and authoritarian regimes. Among 167 countries and regions included in the 2011 survey, Norway had the highest overall score (9.80) and North Korea the lowest (1.08). China was classified as an authoritarian state with an overall score of 3.14 and placed at number 141.13 During the past few years China’s democratic score has hardly improved, but if we could go back to the 1970s, I am convinced that it would have been lower than in 2011. And in the future it must improve quite a lot before we can call China even a “flawed,” let alone a “full democracy.”

The Reform Program and Today’s Problems The reason why I have taken some time to argue that China has in the era of reform and opening up moved in the direction of democracy, rather than farther away from it, is that I believe it is deeply mistaken to think of China under the rule of Mao as a more democratic society than it is today. It is rather that today’s China is less totalitarian, more open and less remote from democracy than Mao’s China ever was. However, while so much progress has been made in China over the past three decades, we also know that Chinese society is beset by a number of serious problems. One of these is the increasingly unequal distribution

13. Democracy Index 2011: Democracy Under Stress, compiled by The Economist Intelligence Unit, www.eiu.com/public/thankyou_download.aspx?activity=download&campaignid=Democr acyIndex2011

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of wealth. At the time of Mao’s death the Gini coefficient was probably a little over 0.2 and today it has risen to 0.5, which places China among the countries in the world with the most unequal distribution of income and wealth.14 Another problem is the galloping corruption which, just like the unequal distribution of wealth, threatens the cohesion of Chinese society. Combined with the authoritarian one-party rule and lack of a truly independent judiciary, these problems combine to result in glaring social injustice, which is now widely identified as a major problem. Another problem again is the environment with frightening levels of CO2 emissions, toxic pollution of air and water, water shortage threatening big cities and so on. These problems are all very serious, so it is not surprising that they cause both concern and anger among the Chinese population. Moreover, the progress that has been made over the past few decades has resulted in a revolution of rising expectations, which means that many more people in China today than ever before are willing to make their voices heard and demand improvements to their quality of life. It is also not surprising that there are people who see these problems as caused by the reform programme. Undeniably, there is a connection between the reform policies and the widening income gaps, corruption and the environmental problems. This perceived link between reform and opening up and some of the most serious problems besetting Chinese society today is probably the most important explanation why some people have come to look back to Mao Zedong’s time, thinking that after all life was in many ways better under his rule: there was more equality, less corruption, less serious environmental problems and so on. The various expressions of nostalgia for the Maoist era may be found in many

14. The Gini coefficient, which takes its name from the Italian sociologist Corrado Gini (1884– 1965), is a measure of the distribution of wealth in a society. If all wealth were equally shared by all, the coefficient would be 0; if all wealth belonged to one person, it would be 1. There are different ways of calculating the Gini coefficient, which definitely has to be taken cum grano salis, but using the same way of calculating it at different times still tells us whether economic equality in a society is increasing or decreasing.

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different sectors and walks of life in China, among peasants and among intellectuals, among industrial workers and among officials. This nostalgia certainly takes very different expressions, from the idolizing of Mao as a strong leader to a romantic idealization of the purity and justness of the People’s Communes. If we try to estimate the extent of this nostalgia, it seems that it is still limited to a small section of the population, and it seems impossible to say whether the numbers are growing or diminishing, but we cannot rule out the possibility that it is growing. Anyway, this nostalgia is certainly one basic component of New Maoism in its broadest sense. The form of New Maoism with which I can claim any familiarity is that represented by a number of intellectuals whom I know, if not personally at least through some of their writings and who are generally taken to represent the New Left in contemporary China: Cui Zhiyuan,15 Gan

15. Cui Zhiyuan 崔之元 (1963–) emerged on the intellectual scene in China in the early 1990s, when he called for “a second liberation of Chinese thought,” this time from the influence of neo-liberal capitalist thought. In a number of books, papers and lectures since then he has argued that China should not give up the plan economy, that some of the policies that were developed by Mao Zedong—such as the people’s communes—were in fact good, and he has come out in strong support of the so-called Chongqing model of Bo Xilai. Some of his representative works are: Cui Zhiyuan, “Anshan xianfa he hou Futezhuyi” [The Angang constitution and post-Fordism], Dushu (Reading) 1 (1996); Nanjie cun 南街村 [Nanjie village], with Deng Ying-Tao and Miao Zhuang (Beijing: Modern China Press, 1996); Zhongguo gaige de zhengzhi jingji xue 中國改革的政治經濟學 [The political economy of Chinese reform], ed. Cui Zhiyuan and Gan Yang (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press,1997); Zhidu chuangxin yu di er ci sixiang jiefang (geren lunwenji) 制度創新與第二次思想解放（個人論文集[Institutional Innovation and the Second Thought Liberation (collection of papers)] (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1997); Kan bu jian de shou de fanshi de beilun 看不見的手的範式的悖論 [The paradox of the invisible hand paradigm ] (Beijing: Economic Science Publisher, 1999); and “Liberal Socialism and the Future of China: A Petty Bourgeoisie Manifesto,” in China’s Model for Modern Development, ed. Tian Yu Cao 157–174 (London: Routledge, 2005). Concerning Cui Zhiyuan and the Chongqing model, see Cui Zhiyuan, “Kending Chongqing jingyan er fei Chongqing moshi” 肯定重慶經驗二非重慶模式 [Approve of the Chongqing experience but not the Chongqing model], http://www.21ccom.net/articles/zgyj/dfzl/2012/0119/52249.html

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Yang,16 Liu Xiaofeng,17 Wang Hui,18 Zhang Xudong19 and others. In most

16. Gan Yang 甘陽 (1952–) became famous in the 1980s during the so-called “culture fever.” He played a key role for the book series Wenhua: Zhongguo yü shijie 文化：中國與世界 [Culture: China and the World], which he founded in 1985 and which published a great number of translations of important foreign scholarly worlds. Over the years he has become increasingly leftist. Concerning his political views, see, e.g., Gan Yang, Jiang cuo jiu cuo 將錯就錯 [Making the same mistake] (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 2000); “Debating Liberalism and Democracy in China in the 1990s,” trans. Zhang Xudong, in Whither China? Intellectual Politics in Contemporary China, ed. Zhang Xudong, 79–101 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001); Gujin zhongxi zhi zheng 古今中西之爭 [The struggle between China and the west in ancient and modern times] (Beijing: Shenghuo, Dushu, Xinzhi Sanlian Shudian, 2006); Tong san tong 通三統 [Three traditions combined] (Beijing: Shenghuo, Dushu, Xinzhi Sanlian shudian, 2007). 17. Liu Xiaofeng 劉小楓 (1956–), intellectual historian and theologian with a doctoral degree from Basel (1989), emerged on the intellectual scene in China in the late 1980s and early ‘90s as a critic of the Chinese tradition, which he found characterized by collectivism and lack of respect for the individual human being. By contrast he found in Western tradition, and especially in Christianity, a worldview characterized by respect for the infinite value of every human being. This theme he developed especially in Liu Xiaofeng, Zhengjiu yu xiaoyao 拯救與逍遙 [Salvation and leisurely wandering], (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1988. Revised editions 2001 and 2007); Zouxiang shizijia shang de zhen 走向十字架上的真 [Truth on the way to the cross] (Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian, 1990). Through these and numerous articles he established himself as a pioneer among a group of intellectuals who have become known as “cultural Christians.” He has gradually become more and more interested in political thought and devoted much energy to translating and introducing the neo-conservative thinker Leo Strauss. At the same time he seems to share some basic ideas of the Chinese New Left, and especially those of Gan Yang. 18. Wang Hui 汪暉 (1959–) is a specialist in modern Chinese literature and thought. On the ideological scene he is recognized as perhaps the most influential representative of the Chinese New Left. Concerning his ideas, see, e.g., Wang Hui, China’s New Order: Society, Politics, and Economy in Transition. Translated by Ted Huters and Rebecca Karl (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003); Qu zhengzhihua de zhengzhi 去政治化的政治 [Depoliticized politics] (Beijing: Sanlian shudian, 2008); Xiandai Zhongguo sixiang de xingqi 現代中國思想的興起 [The rise of modern Chinese thought]. 4 vols. (Beijing: Sanlian shudian, 2004–2009); Yazhou shiye: Zhongguo lishi de xushu 亞洲視野：中國歷史的敘述 [From an Asian perspective: The narrations of Chinese history] (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 2010a); “Zhongguo jueqi de jingyan ji qi mianlin de tiaozhan” 中國崛起的經驗及其面臨的挑戰 [China’s rise and the challenges she faces], Wenhua Zongheng 文化縱橫, 2. (2010); The Politics of Imagining Asia. Translated by Theodore Huters (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011); “The Rumor Machine,” London Review of Books, no. 9 (2012), www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n09/-wanghui/the-rumour-machine 19. Zhang Xudong 張旭東 (1965–) is a professor of East Asian Studies and comparative literature, strongly influenced by postcolonial theory. In 2011, at the height of Bo Xilai’s career, he was appointed dean of an institute for advanced studies in the humanities and social sciences at Chongqing University. Concerning his ideas, see, e.g., Whither China? Intellectual Politics of Contemporary China, edited and with an introduction by Xudong Zhang (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002); Zhang Xudong, Postsocialism and Cultural Politics: China in the Last Decade of the Twentieth Century (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2008).

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cases they are names I first heard of in the 1980s and1990s, when they emerged as social critics, demanding more reforms than Deng Xiaoping’s programme offered. They were critics of the Chinese “system” (tizhi 體 制)—politics and culture—and they looked outside China, especially to the Western world, for ideas and theories that would be helpful for reforming and humanizing China. In this they were heirs of their May Fourth predecessors. In them, as in most young Chinese who went to North America or Europe to study in the 1980s and ‘90s, it is possible to varying degrees to see an idealization of the West, an expectation to find a social system and a culture worthy of emulation. After some time in the West, being by temperament social critics rather than eulogists, they soon discovered the problems of the Western societies, and what attracted them most were leftist ideas and theories that they met with, ideas and theories that were rooted in a concern among Western intellectuals with the problems that their societies faced. The young Chinese intellectuals, whom we have later come to think of as New Maoists, found some of these ideas highly relevant for understanding the nature of China’s problems and, in particular, for finding remedies to these problems. Some of the currents that appealed to the Chinese especially had a “post” as prefix: post-colonialism, post-modernism, post-structuralism. Imported to China these currents were transformed into a kind of Chinese “post-ism” (houxue 後學), to use a term originally presumably coined by the literary scholar Zhao Yiheng.20 With the help of different varieties of “post-ism” theory these intellectuals feel that they can understand how globalization, and especially the free flow of international capital across national borders, in conjunction with the broadening scope for the market economy in China, are major causes of those serious problems we have just briefly discussed.

20. For a critical analysis of the reception of these currents of thought among Chinese intellectuals, see Zhao Yiheng 趙毅衡, “Houxue’ yu Zhongguo xinbaoshouzhuyi” 後學與中國新保守主義 [“Post-ism” and new conservatism in China], Twenty-first Century, February 1995; “Wenhua pipan yu houxiandaizhuyi lilun” 文化批判與後現代主義理論 [Cultural criticism and the theory of postmodernism], Twenty-first Century, August 1995, and these two articles in a slightly revised form in “Houxue: xin baoshouzhuyi yu wenhua pipan” 後學：新保守主義與文化批判 [Post-ism: new conservatism and cultural criticism], Huacheng 花城, 5 (1995).

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Of course, this does not mean that they are all against international trade and economic cooperation, nor that they see no role whatsoever for the market economy in China. But it does mean that they think that the forces of globalization and the market economy are not sufficiently controlled. Furthermore, they argue that these effects of the reform and opening up that they think they have identified show that it was a mistake to abandon so radically Mao Zedong’s policy of self-reliance internationally and the plan economy domestically. While recognizing that Mao made several mistakes, they still think that some of his core ideas, such as selfreliance, plan economy, and focus on equality were good for China and should be reintroduced. In their view, abandoning the people’s communes in favour of individual farming was a mistake, which is also how they view the dismantling of the state-owned enterprises. They believe that China should have more, not less, collective ownership and less, not more, private ownership. These ideas have been repeated again and again and we can say that they define the position of the Chinese New Left, as opposed to the liberal camp, whose representatives are also very much concerned with the social problems that we have just discussed.21 In opposition to the New Left, the Liberals argue that these problems are not the fault of the market economy or the reform policies.22 What has caused these problems is rather that the market economy has been too much controlled and manipulated by the party-state and that the reform policies have not been radical enough. The liberals see the lack of basic freedoms and rights, the lack of an independent judiciary and independent media, the lack of transparency, in short the lack of democratic reforms, rather than globalization and the market economy, as the roots of today’s problems.23

21. For an excellent analysis of the ideas of the New Left, see Ma Licheng, Dangdai Zhongguo ba zhong shehui sichao, pp. 66–81. 22. For an introduction to liberal thought in contemporary China, see ibid., pp. 113–32. 23. For a clear and interesting analysis of the New Left by a leading Chinese liberal, see Xu Youyu 徐友漁. “The Debates between Liberalism and the New Left in China since the 1990s,” Contemporary Chinese Thought, 34(3) (2003).

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The New Left and New Maoism are not conceptually identical, but they overlap to a great extent, and the New Maoists that I discuss here also represent the New Left and thus argue that some of Mao’s ideas and policies should be recognized as having played a very important and positive role for China and should therefore be reintroduced. Among these ideas are “self-reliance” and ideological training in socialist thinking emphasizing ideological rather than material incentives for work. Furthermore, the collectivistic policies of Mao Zedong are considered to be positive alternatives to the privatization and deregulation introduced by the present regime. Abandoning the people’s communes in favour of individual farming is seen as a mistake, which is also how they view the dismantling of the state-owned enterprises. The New Maoist ideas are by no means confined to some intellectuals who have spent time in the West. In practical politics, Bo Xilai was a highranking leader in the Communist Party who flirted with these ideas and managed to attract some of the intellectuals who represent the New Left and New Maoism as advisers. His own political message as manifested in the so-called Chongqing model bears their imprint. Scholars such as Cui Zhiyuan, Gan Yang and Zhang Xudong even accepted prestigious academic positions in Chongqing, which would offer them a platform to take part in devising policies to implement their ideas. In the wake of Bo Xilai’s demise, the New Maoists complain about the oppression exercised by the Beijing government. Wang Hui describes the ousting of Bo Xilai in terms of “clamping down on political freedoms in order to make it easier to drive through deeply unpopular neoliberal measures.”24 In other words, New Maoism is articulated as a critique of the “neoliberal” policies of reform and opening up, which may give us the impression that the New Maoists are essentially opposed to the present political leadership. However, this would be to oversimplify things. In fact, sometimes they have appeared quite supportive of the present leadership. In an article published in 2010, which attracted a great deal of attention,

24. Wang, “The Rumor Machine.”

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Wang Hui painted a picture of China’s development during the years of reform and opening up, which was on the whole very positive.25 His main point was to argue that the foundation for the positive developments in post-Mao China was in fact laid under the rule of Mao Zedong, and that the most important aspect of this foundation was that Mao turned China into a truly sovereign state. Probably Wang Hui is of the opinion that the idea of self-reliance, which did indeed permeate Mao’s policies, was the main tool for developing and upholding China’s sovereignty as a basis for the rapid economic development that has taken place in post-Mao China. Anyway, there is no doubt that he argues that the programme of reform and opening up owes its success to the policies pursued under Mao Zedong. This means that it is not so clear to what extent various New Maoists really want to reintroduce the policies of Mao Zedong, but they are at least united in the belief that the reform policies have moved too far in the direction away from the policies of Mao. As we know, there are deep divisions within the top echelons of power in China—not least the Bo Xilai incident demonstrates this—and the New Maoists have indeed offered support to forces in the central leadership, although quite obviously not to the more liberally oriented politicians such as Wen Jiabao. It is also quite clear that in the past few years, especially since the celebration of the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the image of Mao Zedong that the Party projects has been strengthened rather than weakened. Personally, I was long convinced that the time was fast approaching when Mao’s portrait would be removed from Tiananmen Square and a “de-Maoization” would begin. However, by means of the propaganda film Jianguo daye [Lofty Ambitions of Founding a Republic] in 2009 the party leadership rather seemed to make it clear that they had no such intention. In May 2012 one hundred prominent Chinese writers and artists—among them Han Shaogong, Mo Yan, Su Tong, Wang Meng—copied parts of Mao’s Yan’an Talks, which to many of us is the arch symbol of oppression in the cultural

25. Wang, “Zhongguo jueqi de jingyan ji qi mianlin de tiaozhan.”

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field, to be published in commemoration of these talks.26 This event must be seen as a statement by official China that the image of Mao Zedong as a great leader and teacher is to be upheld.

Maoism a Good Prescription? So what should we make of all this? What do the ideas of New Maoism really signify, and how should we evaluate them? New Maoism seems to offer both a diagnosis of the situation in China in the reform era and a prescription for improving the situation. One may have different views about the relationship between economic equality/ inequality and democracy, but it cannot be denied that the income gap between rich and poor in China is so huge that it is a democratic problem. Also it cannot be denied that Chinese workers are in many cases exploited, by Chinese and by foreign companies. These are problems that need to be addressed, so it is not possible to say that the New Maoists do not speak about real problems. The unequal distribution of wealth has now reached a level where it obviously also worries the top leaders, and it is likely that we can expect stronger efforts from the regime in order to do something about it. In spite of much talk about fighting corruption, the fact is that the situation is extremely serious in this regard and is giving rise to protests and unrest, which must also be regarded as a serious threat to continuing social stability. Although one can see an increasing awareness both among leaders and the population about the environmental problems, they continue to be very serious: the air in big cities such as Beijing is so polluted that living there very concretely threatens people’s health. The water supply in many areas, not least the huge cities, is in many cases a big problem. Contamination of food occurs time and again.

26. Mao Zedong 毛澤東, Mao Zedong tongzhi ”Zai Yan’an wenyi zuotanhuishang de jianghua” bai wei wenxue yishu jia shouchao zhencang jiniance 毛澤東同志在延安文藝座談會上的講話百 位文學藝術家手抄珍藏紀念冊 [Commemorative collection of Comrade Mao Zedong’s ”Talks at the Yan’an Forum on Literature and Art” hand-copied by one hundred writers and artists] (Beijing: Zuojia chubanshe, 2012).

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These three problem areas—unequal distribution, corruption, and the environment—are closely intertwined. Corruption contributes both to widening gaps and to the destruction of the environment. The extreme inequality and the fast growing number of very rich people—China will soon be the country with the greatest number of dollar billionaires—has a devastating impact on values, making becoming rich, and rich at almost any cost, the highest priority for millions of people. Thus, in so far as the New Maoists argue that these are major problems facing today’s China, there is no reason to disagree with them, and most observers would also agree with them. In fact, liberals such as Qin Hui,27 Xu Youyu28 and Zhu Xueqin,29 whom the Maoists identify as some of their major opponents, often seem more daring than the Maoists in their criticism of social injustice, corruption and destruction of the environment. But how right are the New Maoists in arguing that the enormous problems just mentioned are the result of the neoliberal policies pursued within the framework of reform and opening up?

27. Qin Hui 秦暉 (1953–), a historian specializing in economic history, can be described as a left liberal arguing for the importance of a market economy that operates under the conditions of democracy. Concerning Qin’s ideas, see Qin Hui. Shichang de zuotian yu jintian: shangpin jingji, sichang lixing, shehui gongzheng 市場的昨天與今天：商品經濟，市場理性，社會 公正 [The market today and tomorrow: Commodity economy, market reason, social justice] (Guangzhou: Guangzhou jiaoyu chubanshe, 1998); Chuantong shi lun: bentu shehui de zhidu, wenhua ji qi biange 傳統十論：本土社會的製度，文化及其變革 [Ten essays on tradition: the insitutions and culture of our indigenous society and their changes] (Shanghai: Fudan Daxue chubanshe, 2003). 28. Xu Youyu 徐友漁 (1947–), philosopher of the analytical school, social critic, specialist on the history of the Cultural Revolution, left liberal, one of the signatories of Charter 08. He sees democracy as the prerequisite of a well functioning market economy and a society where freedom and social justice can prevail. Concerning his ideas, see Xu Youyu, Gaobie 20 shiji: dui yiyi he lixiang de sikao 告別20世紀：對意義和理想的思考 [Farewell to the twentieth century: Thoughts on meaning and ideals] (Jinan: Shandong jiaoyu chubanshe, 1999); Ziyou de yanshuo: Xu Youyu wenxuan 自由的言說：徐友漁文選 [Free words: Selected writings by Xu Youyu] (Changchun: Changchun chubanshe, 1999); and “The Debates between Liberalism and the New Left in China since the 1990s” (2003). 29. Zhu Xueqin 朱學勤 (1952–), historian, public intellectual, left liberal. Concerning his ideas, see, e.g., Zhu Xueqin, Shuzhai li de geming 書齋裡的革命 [Revolution in the study]. (Kunming: Yunnan Renmin chubanshe, 2006).

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This question is rather complicated. When it comes to the widening income gap, it may be said on the one hand that this gap has been propelled by the market forces in a way that has made individual people in many cases not just rich but filthy rich. On the other hand, it may also be said that this would not have happened to the same extent if the market had been allowed to operate in an open society with really free competition. Many of the nouveaux riches in today’s China owe a considerable portion of their wealth to connections with officials and politicians, who have given them enormous advantages in the market as compared to their competitors—be it in the form of access to raw materials from the parts of the economy that still operate under state planning or be it in obtaining permissions and rights denied to others. Corruption seems to have much more to do with the political power monopoly of the Communist Party and the possibility for Party apparatchiks to grant favours to relatives and friends in the business community, and thus amass wealth of their own, than with liberal economic policies. We cannot say that the increasingly unequal distribution of wealth is unrelated to the market economy reforms, but more importantly it is a testimony to a government incapable of introducing a decent system of taxation and other methods to come to terms with undesirable effects of the market economy. As I see it, the market economy should be embraced as an engine of growth, but it is the task of the government to define a framework of rules for the market to operate within and to adopt measures to come to terms with social injustice. We must also not forget that China is by no means a full-fledged market economy. The state still monopolizes important areas of the market, and there are still huge state-owned enterprises. These vestiges of the plan economy contribute to corruption and other kinds of malfunctioning. In other words, that aspect of the New Maoist diagnosis which identifies neoliberal policies as an essential cause of the most important problems in China today may contain a grain of truth but still appears largely misleading. In terms of a prescription to come to terms with today’s problems, the New Maoists suggest, as we have seen, a return to some of the core policies

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of Mao Zedong’s rule. The public sector in the economy (i.e., state and collective forms of ownership) should be dominant. International trade and foreign investments should be more strictly controlled than today, so as not to threaten China’s sovereignty. In constructing a new judicial system China should look less to the West and more to the indigenous tradition. Mass participation in politics should be encouraged, and when it comes to the quest for democracy one should look less to the West for models to emulate and rather try to define a form of democracy that fits Chinese conditions. In doing this China should again consider the legacy of Mao Zedong. But would not this prescription again make China a more closed society and an economically stagnant one? In terms of democracy, human rights and popular participation, should not the Mao years be a warning example? Was this not a period in China’s history when rule of law was conspicuously absent and people did not know from one day to the next what was allowed? Was this not a period of widespread persecution and imprisonment without fair trial? Was this not a period with little or no respect for the integrity of individuals? In order to build a democratic China, where human rights and the dignity of all citizens are respected, the rule of law is crucial. In Europe, as Niall Ferguson has pointed out, “democracy was the capstone of an edifice that had as its foundation the rule of law,” and we have good reason to assume that the democratization of China will have to follow the same logic.30 In order to have rule of law, there must be laws, rules and regulations that stand above politics. In particular, the Constitution must stand above politics. The very idea of a constitution is to have rules that politicians must follow; a constitution must not be a document that political leaders can disregard whenever they feel a need to do so. But rule of law does not seem to be something to which New Maoism gives very high priority. Furthermore, China must get away from the system where in all public institutions there are party committees which have the final say. During

30. Niall Ferguson, Civilization: The West and the Rest (London: Allen Lane. 2011), p. 97.

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more than 30 years of reform and opening up, several steps have been taken in the direction of rule of law. Yet, whenever it finds it necessary the Party can still intervene and overrule decisions by non-party organs.31 In order to build a vital democracy it is necessary also to have independent media that can examine what the authorities are doing, and there must be freedom of expression. In China this means that private publishers must be allowed and that political censorship must cease. Compared with the Mao period several steps have been taken in the direction of democracy but very much remains to be done. As noted above, China occupies place number 141 among 167 countries and regions on the 2011 democracy index list compiled by The Economist. A number of interesting suggestions were made in the document Charter 08 which could have served as a basis for discussions between spokesmen for the Party and Government and social critics who want to see brave steps taken in the direction of democracy. Unfortunately, the authorities chose to ban the document and put the main person behind it, Dr. Liu Xiaobo, in prison. The idea that the problems of reform and opening up should be remedied by means of recourse to the ideas and practice of Mao Zedong is, I believe, to suggest a “cure” that would if not kill the patient at least worsen the illness and move China even farther away from the rule of law, respect for human rights and democracy.

The Need to Come to Terms with the Past If their activities result in more open discussions and analyses in China about the Mao years and Mao’s legacy, the New Maoists will make an important contribution. So far the party leaders have not allowed open discussions about this, obviously for fear that it would affect their own legitimacy. It seems vitally important for the Chinese people, and therefore

31. Concerning the role of the communist party in today’s China, see Richard McGregor, The Party: The Secret World of China's Communist Rulers (London: Allen Lane, 2010).

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also for the rest of the world, to allow open discussions with no taboos about, for example, the ideas of the New Left/New Maoists, the liberals and the ideas representing different factions within the Communist Party. It seems especially important that China’s modern history and such events as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution can be discussed without taboos. Probably most important of all, there is a need for an unfettered discussion and evaluation of Mao Zedong and his role in Chinese history. After World War II the Germans engaged in what they called a Vergangenheitbewältigung, an effort to come to terms with the past—“mastering the past”—by facing and analyzing what had really happened. A Chinese Vergangheitsbewältigung is important for the future of Chinese culture and society.32 As long as the leadership in Beijing does not allow these issues to be openly discussed, the New Maoists can continue to do what Wang Hui did in his 2012 article in London Review of Books, that is, to describe New Maoism as a suppressed liberating force. He may be right that the ideas of the New Left and New Maoism cannot now be freely expressed, and this is indeed regrettable. But we should not be led to believe that these ideas are themselves a liberating force. They rather suggest the return to a closed society with arbitrary authoritarian rule. Another very regrettable result of the lack of an open and penetrating discussion about Mao and Maoism is that some ideas and values, which are very important for the future modernization and democratization of China, have been discredited by the political realities of the rule of Mao. Therefore, in the eyes of many people they are closely linked with oppression. One example is the idea of “equality” (pingdeng 平等), for example the equality of men and women. In the eyes of many people in China this word seems to have taken on a negative connotation, because

32. Concerning the significance of a Vergangenheitsbewältigung, see Andreas Maislinger, “Coming to Terms with the Past: An International Comparison,” in Nationalism, Ethnicity, and Identity. Cross National and Comparative Perspectives, ed. Russell F. Farnen (New Brunswick and London: Transactions Publishers, 2004).

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it is so closely associated with the policies of the Cultural Revolution. Actually, an open discussion would show, I believe, that Mao Zedong’s China was in many ways a very unequal society, although the income gap was indeed much narrower than today. In terms of rights and opportunities, Mao’s China was an extremely unequal society. If you were born in a poor village in the countryside you were doomed to spend the rest of your life there. If your parents had the wrong class background or had committed serious political errors, you were disqualified from higher education and many jobs. A long list could be made of examples of inequality in Mao’s China. Equal rights and a reasonably fair distribution of wealth are cornerstones of a civilized democratic society. And “fair distribution” must mean “not too unequal.” Therefore increased equality should today be a major political objective—but many people associate this idea with Mao and the New Maoists and fear that efforts by the government to achieve this will inevitably lead to more oppression. In other words, since the time of Mao, the idea of “big government” is for many people automatically associated with autocratic rule. Open and free discussion is needed to clarify that a government, especially a democratic government which has to face its voters at regular intervals and which considers the market economy an engine to promote economic growth, but which also uses legislation, taxation and the like to prevent economic growth from leading to unreasonably unequal distribution of wealth and other negative effects, does not necessarily imply autocratic rule and oppression. The idea that a strong, democratic government can indeed, within the framework of the rule of law, exercise good governance seems crucial. In order to clarify this point open discussion about modern Chinese history and about the experience of other countries is essential. Only if there is open discussion with no taboos about China’s modern history will it be possible to explode the myth, today nourished by New Maoism, of Mao’s China as a more equal and just society than today’s China. And only when there is such open discussion will it be possible to rescue a number of notions such as “equality,” “strong government”

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and the like from the contamination they suffered in the eyes of millions of people during the years when Mao Zedong ruled China. Open and unfettered discussions about modern Chinese history would be a decisive step towards democracy in China, and in turn only a democratic China can in the long run guarantee the freedoms which make such discussions possible.

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8 The “Chongqing Model” What It Means to China Today Joseph Y. S. CHENG Chair Professor of Political Science Department of Public Policy, City University of Hong Kong

Introduction The political demise of Bo Xilai generated much political drama in China in early 2012, the year of the 18th Party Congress which was expected to determine the new leadership lineup for the following decade.1 This chapter tends to examine the significance of the “Chongqing model” and the appeal of China’s New Leftists in Chinese politics and society, as well as their impact on China’s ideological debates and political development. The “Chongqing model” attempted to address people’s grievances at this stage with a policy programme framed in Maoism. Bo Xilai’s analysis of the major sources of people’s grievances did not differ from that of the Chinese authorities as articulated by the official think-tanks; they included the anxiety in the process of rapid socio-economic development among those who had not done well, the concern about the erosion of social

1. See, for example, Xiang Lanxin, “The Bo Xilai and China’s Future,” Survival Vol. 54, No. 3, June/July 2012, pp. 59–68; and Li Cheng, “The End of the CCP’s Resilient Authoritarianism? A Tripartite Assessment of Shifting Power in China,” The China Quarterly, No. 211, September 2012, pp. 595–623.

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security in the market economy, and the social injustice associated with the widening of the gap between the rich and poor. Embedding the policy programme within a Maoist ideological framework enhanced its appeal, made it easily understood by the people, and offered additional emotional support.2 The “Chongqing model” therefore is a case of the uses of Mao by Chinese leaders. It demonstrates the relevance and significance of Mao in Chinese politics today, and the struggle for ideological orthodoxy among Chinese leaders centering on Maoism. It reinforces the perception that Mao can still be used to articulate the grievances of the under-privileged, as well as offering legitimacy to this articulation. In this connection, the leaders who choose to present themselves as advocates for the interests of the under-privileged are naturally tempted to appeal to Maoism for ideological and policy justification, which in turn reinforces the significance and uses of Mao. Bo Xilai was a very ambitious politician who had been working hard to seek promotion to the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the 2012 Party Congress. There were even suggestions that Bo had been bargaining for an influential and prestigious position like premiership or vice presidency of the state in the top leadership lineup. More dramatic still, there was a conspiracy theory that Bo joined hands with Zhou Yongkang, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau chairing the Party’s Political and Legal Affairs Commission, to unseat and replace Xi Jinping at a later stage.3 In the eyes of the Chinese leadership headed by Hu Jintao, Bo had violated Party discipline in three significant ways. He promoted the “Chongqing model” without proper authorization by the Party; he invited six of the nine Politburo Standing Committee members to Chongqing to

2. Su Zhenhua, Zhao Hui and He Jingkai, “Authoritarianism and Contestation,” Journal of Democracy Vol. 24, No. 1, January 2013, pp. 26–40. 3. See, for example, Willy Xam, “The Maoist Revival and the Conservative Turn in Chinese Politics,” China Perspectives No. 2, 2012, pp. 5–15.

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praise his achievements to lobby his advance to the Politburo Standing Committee; and he promoted the neo-Maoist ideological line in Chongqing symbolized by his “singing red” campaign, i.e., the revival of revolutionary songs epitomizing the leftism of the Maoist era. Apparently the central leadership had been indecisive in sanctioning Bo, and it had to wait till Wang Lijun, Chongqing’s former vice mayor and public security chief, went to seek help from the U.S. consulate in Chengdu to act.4 It was speculated that Wang had fallen out with Bo, his superior. Part of this indecision on the part of the central leadership reflected the lack of transparency and due process in disciplining insubordinate senior cadres, and part of the cause might well be the popularity of Bo. Like Chen Xitong and Chen Liangyu (also Politburo members) before him, Bo was subsequently prosecuted for corruption and other criminal charges instead of challenging the central leadership.5 It is not the intention of this chapter to concentrate on Bo Xilai’s case, but to examine the appeal of the “Chongqing model” in the context of the socio-economic problems at this stage of China’s development. Zheng Yongnian describes China in 2011 as “full of anger, political consciousness, anxiety and uncertainty”.6 Apparently the Hu Jintao/Wen Jiabao administration was aware of this anger, hence its promotion of “building a harmonious society”; its realization of the widening gap between the rich and poor was the principal reason for its efforts to establish a basic social security net covering the entire population.

4. See Lin Chun, “China’s leaders are cracking down on Bo Xilai and his Chongqing model,” The Guardian (London), April 22, 2012, www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/apr/22/chinaleader...; and John Garnaut, The Rise and Fall of the House of Bo, Melbourne, 2012, www. goodreads.com/book/show/16110618-the-rise-and -fall-of-the-house-of-bo. 5. Yongnian Zheng, “China in 2011—Anger, Political Consciousness, Anxiety, and Uncertainty,” Asian Survey Vol. 52, No. 1, January/February 2012, p. 28. 6. Li Peilin and Chen Guangjin, “Cheng Shi Hua Yin Ling Zhong Guo Xin Cheng Zhong Jie Duan (Urbanization Leads to a New Stage of Development),” in Ru Xin, Lu Xueyi and Li Peilin (eds.), 2012 Nian: Zhongguo Shehui Xingshi Fenxi yu Yuce, (Society of China Analysis and Forecast 2012), Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (China), January 2012, p. 5.

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Yet high rates of inflation and the problems of access to education, medical services and housing made the bulk of the population at the grassroots level wonder if its quality of life had been improving, despite the rise in monetary incomes. The tertiary institutions produced 6.6 million graduates in the summer of 2011; the government expected an unemployment rate of 10% six months after their graduation, but unofficial estimates were considerably higher.7 With the rapid expansion of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) which had been much benefitted by the four trillion yuan financial stimulus package in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008, private-sector enterprises were squeezed out largely because of their difficulties in securing bank credits. Many small- and medium-sized enterprises were in crisis. Even the elites seemed to have lost confidence. According to a report by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in March 2012, spouses of senior and middle-ranking cadres at the provincial/central ministerial level, prefectural/bureau level and county/section (“chu”) level who held foreign passports or had permanent residential rights in foreign countries amounted to over 185,700, and children of such cadres enjoying the same status numbered more than 813,000.8 The Bank of China released a report in 2011 indicating that in the future, three out of five rich Chinese would hold foreign passports. Among those each with 10 million yuan and more available for investment, 14% had already emigrated, and 46% were planning or in the process doing so. In another report by the China Merchant Bank, among the 20,000 Chinese each with 100 million yuan or more available for investment, 27% had

7. See also Li Chunling and Lu Peng, “‘80 Hou’ Da Xue Bi Ye Sheng De Jiu Ye Zhuang Kuang—Ji Yu 6 Suo ‘985 Gao Xiao’ Bi Ye Sheng De Diao Cha” (Employment Situations of Graduates among the ‘80s Generation’—A Report of Graduates from Six ‘985’ Chinese Universities),” in Ru Xin, Lu Xueyi and Li Peilin (eds.), 2011 Nian: Zhongguo Shehui Xingshi Fenxi yu Yuce (Society of China Analysis and Forecast, 2011), Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (China) January 2011, pp. 138–151. 8. Mu Mu Ying, “Zhong Gong ‘Luo Guan’ Fan Lan Yin Fa Min Fen” (People Are Angry with the Common Phenomenon of Party Officials Having Their Families Staying Abroad), Cheng Ming (an anticommunist monthly magazine in Hong Kong) No. 414, April 2012, p. 13.

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already emigrated, and 47% were considering doing so. These banks estimated that these rich Chinese had invested 36 trillion yuan overseas, despite nominal strict official controls.9 At the end of 2009, “Renmin Luntan” (People’s Forum), a magazine of the Renmin Ribao group, conducted a survey on the “Ten Most Serious Challenges in the Coming Decade”. 82.3% of the respondents chose “the issue of corruption exceeds the baseline of people’s tolerance”; 80.6% of the respondents picked “the widening of the gap between the rich and poor as well as injustice in distribution exacerbate social contradictions”; and 63.2% identified “conflicts between cadres and the masses at the grassroots level”. Soon after the exposure of the Bo Xilai incident, this Renmin Luntan article was widely circulated among the micro-blogs in China. The English edition of Global Times, which also belongs to the Renmin Ribao group, released another alarming survey report in early 2012. Over 15% of the respondents firmly believed that China was “at the edge of a new revolution”; and 34% of the respondents considered that China was possibly in that kind of situation.10 During the annual sessions of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in March 2012, the exorbitant profits of the state-owned commercial banks and the high level of remuneration for the senior executives of state-owned financial institutions emerged as the foci of public criticisms, yet the latter still publicly defended that such profits and remuneration were “reasonable”. Similarly the consumption of “maotai” (the official price was 2,280 yuan per bottle then) by public accounts expenditure became a symbol of corruption and abuse of public money, so much so that there were resolutions introduced at the above-mentioned annual meetings “to prohibit the consumption of maotai by public

9. Jia Ren, “Zhong Guo Xin Fu Jie Ceng Da Yi Min Yin SHen Si” (The Massive Migration of China’s New-Rich Stratum Generates Deep Reflection), The Mirror (a pro-Beijing monthly magazine in Hong Kong) No. 418, May 2012, p. 10. 10. Cao Jing Xing, ”Wei Ji Bu Zhi Lai Zi Bo Xi Lai,” (The Crisis Does Not Come from Bo Xilai Alone,” Ming Pao Monthly (Hong Kong) Vol. 47, No. 5, May 2012, pp. 33–34.

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money”. It was exactly this kind of anger which had provided the foundation for Bo Xilai to exploit the “Chongqing model” as his personal political asset to pursue his career advancement and challenge the central leadership. It was probably the awareness of such anger which had contributed to the latter’s initial indecisiveness in disciplining Bo. There was another type of healthy response to this anger. In his final years in office, probably since August 2010, Premier Wen Jiabao made several open and formal appeals for political reforms. A significant example is Wen’s speech at the Summer Davos Forum in Dalian, Liaoning Province on September 14, 2011. Wen elaborated his ideas in a five-point proposal ranging from the separation between the CPC and the state to “expanding people’s democracy” through elections.11 But Wen’s appeals, while attracting considerable attention of the international media, were not accorded significant treatment by the official media in China. There was no support from the top leadership. In fact, Wu Bangguo, chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, set the limits for China’s political reforms in his speech at the NPC annual session earlier on March 10, 2011. Wu explicitly said no to the following liberal political ideas: competition and rotation among several political parties to capture government; diversity in ideological guidelines; a system of checks and balances among the three branches of government; a bicameral legislature; a federal system; and a privatized economy. In view of the resistance of vested interests, pushing for political reforms demands strong leadership backed by a broad consensus. Both are absent for the time being, and hence the maintenance of the status quo. The declaration of assets on the part of cadres had been on the political reform agenda for more than a decade, and in recent years specific regulations had been promulgated, yet the actual implementation has been far from

11. See “Wen Jiabao Guanyu Zhengzhi Gaige de Wudian Jianyi” (Five Suggestions on Political Reforms by Wen Jiabao), Wenhui Bao (Hong Kong), September 15, 2011, at www. chinaelections.org/newsinfo.asp?newsid=214508, accessed May 5, 2012.

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satisfactory. This is certainly a significant indicator of the resistance of vested interests as well as the lack of strong leadership and political will, leading to cynicism and anger among the people.12

Attractive Elements of the “Chongqing Model” In July 2008, the Chongqing municipal authorities summarized their development policy programmes as “the Five Chongqings”: “yiju” Chongqing (Chongqing with an ideal living environment), “changtong” Chongqing (Chongqing with smooth transport), “pingan” Chongqing (safe Chongqing), “senlin” Chongqing (forested Chongqing) and “jiankang” Chongqing (healthy Chongqing).13 Within a month, plans for “the Five Chongqings” were released; and in several months’ time, leadership groups were established respectively for “the Five Chongqings” on an inter-agency basis. Living Environment and Housing When people in China worried about rising property prices and most young people felt that they could no longer afford to buy their own accommodation, Bo Xilai accorded top priority to improve the housing conditions for the population of Chongqing. According to Bo, per capita accommodation space for the city’s urban population would increase from 27.34 sq. m. in 2008 to 30 sq. m. in 2012, and to 35 sq. m. in 2017. Sub-standard housing in the rural areas would be replaced, so that the proportion of concrete-brick buildings would reach 95%, and those with toilet facilities would reach 70% in 2012. The municipal authorities

12. Feng Lin, “Democratization within the CPC and the Future of Democracy in China,” in Joseph Y. S. Cheng (ed.), China—A New Stage of Development for an Emerging Superpower, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong Press, 2012, pp. 55–89. 13. Wang Shaoguang, “Zhong Guo Shi She Hui Zhu Yi 3.0: Chong Qing De Tan Suo,” (Chinese Socialism 3.0: Chongqing Experience), Gonggong Xingzheng Pinglun (Journal of Public Administration) Vol. 4, No. 6, 2011, pp. 48–78.

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designed new models (“Bayu Xinju”) for new rural housing: they were to be built in clusters, with modern functional facilities and an emphasis to protect the environment and save energy, and with elegant styles and tidy, clean appearances. By 2012, 40% of newly-built rural housing would conform to these new models, and the proportion would reach 60% by 2017.14 Bo Xilai pledged to help the poor to build houses. His policy scenario was that the 10% high-income families would live in high-quality private housing, and eventually they would have to pay a “special housing consumption tax”. The 60% middle-income families would live in ordinary private housing. In late 2011, real estate prices in Chongqing were still lower than those in other western cities like Xian, Chengdu and Guiyang. Bo promised to regulate the housing market so that double-income urban families would be able to acquire small- and medium-sized housing units at 6.5 times of their annual incomes. For the 30% low-income families, the Chongqing municipal authorities offered various social-security types of housing, including low-rental housing, low-cost economical housing, rebuilding of old and dangerous buildings, re-structuring of villages in urban areas, apartments for migrant workers, and a new type of public rental housing. The former five types were for those with economic difficulties and migrant workers; the final type was designed for the “sandwiched groups” who did not qualify for social-security types of housing, but who could not yet afford to buy private housing. Chongqing was almost one year ahead of the National Twelfth Five-Year Economic and Social Development Programme in terms of public housing construction; the central leadership too realized the significance of the housing problem, and planned to build 36 million public housing units in the 2011–2015 period and 10 million such units in 2011 alone. The 2011 annual national target was not implemented; and Chongqing performed

14. The official website for “Yiju Chongqing” is www.yjcq.gov.cn/Index.aspx, where relevant information and the work reports of municipal Yiju Chongqing Office are available.

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better than all other provincial units in the field of public housing and in the tackling of a serious people’s livelihood challenge. Transport Network Building transport networks has been a key element in China’s economic development in recent decades. Chongqing is a hilly city in interior China, and the backwardness of its transport system has been a handicap. Bo Xilai pledged to establish smooth and efficient transport networks within the urban areas of the municipality, between its urban and rural areas, within southwestern China, and efficient transport links with the neighbouring provinces, the Yangtze Delta, the Pearl River Delta, China, Southeast Asia, and the whole world. According to Bo’s plans, by 2012, cars would be able to travel at more than 30 km per hour along the main city routes and move from one spot to any other point within the main city centre within half an hour. In 2010, the municipal authorities invested 7.5 billion yuan to build and improve 8,000 km of rural roads. It was also scheduled that by 2012, Chongqing would become the comprehensive transport hub in southwestern China; it would be able to reach any neighbouring provincial capital by highway in eight hours by 2012, and by train in four hours by 2015. In the same year, it would be able to reach the Yangtze Delta, the Pearl River Delta and Southeast Asia by train in eight hours. Afforestation Chongqing is a very hot place in summer, and it is recognized as one of the “furnaces” in China. The afforestation scheme starting in August 2008 aimed to raise the forest coverage rate from 34% in 2008 to 38% in 2012, and 45% in 2017. The output value of the forestry industry would also rise from 17.4 billion yuan in 2008 to 25 billion yuan in 2012 and 50 billion yuan in 2017. From August 2008 to the end of 2009, 17.8 billion yuan was spent to plant over 910 million trees. In the spring of 2010, the neighbouring provinces of Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou suffered a severe drought; the situation in Chongqing was relatively better, and one of the

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reasons appeared to be the afforestation scheme. In early 2010, Chongqing was named a “national garden city”, securing the very front rank among 44 cities seeking the honour. Safety As Well As Law and Order Law and order actually ranked fourth in the “Five Chongqings” policy programme. According to the ninth national survey on the people’s sense of security conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics in 2009, the sense of security index of Chongqing was 96.62%, ninth among all provincial units and first among the four municipalities. As a result, the central ministry of public security commended Chongqing nationally.15 “Pingan Chongqing” had a package of indicators including people’s sense of security index, accidental death rate per 100 million yuan worth of GDP output, accidental death rate per 100,000 employees in the industrial, mining, commercial and trade sectors, death rate per 10,000 automobiles, death rate per one million ton output from coal mines, death rate of food poisoning cases, success rate of mediation in civil disputes, level of satisfaction among the people regarding law enforcement forces, etc. The municipal authorities also set targets for all these indicators by 2012. To achieve these targets, 9 billion yuan were invested in 2009 to enhance people’s safety by the municipal and district governments, the departments of the municipal government and the municipality’s enterprises. For all these efforts, Chongqing won the national honour of being a “demonstration model city of safety and security” in 2009. Health Services16 Chongqing was originally a city with sharp distinctions between the urban and rural sectors, a large segment of the population in poverty receiving

15. Chongqing Shang Pao, June 18, 2010. 16. See the official web site of the Chongqing authorities, www.cq.gov.cn/5cq/jiankang/

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minimum income guarantee subsidies, and backward medical and health infrastructural facilities. In 2005, its satisfactory health rate was only 86.7% in a sample survey, 0.5% below the national average, and 0.2% below the average of western provincial units.

The policy objectives of “jiankang Chongqing” set by Bo Xilai were: (a) quality of health of people in Chongqing exceeding the average national level; (b) level of health insurance enjoyed by the people in Chongqing at the front ranks of western China; and (c) the cultivation of healthy behaviour on the part of people in Chongqing basically completed. In terms of concrete indicators, it was set that average life expectancy among Chongqing people should reach 77 years by 2012; and by 2020, everyone should enjoy basic medical insurance, fundamental medical and health services, safe food, clean drinking water, and satisfactory physical and mental health. From 2008 to 2012, the Chongqing authorities planned to invest 28 billion yuan on their health action programme, and 7.3 billion yuan on their physical education action programme.17 The above policy programme did not have any significant ideological overtone, and it could have been adopted by any competent and ambitious local leader. Bo Xilai was a skilful politician and he knew how to package his policies and attract attention. Any local leader understands that he has to perform and deliver policy results, but to secure a national reputation has to create a model with an appealing ideological framework; and Bo chose a Maoist ideological framework. New Left scholars such as Cui Zhiyuan, Wang Shaoguang, etc. and Maoist ideologues were quick to endorse him. The success of securing a national fame had its political risks, i.e., his promotion of a model was perceived as challenging the central leadership and its ideological orthodoxy, illustrating the appeal of the uses of Mao and their potential political danger.

17. Chongqing Municipal Government, “Notice on the Release of the ‘Jiankang Chongqing’ Health Action Programme (2008–2012)” (in Chinese), December 15, 2008, see www.cq.gov. cnzwgkzfgw/126522.htm.

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“Singing Red” and “Strike Black” Campaigns Improvement of public housing supply and transport networks, enhancement of public safety and security standards, afforestation programmes and the raising of medical and health service standards are routine policies pursued by almost all provincial leaders who are committed to the improvement of the quality of life of the people as well as the promotion of economic development. Bo Xilai’s plans were just more ambitious, especially in view of the limited financial resources of Chongqing; and ambitious local governments can easily fall into the debt trap. Hence it was natural that his “Singing Red” and “Strike Black” campaigns attracted much more domestic and international media attention, as his distinct approaches in response to serious social concerns became controversial, generating admiration and fears at the same time. In recent years, social trust and moral standards in society have become increasingly rare commodities in the rapid socio-economic transition process in China. In economic life, fraud, dishonest and immoral behaviour are common, especially cases of fake products, poisonous food, substandard and even harmful medicine, etc. These cases sometimes involve famous brand names and major enterprises, seriously affecting people’s trust of the market. At a higher level, people ask what has been the impact of the focus on making money in a market economy on the values and moral standards of the society. At the same time, the pressures of working life have made people more individualistic and apathetic. Chinese people now lament over incidents of elderly people falling down, small children knocked down by cars, etc., being ignored by passers-by. In this general anxiety over coolling inter-personal relations, breaking down of neighbourhood ties and even family ties, rampant corruption, loss of respect for cadres, government officials, teachers, doctors, etc. naturally there is a certain emergence of nostalgia for the good old days of socialism (especially the period before the Cultural Revolution) when people cared and were keen “to serve the people”. Hence, following the example of Chongqing under Bo Xilai, old Communist revolutionary songs with their enthusiastic sense of dedication soon occupied the nation’s

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public space and television screens. Anecdotal evidence revealed that this wave was supported by old cadres, low-income groups, people without much education, etc. There was, at the same time, a grave concern that Bo’s campaign might signal a turn to the left as serious as a return to the Cultural Revolution. The concern was mainly shared by well educated people with liberal inclinations. At the end of 2008, the Propaganda Department of the Chongqing Municipal Party Committee distributed 110,000 questionnaires among cadres and ordinary people in the municipality. The survey results demonstrated a loss of ideals and convictions, as well as unhealthy value orientations: 31.92% of the respondents revealed non-Marxist ideological inclinations; 13.67% either did not support or did not care the longterm prospects of the CPC capturing government; 14.48% refused to support or did not care the upholding of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics; 20.13% praised hedonism; and 14.13% believed that getting rich was most important. Given that the revelations were based on responses to an official opinion survey, the actual situation was probably considerably worse. To be fair to Bo Xilai, his “Singing Red” campaign was richer in content than the mere revival of old Communist revolutionary songs. In addition to the singing campaign, he also recommended the reading of Marxism– Leninism–Mao Zedong Thought classics as well as traditional Confucian classics and traditional classical Chinese literature. Occasionally, even famous moralistic statements of Western figures were included too. The above was further reinforced by a story-telling campaign and active measures of spreading series of moralistic statements by familiar historical figures. The scale of the campaign activities was very impressive, and it reflected a substantial measure of popular support alongside the official mobilization efforts. Similar activities outside Chongqing were mainly based on popular support. Up till the end of April 2010, there were 109,800 “Singing Red” concerts held and various “Red Culture” activities had attracted 69.14 million participants in Chongqing; it was estimated that over 90% of the

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citizens had taken part. More than 8.55 million copies of pocket-books were released on the spreading of classical readings. Bo summarized the purpose of his “Singing Red” campaign as follows: “After we have concluded our examination of China’s values, we discover (a) we cannot totally accept Western values; (b) we cannot completely follow the Confucian traditions; and (c) we cannot revive extreme-leftism. The ‘red’ in ‘Singing Red’ means serving the people. This is the fundamental red root of the CPC. We organize this ‘singing, reading, telling stories, and spreading statements’ campaign, the objective is to inherit the foundation of the classics of China’s traditional culture and the red traditions of the CPC, on this we shall build our own modern values.” The central leadership in recent years has been equally concerned with the ideological vacuum and the decline in moral standards of cadres. It has exploited nationalism and traditional Confucian values to fill this vacuum.18 Today Chinese leaders work hard to raise China’s international status and influence, and achievements in this field are perceived by both the authorities and the people as an important source of legitimacy for the Party regime. This has contributed to an increasingly assertive foreign policy posture, especially in dealing with territorial disputes with the neighbouring countries. Meanwhile, as Chinese leaders consider that they cannot be seen to be weak in international relations, especially with regard to Japan and the United States, this has also caused inflexibility and weakening of visionary proposals. In the eyes of the Hu Jintao administration, ideological education remains an important part of cadre cultivation. The CPC Central Committee and State Council issued the “Opinions on further strengthening and improving ideological and political education of

18. Zhao Suisheng, “A state-led nationalism: The patriotic education campaign in post-Tiananman China,” Communist and Post-Communist Studies, No. 31, 1998, pp. 287–302 and “China’s pragmatic nationalism: Is it manageable?” The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 1, 2005, pp. 131–144; and Chen Jie, Popular Political Support in Urban China (Washington, D.C. and Standford, California: Woodrow Wilson Centre Press and Stanford University Press, 2004).

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university students” in October 2004. The document reflected the Hu– Wen leadership’s intention to give ideological and political direction to university students in conformity with the principles of Marxism– Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, and “the important thinking of the ‘three represents’”. This ideological and political education aimed to foster a “correct world outlook, life philosophy, and values” among university students, to educate them in civic virtues based on “essential moral standards”, and to strengthen their patriotism. The document acknowledged that there were “many weak links” in university students’ ideological and political attitudes; and highlighted the role of the Communist Youth League and student organizations in fulfilling the goals of the authorities.19 On December 26, 2005 (the birthday of Mao Zedong), the status of the Institute of Marxism–Leninism–Mao Zedong Thought in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences was raised to that of a school with a much expanded establishment. In the year before, the Party centre endorsed a ten-year research programme on Marxist theory, including the writing of a series of textbooks for China’s tertiary institutions.20 In January 2005, the Party launched a mild rectification and education campaign for its 70 million members to be implemented in three stages; the basic objective was to study the theory of Deng Xiaoping, the “three represents” demand of Jiang Zemin and the scientific development perspective of Hu Jintao.21 In the final years of his administration, Hu Jintao advocated “eight honours” and “eight shames” among cadres as well as promoted “guande” (morality among officials). In many ways, Bo Xilai’s “Red Culture” campaigns intended to address similar problems, though they were more conspicuous and the Chongqing authorities exerted much greater efforts in mass mobilization.

19. New China News Agency commentary, October 14, 2004. 20. Oriental Daily News and Wen Wei Po, November 5, 2005; Ta Kung Pao, November 25, 2005 (all Hong Kong Chinese newspapers); and New China News Agency dispatch, November 16, 2005. 21. New China News Agency dispatches, November, 28, 29 and 30 and December 20, 2005.

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Law and order had been a more serious concern at the society level at the turn of the century; in the following three or four years, crime rates appeared to have abated a little. While corruption remained the focus of the nation’s criticisms against the authorities, gangster activities increasingly loomed large. As corruption predominantly involved land deals, shadowy entertainment industries and prostitution, smuggling, etc., corrupt officials and greedy entrepreneurs often relied on criminal gangs as operators. The latter were sometimes even used to clear settlements, harass dissidents, threaten visitors who went to the central officials to launch complaints, etc. Given the major role of criminal gangs in corruption and the perceived collusion between corrupt officials and criminal gangs, it is not surprising that the “Strike Black” campaign could be highly popular. Since the days of Deng Xiaoping, Chinese central leaders and local officials have appreciated that a crackdown on crimes and criminal gangs can enhance the political appeal of the leaders and officials concerned. While the central leadership was critical of rampant criminal activities, especially those in some coastal cities like Shenzhen, the focus of its attention in the law and order field had turned to social unrest and mass incidents since the riots in Tibet in March 2008 shortly before the Beijing Olympics. On February 19, 2011, Hu Jintao made an important speech at the Central Party School on the theme of “social management”, calling on cadres at all levels to manage society in innovative ways. The issue again emerged in the agenda of a Politburo special meeting on May 30. This concern about rising social instability was reflected by the expansion of government budget for domestic security, or the maintenance of stability. In 2010, according to the published budgetary figures, the Chinese authorities spent 533.5 billion yuan on the military, but increased public security appropriations by 15.6% to 548.6 billion yuan.22 At the annual NPC session in March 2011, the central government released a

22. “China’s Spending on Internal Policing Outstrips Defense Budget,” Bloomberg, March 6, 2011, www.bloomberg.com/news/

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plan indicating the establishment of a nationwide “rapid-response system for tackling emerging incidents involving the local police, the People’s Armed Police, and the People’s Liberation Army”. This would go hand in hand with a system of “social management offices” to be set up throughout the country at the county, city district and town/township levels.23 Arguably, Bo’s “Strike Black” campaign did not significantly deviate from the central policy line. In fact its priority was more in line with the people’s concerns. Again, the competition for ideological orthodoxy with the central leadership entered into the picture.24

The “Chongqing Model” in China’s Ideological Spectrum As Bo Xilai’s policy programmes were seen to benefit those who had not competed well in the market economy through government assistance, many New Left scholars came out to praise the “Chongqing model”.25 It was Cui Zhiyuan who first summarized Bo’s policy initiative as the “Chongqing model”; he became an official in Chongqing and worked hard to promote the municipality’s model policy programmes.26 Wang Shaoguang, who was teaching at the Chinese University of Hong Kong then, also coined the phrase “socialism 3.0” to publicize the model.27 Wang stated: “As China has already entered the stage of moderate prosperity (“xiaokang”), it is exploring socialism 3.0. Among other pilot programmes across the country,

23. Willy Lam, “Beijing’s Blueprint for Tackling Mass Incidents and Social Management,” Jamestown Foundation: China Brief, Vol. 11, No. 5, March 25, 2011. 24. Francois Sohichan, “Fighting the Chongqing mafia,” China Perspectives, No. 2, 2010, pp. 75–77. 25. See Charles W. Freeman III and Wen Jin Yuan, “China’s New Leftists and the China Model Debate after the Financial Crisis,” Washington, D.C.: Center for Strategic and International Studies, July 2011, available from the Center’s website, www.csis.org 26. “Xin Zuipai Cui Zhiyuan Dangguan Zhu Bo Zhongjie Chongqing Moshi” (New Leftist Cui Zhiyuan Becomes an Official, Helping Bo Xilai Summarize the Chongqing Model), Xinwei Yue Kan, January 23, 2011, http://winweiyuekan.com/taxonomy/term/179. 27. See Wang Shaoguang, op. cit.

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Chongqing stands out as a prominent case.” Further, since “Chongqing is an inland rather than a coastal municipality”, its model would be more attractive to inland cities and provinces less well-endowed when compared with Guangdong and Shanghai. “Chongqing model” attracted much attention because it was initiated when the international financial crises of 2008 hit China hard. Subsequently the Chinese leadership and the intelligentsia studied adjustment measures and innovative strategies to face the new challenges of China’s next stage of economic development. In 2011, China’s urban population exceeded its rural population for the first time in history. Industrialization, urbanization and marketization have become the “troika” generating important socioeconomic changes. In the rapid process of urbanization, the substantial appreciation of land value had become a significant source of economic growth and financial revenue for local governments. The people’s demand for improvement in housing created new consumption demand in line with the desired change in economic development mode and the corresponding expansion of domestic consumption demand. Profits of the vast real estate sector in turn affected industrial development, price stability, inflation and income distribution. At the end of the last century, Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji initiated the development of western China strategy. As a result, since then central and western China have surpassed eastern China in economic growth rates, thus improving the regional balance. In recent years, the rural population’s per capita net income have also risen faster than the per capita disposable income of the urban population. In the above context, the co-ordination of the development of the urban and rural sectors as well as the breaking down of the dual structure of the two sectors have become new themes in China’s economic development. Chengdu and Chongqing were chosen by the central government to be experimental sites for this co-ordinated urban and rural development. Urbanization involves comprehensive reforms of many social systems including the household registration system, employment, social security, income distribution, education, medical services, social management, etc. The development of transport networks

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at this stage also means that new relations between the rural and urban sectors have been created because many cities now claim that their rural residents in the suburbs can travel to the city centres within one hour. Even before the global financial tsunami in 2008, Chinese leaders were already aware that the country’s sustainable economic development had to rely less on exports as well as investment in infrastructure and more on domestic consumption. They came to embrace urbanization as inevitable and beneficial for economic development. They realized too that improvement in the quality of life should assume a higher priority than simple expansion of GDP, and that much more efforts should be made to protect the environment and enhance energy intensity. Provincial leaders understood that they had to develop new policy programmes to meet the new demands of the central authorities which had introduced new criteria to assess their performance. To reduce the grievances generated by the widening of the gap between the rich and poor, the Hu Jintao/Wen Jiabao administration had been working hard to develop a basic social security net covering the entire population. This in turn added to the financial burden of local governments and they had been hard pressed to secure the fiscal revenues to meet the new demands. These challenges had an impact on the ideological debates on China’s development strategies and priorities. Since the end of 1978, the broad direction of economic reforms had been marketization with an emphasis on growth and efficiency. The commitment to deliver a more generous and comprehensive social security net and better social services in general reflected that equity and social justice had been given higher priority. This commitment not only contributed to social stability and the building of a “harmonious society”, but also served to stimulate domestic consumption. This commitment was in line with the New Left (“xinzuopai”)’s ideological advocacy; and the New Leftists were encouraged by the policy initiatives of Bo Xilai in Chongqing. Since Deng Xiaoping’s southern tour in early 1992, the New Left had been handicapped by the lack of an appropriate model among all provincial units.

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Besides the New Left, there are also two less influential subgroups in China’s left-wing political and academic circles. The Maoists or ultraleftists (“jizuopai”) advocate a traditional Maoist position; some of them even continue to deify Mao and consider that the Party regime today has betrayed the traditional ideals of the CPC. Their vision is to restore a centrally-planned economic system and a Leninist Party-state structure as in the 1950s. They also continue to defend the legitimacy of the Cultural Revolution. While people in China occasionally talk about the good old days of the 1950s, very few actually dream of the restoration of the systems in the 1950s. Hence this group has very limited appeal; and perhaps because of this, it is tolerated by the Chinese authorities. Their flagship website was called “Red China” (“Hongsezhongguo”). The other subgroup may not be leftists per se, but it is perceived to be leftists. They actually promote Chinese economic nationalism, and propose the strengthening of government control over daily economic life; and the former is probably much more popular than the latter. The New Left academic group began to make its reputation in 1994 when it questioned the Western model of large-scale private enterprises in the context of the massive re-structuring of SOEs and the dismantling of the social welfare system which began the year before. The latter led to many complaints in the recent decade regarding the access and affordability of education, medical services and housing as well as difficulties in seeking employment. The New Leftists praised the “Chongqing model” because Bo Xilai attempted to deal with these complaints through his policy programmes; the former had been arguing that economic policy should not only focus on boosting growth, but also on establishing an adequate social security net and enhancing social equity. Wang Shaoguang, for example severely criticized the notion of small government and big market, and considered that the Chinese government should be further expanded to operate efficiently.28 Cui Zhiyuan, in turn,

28. Wang Shaoguang, “Xiaozhengfu Dashehui Cong Genben Shang Shi Cuo De” (The Notion of Small Government and Big Market Is Fundamentally Fallacious), Utopia March 10, 2011, www.wyzxsx.com/Article/Class17/201103/219956.html.

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rejected the “Washington consensus”. He supported the decision of the State Council’s State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission to encourage SOEs to increase the stock holdings of the listed companies they controlled. This decision, according to Cui, reflected that “state-owned assets are still an active and stable force in China’s capital market”.29 Many New Left scholars studied or worked at American and European universities; apparently they had been influenced by the ideas of post-modernism. This group considers that China should gradually move toward a political system based on “democracy with Chinese characteristics”. Its flagship websites was Utopia (“Wuyouzhixiang”). An important policy recommendation of the group which had been accepted by the Chinese authorities has been that the government should lead the process of upgrading the country’s industrial structure and facilitating technological innovation. As the princelings (“taizidang”) became more active in organizing themselves in loose groupings like the “Association of Yanan Descendants” in the beginning of the decade, attempts were made to link these groups to the intellectual and ideological debates between the New Leftists and the Rightists. One of the more influential subgroups was led by Zhang Musheng and Liu Yuan, son of former Chinese President Liu Shaoqi and a PLA general. Zhang published his book Remaking Our Cultural Historical Views (in Chinese) in early 2011, and his arguments seemed to be in line with those of the New Leftists. Zhang appealed to a return to the “new democracy (“xin minzhuzhuyi”) of the CPC in the 1945–1949 period.30 In contrast to the New Leftists, Chinese scholars in the right-wing political and academic circles generally hold neo-liberal views and uphold

29. Wu Ming, “Cui Zhiyuan Fang Tan: Kan bujian de Shou Fanshi de Beilun Yu Dangqian Jinrong Weiji” (Interview of Cui Zhiyuan: The Invisible Hand Paradox and the Current Financial Crisis) Utopia September,28,2008, www.wyzxsx.com/Article/Class4/200809/52300.html. 30. Zhang Musheng, Gaizao Wo Men De Wenhua Lishi Guan (Remaking Our Cultural Historical Views), Hong Kong: Dafeng Chubanshe, 2011. See also Yongnian Zheng, op. cit., pp.35–36.

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the pro-market, efficiency-first position. This group advocates establishing a Western-style democratic political system and continuous capitalist economic reforms and opening up. Some of them who are known as “left liberals” share the New Leftists’ position of establishing a comprehensive social security net. In response to the international financial crisis in 2008, the Rightists like Zhang Weiying of Peking University believe that the cause was not that the U.S. financial system was problematic, but the U.S. Federal Reserve had interfered too much in the financial market. Zhang argued that the government should not try to rescue SOEs but should allow the market to adjust itself; and he proposed that the government should continue market reforms and allow private companies to openly compete with SOEs and foreign-owned companies in the market.31 The Rightists or liberals seem to have received political support from a corresponding subgroup of the princelings too, one led by Hu Deping, the eldest son of the former Party General Secretary Hu Yaobang.32 On August 27, 2011, Hu Deping presided over a forum to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the release of the important Party Central committee document “Decision on the Party’s Historical Issues” which offered a critical review of the excesses of the Cultural Revolution and the Maoists era. Later on October 6, 2011, Hu Deping organized another meeting on the 35th anniversary of the arrest of the “Gang of Four” and Jiang Qing, the wife of Mao Zedong. In both meetings, the Rightists were well represented and they appealed for political reforms, democracy, the rule of law and constitutionalism. The meetings attracted the attention of the overseas Chinese media too.

31. Zhang Weiying, “Weiji Zhong de Xuanze” (Choices among the Crisis), Sina, February 14, 2009, http://finance.sina.com.cn/roll/20090214/00435854960.shtml. 32. See Yongnian Zheng, op. cit., pp.36-37. See also Li Cheng, “China’s Team of Rivals”, Foreign Policy, No. 171, March/April 2009, pp. 88–93.

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An Evaluation of the “Chongqing Model” The 2012 edition of the Blue Book of China’s Economy devotes a chapter on Chongqing, reflecting that the municipality’s development attracted much domestic attention. In the first half of 2011, it achieved an economic growth rate of 16.5%, ranking second nationally and first in western China.33 The review report considered that Chongqing was then in a stage of relative rapid development, and investment played an important role in promoting economic growth; at the same time, the quality of its economic growth continued to improve. But the economy might have become overheated, and the pressure of inflation was exacerbating. The economic structure had to be further improved, and there was a need to enhance the intensity of the use of energy and other industrial raw materials. In the first half of 2011, industrial growth mainly came from six industries which had a high consumption of energy resources. Admittedly, the attention of domestic and international media given to Chongqing and the national strategy of opening up the interior offered a precious opportunity for the municipality; and it made some achievements in the cultivation of new strategic industries including electronics, new materials, aviation and logistics. In the Western world, the “Chongqing model” was sometimes perceived as an investment in the next wave of export-led growth by the mobilization of inland Chinese assets; but a slowdown in international demand could make this investment a risky proposition.34 But its attraction mainly lay in Bo Xilai’s attempts to enhance socio-economic equality in the municipality, alleviating some of the social polarization

33. Wang Chongju et al., “Ji Yu CASS Zhi Shu De 2011 Nian ChongQingJing Ji Xing Shi Fen Xi Yu 2012 Nian Zhan Wang,” (Analysis and Outlook of Chongqing Economic Condition Based on CASS Index (2011–2012)),” Chen Jiagui and Li Yang (ed.), 2012 “NianZhong Guo Jing Ji Xing Shi Fen Xi Yu Yu Ce” (Economy of China Analysis and Forecast (2012)), Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (China), December 2011, pp. 273–279. 34. Francois Godement, “One or two Chinese models?” China Analysis (European Council on Foreign Relations and Asia Centre), http://ecfr.eu/content/entry/china_analysis_one_or_two_ chinese_models

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and frustration which other Chinese cities experienced on the path to economic growth and transformation. The social housing policy discussed in above is a most important example. There were also experimental schemes for rural residents to swap land with urbanites, thus reducing the potential for abusive land grabs by local officials that had generated many mass incidents, i.e., protest activities. This could be a significant policy measure to promote smooth urban-rural integration. Bo used stateowned construction companies in his social housing schemes, not private developers which had raised considerable foreign capital for their housing projects. This was opposed by liberal reformers who objected to private enterprises being squeezed out by SOEs which enjoyed good access to state-owned bank credit. As an experimental site for co-ordinated urban and rural development, Bo Xilai initiated an ambitious plan to transform the existing household registration system which was widely perceived to be an obstacle to the present stage of China’s development. The reform of the household registration system was to be implemented in two stages; by 2020, it was scheduled that 10 million peasants would have their household registration status changed, and those who would enjoy urban household registration status would reach 60%. The associated challenge was to remove the differences in social services and social security treatment caused by household registration status; Bo’s policy programme was to equalize the treatment in the urban and rural sectors through a more equitable distribution of resources. This was indeed laudable, and in line with the central leadership’s long term policy objectives. In 2008, Chongqing promoted a comprehensive pension fund scheme for migrant workers, giving them a scheme roughly equivalent to the urban residents’ basic pension scheme. At the same time, the municipal authorities claimed to have satisfactorily resolved the troublesome issues of transfer and extension/continuation. In the following year, the Chongqing authorities identified fifteen counties and districts as experimental sites to explore the establishment of an integrated pension scheme for both urban and rural residents. The municipal government also attempted to integrate the newlyestablished rural co-operative medical services scheme and the urban

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residents’ basic medical insurance scheme, so as to remove the barriers created by the urban/rural divide and the household registration system.35 But where came money to support Bo’s ambitious policy programmes? In 2011, Chongqing’s revenues rose 51% to 150.8 billion yuan, and spending 45.7% to 164.1 billion yuan. Like most local governments, most of the increased revenues came from real estate transactions, primarily the sale of state land use rights for industrial development amid rampant property speculation, accompanied by the resettlement of many farmers. After Bo’s demise, there emerged many criticisms of the “Chongqing model” in the domestic media. An article in late March 2012 by the National Business Daily debunked the “shared prosperity” in Bo’s Chongqing as “just an empty phrase”. It considered that Bo’s economic policy was essentially the same as that in various coastal export processing zones, depending on an influx of foreign capital, attracted by heavily subsidized land supply, reduced taxes and cheap credit. The author warned: “There is nothing innovative and reforming (in the Chongqing model) and it contains extremely high dangers for the future.”36 The normally highly nationalistic Global Times somewhat surprisingly joined the chorus. Its editorial on March 27, 2012 attacked the notion of social welfare, declaring: “The long-term goal of the Chinese people should not be distributing and enjoying wealth but creating wealth…A new risk China is confronted with is that irrational propositions on social welfare have become dominant on the Internet. They even express criticisms and disturb the government’s policy-making process. It is time for society to take a step back and reflect what is achievable.” Debts of local governments by 2010 or so was recognized as a political and economic problem; the 2011 edition of the Blue Book of China’s

35. “Zhuan Xing Zhongguo De Chongqing Tu Po” (The Chongqing Breakthroughs in the Transforming China), Liaowang Weekly (Beijing) April 20, 2010, www.cqcb.com/cbnews/ gusty/2010-04-20/63488_3.html. 36. John Chan, “Chinese media attacks ‘Chongqing model,’” World Socialist Web Site, April 5, 2012, www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr2012/chin-a05.shtml

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Society had a chapter discussing the issue.37 As the 1994 tax division scheme allows the central government to secure a predominant share of tax revenues and in the last decade, local governments had to spend considerably more to offer better social services including an improving the social security net, local governments began to be in debt. The fiscal stimulus package introduced in the wake of the international financial crisis in the autumn of 2008 demanded matching funds from the local governments. This explained why they had to rely on real estate development projects to expand revenues. When the property market slows down or in difficulty, local governments easily fall into a debt crisis; and this was the general situation in 2011 and 2012. Chongqing’s challenge was not much different from other local governments. However, given the ambitious development plans of Bo Xilai, the speculation was that its difficulties were more severe. Naturally Bo’s demise had turned the media’s attention to the problem too. Reuters in early May 2012 reported that the “Chongqing model” had left huge debts behind; and the Chongqing branch of the China Development Bank had to clarify publicly that its share of non performing loans was below 0.1% at the end of March 2012, in response to the report that it had lent almost 100 billion yuan to the municipal authorities.38 Given the problems of the Chongqing leadership, the debt issue likely exacerbated and tarnished the image of the “Chongqing model”. Like many ambitious leaders, Bo Xilai’s eagerness for achievements and publicity meant that he was prone to make hasty mistakes. A widelycirculated story is that he (or his wife) had a special preference for ginkgo trees, and he wanted to see many ginkgo trees in Chongqing in his afforestation programme. Ginkgo trees grow very slowly, so the impatient

37. Huang Yanfen and Wu La, “Di Fang Zhai Wu Feng Xian: Xian Zhuang, Cheng Yin Ji Dui She Hui De Ying Xiang,” (The Debt Risks of China’s Local Governments: Status, Causes and Impact on Society) in Ru Xin, Lu Xueyi and Li Peilin (eds.), 2011 Nian: Zhongguo Shehui Xingshi Fenxi yu Yuce (Society of China Analysis and Forecast (2011)) op. cit., pp. 229–244. Difang Zhaiwu Fengxian: Xianzhuang, Chengyin ji dui She hui de Yingxiang 38. Hong Kong Economic Journal (a Chinese newspaper based in Hong Kong), May 8, 2012.

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Bo spent lots of money to acquire mature ginkgo trees to be transplanted in the municipality. Most of these ginkgo trees did not survive; and Chongqing citizens now call ginkgo trees “Xilai trees”.39 There were many more stories of this kind circulating after his demise; and following former Premier Li Peng’s precedent, Bo now enjoys the “honour” of having most jokes about him among Chinese politicians in recent years. Some of the criticisms of the “Chongqing model” were indeed based on ideological considerations. Some were in line with the appeal of the central leadership then to uphold unity in thinking and there were also criticisms from those who had praised the “Chongqing model” and who were subsequently eager to demonstrate their political correctness. Then Premier Wen Jiabao actually issued a warning in the annual NPC session in March 2012 before the announcement of Bo’s dismissal; Wen cautioned that China could face social upheavals like the Cultural Revolution. This warning echoed the fears of the liberal intellectuals regarding Bo Xilai’s mobilization campaigns and political style. Bo’s “Singing Red” campaign was well known, but his approach to alleviate grievances at the grassroots level and to combat bureaucratism was also distinctly Maoist. Under the leadership of Bo Xilai, all cadres in Chongqing had to spend one week per annum, and newly recruited civil servants as well as newly promoted leading cadres had to spend one month per annum at the grassroots level to eat, live and work with the masses. Leading cadres at the district and county level had to spend three months every year to engage in research at the grassroots level, and leading cadres at the municipal bureau level had to do the same for two months every year. Along the same line, leading cadres at the municipal bureau level and those at the district/county level had to support and give assistance each to one cadre family and one ordinary household in economic difficulties; and municipal cadres at the section (“chu”) level, those at the district/county departmental level and those at the town/township level each had to give

39. Ma Ling, “Bo Xilai He Yi Dao Tai?” (Why Did Bo Xilai Fall?), Ming Pao Monthly (a Chinese magazine based in Hong Kong), Vol. 47, No. 5, May 2012, pp. 25–26.

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assistance to one family in economic difficulties while ordinary cadres were encouraged to do so either individually or collectively.40 In addition, leading cadres at the district/county level were also required to make a visit to the grassroots at least once a month. Worse still, Bo’s “Strike Black” campaign was severely criticized overseas even before his downfall for arbitrarily targeting private businessmen and seizing their assets on the basis of dubious charges. Caijin, a leading financial journal, interviewed Jiang Ping, a liberal law professor at the Chinese University of Politics and Law, who condemned Bo’s campaign as “a step backward from the rule of law” by restoring “the legacy of the Cultural Revolution”. He indicated that Bo had used illegal methods, including torture, to extract confessions, similar to the way in which Red Guards had staged sham trials of anyone labelled an enemy of Chairman Mao.41

Conclusion: The Political Significance of the “Chongqing Model” The “Chongqing model” reflects the challenges of the present stage of China’s development. The basic policy programme of Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao based on economic growth, a fundamental social security net covering the entire population, and good governance in the absence of democracy was found inadequate. Grievances had been accumulating, and an increasing segment of the population wanted to see changes and reforms. Then Premier Wen Jiabao’s appeals for liberal democratic reforms encountered strong resistance;42 and the ambitious Bo Xilai tried to offer an alternative based on the uses of Mao.

40. Chongqing Ribao, July 8, 2010. 41. John Chan, op. cit. 42. Eric X. Li, “The Life of the Party: The Post-Democratic Future begins in China,” Foreign Affairs Vol. 92, No. 1, January/February 2013, pp. 34–46.

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In view of the policy paralysis in the context of a lack of consensus within the central leadership and the privileges of entrenched power elites, both the intelligentsia and the princelings intended to introduce changes.43 Accepting the risk of over simplification, the broad directions of change were either further liberalization of the economic system and serious democratization of the political structures; or strengthening the state sector to introduce a more equitable income distribution through broad improvement of social services and social security, and enhancing the combat of bureaucratism through the revival of the good, old Maoist traditions of the CPC. The ideological and policy debates became more significant partly because of the leadership succession process to be finalized in the 18th Party Congress in the autumn of 2012 and partly because of the perceived domestic and international challenges. The former included the economic slowdown in the aftermath of the global financial tsunami; and the latter mainly involved the Barack Obama administration’s “return to Asia” position and its exploitation of the hedging strategies of China’s neighbours in response to its increasingly assertive posture in the territorial disputes since 2010. The debates revealed a dissatisfaction with the status quo including the incumbent leadership, and an eagerness to break the existing policy paralysis. Breaking the policy paralysis might probably affect the factional balance within the top leadership. But the gossips and rumours that emerged upon the demise of Bo Xilai were largely exaggerations. The Chinese leadership had been working hard to prepare for a predictable and smooth leadership succession process; some top positions had been securely allocated to Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang and Wang Qishan. The shortlist of the membership of the next Politburo Standing Committee was well known and in the end offered few surprises. Yet there were still many startling conspiracy

43. Chan Xi, “The Rising Cost of Stability,” Journal of Democracy Vol. 24, No. 1, January 2013, pp. 57–64.

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theories.44 They obviously reflected a lack of transparency and trust for the official media, and they had been exacerbated by the traditional political culture of factional fighting, etc. The phenomena did not bode well for political stability in the future. Political stability and legitimacy of the regime have been heavily dependent on economic growth in the era of economic reforms and opening to the external world since 1979. When economic growth stagnates, and especially when the benefits of economic growth have been much eroded by the widening gap between the rich and poor, legitimacy is bound to weaken. Under such circumstances, either the incumbent leaders or their challengers may be tempted to exploit the uses of Mao. At present, however, economic growth remains respectable; and the bulk of the population considers that its living standards have been raised considerably in the past three decades and more and it still expects continued improvement in the foreseeable future, hence there is no desire for major changes yet and it is still reluctant to confront the authorities. Chinese leaders normally have more tolerance for the leftists because they do not challenge the Party’s monopoly of political power, whereas the rightists (liberals) demand democracy. The Bo Xilai case was one of the rare cases when a severe challenge came from the left and the central leadership became seriously concerned. Perhaps this revealed the inadequacies of the hitherto achievements in economic development. Bo Xilai’s departure from the political scene has reduced the appeal of the New Leftists, but it does not represent a victory or even a significant opportunity for the rightists (liberals).45 There are no signs of any significant political reforms yet, as reflected by the tightening of the control over the Internet and the handling of the Chen Guangcheng case.

44. See, for example, the series of articles on the Bo Xilai case in Open Magazine (a Hong Kongbased Chinese monthly), No. 305, May 2012, pp. 18–41. 45. Jean-Pierre Cabestan, “Is Xi Jinping the Reformist Leader China Needs?” China Perspectives No. 3, 2012, pp. 69–76.

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The Chinese authorities have been encouraging competing experiments on the part of local governments as long as they do not challenge their basic policy line. Wang Yang’s policy programmes in Guangdong did not claim to be a model; but like Bo Xilai, he had to work hard to demonstrate his achievements in seeking promotion to the Politburo Standing Committee.46 Wang not only belonged to the Communist Youth League faction, that of Hu Jintao; he had been careful to avoid deviations from the central policy line too. His attempts to emphasize quality of life rather than mere GDP, strengthen the province’s international economic competitiveness, upgrade Guangdong’s industries, accord a higher priority to environmental conservation, etc. were all policy measures to meet the challenges of the present stage of development. His handling of the Wukan village riots and appeal for greater media freedom also helped him to establish a liberal image. Gradual reforms, with an emphasis on economic development, may well be the best policy for young and ambitious leaders in China as the central authorities still maintain a strong path-dependence policy orientation. In sum, the “Chongqing model” demonstrates the appeal of the uses of Mao in Chinese politics today as well as their limitations. Regarding the latter, Chinese leaders at the central and local level must achieve respectable economic growth rates in order to improve the social security net; over ambitious social policy programmes may easily lead local governments into the debt trap. The Maoist line upholds the leadership of the Party and is therefore often tolerated by Chinese leaders, but when it is exploited to challenge the incumbent central leadership, it is unavoidably perceived as a threat and lead to a showdown.47

An early version of this paper was published in Journal of Comparative Asian Development, Vol. 12, No. 3, December 2013, pp. 411–442

46. Francois Godement, op. cit.; and Michele Scrimenti, “Chongqing vs. Guangdong: Which Model Will Rule China?” ChinAnalyst, December 1, 2011, http://chinanalyst.com/archives/629 47. Zhao Yuezhi, “The Struggle for Socialism in China: The Bo Xilai Saga and Beyond,” Monthly Review, Vol. 64, No. 5, October 2012, pp. 1–17.

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9 In The Red 2.0 Online Reactivation of Maoist Mobilization Methods and Propaganda Émilie TRAN1 Assistant Professor, Faculty of Administration and Leadership University of Saint Joseph

Arouse the largest numbers of the masses in the shortest possible time and by the best possible methods Mao Zedong, January 19302

This chapter was inspirited by Geremie Barmé’s In the Red, which investigated what happens when the Chinese Party-state and cultural activists are embroiled in the production and distribution of cultural products.3 By the time In the Red was published, China, as Barmé noted, had become one of the world’s greatest writing and publishing nations.

1. The author gratefully acknowledges the invaluable contribution of Grégoire Muller without whom this paper would not have come into being, and thanks the anonymous referee for his/her constructive comments, as well as Joseph Cheng for his patience and support. 2. “A Single Spark Can Start a Prairie Fire,” January 1930, Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung Vol. 1 (Peking (Beijing): Foreign Languages Press, 1965), p. 124. 3. Geremie R. Barmé, In the Red: On Contemporary Chinese Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999).

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In this early 21st century, China has also become the world’s number one country by number of Internet users with 632 million users in mid 2014,4 thus accounting for 22% of the world Internet users, by far ahead of the United States (279 million), India (243 million), Japan (109 million), and Brazil (107 million).5 The present chapter deciphers some cultural and political trends that have developed on the Chinese Internet and explores what happens when global culture and Chinese netizens meet with a Partystate whose online rhetoric and actions remind of some features of Mao’s time, namely in the celebration of national heroic figures, the revival of the mass line, and the reassertion of democratic centralism. In early April 2012, within the three weeks following Bo Xilai’s downfall from his position in Chongqing, the Chinese authorities cracked down on the country’s leading leftist websites, which the former Communist Party secretary of Chongqing had used to promote his Maoist revival policies and to defend himself after his removal from office. Utopia, Maoflag, Mao’s Time, iMaoZedong and Mao Zedong’s Art were among the websites that were “harmonized” since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) set itself the goal to construct a “harmonious society” (héxié shèhui) in 2004. In the Internet slang of Chinese netizens, being harmonized means being censored, which appears as an homophonic play on words using the characters for “river crabs” (héxiè) and in this case, the above mentioned Maoist websites were simply shut down. Therefore, to the dozen or so post Mao political campaigns, a new one unfolded in the cracking down on the Red culture. Initiated in the summer of 2008 by the then ambitious Chongqing party boss Bo Xilai, the “Red

4. China Internet Network Information Center, 中國互聯網絡發展狀況統計報告, July 2014: www. cnnic.cn/hlwfzyj/hlwxzbg/hlwtjbg/201407/P020140721507223212132.pdf [accessed August 18, 2014] 5. According to Internet Live Stat that compiles data elaborated by the International Telecommunication Union, United Nations Population Division, Internet and Mobile Association of India, and the World Bank: www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users-by-country/ [accessed August 18, 2014].

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culture movement” expanded to a countrywide movement in Spring 2011, as the Party-state was about to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party, to glorify its revolutionary Communist past in order to reunite the society under the red flag after three decades of embracing market-oriented reforms, often in the most ruthless forms of capitalism. The campaign ranged from singing sessions of “Red songs” in city squares to touching personal stories of “Red stars” in Chinese newspapers, from showing red movies in theaters to red tours of historical sites of the Revolution including former party leaders’ hometowns. According to CCTV, more than ¥8 billion have been spent to revamp famous places like Mao Zedong’s hometown since 2004, and the Chinese National Tourism Administration reported that the number of visitors to the country’s top 10 “red tourism” sites had grown by more than 50% each year ever since red tourism started in the mid 2000s. When Beijing put a stop to the “Red culture movement,” the authorities removed actual signs (posters and inscriptions on walls) and online testimonies, practically overnight. The next day, the residents of Chongqing woke up from their “Red” fever in a freshly harmonized Chongqing. In that heavy atmosphere of suspicion, they behaved as if nothing had happened, being cautious not to mention anything related to Bo Xilai and his “Red culture movement” to anyone, as one informant recalled. An educated youth himself, he went on to comment that even during the Cultural Revolution, it was not that easy to silence the Red Guards, and for an entire population to make a 180-degree turn in such a short time indicates that kind of prowess of which only a fully charged one-Party rule is effectively capable.6 Once again, Maoists find themselves on the wrong side of history. The last time Mao’s supporters came to a zenith before being purged was indeed during the Cultural Revolution and its subsequent campaign to denounce the “Gang of Four.” History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme.

6. Personal conversation with a Sichuanese informant, May 8, 2012.

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Whether “‘Red’ websites such as Utopia or Maoflag, though temporarily shut down after the fall of Bo, are likely to come back on line eventually”7 or not, this chapter argues that Mao’s legacy in 21st century China is not limited to nostalgic slogans and leftist advocacy on a few “Red” websites, but is far more deeply entrenched in the Chinese Party-state exercise of power, therefore supporting the thesis of Sebastian Heilman and Elizabeth Perry of “Mao’s invisible hand” that continues to influence China’s political structures and policies today. Having said that, the Partystate has also been making use of the potentialities offered by Web 2.08 by reactivating, applying and adapting some Maoist mobilization methods and propaganda to the digital age. And this more proactive approach of the Party-state apparatus illustrates the stance adopted in the 2012 special feature in China Perspectives, “Mao Today: A Political Icon for an Age of Prosperity:” Maoism or Mao-era references are not considered only as an implicit structure of the polity, an “invisible hand” that continues to influence the interactions of state and society; the hypothesis is rather that the many explicit references to Mao are relevant to understanding the political, social, and intellectual debates about the future of the People’s Republic, in a context in which politics is dominated by interest groups without clear political agendas.9 This chapter shows how the Web 2.0 has actually enabled the Chinese Party-state to put into fuller practice certain Maoist methods of mobilization and propaganda, both implicitly and explicitly.

7. Sebastian Veg, in his editorial to China Perspectives special feature, “Mao Today: A Political Icon for an Age of Prosperity,” issue 2 (2012): 3. 8. In contrast with Web 1.0, which is a top-down approach where users can only view webpages without being able to reflect on their content, a Web 2.0 site allows users to interact and collaborate with each other and to create user-generated content in a social media dialogue. 9. Veg, editorial to “Mao Today: A Political Icon for an Age of Prosperity,” p. 3.

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China’s Top Models: The Dead, the Living and the Virtual In October 2011, the video of passersby ignoring a child who was run over by several vehicles before being rescued by an old lady collecting rubbish in the Foshan market shocked the world. Against this background, the efforts deployed by the Chinese government and official media to revive the civic duties and moral values of Chinese citizens through the promotion of models of virtue have gained even more momentum, and echo the idea to honor heroes affirmed by Mao in September 1944 at the memorial of the soldier Zhang Side (張思德): From now on, when anyone in our ranks who has done some useful work dies, be he soldier or cook, we should have a funeral ceremony and a memorial meeting in his honour. This should become the rule. And it should be introduced among the people as well.10 Honoring the exemplary citizen reached an apex in the Mao era through the campaign on Lei Feng. In the post-Mao era, model workers and models of virtue have continued to exist and to be promoted in newspapers and magazines, and on radio and TV programs, such as “感動中國2011年度人物評選” (Gǎndòng Zhōngguó 2011 nián duó rénwù píngxuǎn) which has been broadcast since 2003. Viewers of that program can also cast their vote on the Internet to decide which character touched them most during the past year. The propaganda machine has taken advantage of the 90th anniversary of the foundation of the CCP in 2011 and the 50th anniversary of Lei Feng’s death in 2012, in order to revitalize the promotion of its model workers and models of virtue: whether dead or alive, they now have to go virtual, according to the official line.

10. “Serve the People,” September 8 1944, in Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung vol. III, www. marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-3/mswv3_19.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012].

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A soldier of the People’s Liberation Army, Lei Feng was portrayed after his death as a model citizen, a selfless and modest person who was devoted to the Communist Party, Chairman Mao, and the Chinese people. In 1963, he became the subject of a nationwide, posthumous propaganda campaign “Learn from Comrade Lei Feng” (“向雷鋒同志學習, xiàng Léifēng tóngzhì xuéxí”) and the masses were encouraged to emulate his selflessness, modesty, and devotion to Mao. After Mao’s death, Lei Feng remained a cultural icon representing earnestness and service; his name entered daily speech and his imagery appeared on t-shirts and memorabilia. Although the accounts of Lei Feng’s life as depicted by Party propaganda have been disputed, with a segment of the Chinese people questioning his existence, Lei Feng’s image as a role model serviceman has survived decades of political change in China and his story continues to be referenced in popular culture. For instance, a popular song by Jilin singer Xue Cun is called “All Northeasterners are Living Lei Fengs” (“東北人都是活雷鋒, Dōngběi rén dōu shì huó Léi Fēng”). In March 2006, a game called “Learn from Lei Feng Online” was released where the player had to do good deeds and fight spies. If the player won, he or she would get to meet Chairman Mao in the game. More recently the short film “Léifēng xiá” (《雷鋒 俠》) that portrayed an ordinary man who tried to become a superhero by emulating Lei Feng with a superhero outfit, created a stir when it was released on the Internet: it was seen by millions of people online and generated millions of message threads. In this modern depiction of Lei Feng, the political content of the exemplary PLA soldier has been tamed, therefore becoming a Chinese version of “Forrest Gump”—a “yes man” always ready to serve without questioning orders from above. Every year on March 5, the official “Learn from Lei Feng Day” (學雷鋒日, xué léifēng rì), everyone is encouraged to perform good deeds: school children leave the classroom to do community service, including cleaning up parks and public venues, and helping old people cross the streets, while adults offer free haircuts and free makeup sessions (as seen in front of the Vanguard supermarket in Zhuhai in March 2012) to revive the spirit of Lei Feng through voluntary work. But what used to be a one-day event every March 5, was then extended to a month-long campaign—throughout the month of March—and was stretched out to a continuous national celebration

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throughout 2012, since China was to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of Lei Feng in August 2012. While extending in time the commemoration of the cult figure but nonetheless dead Lei Feng, the Chinese propaganda has also been promoting living models of virtue in cyberspace. April 2012, over 200 model workers were mobilized to open microblog accounts on Sina Weibo, after being invited to attend training on microblogging held by the All-China Federation of Trade Unions in Beijing. Following the training, the model workers were encouraged to share their spirit of hard work on Sina Weibo (the Chinese equivalent of Twitter) using cell phones and computers. Guo Mingyi, a worker from the Anshan Iron and Steel Group based in Liaoning province, who has been nicknamed the “modern day Lei Feng” (“Dāngdài Léi Fēng”) for his selflessness and hard work, has nearly 10 million followers on his Sina Weibo account. Portrayed as a “steel worker with a soft heart,”11 the 52-year-old has worked overtime for more than 15,000 hours over the past 15 years, for the benefit of his employer, and at the same time helped to subsidize charity work and donated 60 liters of blood, equivalent to the total blood volume of 10 adults——over the past two decades. On top of that, he is always trying to recruit other people to become blood donors. In this regard, social media have proved to be an excellent tool of mobilization. In February 2012, Guo posted a message about a pregnant woman who urgently needed a blood transfusion and 40 minutes after the post was published, a long queue of blood donors formed at the city’s blood donation center. The endless list of good deeds of model worker Guo Mingyi is reminiscent of Lei Feng’s story. But unlike Lei Feng, who became an icon only after his death, Guo Mingyi is a genuine person whose life has already been told in a movie released in theater in July 2011. In May 2012, the case of Zhang Lili, also called “the most beautiful female teacher” by the Chinese media and netizens, moved the whole nation when her story was broadcast of on CCTV. On May 8, Zhang Lili

11. Ma Yunjia, “Steel worker with a soft heart,” China.org.cn, May 5, 2011, www.china.org.cn/ china/CPC_90_anniversary/2011-05/05/content_22500325.htm [accessed June 7, 2012].

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lost both her legs after having pushed two of her students out of harm’s way when a bus was moving toward them. The seven o’clock edition of the TV news broadcast “Xinwen Lianbo” (新聞聯播) gave accounts of her accident, her fall into coma and reanimation during the few days following her accident. Her bravery moved Chinese citizens, who came to the hospital to donate money to this model of virtue. Zhang Lili’s case was a godsend for the official media who are always looking for good deeds by the common people to report, in order to show that Chinese citizens do have a good heart and uphold high moral values, despite the many other dreadful stories that circulate on traditional and social media. Personifying the government’s efforts in promoting a socialist spiritual civilization, Lei Feng, Guo Mingyi and Zhang Lili are now present both on traditional and electronic media venues. Whereas in the past, model workers and models of virtue used to be rather passive icons in memorabilia and traditional media, Web 2.0 has enabled them to reach out and to interact directly with the public, making them much more prominent figures than they have ever been. Although the impact on their fellow citizens of the role models’ twits and blogs is undeniable—through charity, raising awareness, blood donation and the like—in cyberspace model workers and models of virtue remain far less popular than many pop stars or sport events. Even though Guo Mingyi has nearly 10 million followers on Sina Weibo, comparatively, forums or blogs related to models of virtue attract far fewer participants than many other more popular topics, such as the 2012 Beijing International Automobile Exhibition or the “5.26 Shenzhen car accident.” Indeed, as James Leibold noted in his study of the Chinese blogosphere, “Blogging Alone: China, the Internet, and the Democratic Illusion?” [P]olitical content comprises only an extremely tiny portion of China’s cybercacophony—an important point that is rarely noted in the scholarly and journalistic literature on the Chinese internet.12

12. James Leibold, “Blogging Alone: China, the Internet, and the Democratic Illusion?” The Journal of Asian Studies 70 (2011):1023-41, pp. 4–5.

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Similarly, the most popular Internet searches on Russian search engines are not on issues like democracy or human rights protection, but about love and weight loss, as Evgeny Morozov recalls in his book, The Net Delusion: The Dark side of Internet Freedom, in which he demonstrates that the liberating potential of the Internet also contains the seeds of depoliticization and thus dedemocratization.13 Morozov’s thesis echoes Cass Sunstein’s “Daily Me” (2007)14 and David Healy’s 1997 “lifestyle enclaves.”15 It also recalls Neil Postman’s criticism of television, back in 1985, in Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business,16 still regarded as one of the most important contributions to the field of media ecology, i.e., the study of how media and communication processes affect human perception and understanding. For Postman, the contemporary world is better reflected by Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, in which the public is oppressed by their addiction to amusement, than by George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, where they are oppressed by state control. The critical analysis by Leibold of China’s blogosphere today reaches the same conclusions as those authors, i.e., the people are alienated by the medium. Quoting Hao Jinhua and Pang Shufang,17 and Ye Haisheng,18 Leibold wrote that: In contrast to those that argue the Internet is empowering ordinary citizens, many inside China worry that the web is peddling a new “digital

13. Evgeny Morozov, The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom (New York: Public Affairs, 2011). 14. Cass Sunstein, Republic.com 2.0. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007). 15. Dave Healy, “Cyberspace and Place: The Internet as Middle Landscape on the Electronic Frontier,” in Internet Culture, ed. David Porter, 55–69 (London, Routledge, 1997). 16. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (New York: Penguin, 1985). 17. Hao Jinhua and Pang Shufang,〈如何正確引導乎學生對待互聯網〉(Rúhé zhèngquè yǐndǎo xuéshēng duìdài wǎngluò, How best to correct and guide students in their use of the internet) Zhongguo jiaoyu wenzhai, 2006, www.eduzhai.net/edu/316/jiaoxue_83580.html [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 18. Ye Haisheng,〈互聯網像是電子鴉片〉(Hùliánwǎng xiàng shì diànzǐ yāpiàn, The Internet is like digital opium) 2007, http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_45c4befb010009ze.html [accessed on June 11, 2012].

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opium” (“電子鴉片, diànzǐ yāpiàn”): one that threatens to undermine the spiritual and cultural “quality” of Chinese youths without proper regulation.19

Reviving the Mass Line For Stuart Schram, “mass line” is part of, and indeed a central part of the “Yenan heritage.”20 Mass line is a political, organizational and leadership method developed by Mao over the years. The ideas and methods corresponding to the “mass line” began to make their appearance in Mao’s work during the 1927 to 1936 period, “though this concept is formulated systematically only during the ensuing decade.”21 “From the masses to the masses” (從群眾中來，到群眾中去, Cóng qúnzhòng zhōng lái, dào qúnzhòng zhōng qù) appeared in a resolution on methods of leadership written by Mao Zedong and adopted on June 1, 1943 by the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. Although some sinologists argue that “the concept of the mass line . . . is rather poorly defined,” even by Mao himself,22 the 1943 version marked formally the concept of mass line. This means: take the ideas of the masses (scattered and unsystematic ideas) and concentrate them (through study turn them into concentrated and systematic ideas), then go to the masses and propagate and explain these ideas until the masses embrace them as their own, hold fast to them and translate them into action, and test the correctness of these ideas in such action. Then once again concentrate ideas from the masses and once again go to the masses so that the ideas are persevered in and

19. Leibold, “Blogging Alone,” p. 6. 20. Stuart Schram, The Thought of Mao Tse-Tung (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), p. 86. 21. Ibid., p. 9. 22. Edward Hammond, “Marxism and the Mass Line,” Modern China 4(1) (1978), p. 4.

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carried through. And so on, over and over again in an endless spiral, with the ideas becoming more correct, more vital and richer each time. Such is the Marxist theory of knowledge.23 Although not explicitly, the “mass line” has been recently brought up to date by the Party-state. Recent developments discussed below contain indeed implicit references to this legacy of Mao. In July 2011, the government launched a campaign to change journalists’ perspectives on reporting by sending them to the grassroot24 (i.e., 走基層、轉作風、改文風, Zǒu jīcéng, zhuǎn zuòfēng, gǎi wénfēng). Similarly, CCTV regularly broadcasts programs about Party cadres going to the grassroot25 (i.e., 幹部下基層, Gànbù xià jīcéng). Through these two campaigns, the Party-state has been trying to reassert to the grassroot its willingness and proactiveness in taking their opinions and their situations into account, which is in line with Jiang Zemin’s notion of “guidance of public opinion.” Back in January 2003, Li Changchun elaborated this into the “Three Closenesses,” i.e., “Closeness to reality, closeness to the masses and closeness to real life” (貼近實際、貼近群眾、貼近生活, Tiējìn shíjì, tiējìn qúnzhòng, tiējìn shēnghuó), as the approach that the top leadership would adopt in controlling the mass media in China. But technology in the 21st century in China allows the Party-state to put the mass line into fuller practice, to a wider extent and more effectively than ever before, thanks to the advent of social media and especially the birth of “China’s unique form of online vigilantism,”26 i.e., from the masses,

23. Mao Zedong, “Some Questions Concerning Methods of Leadership,” June 1, 1943, Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-3/ mswv3_13.htm [accessed June 10, 2012]. 24. 〈關於新聞戰線廣泛深入開展「走基層、轉作風、改文風」活動的意見〉 , June 7, 2011, www.dongman.gov.cn/cygc/2011-09/15/content_27350.htm [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 25. See 〈千名幹部下基層、當好群眾貼心人〉 , www.shdj.gov.cn/list.aspx?itemId=012003 [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 26. Leibold, “Blogging Alone,” p. 10.

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through “online public opinion and journalism 2.0,”27 such as “Net Eyes” in the Southern Metropolis Daily and “human-flesh search engines.” By monitoring the online discussions on any topics, from food safety, school bus safety and environmental degradation, to corruption of local cadres, wrongful evictions and sexual exploitation of children by government functionaries, the CCP can apprehend the issues of concern of the masses and what people think and say about them. The Internet has become a tool for the CCP to gather ideas from the masses, and to react to them, either by restating its own version of the truth, or by taking measures to deal with the problems in one way or another, and not necessarily in the best interests of the concerned parties. The high speed train collision in Wenzhou in July 2011 is a typical illustration of the secrecy and expediency that characterize contemporary China’s political culture. The authorities tried to stop negative reports about the accident by rapidly burying the wrecked train carriage—almost burying alive a toddler who was finally rescued—and the Central Propaganda Department instructed media across the country to avoid hard questions and focus instead on “stories that are extremely moving, like people donating blood and taxi drivers refusing to accept fares.” The overarching theme, it said, should be “great love in the face of great tragedy.”28 Secrecy combined with censorship, by encouraging the spread of mainly “positive” news, has not only discredited the official media to the Chinese audience, who tend to turn online to unedited news and stories, but has also created the perfect environment for rumors to develop and spread on the Internet. When a government is believed to be hiding embarrassing facts, conspiracy theories blossom. At the same time, Internet users have

27. Eric Sautedé, “The Internet in China’s state-society relations: Will Goliath prevail in the chiaroscuro?” China Information November 2013, 27: 347–369. 28. David Bandurski, “China High-Speed politics,” The New York Times, July 28, 2011, www. nytimes.com/2011/07/29/opinion/29iht-edbandurski29.html?ref=highspeedrailprojects [accessed on June 11, 2012].

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become increasingly bold in discussing current affairs and even sensitive political news, prompting officials to resort to old ways and seek new ones of reining them in. Earlier this year, amid China’s most serious political crisis for years, rumors of a coup in Beijing after the fall of Bo Xilai spread through the Chinese Internet. The government responded harshly by shutting down 16 websites and detaining six people.29 The case of a car crash that occurred in the early morning of May 26, 2012 in Shenzhen created a huge buzz, to an extent that it was even reported in English.30 How could an incident that is relatively minor end up making the national news agenda on CCTV 4? Shortly after it was reported by the local press, netizens started to raise questions about the true identity of the rampaging driver of the red sports car that crashed into two taxis, causing the death of three passengers in one of the two. Some people thought that the real driver of the sports car was not the “poor” Mr. Hou, but his “rich” boss Mr. Xu, or even one of the escorts. That story had all the ingredients to create a buzz: a drunk driver with escorts, a sports car, a rich boss and an electric taxi mysteriously catching fire.31 The Shenzhen traffic police reacted promptly to the Internet buzz by organizing press conferences and releasing all the information related to this tragic accident. But instead of resolving doubts, the video footage handed out to the public was scrutinized by Internet users and rumors about the veracity of this evidence started to grow on microblogs. The official press also tried to dispel rumors by releasing positive news about the Shenzhen traffic police, and launching a “Tiger Hunt 173” to catch drink-drivers just one

29. “Censorship in China: Crackdown on bloggers as rumours of coup swirl,” The Observer, April 1, 2012, www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/01/china-crackdown-bloggers-coup-rumours, [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 30. “Scapegoat at a deadly car crash? A truth lost in Weibo,” Offbeat China, May 30, 2012, http:// offbeatchina.com/scapegoat-at-a-deadly-car-crash-a-truth-lost-in-weibo, [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 31. The latter point addressed by the manufacturer of the taxi: “Voluntary Announcement relating to the 5.26 Traffic Accident,” BYD Company Limited, May 29, 2012, Hong Kong, http://bydit. com/userfiles/attachment/20120529-Voluntary%20Announcement%20relating%20to%20 the%205.26%20Traffic%20Accident.pdf [accessed on 11 June 2012].

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day after the “Shenzhen 5.26 sports car crash.”32 Although the authorities demonstrated that they had learned from their previous mistakes, with the Shenzhen traffic police choosing to release information instead of classifying it as “state secret” as had been the case in the Wenzhou train collision, rumors kept spreading. Relatives of the victims and netizens prompted “human-flesh search engines” to release information about the owner and actual driver of the car, fearing that the police were botching the investigation, just like in other accidents involving luxury cars and rich entrepreneurs or Party officials would escape penalties, as occurred in Hangzhou on May 7, 200933 and in Beijing on March 19, 2012.34 In a polity where rumors and truth are sometimes closely related—the fall of Bo Xilai is just a recent example of a rumor suddenly becoming true— netizens-turned-vigilantes can sometimes behave like digital Red Guards seeking justice, a dangerous crowd smashing anything on their way, an implacable “human-flesh search engine.” Having said that, although online activists are the ones to start the stir (from the masses), for the buzz to have an actual impact, Sautedé believes that “interaction with traditional media and especially the press in writing” (to the masses) has proved to be a decisive factor.35 Rather than just waiting for the issues to create a buzz on the Internet to react upon, the Chinese government has also taken a proactive approach by encouraging citizens to denounce malpractice on websites specially designed for this since the late 2000s. In June 2009, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate launched simultaneously a confidential 24-hour unitary anti corruption hotline (12309) and a website (12309.gov.cn), for citizens to report cases of alleged abuse by government officials. One month before

32. 〈千名幹部下基層、當好群眾貼心人〉, 《南方日報》, Xinhuanet, May 28, 2012, http://news. xinhuanet.com/legal/2012-05/28/c_123200147.htm , [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 33. “Restrain themselves, luxury-car drivers!” China.org.cn, May 18, 2009, www.china.org.cn/ china/opinion/2009-05/18/content_17792702.htm [accessed on June 11, 2012]. 34. “Online restrictions after China Ferrari crash,” BBC, March 20, 2012, www.bbc.co.uk/news/ world-asia-china-17444694 [Accessed on June 11, 2012]. 35. Sautedé, “The Chinese State and the Internet.”

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the launch, in May 2009, the China’s Supreme People’s Court launched a website (jubao.court.gov.cn) especially designed to collect reports from the people about corrupt judges and other officials in the legal system. In early 2011, all provincial courts opened similar websites and these are connected to that of the Supreme Court’s. The court’s discipline department must respond to the tipoffs and information on these websites within 10 working days and put its response online, and that department has also to supervise the provincial websites’ operation through an internal computer network. Given that 80% of investigations by procuratorates in China are instigated by tipoffs,36 procuratorates are literally submerged by the huge amount of information that is directed to them, and even the state media, such as Xinhua and People’s Daily Online, have questioned the handling capacities and communication facilities of the procuratorate system.37 The China Internet Illegal Information Reporting Centre (CIIRC) is another example of whistle blowing by the people but set up by the government. Founded in June 2004, the CIIRC is sponsored by an NGO—the Internet Information Service Commission of the Internet Society of China—registered with the Ministry of Civil Affairs of China. But the CIIRC is also supported by the Ministry of Information Industry, the Ministry of Public Security and the State Council Information Office. Reports and complaints related to online content are directed to the CIIRC. Internet users can log onto the CIIRC and fill out a web-form to report any website which may disseminate “illegal and harmful information on the Internet within the border of China.” According to the June 2010 white paper on The Internet in China published by the Information Office of the State Council of the PRC,38 “harmful information” is defined as follows:

36. Xinhua news, “Whistleblowers flood China’s anti-corruption hotline,” June 30, 2009, http:// en.chinacourt.org/public/detail.php?id=4469 [accessed June 10, 2012]. 37. Ibid. http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90776/90785/6689783.html [accessed on June 10, 2012]. 38. Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, The Internet in China, Beijing, June 8, 2010, www.china.org.cn/government/whitepaper/node_7093508.htm [accessed on June 10, 2012].

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no organization or individual may produce, duplicate, announce or disseminate information having the following contents: being against the cardinal principles set forth in the Constitution; endangering state security, divulging state secrets, subverting state power and jeopardizing national unification; damaging state honour and interests; instigating ethnic hatred or discrimination and jeopardizing ethnic unity; jeopardizing state religious policy, propagating heretical or superstitious ideas; spreading rumors, disrupting social order and stability; disseminating obscenity, pornography, gambling, violence, brutality and terror or abetting crime; humiliating or slandering others, trespassing on the lawful rights and interests of others; and other contents forbidden by laws and administrative regulations.39 Each item of the long list above has a lot of room for interpretation and in order to avoid getting into trouble, netizens have to be more cautious and apply self-censorship since some popular microblogs such as Sina Weibo have created a direct link to the CIIRC on their main page. And that is exactly what the Chinese authorities have been aiming at since “[t]he state proactively promotes industry self-regulation and public supervision,” as stated in the white paper on the Internet in China.40 Even though it would be very complicated for the Party-state apparatus alone to effectively control the entire Internet, self-censorship by Internet users and self-regulation by the Internet industry may fill in the gaps of the Chinese digital panopticon.

Reasserting Democratic Centralism According to Article 3 of the PRC Constitution (1982), “the state organs of the People’s Republic of China apply the principle of democratic

39. Ibid. Chapter V: “Protecting Internet Security.” 40. Ibid. Chapter IV: “Basic Principles and Practices of Internet Administration.”

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centralism.”41 Coined by Lenin and upheld by the communist parties of the Soviet Union and China, democratic centralism is often interpreted as “democracy in discussion, centralism in action” or “freedom of discussion, unity in action.” Trotsky underlined the fact that “democracy and centralism do not at all find themselves in an invariable ratio to one another”42 because [e]verything depends on the concrete circumstances, on the political situation in the country, on the strength of the party and its experience, on the general level of its members, on the authority the leadership has succeeded in winning.43 In the post-Mao era, even though to a great extent the liberalization of the Chinese polity and society is undeniable, with the CCP itself having encouraged the Chinese to “jump into the sea” (下海, xiàhai) and allowed elections at the grassroot level, more recently Liu Xiaobo, Ai Weiwei, Ni Yulan, Chen Guangcheng and Xu Zhiyong to cite only some cases that came under the spotlight of world media, are there to retell the intrinsic nature of the political system in China. An estimated 500,000 people are enduring punitive detention without charge or trial, and millions are unable to access the legal system to seek redress for their grievances, harassment, surveillance, house arrest and imprisonment of human rights defenders are on the rise, and so is censorship of the Internet and other media.44 Since the May Four movement, the periods in which movement for democracy seemed to win over centralism and authoritarianism were exceptional, and as soon as people start to question the legitimacy of oneparty rule, rectification campaigns follow rather harshly (e.g., after the Hundred Flowers campaign, the Democracy wall or June Fourth). As Jean-

41. Chinese Government’s Official Web Portal, “Constitution,” http://english.gov.cn/2005-08/05/ content_20813.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 42. Leon Trotsky, “On Democratic Centralism and the Regime,” 1937, www.marxists.org/archive/ trotsky/1937/xx/democent.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 43. Ibid. 44. Amnesty International, “China Human Rights,” www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/countries/asiaand-the-pacific/china [accessed on June 9, 2012].

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Philippe Béjà put it in À la recherche d’une ombre chinoise. Le Movement pour la démocratie en Chine, democracy in China has been nothing but a shadow.45 That Chinese shadow play has now moved into cyberspace. Seen by many as a liberating technology, the Internet has the potential eventually to fulfill the 1956 Hundred Flowers campaign’s slogan: “Let a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend” (百花齊放、百 家爭鳴, bǎihuāqífàng, bǎijiāzhēngmíng). Although Chinese netizens know the topics they cannot touch upon—such as the one-party rule, Xinjiang, Tibet and June Fouth—there are many other ways to question and challenge the CCP. As the cofounder of the Utopia website, Fan Jinggang, reiterated, the website was shut down by the State Internet Information Office in order to restrict the dissemination of opinions supporting Bo Xilai and criticizing the course of economic reforms,46 characterized as non mainstream and politically incorrect. No matter the true motivations of the former Chongqing boss in advocating a leftist turn, there was a window of opportunity for plurality and diversity of opinions from within the CCP itself, but once again a rectification campaign occurred. There can be only one official ideology, although that latter may be evolving with time: whereas Marxism–Leninism and Mao Zedong’s thoughts are still referred to47—though to a lesser extent—Mao’s particular idea of permanent revolution over governance has been definitively abandoned, replaced by Hu Jintao’s “harmonious society.” Democratic centralism or the prevalence of a unique Party line is achieved through a top-down control that permeates all levels of the administrative division and encompasses all aspects. Regarding the Internet, the CCP has been using different methods to assert its control:

45. Jean-Philippe Béjà, À la recherche d’une ombre chinoise. Le Mouvement pour la démocratie en Chine (1919–2004) (Paris: Le Seuil, 2004). 46. “Utopia website shutdown: Interview with Fan Jinggang,” April 14, 2012, www.danwei.com/ interview-before-a-gagging-order-fan-jinggang-of-utopia/ [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 47. 〈李長春在馬克思主義理論研究和建設工作會議上的講話〉 , 《人民日報》 , June 4, 2012, http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64093/64094/18059720.html [accessed on June 7, 2012].

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from enacting laws and regulations—including licensing systems and enforcing real name registration—to online censorship, Internet police, “the Great Firewall,” closure of websites, and physical intimidation of activists. The CCP is well on its way to effectively take over Lawrence Lessig’s four constraints on the Internet: market, law, norms and architecture.48 In August 2011, an official website was created to support the campaign to “establish civilized websites on the Internet”49 with contents that aim at giving Chinese netizens instructions on the practical implementation of this expansion of the socialist spiritual civilization online. Since the early 1980s, the Propaganda Department has launched several campaigns against “spiritual pollution” or “bourgeois liberalization” and the “Central Guidance Committee for Building Spiritual Civilization” was officially founded in 1997.50 The concept of spiritual civilization was introduced by Ye Jianying in a speech commemorating the 30th anniversary of the founding of the PRC during the fourth plenum of the 11th Congress in September 1979. After the chaotic years of the Cultural Revolution, the socialist spiritual civilization was promoted to restore moral and civic values. In the early years of the reform era, this concept of spiritual civilization became an ideological tool to counterbalance the development of a material civilization while China was implementing market-oriented reforms. In the Internet era, websites are easier to control than netizens, therefore the CCP has set the establishment of civilized websites to control the Internet more efficiently its goal. The implementation of civilized websites just looks like another rectification campaign (centralism/authoritarianism) against the myriad of so-called uncivilized websites that spangle the Chinese cyberspace (plurality-diversity/ democracy) and are accused by the authorities of disseminating on the

48. Lawrence Lessig, Code version 2.0, 2006, http://codev2.cc/ [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 49. 〈全國創建「文明網站」活動官方網站〉 (Quánguó chuàngjiàn “wénmíng w ǎ ngzhàn” huódòng guānfāng wǎngzhàn), www.wenmingwangzhan.cn/ [accessed on June 7, 2012]

50. 〈社會主義精神文明建設的提出與發展〉 (Shèhuì zhǔyì jīngshén wénmíng jiànshè de tíchū yǔ fāzhǎn), Xinhuanet, http://news.xinhuanet.com/ziliao/2003-01/20/content_697927.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012]

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Chinese Internet harmful information, rumors, pornography, scams, evil cults or satire. Cleansing the Internet of its bad elements while praising the virtue of civilized websites that “unswervingly uphold the System of Core Socialist Values”51 may well be a modern application of Mao’s “Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art”.52 In the early 21st century, literature and art have made way for the Internet: just like arts and humanities were an extension and an illustration of the ideology, today websites are to be the mouthpiece of the Party and adhere to the mainstream line. For example, a campaign was launched in September 2011 to “popularize Internet law knowledge”53 (互聯網法律知識普及, hùliánwǎng fǎlǜ zhīshì pǔjí): civilized websites had special columns or links dedicated to the law and regulation of the Internet. However, some websites simply refuse to post this type of information because it might not bring any commercial value—like other media, websites are constantly trying to optimize their compliance with the government’s guidelines along with profitability. However, since websites cannot operate in the PRC without a license issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, sooner or later they will have to comply with the requirements of civilized websites including popularizing the Internet law. The ongoing “harmonization” of the Chinese Internet is therefore twofold. On the one hand, there is cracking down on dissenting content and websites through the intensification of online censorship and repression, as documented by China Media Project;54 on the other hand,

51. “Unswervingly Upholding the System of Core Socialist Values,” Qiushi Journal 1(1) (2009), English edition, http://english.qstheory.cn/culture/201109/t20110924_112464.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 52. “Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art,” May 1942, Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung, vol. 3, pp. 69–98. 53. 〈 互 聯 網 法 律 知 識 普 及 活 動 反 響 熱 烈 〉 , X i n h u a n e t , h t t p : / / n ew s . x i n h u a n e t . c o m / legal/2011-10/28/c_111129787.htm [accessed on June 7, 2012]. 54. China Media Project, A Project of the Journalism and Media Studies Centre at the University of Hong Kong, see: http://cmp.hku.hk/ [accessed on June 10, 2012].

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the setting up of a framework within which Chinese websites would be allowed to “bloom” and “contend,” in the phraseology of the Hundred Flowers campaign, defined by the implementation of a set of laws, regulations and guidelines including the latest campaign for building up civilized websites. Contrary to the “cyberuptopians” who see in the Internet a powerful tool for political emancipation, Eric Sautedé in 200955 and Evgeny Morozov in 201156 argued that the Internet is just a tool, a technology any political regime that aims at “an adaptative panoptical control”57 can twist to make it become the perfect tool to support the “trinity of authoritarianism: propaganda, censorship and surveillance.”58 Unlike radio and television, the Internet can effectively make use of keyword-based filtering, which allows regimes to use URLs and text to identify and suppress dissenting voices.

Conclusion—Long Live Mao: From the Online Reactivation of Maoist Mobilization Methods and Propaganda in China to Worldwide Digital Maoism Some 80 years ago, Mao exhorted his followers to “[a]rouse the largest numbers of the masses in the shortest possible time and by the best possible methods.”59 The Internet in its Web 2.0 manifestation has indeed enabled the CCP to fulfill the vision of Mao. Once a dead political and cultural icon immortalized on memorabilia, Lei Feng has been living a second digital life, whereas living model workers and models of virtue have come back into vogue, actively reaching out to their millions of followers on social media venues. Online discussions and contents reflect what the

55. Eric Sautedé, “Pour en finir avec les « technologies de la libération » : Internet, société civile et politique en Chine,” Hermès 55 (2009): 133–140. 56. Morozov, The Net Delusion. 57. Sautedé, “The Chinese State and the Internet.” 58. Ibid., p. 311. 59. “A Single Spark Can Start a Prairie Fire,” January 1930, Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung vol. 1, p. 124.

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masses are concerned about, therefore Web 2.0 allows the CCP to take the pulse of the Chinese society and to learn “from the masses,” as for a revived version of the mass line theory. But what was believed to be a liberation technology that could have “let a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend” has to inevitably face and defer to democratic centralism. By closely monitoring the Internet, implementing measures that aim at self-regulation, public supervision and therefore resulting in increased self-censorship, the CCP has also been asserting “to the masses” its ultimate control over the medium and netizens. Despite the ongoing online reactivation of Maoist mobilization methods and propaganda, the broad picture of Chinese netizens is not very different from that of social media users from other parts of the world. Regardless of the country they live in, social media users are in their vast majority much more driven by depoliticized pastimes, as blogging alone and online vigilantism are most of the time. In this regard, China and its Internet users just reflect a global trend. But at the same time, the rest of the world has been “Maoisized.” In May 2006, American computer scientist and artist Jaron Lanier—best known for popularizing the term “virtual reality”—criticized the diktat of the new online collectivism or hive mind, which he coined as “digital Maoism:” What we are witnessing today is the alarming rise of the fallacy of the infallible collective. Numerous elite organizations have been swept off their feet by the idea. They are inspired by the rise of Wikipedia, by the wealth of Google and by the rush of entrepreneurs to be the most Meta. Government agencies, top corporate planning departments and major universities have all gotten the bug.60 Lanier’s essay sparked controversies both online and in traditional media. The depth and breadth of the discussions reflect the complexity of

60. Jaron Lanier, “Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism,” in Edge, 2006, www.edge.org/3rd_culture/lanier06/lanier06_index.html [accessed June 11, 2012].

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the challenge our societies are now facing: although tension has always existed between our individual and group identities, the digital age has made this tension even more acute by providing the individuals enormous new powers and at the same time enormous new opportunities for group actions, but also decupled the authorities’ ability to surveil: Big Brother is watching more closely than he ever had, and as exemplified by China where since 2013, an intensified repression has been ongoing with the arrest of the “Beijing Xidan Four” and other high profile cases such as Xu Zhiyong, and that aims at human rights activists, dissidents, underground churches, Falun Gong adherents, petitioners, activist netizens and liberal scholars. The scope of this current wave of repression in duration, number of people arrested and the severity of punishment, has led some to believe that the Party-state has moved “from surveillance mode to elimination mode” of the Chinese civil society.61 The depoliticization of the vast majority of Chinese Internet users combined with a harsher crackdown driven by the current renewed authoritarian drive and made possible by web technology appear to be two effective developmental factors towards the fulfillment of Mao’s goal of a total control over society.

61. Teng Biao, “Beyond Stability Maintenance—From Surveillance to Elimination” in China Change—News and Commentary from Those Who Work for Change, 22 June 2014: http:// chinachange.org/2014/06/22/beyond-stability-maintenance-from-surveillance-to-elimination/ [accessed on August 18, 2014].

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10 Propaganda and Pastiche Visions of Mao in The Founding of a Republic, Beginning of the Great Revival and Let the Bullets Fly Sebastian VEG1 Assistant Professor, Department of Comparative Literature The University of Hong Kong

Introduction It has often been underlined that the Chinese propaganda apparatus, whose existence remains solidly justified by its mission to provide the ideological underpinnings to the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), has undergone major transformations in recent years. Several recent studies by Anne-Marie Brady and David Shambaugh have examined the structure of the propaganda apparatus and its institutional adaptability in the context of the authoritarian “resilience” of the Chinese regime. Responding to earlier studies questioning the Party’s capacity to maintain control over thought work,2 Brady highlights that propaganda did not weaken after 1989; on the contrary, Jiang Zemin’s “two hands” (“liang

1. This article first appeared in China Perspectives vol. 2012/2. The author is profoundly grateful to Geremie Barmé, Arif Dirlik, Christoph Steinhardt, Kristof Van den Troost and the anonymous reviewers of this article for their attentive reading and invaluable comments. 2. See Daniel Lynch, After the Propaganda State: Media, Politics and “Thought Work” in Reformed China (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999).

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shou”) theory emphasized the need to sustain both economic growth and political control. But, as Brady notes, the latter took a new turn toward what she terms “popular authoritarianism:” “In an extraordinary process of cultural exchange, China’s propaganda system has deliberately absorbed the methodology of political public relations, mass communication, and other modern methods of mass persuasion commonly used in Western democratic societies ... slick advertising campaigns have replaced political campaigns.”3 A 2008 speech given by Hu Jintao for the 60th anniversary of People’s Daily illustrates this new strategy in the area of the media: building on Jiang Zemin’s concept of “correct public opinion guidance,” Hu emphasizes the need for a “new pattern of public opinion guidance” (“輿論 引導新格局, yulun yindao xin geju”), which uses the “metropolitan media” (less directly under the Party's control and more subject to commercial demands) to “set the agenda” in a way that is more relevant to “public opinion.”4 Similarly, film and related productions remain subject to strong control through the censorship system under the auspices of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) and the Propaganda Department under the Central Committee of the CCP, via its Leading Small Group (LSG) for Propaganda and Ideological Work.5 However, while

3. Anne-Marie Brady, Marketing Dictatorship: Propaganda and Thought Work in Contemporary China (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008), p. 3. The Party’s ability to produce more “savvy” propaganda has nonetheless also been questioned after a string of public relations disasters for the Chinese government over the last few years. 4. See the original speech and discussion in: D. Bandurski, “Propaganda Leaders scurry off to carry out the ‘spirit’ of Hu Jintao’s ‘important’ media speech,” China Media Project, available online at cmp.hku.hk/2008/06/25/1079/. (All links in the article were checked and accessed on April 3, 2014). Hu’s policy is discussed in Christoph Steinhardt, “Speaking about the Unspeakable: The Evolution of Political Discourse on Popular Protest in Contemporary China” (PhD Dissertation, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2012), pp. 125–30. 5. See David Shambaugh, “China’s Propaganda System: Institutions, Processes and Efficacy,” The China Journal no. 57 (2007): 25–58, at 31. On LSGs, see also Alice Lyman Miller, “The CCP Central Committee’s Leading Small Groups,” China Leadership Monitor no. 26 (2008), www. hoover.org/publications/china-leadership-monitor/article/5689.

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institutional aspects and control of the media are well documented, less attention has been devoted, apart from Geremie Barmé’s seminal study In the Red,6 to the ideological nodes around which official discourse is structured and restructured, and to how the increasing commercialization and entertainment culture highlighted by Brady has, since the mid 1990s, influenced the ideological content of propaganda discourse itself. Two state-sponsored blockbusters in 2009 and 2011 represent a good opportunity to assess the de-ideologization or re-ideologization of propaganda: neatly symmetrical in their Chinese titles, Jian guo da ye (The Founding of a Republic, 2009) and Jian dang wei ye (Beginning of the Great Revival/The Founding of a Party, 2011) were both codirected by Fifth-Generation director Huang Jianxin and the colourful chairman of China Film Group (CFG), Han Sanping, who effectively embodies the link with the propaganda-ideological apparatus.7 China Film Group directly produced both of these films, although The Founding of a Republic garnered more coproducers, including the notorious Hong Kong based Emperor Entertainment Group, headed by tycoon Albert Yeung.8 Both films rely on the same formula of a star-studded cast of Chinese and more

6. Geremie R. Barmé, In the Red: On Contemporary Chinese Culture (New York, Columbia University Press, 1999). 7. See for example his interview: “Han Sanping: Shuo Zhong Ying yizhiduda geng zhunque” (Han Sanping: It’s more exact to call CFG the biggest fish in the pond), Nanfang Zhoumo, September 10, 2009, www.infzm.com/content/34410. He has no qualms about his love for hero figures: “I not only like reading books about Mao, I also like books about Stalin, Lenin, Qinshihuang, even Hitler, Chiang Kai-shek. These books are my first choice.” See: Yuan Lei, “Han Sanping qian zhuan” (Biography of Han Sanping), Nanfang Zhoumo, September 9, 2009, www.infzm.com/ content/34412. Meanwhile, interestingly, it has transpired that Han Sanping may be embroiled in the possible investigation surrounding Zhou Yongkang that is rumored to have been launched in the wake of the fall of Bo Xilai. See: Li Jing, “China Film Boss Han Sanping retires amid links to Zhou Probe,” South China Morning Post, March 19, 2014, www.scmp.com/news/china/ article/1451521/china-film-boss-steps-down-after-taking-part-corruption-inquiry-top. 8. On Albert Yeung, see: Thomas Crampton, “Allegations range from simple bribes to stock swindles,” The New York Times, July 23, 2003, www.nytimes.com/2003/07/23/news/23iht-pop. html; “Rigged music awards and bribery scandal linked to powerful and feared tycoon,” Asian Pacific Post, July 24, 2003, www.primetimecrime.com/APNS/20030724riggedawards.htm; Augustine Tan, “Mugabe’s Hong Kong hideaway,” Asia Times, February 28, 2009, www.atimes. com/atimes/China/KB28Ad01.html.

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largely sinophone actors from around Asia, playing cameo roles that guarantee a cabaret-like recognition effect for the audience.9 The Founding of a Republic was a strong financial success, totaling ¥420 million at the box office (see Table 10.1) for a reported cost of only ¥30 million,10 while Beginning of the Great Revival fell short of expectations given its reported cost of approximately ¥100 million, although its final return was perhaps not as low as suggested, with the help of grouped ticket sales to various state-owned or state-affiliated entities.11 Huang Jianxin described in an interview how The Founding of a Republic originated: “Last October [2008], SARFT gave Han Sanping an order: to shoot an allencompassing, solid, documentary-coloured film that positively represents the establishment of the new China.”12 There is therefore not the slightest doubt about its top-down conception and approval at the highest level.

9. These two films generated at least one spin-off: 1911 (Xinhai geming, also 2011), directed and coproduced by Jackie Chan, with support from some of the funders of the two previous official films (Shanghai Film Studio): it can be seen as a patriotic Hongkonger’s contribution to and inflection of the official narrative that tries to deflect the focus away from the CCP and toward the less controversial, harmonious figure of Sun Yat-sen, the perhaps overly literary (“wen”) figure of the “father of the nation” (guofu, as he is known in Taiwan) and his more martial (“wu”) sidekick, Huang Xing, played by Jackie Chan. However, 1911 differs from the two mainland productions in that it lacks their cameo structure, constructing a grand historical narrative around a few iconic figures. As a Cantonese-centered film, it severely criticizes “Northerner” Yuan Shikai, who gets off rather lightly in Beginning of the Great Revival. 10. This figure is given in “Han Sanping: Shuo Zhong Ying yizhiduda geng zhunque.” 11. The New York Times estimates the production cost at US$12 million (Xiyun Yang, “People, You Will See this Film. Right Now,” The New York Times, June 24, 2011, www.nytimes. com/2011/06/25/movies/chinese-get-viewers-to-propaganda-film-beyond-the-great-revival. html), whereas Nanfang Zhoumo’s figure is ¥70 million; see: Yuan Lei, “Heibang pian, zhenglun pian, qingchun pian” (Mafia film, political theory film, youth film), June 17, 2011, infzm.com/content/60462. 12. “Huang Jianxin: Jian guo da ye jue bu shi xuanchuan pian” (Huang Jianxin: The Founding of a Republic is absolutely not a propaganda film), Nanfang Renwu Zhoukan, September 21, 2009, www.infzm.com/content/34713. He goes on to tell how Han summoned him to his office in January 2010, the film was shot in 120 days in the spring and finished on July 3, after which it underwent “60 days of screenings and controls (“shen kan”) by experts in history, literature, and film.”

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Table 10.1  Five Top Grossing Chinese Films Title

Director

Year

Production companies

Production budget (CNY)

Box-office income (CNY)

Let the Bullets Fly

Jiang Wen

2010

Beijing Buyilehu; CFG; Emperor

150 million

730 million

Aftershock

Feng Xiaogang

2010

Tangshan City; CFG, Huayi Brothers

120 million

673 million

The Founding of a Republic

Han Sanping/ Huang Jianxin

2009

CFG

30 million

420 million

If You Are the One I

Feng Xiaogang

2008

Huayi Brothers; Media Asia

350 million

Red Cliff I

John Woo

2008

Beijing Film Studio, CFG, Lion Rock

321 million

Top grossing foreign movies in China include: Avatar (2010; 1.38 billion yuan); 2012 (2009; 466 million yuan); Inception (2010, 457 million yuan); Transformers (2009; 455 million yuan). Sources: soundingsblog.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/top-5-grossing-movies-in-mainland-china/ ; boxofficemojo.com; www. imdb.com. Zhongguo Dianyingjia xiehui chanye yanjiu zhongxin, 2011 Zhongguo dianying chanye yanjiu baogao;The Research Report on Chinese Film Industry, Beijing, Zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 2011.

The two films are significant in that they mark a new will within the party-state: far from toning down or sublimating the great milestones in the history of the Party, it firmly intends to transform them into cultural and commercial icons around which to structure a national narrative that is based on a repackaged ideology. One might have thought that, in the ultracapitalist China of the early 2010s, the foundation of the CCP by a small group of idealistic anarchist utopians in 1921 would seem irrelevant: on the contrary, the Party has made the wager that it can repackage historical events like this one to reformulate its claim to legitimacy in the new era. Yuezhi Zhao’s observation remains valid, when she writes that “instead of bidding ‘farewell to revolution,’ the CCP, although embracing market reform, continues to selectively draw upon its revolutionary

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legacies to sustain its rule at both normative and tactical levels.”13 Indeed, both films are very obviously structured around the figure of Mao Zedong, played in one case by famous Mao look-alike Tang Guoqiang, in the other by young heartthrob and erstwhile indie actor Liu Ye, with moments of surprising physical resemblance to the young Mao. Three decades after his death and the historical verdict passed in the 1981 resolution, it is thus remarkable that Mao still remains the central figure of the main historical narrative of modern China presented by the Chinese government.

Repositioning Mao What then is the image of Mao the Party wishes to present today? Firstly, it is significantly restricted in time. It should be noted here that the two films proceed backwards. The first one, released in 2009 for the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), is set in the years of the Civil War, between 1945 and 1949, and culminates with the proclamation of the PRC and the establishment of its main institutions. The second one, released in 2011 for the ninetieth anniversary of the foundation of the CCP, covers the first decade of the PRC and ends with the establishment of the Communist Party in 1921. Paradoxically, though predictably, both films entirely sidestep any engagement with the history of the PRC after 1949, which would seem a natural subject for both commemorations. This deliberate avoidance can be traced, as I tried to argue previously, to the absence of a consensus on the interpretation of that segment of history even within the power apparatus, as was prominently displayed by a similar avoidance at the Opening Ceremony of 2008 Beijing Olympics, which focused on

13. Yuezhi Zhao, “Sustaining and Contesting Revolutionary Legacies in Media and Ideology,” in Mao’s Invisible Hand, ed. Sebastian Heilmann and Elizabeth Perry (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Asia Centre, 2011), p. 208. Zhao’s chapter is mainly devoted to the role of the press and the media.

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the “four great inventions” and the cultural achievements of “China’s” purported multimillennial history.14 This approach is consistent with—though perhaps even more cautious than—the 1981 “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party,” which distinguished among five periods: the pre-1949 and 1949–1956 periods, during which the line of the Party and Mao’s leadership are deemed “correct”; the 1956–1966 decade, marked by some errors, the responsibility for which is shared by Mao and the collective leadership, and the “Cultural Revolution Decade” of 1966–1976, which is entirely condemned, including Mao’s role. Finally, the post-Mao era was, unsurprisingly, endorsed. However, the Party’s final judgment on Mao remained positive.15 It served, by and large, as the yardstick for a series of Mao-centered films recounting officially endorsed history throughout the 1980s, joined in the 1990s by a growing flow of television dramas, probably inspired by the Qing court dramas that became more and more

14. On the opening ceremony, see Geremie Barmé, “China’s Flat Earth: History and 8th August 2008,” China Quarterly 197 (2009): 64–86. For a similar discussion on the opening of the new National Museum in 2009, see Shelly Kraicer, “History in Progress, with Gaps: The National Museum of China,” dgeneratefilms.com/china-today/history-in-progress-with-gaps-thenational-museum-of-china-part-two/. See also my comment in “1911: The Failed Institutional Revolution,” The China Beat, October 10, 2011,www.thechinabeat.org/?p=3867: “It took almost one century from the fall of the Bastille until French citizens of all political stripes could come together at the funeral of Republican icon Victor Hugo, a sign, according to historian François Furet’s famous pronouncement, that ‘Revolution had entered port.’ [By contrast, the] absence of a minimal consensus on the nature of the Chinese polity speaks eloquently to the open legacy of 1911.” 15. See “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China,” www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/cpc/history/01. htm. The key assessment on Mao is in paragraph 18. For the Chinese original, see “Guanyu jianguo yilai dang de ruogan lishi wenti de jueyi,” news.xinhuanet.com/ziliao/2002-03/04/ content_2543544.htm.

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popular as television sets spread throughout the country.16 As noted by Anne-Marie Brady, the endorsement of Mao was reinforced by Jiang Zemin after the Tiananmen protests and in the run-up to the centenary of the Chairman’s birth: “Jiang’s speech [in November 1989] was full of Mao quotes and allusions to Maoist theories on propaganda work. In a backlash against the de-Maoization of the 1980s and the perceived damage that had been caused to Party prestige as a result of that process, Mao would again become a point of reference in propaganda and thought work in China throughout the 1990s and early twentyfirst century ... In advertising terms, Mao Zedong is a powerful brand which the CCP cannot afford to give up, no matter how much it has walked away from the principles he upheld.”17 The two commemorative films may therefore be seen as marking a new climax in the “branding” effort that the Party continues to devote to Mao and the framing of the narrative of the Chinese Revolution. Brady highlights an important shift, from Jiang’s use of Mao as a weapon in an ideological struggle to a much looser instrumentalization of Mao as a “brand,” or vague symbol for anything ranging from social equality to strong leadership. In this sense, the use of Mao as a cultural commodity can be seen as one illustration of the more general contradiction inherent in the notion of a “socialist market economy,” in which the Party to a large extent ends up marketing itself through a

16. For a roundup and discussion of these films, see Chang Ping, “Jian guo da ye zou xiang shijie” (The Founding of a Republic marches out to the world), originally published on FT Chinese, it has been reposted on various websites, for example: fzbk77.blog.sohu.com. See also the welldocumented resource site “History in Chinese Film and Television,”www.sino.uni-heidelberg. de/representations/index.html, and Matthias Niedenführ, “Revising and Televising the Past in East Asia: ‘History Soaps’ in Mainland China” in Contested Views of a Common Past — Revisions of History in Contemporary East Asia, ed. Steffi Richter, 351–70 (Frankfurt and New York: Campus, 2008). For a television drama based on similar historical events as Beginning of the Great Revival, see “Kai Tian Pi Di” (Creating a new world), tv.sogou.com/series/ wxt4vu5644ql7kwm5sy5tnoy.html. 17. Brady, Marketing Dictatorship, p. 47.

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combination of commercial advertising techniques and political control or ideology.18 This kind of branding of course goes back to the 1990s and even the 1980s, when “pop art,” mocking and reappropriating propaganda, began to be absorbed back into the mainstream. It is ironic that Geremie Barmé should, in 1996, have mentioned Huang Jianxin’s Black Cannon Incident (1985) as one of the films that prepared the “repackaging and commercialization of 20th century Chinese history along the general lines determined by a Party-defined nostalgia. These filmic reprises of party culture, albeit originally seditious if not tongue-in-cheek, have over the years aided and abetted in the reformulation and rebirth of party culture as part of mainstream Chinese culture, both on the mainland and in the Sino-Kong-Tai world.”19 This framework remains highly relevant to the two films Huang codirected a quarter of a century later. In a way, the two films may be seen as a climax—in terms of sheer scale—of this repackaging technique, which also heightens its inherent contradictions. Various critics of different political stripes have noted a set of related trends in the Chinese intellectual debate throughout the 1990s and 2000s. While Geremie Barmé was the first to highlight the commodification of the

18. Geremie Barmé builds on Mikhail Epstein’s definition of “ideology” to unmask “socialist market economy” as “a term created to convey the extreme contradictions of contemporary economic realities and to allow for an ideological underpinning to what, superficially at least, appears to have been an example of the Party’s retreat from its avowed Marxist–Leninist– Maoist ideals.” (In the Red, p. 327). Epstein defines ideology as “simply a habit of thinking, a manner of expression, the prism through which all views and expressions are refracted without depending on specific views and ideas.” Quoted in G. Barmé, “New China Newspeak,” The China Heritage Quarterly no. 29, March 2012, www.chinaheritagequarterly.org/glossary. php?searchterm=029_xinhua.inc&issue=029. 19. Barmé, In the Red, p. 247.

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icons of Chinese socialism and of the figure of Mao himself,20 Dai Jinhua provided an astute analysis of the depoliticization of Red Nostalgia: how “red” culture came to be “relived” and subsequently theorized as an object of nostalgia distinct from the political arrangements that had originally allowed for its production in films like Red Cherry by Ye Daying (1995).21 Dai’s nostalgia was in this sense the opposite of the popular yearning for the era of “deeply stirred passions and beliefs firmly held”22 that Geremie Barmé termed “totalitarian nostalgia,” and defined as “[not] merely a commodified social mood sated simply by the revenant Mao cult of the early 1990s or a crude retro Cultural Revolution longing that fed the success of works like Jiang Wen’s 1995 film Under the Radiant Sun. Rather, it was a nostalgia for a style of thought and public discourse; it was a nostalgia for a language of denunciation that offered simple solutions to complex problems.”23 Finally, Wang Hui, in his more general perspective of drawing parallels between post-Mao China and the “post-modern West” has highlighted a concomitant “depoliticization” in both places, which has contributed to emptying politics of debates and of policy choices, reducing politics to “governance” and a form of marketing, which translates into propaganda in China and into “branding” or “PR politics” in the West.24 This chapter

20. See in particular the following sections of In the Red: “Selling Socialism and Ideology in a Consumer’s Market,” pp. 115–22 and “CCP™ & AdCult PRC,” pp. 235–54, where Barmé coins some of the classic concepts such as “Party Inc.” or “Corporate communism.” See also Geremie Barmé, “The Irresistible Fall and Rise of Mao Zedong,” in Shades of Mao: The Posthumous Cult of the Great Leader, 3–73 (Armonk, NY: ME Sharpe, 1996). 21. Dai Jinhua, “Rewriting the Red Classics,” in Rethinking Chinese Popular Culture: Cannibalizations of the Canon, ed. Carlos Rojas and Eileen Cheng-yin Chow, 151–78 (NewYork: Routledge, 2009). 22. Geremie Barmé, “Totalitarian Nostalgia,” in In the Red, p. 323. 23. Ibid., p. 317. 24. See Wang Hui, “Quzhengzhihua de zhengzhi, baquan de duochong goucheng yu 60 niandai de xiaoshi” (Depoliticized politics, the multiple structures of hegemony and the vanishing of the 1960s), in Quzhengzhihua de zhengzhi, 1–57 (Beijing: Sanlian, 2008).

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will draw on all three approaches to assess the complex interplay between political and marketing strategies and to question what, if any, new contribution is made by the two films.

Post-Mainstream Culture It seems useful to situate the two Mao films more precisely within the Chinese context and to investigate the circumstances of their production and reception. Post-reform Chinese film production has been traditionally divided into the three categories of propaganda, commercial and independent art film, but the first two have become increasingly blurred in recent years. While commercial blockbusters may seem unrelated to Party politics, it is true that even romantic comedies such as If You Are the One by Feng Xiaogang (“Fei cheng wu rao,” 2008 and 2010) or martial arts films set in the distant past, such as Red Cliff by John Woo (“Chi bi,” 2008 and 2009) or Hero by Zhang Yimou (“Yingxiong,” 2002), have their political twists. Other super productions, however, fall much more squarely within the writ of the censorship commission, dealing with issues of contemporary political relevance, such as Aftershock by Feng Xiaogang (“Tangshan da dizhen,” 2010), an indirect grappling with the Sichuan earthquake that ends by extolling the government’s response in Sichuan, or with historically sensitive subject matter, such as Assembly, also by Feng Xiaogang (“Jijie hao,” 2007), a recollection of the forgotten martyrs of the civil war of 1946–1949. Conversely, propaganda films, produced at the initiative of the propaganda and ideological organs of the Party, have increasingly resorted to the visual and narrative effects of commercial blockbusters, absorbing many characteristics of recent commercial films dedicated to subjects such as the 1911 Revolution or the Civil War. Indeed, the two categories are now often lumped together under the heading “zhuxuanlü” or “main melody” films. Most recently, the third category of independent film appears to have become increasingly attracted into the orbit of the “main melody:” the critic Shelly Kraicer put forward the notion of “post-main

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melody film” when discussing Lu Chuan’s City of Life and Death (“Nanjing, Nanjing,” 2007), a film devoted to a typical propaganda topic (the Nanjing massacre, already somewhat inflected by the 1980s production One and Eight), with a new independent angle (a “good” Japanese character as well as “indie” actor Liu Ye) and a strong commercial backing.25 It should be noted that Lu Chuan also served as one of the assistant directors for the two Mao films that will be discussed in this essay. City of Life and Death can thus be seen as a harbinger of the increased blurring of boundaries between categories. Against this background, the Mao films provide interesting insights into views held in the “Center” about the Chinese film industry, which has been repeatedly called upon to liberalize, both from abroad by Hollywood lobbyists eager to enter the Chinese market, and from inside by independent directors requesting an easing of censorship. Hu Jintao’s call during the 2011 Central Committee Plenum to lay the foundations of a new Chinese culture underpinning the contemporary polity effectively reconceptualized propaganda and censorship as a legitimate policy to ensure “equality of cultural content” in a situation of “Western strength and Chinese weakness” (“西強我弱, Xi qiang wo ruo”), and to safeguard the national cultural industries—including cinema—with their “special characteristics.” In this way, propaganda and censorship can be usefully equated with protectionist cultural policies like those enforced in South Korea or France,26 allowing the Center both to maintain control over the cultural industries (and, crucially, the Internet) and to justify this control

25. See Shelly Kraicer, “A Matter of Life and Death: Lu Chuan and Post-Zhuxuanlü Cinema,” cinema-scope.com/wordpress/web-archive-2/issue-41/features-a-matter-of-life-and-death-luchuan-and-post-zhuxuanlu-cinema-by-shelly-kraicer/. 26. Needless to say, such an equation of course remains purely rhetorical, as in France and South Korea the state subsidizes independent productions (including, in France, via the “Fonds Sud,” many foreign-directed independent productions that meet certain post-production criteria in France) while CFG subsidizes homegrown state-endorsed blockbusters.

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in universal terms.27 The official discourse on the Chinese film sector is phrased in terms of a need to “shield” a “fledgling” industry (Chinese state productions, which are “not yet” fully marketable) from more developed foreign competition, while at the same time insisting on its “great potential,” making the case to investors that the more they invest in this “maturing” industry, the faster it will become viable and hence open to competition.28 Similar arguments have been made recently to ban foreign (mainly Korean and Japanese) soap operas from primetime television and to justify the Green Dam Internet software limiting access to sensitive websites and thus ensuring that “Chinese content” is fairly represented on the “Chinese Internet” rather than letting it be overrun by “foreign” news and entertainment.29 What is interesting is therefore not so much that mainstream Party culture is capable of absorbing ironic or parodic representations of itself, but rather that it cannot let go of the Revolution and of Mao, who need to be reinvented in order to fit into the new narrative. This essay

27. See Hu Jintao, “Jianshe shehui zhuyi wenhua qiang guo” (Building a strong country with a socialist culture), Qiushi, January 1, 2012. Similarly, in a special issue of Modern China devoted to the “Chongqing model,” new left film and media scholar Lü Xinyu extols the “public television” model that she sees as characteristic of Chongqing under Bo Xilai. See: “Government Subsidies, Market Socialism, and the ‘Public’ Character of Chinese Television: The Transformation of Chongqing Satellite TV,” Modern China 37(6) (2011): 661–71. 28. For an overview, see: Zhongguo dianying chanye yanjiu baogao (Research report on the Chinese film industry) (Beijing: Zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 2011). Triumphalism was perceptible when China’s box office takings reportedly overtook Japan for second place in the first quarter of 2012, see for example: Zheng Yangpeng, “China’s movie sector becomes second largest,” China Daily, April 13, 2012, english.people.com.cn/90778/7785866.html. In addition to not quoting any figures for the first quarter, the article also uses a rather misleading title. In terms of number of films produced, China is currently in third place, behind India and the United States, with more than 500 films produced per year. See: Zhang Hong, “Make Way Hollywood?” www.chinatoday.com.cn/ctenglish/se/txt/2012-03/27/content_442597.htm. Another good resource site for official Chinese cinema is: www.chinesefilms.cn/index.htm. 29. On TV bans see: Andrew Jacobs, “China Limits Foreign Made TV Programs,” The New York Times, February 14, 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/world/asia/censors-pull-reins-aschina-tv-chasing-profit-gets-racy.html?pagewanted=print. For a roundup on Green Dam, see David Bandurski, “ISC required members to ‘actively’ promote Green Dam last January,” China Media Project, June 16, 2009, cmp.hku.hk/2009/06/16/1665/.

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will argue that the two Mao films, while undeniably marked by both commodification and depoliticized red nostalgia, in fact try to reconstruct a consensual figure of Mao as the centrepiece of the emerging new national narrative of “the great revival of the Chinese nation.”30 The aim remains, through a cultural policy that does not seek to hide the heavy hand of state involvement, to articulate a “main melody” discourse that “guides” and gives shape to a possible consensus on the foundations of the modern Chinese polity, underscoring that the CCP’s legitimacy continues to remain rooted in the battle over history. As Hu Jintao wrote in the published version of his address to the 2011 Plenum of the Central Committee on cultural policy: “[We must] correctly handle the relationship between enhancing the main melody and advocating diversity, between educating the people and satisfying the people’s need for a diverse spiritual culture ... and unceasingly strengthen and expand mainstream socialist culture.”31 In order to illustrate better how propaganda redefined as a cultural policy tool retains a central, though not exclusive, position at the heart of this “mainstream socialist culture,” the analysis of the two Mao films will be complemented by a brief allusion to a third film which, at first view, has no connection to Mao: Jiang Wen’s Let the Bullets Fly, reported to be China’s highest grossing domestic film ever. The work of “Sixth Generation” independent-but-more-recently-mainstream actor and director Jiang Wen, it has been read as a veiled allegory of Mao and the CCP’s rise to power, although it is set in Republican era Sichuan. Reading it in conjunction with the two Mao films, this essay will argue that it wittily subverts the new “main melody” discourse on Mao and the Party’s place in modern history while at the same time accepting and thus subtly legitimizing the new cultural model. In this way, it represents exactly the tradition of “bankable dissent”32 that films like The Founding of a Republic have been able to incorporate into the mainstream.

30. This phrase originated in the Jiang Zemin era but has become strongly associated with Hu Jintao, who uses it frequently in his speeches. 31. Hu Jintao, “Jianshe shehui zhuyi wenhua qiang guo.” 32. See Barmé, In the Red, pp. 188–94.

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While on one level, it is easy to classify the two Mao films as propaganda on the basis of their production structure, in that they are top-down, state sponsored and controlled projects, from the point of view of their intended audience, these films again seem to blur the boundaries between propaganda and other variants of “soft power” such as those developed in Hollywood or similar institutions around the world. The choice of actors, the structure of the films, and even many of the episodes—in particular those involving the KMT and Chiang Kai-shek—may be best understood as directed to a pan-Chinese and even international audience, as part of China’s “soft power” push. While they may not be particularly innovative in terms of content alone, their positioning as pan-Chinese productions equally targeting the domestic market, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and overseas Chinese communities, as well as the world at large as an articulation of Chinese state discourse, is quite unprecedented for this type of state production, and brings them close to Jiang Wen’s Bullets.

The Founding of a Republic: Returning to Mao via New Democracy Both films run to over two hours and rely heavily on voice-overs and text inserts. The Founding of a Republic may in fact first jar the Anglophone viewer’s eye by the translation of its title. “Republic” is at best a somewhat expanded translation of “guo” in the Chinese title 《建國大業》(“The great enterprise of founding a country/building a state”); undoubtedly the regime that was replaced by the People’s Republic of China in 1949 was also a republic, in addition to being a country endowed with a state, so that the Chinese and the English versions of the title each convey their distinct sense of hubris (“jian guo” being of course the official name enshrined in textbooks since 1949 for the “establishment of the new regime”).33 The film carries a liminal dedication to the 60th anniversary of

33. Barmé notes that both Jianguo and Daye chime with names chosen by two emperors for their reigns. See “Editors note” to G. and M. E. Davies, “Filmed Founding Myths,” China Heritage Quarterly, no. 20, December 2009, chinaheritagequarterly.org/scholarship. php?searchterm=020_founding.inc&issue=020.

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the PRC and the first Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the constitutional assembly gathered by Mao in the lead-up to October 1, 1949. It begins with a text insert establishing the year as 1945, a time when China faced an “undetermined future,” and ends with the original archival footage of Mao proclaiming the PRC on Tiananmen Gate on October 1, 1949, followed by Tiananmen today with the national flag floating in the wind. On the whole, little use is made of archive footage, with several large scale battle scenes taken from earlier Chinese films34—a tacit acknowledgment of the ways in which propaganda fiction and archival documentary have largely merged in the collective unconscious. The film can be seen as the product of contending constraints. On the one hand, it seeks to provide a relatively linear narrative of the civil war, highlighting both historical and fictional episodes. Here, the film focuses on key moments such as Mao and Zhou Enlai’s trip to Chongqing to meet Chiang Kai-shek, or Chiang Ching-kuo’s attempt to curb inflation by cracking down on the black market in Shanghai, thwarted by the powerful Kung family. Fictional additions to this category include Mao’s encounter with his cook (who dies in a KMT air raid on Yanan aimed at Mao), designed to illustrate the great man’s human side. On the other hand, the structure is something akin to a cabaret revue: cameo roles are built into the film so as to accommodate the great and the good of today’s Chinese film industry (more than 170 “stars” are billed as having worked on the production but only about 100 made the final cut). The number includes Hong Kong actors like Donnie Yen (as Tian Han), Leon Lai, Andy Lau and Jet Li (as KMT officers), and Jackie Chan and Tony Leung Ka-fai as respectively a Hong Kong reporter and a CCP member. These two structural threads in fact reflect the dual nature of the film both as historical narrative and as commercial entertainment; holding them together requires a constant flow of onscreen surtitles reminding viewers

34. This was first noted in Zhu Dake, “Jian guo da ye he zhuanxing Zhongguo de wenhua luoji– yipian liuchan de Nanfang zhoumo fangtan” (The Founding of a Republic and the cultural logic of the Chinese transition–an aborted interview with Southern Weekend), October 2009, www.21ccom.net/articles/sxwh/shsc/article_201001204927.html.

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of the names of jostling historical figures (the actors’ names are left for the audience to guess, in what is definitely part of the enjoyment). Yet this commercial conceit also carries with it an implied ideological message: history, thus invaded by the contemporary star system, is no longer the province of the anonymous proletariat; turning away from Marxist methodology, the film portrays the founding of the PRC as a succession of intrigues and strategic moves by a well defined set of great men (and a few women) led by Mao. The rural masses are to all intents and purposes swept off the stage of history.35 Perhaps the principles presiding over the new historical narrative can be located within the soul-searching that took place in the aftermath of June 4, 1989. In a text quoted by Anne-Marie Brady, first published in 1991 by the “Theory Department” of the China Youth Daily (the organ of the China Youth League) under the title “Realistic Responses and Strategic Choices for China after the Coup in the Soviet Union,” a call is made to “create a brand-new culture on the basis of Chinese tradition but with sufficient broadness. The Party’s most urgent task is to accomplish the transformation from a revolutionary party to a party in power (‘zhizheng dang’).”36 This influential text is part of the larger theoretical background that has continued to infuse over the last two decades, and has led propaganda workers to define a more “inclusive” rather than a “revolutionary” national narrative. However, inclusiveness has its limits. Highlighting the renewed wave of revolutionary music, films, and television programs in the early 1990s, Brady writes: “Revolutionary symbolism from the CCP’s past is still important however such programs aimed to evoke the positive idealistic feelings of the Mao era and rework

35. Gloria and M.E. Davies, in their review of the film, also underline the disappearance of the proletariat in national narratives since the early 1990s: “Filmed Founding Myths.” Matthias Niedenführ draws the same conclusion about the return of “Great Men” in “Revising and Televising the Past in East Asia: ‘History Soaps’ in Mainland China,” p. 359. 36. Zhongguo Qingnianbao sixiang lilun bu, “Sulian zhengbian zhihou Zhongguo de xianshi yingdui yu zhanlüe xuanze,” September 9, 1991. An online version is available with a slight variant in the title (not uncommon for leaked internal documents) www.ibiblio.org/chinese-text/ politics/China_Policy. See also, Brady, Marketing Dictatorship, p. 47 and note 52, p. 62.

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them for the purpose of the current period.”37 In 2012, the choice of Mao as the central figure of a more “inclusive” narrative of modern Chinese history can thus be interpreted as being the expression of a will both to preserve Mao as an icon of modern China and to “derevolutionize” his historical meaning, with perhaps the ultimate goal of creating a consensual historical figure on the model of Sun Yat-sen. This strategy, no doubt the outcome of a lengthy process of internal screenings and discussions that itself would merit detailed research,38 is pursued in various ways in The Founding of a Republic. Three of these strategies will be detailed below: on the ideological, personal and historical levels. In the area of ideology, The Founding of a Republic takes a step away from more orthodox Marxist concepts and towards what is termed “New Democracy,” the title of a major text by Mao written in 1940 in Yanan,39 arguing for the (temporary) necessity of a “third form” of “new democratic republic,” which is neither a republic under “bourgeois dictatorship” nor under the dictatorship of the proletariat, but is rather “under the joint dictatorship of several revolutionary classes.” Mao saw this form of government as enshrined in the manifesto of the KMT’s First National Congress in 1924 and encapsulated in the original meaning of Sun Yatsen’s “Three Principles.” In this system, private ownership is permissible both in industry and in agriculture, an agenda that continued to be defended by Liu Shaoqi in the early 1950s until Mao officially discarded it.40 This text has of course long proved useful to theorists attempting to

37. Brady, Marketing Dictatorship, p. 75. 38. See Huang Jianxin’s description of this process quoted in note 12 above. 39. See Stuart Schram, The Thought of Mao Tse-tung (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 77–80 and the introduction to Stuart R. Schram (ed.), Mao’s Road to Power: RevolutionaryWritings 1912–1949, Vol. VII: New Democracy, 1939–1941 (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2005), pp. xxxvii–lxxxii. 40. “The republic will neither confiscate capitalist private property in general nor forbid the development of such capitalist production as does not ‘dominate the livelihood of the people’.” Mao Zedong, “On New Democracy,” www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/ volume-2/mswv2_26.htm. On Liu’s defence of New Democracy, see Roderick MacFarquhar, “Editorial Reflections: On Liberation”, The China Quarterly 200 (2009): 891–94.

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reconcile Deng Xiaoping’s market socialism with the theoretical tenets of Marxism and their “adaptation” to Chinese reality as expressed in Mao Zedong Thought. However, the recent surge of interest in New Democracy also points to the CCP’s wish to theorize itself, after the fall of the Soviet model, as the expression of a “third way” that aspires to be more perennial than originally foreseen in Mao’s conceptualization of a transitional phase. While the film cannot be directly equated with the publication of theories such as Party intellectual Zhang Musheng’s 2011 essay “Changing Our View of Cultural History” (in Chinese), in which he proudly proclaimed: “Only the CCP can save China and only new democracy can save the CCP,”41 it is part of a general trend to search for foundations of political consensus within CCP history. Zhang Musheng’s endorsement of New Democracy has been linked to the political ambitions of his patron, Liu Shaoqi’s son Major General Liu Yuan of the PLA Logistics Department (who is no doubt eager to promote a concept that his father defended in the early 1950s), and it comes as no surprise that Liu Shaoqi features prominently in The Founding of a Republic, for example when Mao, Liu, Zhou Enlai, and Ren Bishi get drunk together to celebrate the CCP victory on the Huai River. Mao is thus—rather paradoxically—reclaimed by the CCP as the incarnation of a political consensus, based on the guiding but not exclusive role of the CCP, the central but not exclusive role of the state-owned sector in the economy, and an ideological reconfiguration that begins to evacuate the reference to Marxism, which is somehow subsumed under the idea of “New Democracy.” The much-commented-on episode in the film that encapsulates this configuration takes place just before Mao enters Beijing, in Zhou County, Hebei, where he cannot buy cigarettes because all private shop owners have fled the Communists. This in turn triggers a serious discussion during which Zhu De first stresses that the CCP does not know how to run the

41. On Zhang Musheng, see “Zai ju xin minzhu zhuyi de daqi” (Raising once more the great flag of New Democracy), Nanfang renwu zhoukan, October 31, 2011, news.sina.com.cn/c/sd/2011-1028/114723377991.shtml; David Bandurski, “Turning back to ‘new democracy’?” China Media Project, May 19, 2011, cmp.hku.hk/2011/05/19/12486/.

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economy. Liu Shaoqi adds that capitalists cannot yet be exterminated because the CCP must take care in managing production, Mao asks how the economy can be developed if you cannot even buy cigarettes, and Zhou Enlai joins the table, concluding that democratic capitalists must be invited to run the country together with the CCP. While private merchants are viewed with benevolence, the “proletariat,” whether rural or urban, remains absent from the film; similarly rural reforms in Yanan are only briefly mentioned in a theoretical sequence. This is in keeping with a trend also noted by Brady, according to which model figures such as Lei Feng may be used, but “no longer have to be perfect. A 1994 guideline adviced against promoting extreme behavior in model figures ... as ‘the masses will feel it is impossible to copy such behavior and it is hard to relate to’.”42 Mao is thus portrayed as a humanist, a man sympathetic to ordinary people, self-effacing in discussion, less interested in theoretical issues and class origins than in enjoying a good smoke. This figure, one might argue, is the onscreen, pop culture translation of the concept of New Democracy. Ideology is in this way effectively reduced to a personality conflict, as shown by one of the main structural devices of the film: the game of chess played across the vast expanses of China between Mao and Chiang Kaishek. The KMT as a party largely disappears as the Civil War is recast as little more than a conflict between two larger-than-life personalities, one as amenable and self-effacing as the other is overbearing and ambitious. However, as suggested by the opening episode of the film, the joint press conference held by Mao and Chiang in Chongqing, during which both wear symmetrical Sun Yat-sen suits (known internationally as “Mao suits”), they are defined by Mao as “two disciples of Mr. Sun.” Chiang Kai-shek, though power-hungry and occasionally unscrupulous (when he lets Secret Service head Mao Renfeng, played by Jiang Wen, plot the elimination of Mao in a surprise bombing and the assassination of Zhang Lan, both of which are foiled), never swerves from his loyalty to Sun Yat-sen (in front of whose portrait he takes his presidential oath) and

42. Brady, Marketing Dictatorship, p. 76.

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his dedication to national unity. Chiang not only refuses to encourage any attempt to split China, as proposed by Li Zongren, but also displays confidence that Mao will do the same, recognizing him as his equal (“Mao will not divide China,” he opines to his son, and adds: “Would you?”). This is an episode that seems clearly designed for audiences outside mainland China sympathetic to the KMT, with the aim of promoting “reunification.” There is no mention of his involvement of American forces, as in previous CCP historiography: the only contact with the United States is made by Chiang’s wife, Soong Mayling, who succeeds in garnering only the comment from the black guard at the White House: “She’s so hot, man!” The racist undertone in this portrayal underscores the general message that Americans were dazzled by Mayling’s allure; those who truly understood China, such as US ambassador John Leighton Stuart, are shown as secretly favouring the CCP.43 Symmetrically, there is no mention of the slightest Soviet presence on Chinese soil or of Soviet advisors within the CCP; only a jovial Stalin briefly encourages Liu Shaoqi in Moscow to quickly proclaim a new Republic. The political and ideological struggles central to 20th century world history and also CCP historiography are thus erased in favour of a personal conflict between two proud men who share the same ideal of national unity. When Chiang Ching-kuo raises the question of American and Soviet involvement to his father, he is brushed off with, “It’s not that complicated.” The Civil War thus almost becomes a by-product of both men’s impeccable patriotic credentials, a rather questionable portrayal in view of the larger forces at play. Chiang Kai-shek is also shown as being personally exempt from corruption, and even as encouraging his son Chiang Ching-kuo to stamp out the inflation and trafficking associated with the Kung family in Shanghai. Ching-kuo, played by the dashing young actor Chen Kun, who takes up the role of Zhou Enlai in Beginning of the Great Revival, plays a pivotal role in conveying the message that there are idealistic patriots free

43. This portrayal is no doubt linked to the reburial of Leighton Stuart’s ashes in Hangzhou in 2008, finally authorized after several decades of complex negotiations.

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from corruption on both sides of the civil war, who can work together. Given his role in the democratization of the ROC on Taiwan almost forty years later, there is certainly an implicit message concerning not only the CCP’s willingness to acknowledge the KMT’s place in history in exchange for a peaceful “reunification” with Taiwan, but perhaps even a veiled warning to the CCP that it is not the only party with a claim to represent the Chinese nation. The much-commented-on pronouncement attributed to Chiang Kai-shek, opining that fighting corruption risked destroying the Party, but not fighting it risked destroying the nation, provides both a neat explanation for the KMT’s defeat (an insoluble prisoner’s dilemma) and a warning to the CCP that it, too, could “perish by its own hand,” as Chiang concludes under the pouring tropical rain in Taipei. The KMT’s defeat is finally attributed to destiny and Chiang is raised to the rank of a tragic figure, in a reading of history that implicitly points back to the mandate of heaven44 and its moral foundations. Much commented upon also was the role of the so-called democratic parties, and in particular of the China Democratic League (CDL, Minzhu lianmeng or Minmeng) and its central figure, Zhang Lan, whose role in the film rivals that of Mao and Chiang. From the assassination of the poet Wen Yiduo in Kunming, to the insistent presence of Luo Longji (later purged as one of the main rightists in 1957), all the way to the triumphant personal welcome given to Zhang Lan by Mao, who salutes him as a great contributor to the cause of democracy in China and the benefactor of the CCP, Minmeng activists play a decisive role in the dramatic structure of the film. The spiriting away of Zhang Lan and Luo Longji by Communist agents to thwart a purported assassination order by Chiang Kai-shek is the most vivid dramatization of the importance the CCP gave to the Minmeng. Zhang Lan and his party lend the legitimacy of historical continuity, from the student movements of the late Qing, through May Fourth and Republican politics, to the foundation of the PRC. In this way the historical narrative is recentered around democracy. Again, this is not entirely new,

44. See note 33 above for more dynastic allusions.

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as the CCP has always claimed democracy for itself. However, to showcase the Minmeng as the pivotal force in defining this democracy is noteworthy, as even the 1981 resolution did not mention any of the democratic parties, upholding instead the idea that, as of its foundation in 1921, the CCP alone embodied democratic legitimacy in Republican China. One might argue that this representation of the democratic parties points not so much to a possible role of the United Front parties as they are now (i.e., pure satellites of the CCP) as a tool for democratization, but is perhaps meant to suggest that it is time to reverse the verdict on the Anti-Rightist movement of 1957, in which advocates for constitutional socialism such as Luo Longji and Zhang Bojun played an important role, which they themselves understood as loyal to CCP leadership. In the film, the Revolutionary KMT under Li Jishen is also singled out for its contribution to establishing the new regime, although in a more tactical and less political manner than that used to depict the Minmeng. Li Jishen, who had been moving in and out of the KMT throughout the 1920s, is forgiven for “killing many Communists” by a mellow Mao who recognizes his patriotic resolve in declining Li Zongren’s proposal to partition China.45 The message that past disagreements can be overlooked in the name of national unity can probably be seen as an implicit message to the present day KMT in Taiwan that it may retain some kind of political role if it agrees to a reunification under the aegis of the CCP. National unity remains the bottom line (“dixian”) and ultimate political criterion in judging historical characters. The final part of the film is made in a more “traditional” propaganda style. It portrays a series of endless discussions, not over the projected constitution or the type of government that might be best for the new China, but rather over a set of symbols and icons designed for the new state such as the national flag and the anthem. Despite a surtitle that attempts to define the “Common program” (“共同 綱領, gongtong gangling”) adopted by the new assembly as “in essence the Constitution of the new China” (“juyou xin Zhongguo xianfa xingzhi”),

45. The same idea applies to Fu Zuoyi, the KMT commander who surrendered Beijing.

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the limits of New Democracy are not extended to include a constitutional framework.

Beginning of the Great Revival: A Charming but Ubiquitous Mao Beginning of the Great Revival was released two years after The Founding of a Republic. Produced and directed by a similar team, it also featured cameo roles (as with the earlier film, the actors reportedly did not ask to be paid for their work; nevertheless, the filming on specially built sets in Huairou—known in Chinese as Huai-lai-wu-de or Huai-lywood—made the film more costly than its predecessor). There are many similarities between the two productions, which do not require repetition here. However, there are also some differences that stem from the different historical subject matter they deal with, and which reflect the changes in the political situation in China between 2009, when the country was basking in postOlympic glow, and 2011, when the buildup to the Eighteenth Party Congress was beginning to increase the stakes of many internal debates, at the same time as Bo Xilai’s “red song” movement gathered momentum.46 The film’s English title, which breaks the symmetry clearly palpable in the two Chinese titles, again refers to the phrase “Zhonghua minzu de weida fuxing,” the “great revival of the Chinese nation,” which appeared in the text inserts of “Foundation of a Republic.” Made to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the foundation of the CCP in 1921, the film employs a similar approach in taking the commemorative date itself as the endpoint of its narrative and retraces the events leading up to this date. Similar to the endless committee and protocol discussions featured at the end of Foundation of a Republic, complete with collective acclamations for the new symbols of state, Beginning of the Great Revival

46. On red songs and the Party anniversary, see D. Bandurski, “A Brief History of the Red Song,” China Media Project, June 10, 2011, cmp.hku.hk/2011/06/10/13105/.

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ends with a painstaking discussion surrounding the adoption of the statutes of the CCP. It was only natural, no doubt, that the Party should seek in this prequel to reinforce its historical legitimacy by fleshing out it original connection with May Fourth that can only be alluded to in Foundation of a Republic. After all, in “New Democracy” Mao thus defined its significance: “After the May 4th Movement, the political leader of China’s bourgeoism-democratic revolution was no longer the bourgeoisie but the proletariat, although the national bourgeoisie continued to take part in the revolution.”47 It is a continuity emphasized episodically throughout the film, reflected in Zhu De’s loyal service at the side of the rebellious general Cai E (played by Andy Lau). More surprising, especially in a context in which historiography was seen to be moving away from ideology since the 1990s, it was the design to place Mao firmly at the center of the action of the film, despite his secondary historical role during the May Fourth period in general and in preparations leading up to the congress. The film not only predictably chooses the date of 1921, it does not even mention the first Communist cell meeting of May 1920 in Shanghai, at which Mao was not present and Chen Duxiu was named secretary of the provisional committee.48 Preparations for the 90th anniversary of the Party (including post production of the film) took place amid speculation about Mao’s place in the commemoration. In the late winter and early spring of 2011, rumors began circulating on overseas websites suggesting that a resolution had been passed by the Central Committee in the last days of December 2010 to remove any reference to Mao from all Party documents, supposedly at

47. Mao Zedong, “New Democracy.” 48. See for example Jonathan Spence, The Search for Modern China (New York, London: W.W. Norton & Co., 1991), pp. 320–21. In the film, this episode is alluded to when Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao “divide” the country between them, Chen taking the South and Li the North, to create Party cells everywhere. For a detailed discussion, see the review by the Taiwanese scholar Qiu Shi-jie, “Jian dang wei ye beihou de Zhongguo yu shijie” (The situation of China and the world behind Beginning of the Great Revival), Jinglüe no. 8 (September 2011), article.m4.cn/ art/1125989.shtml. Qiu’s main quarrel with the film is also its minimization of international factors in the founding of the Party.

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the initiative of Wu Bangguo. It was a highly unlikely hypothesis, although the rumors may well have been planted to gain traction for such a proposal within the Party.49 In April 2011, liberal economist Mao Yushi published a strident call to “return Mao to humanity,” in reference to Xin Ziling’s work The Fall of the Red Sun.50 There was a clear official rejoinder to the rumors, first floated by Vice President Xi Jinping on June 20 at a research conference to commemorate the founding of the Party. In a wooden speech in which each sentence is repeated at least four times, Xi put forward one new concept: the “two great theoretical achievements” (“兩大理論成果, liang da lilun chengguo”) of the Party’s 90-year history of “adapting the basic principles of Marxism to the concrete reality of China” and “sinicizing Marxism.” These two achievements are detailed as “Mao Zedong Thought and the theoretical system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, encompassing Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important Three Represents Thought, and the concept of scientific development and other strategic thoughts.”51 This sentence reappeared almost identically, with a lengthy elaboration, in Hu Jintao’s official speech for the Party anniversary. It constituted a rebuttal to the online (and possibly intra-Party) rumors about the removal of Mao’s name and it once again affirmed Mao’s place at the center of Party history.52 Not only does Mao Thought make a striking

49. This rumor seems to originate in various Internet postings by retired Party historian Xin Ziling; for a recent summary of Xin’s position, see: “Xin Ziling he Tie Liu de duihua: jiejue WangBo wenti bixu jianli yi Hu Jintao wei hexin de dang zhongyang de quanwei” (Xin Ziling and Tie Liu in discussion: To solve the Wang Lijun and Bo Xilai problem, we must establish the authority of Party Central with Hu Jintao as its core), March 11, 2012, www.canyu.org/ n43494c6.aspx. The alleged “resolution” is designated as no. 179. 50. Mao Yushi, “Ba Mao Zedong huanyuan cheng ren” (Return Mao to the world of humans), Caixin, April 26, 2011 (removed from Internet); English translation: “Judging Mao as a Man,” The Wall Street Journal, July 6, 2011. 51. Xi Jinping, “Buduan tuijin Makesi zhuyi Zhongguohua, jianchi Zhongguo tese shehui zhuyi daolu” (Unceasingly advance the Sinicization of Marxism, stick to the road of Socialism with Chinese characteristics), Renmin ribao, June 21, 2011, paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/201106/21/nw.D110000renmrb_20110621_6-01.htm. 52. See “Hu Jintao ‘7.1’ jianghua: san jian da shi yu san da chengjiu” (Hu Jintao’s July 1st speech: Three great events and three great achievements), www.360doc.com/content/11/0705/11/12500 31_131581571.shtml.

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comeback to the theoretical frontline, it overrides the reference to the three other leaders (Deng, Jiang and Hu), who are grouped together under a depersonalized heading. Similarly, in the film Beginning of the Great Revival, Mao is so prominent that he single-handedly binds the narrative of modern history together: while Founding was structured by balancing the figures of Mao and Chiang, in beginning, Mao’s youthful frolicking in Changsha, interpreting new words like “republic” for the benefit of his more benighted companions, occupies as much time as the historical events of the Revolution and the New Culture Movement. Played by Liu Ye, who appeared briefly at the end of the first film as an ordinary soldier reporting to Mao in the name of the entire Red Army, Mao is portrayed as a romantic and wistful young man. All too human and impulsive, he falls in love with his teacher’s beautiful daughter and frequently changes his political convictions. In turn, he advocates personal salvation through physical training, then Hunan independence, then studying abroad. However, at the last moment, as he is boarding the boat, he decides to stay in China out of love, rationalizing his impulsive decision in political terms by proclaiming: “Foreign solutions cannot be transposed to China!” (In reality it is thought that he did not have the money to go overseas with his friends). The film scholar Dai Jinhua’s observation that the “rewriting red classics” movement in the 1990s tried to reconcile socialist nostalgia with romantic individualization (for example by using images of the old Shanghai)53 comes to mind during the dreamlike scene in the movie when Mao watches the New Year’s fireworks with Yang Kaihui on a snowy Beijing night. In the end he himself is illuminated, not by evanescent pyrotechnics, but by socialism, when Li Dazhao gives him the Communist Manifesto to read. Liu Ye’s Mao—despite moments of physical resemblance, it is difficult to forget Liu Ye and focus on Mao—goes one step further than Tang

53. See Dai Jinhua, “Rewriting the Red Classics,” p. 158. As Dai argues, the television adaptation of the Soviet novel How the Steel Was Forged “constituted not so much the return of an old style hero, but rather a reminder of the disappearance of the hero, or at least of the socialist or revolutionary hero” (p. 159). The same might here be said for Mao.

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Guoqiang’s Mao in stripping the central figure of the narrative of any real political or ideological content and making him into a pop culture icon; he becomes a romantic albeit somewhat vacuous young beau. Liu’s Mao is surrounded by similarly dashing young men and women, with Zhou Enlai played by Chen Kun and Li Da’s wife Wang Huiwu by Zhou Xun. The political events of the young Republic and the intellectual debates of the May Fourth era that make up the core of the film seem by contrast rather pedestrian. Events surrounding 1911 are portrayed in a way that minimizes the democratic dimension of the new Republic. The young Chiang Kai-shek (played by Chang Chen—the first Taiwanese actor to feature in a Han Sanping project) is shown to be plotting against democracy from the start: together with his mentor Chen Qimei, he masterminds the assassination of Tao Chengzhang in the first few minutes of the film. Song Jiaoren’s assassination is misrepresented to give the impression that the country wide legislative elections of 1913 (which Song had just won as head of the KMT) never took place (Song bids his companions farewell with the rather misleading words “We must conduct a democratic, non-violent election”). Although they do incorporate the debates at Peking University (with Daniel Wu as Hu Shi), the May Fourth episodes mainly focus on the violently patriotic demonstrations, with no mention of “Mr. Science and Mr. Democracy.” Lu Xun makes no appearance, and even Chen Duxiu is depicted as a sympathetic but naive intellectual requiring Li Dazhao’s help and Marxist theory to understand what is really going on. This is perhaps unsurprising if, as Huang Jianxin stated at a talk at the 2012 Hong Kong-Asia Film Financing Forum, the censors requested more than 400 cuts in the initial version of the film. There are parodic moments similar to those in The Founding of a Republic, such as when students hold up billboards with the character “yuan” (injustice), recalling modern-day petitioners; many Chinese viewers seem to have also made a connection with the student movement of 1989. However the grand finale is just as stilted as its congenital partner: following longwinded procedural deliberations and several relocations, the first Party Congress ends with the adoption of a charter, the election of a central committee, and all 12 delegates singing the “Internationale”

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on a boat. The text inserts that feature both at the beginning and at the end of the film locate the events depicted firmly within the accepted Party narrative: while the opening lines stress the semi feudal, semi colonial nature of the prerevolutionary society, bankrupted by Western aggression and corruption, the end marks the true beginning of China’s “great revival”: “The founding of the Chinese Communist Party entirely changed the face of the Chinese revolution. Under the leadership of the Party, China embarked on the glorious road of national independence, people’s emancipation, wealth, and power. Ever since the Chinese nation cleared the way to its great revival, this venerable country with 5,000 years of civilization, adopting an entirely new posture, stands towering in the East of the world.”54 The film ends with the same image of the red flag over Tiananmen Gate as did its predecessor.

Mainstream Socialist Culture While Beginning of the Great Revival was deemed a critical and popular failure—there were reports of rigged ticket sales and mandatory screenings arranged by Party committees, as well as the banning of reviews on Douban and other social networks55—the reception of The Founding of a Republic deserves a detailed discussion, given that it was seen by perhaps

54. My translation for the English subtitle in the film reads: “The founding of the Communist Party in China is a monumental event. It brings forth a new perspective for the Chinese revolution. Under the leadership of the Communist Party, China is well on her way to independence, liberation, power and wealth. As her people embarks on a historic journey of revival, an ancient civilization of 5,000 years towers gloriously in the East.” 55. See Michael Kan, “Web ratings disabled for CCP film,” IDG News, June 22, 2011, www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/230858/web_ratings_disabled_for_chinese_ communist_party_film.html. However, according to a reliable industry website, Beginning earned the equivalent of 364 million yuan in China; source: boxofficemojo.com/ movies/?id=foundingofaparty.htm

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as many as one out of every five Chinese citizens,56 for a time enjoying a reputation as the highest grossing Chinese film in history. On one level, this success is of course due to its incessant promotion by the state apparatus,57 and in this sense it was very much part of the military parade held on October 1, 2009. Gloria and M.E. Davies have similarly emphasized the implicit nationalism that replaces the previous narrative centered on the proletariat, pointing to the portrayal of the loyal opposition of the KMT as a way of highlighting that “principled opposition and conflict resolution is, regardless of the political hue, innately Chinese.”58 This nationalism in turn gives rise to the sarcastic audience comments, such as those by the Shanghai writer Han Han, about “patriotic” actors who have adopted Singaporean or American nationality or Hong Kong permanent residency, or about how the communist ideals of the film might translate into today’s world.59 Chang Ping, the former editor of Southern Weekend, welcomed the wider foreign distribution of the film with the ironic remark that such works help foreigners learn how China sees itself. He endorsed the depiction of the democratic legitimacy enjoyed by the CCP in 1949 with a characteristic grain of salt: “Against the background of the current mainstream international discourse, the leftovers of its pro-democracy proselytizing undoubtedly endow the state established by the Communist Party with a legitimate historical basis. However, the problem the film is unable to deal with is that the CCP’s discourse at the time and the way it has acted until today display considerable contradictions.

56. Editor’s foreword to Davies, “Filmed Founding Myths.” 57. Shanghai cultural critic Zhu Dake also highlights the significance of grouped ticket sales to work units, while some commentators facetiously remarked that since the stars had acted in the film without pay, the audience should logically be able to watch it for free. Zhu Dake, “Jian guo da ye he zhuanxing Zhongguo de wenhua luoji–yipian liuchan de Nanfang zhoumo fangtan.” 58. Davies, “Filmed Founding Myths.” 59. See Han Han, “Cankao xiaoxi” (Reference News), September 20, 2009, blog.sina.com.cn/s/ blog_4701280b0100ezrc.html.

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At that time, among the communist rank and file, no one came forward to object that Chinese tradition had always preferred dictatorship, nor did anyone believe that the low ‘human quality’ of the Chinese people did not make them suited for democracy and necessitated that they should be ‘managed.’ Surely we should not be led to believe that it is 60 years of dictatorship that have so drastically lowered the Chinese people’s democratic quality?”60 This tongue-in-cheek critique highlights the limits of the contemporary Party-guided commercial repackaging of Chinese history. On the contrary, US-based academic Tang Xiaobing takes issue with the representation of the film as “state-funded propaganda” in American reviews, accusing “trigger-happy Cold Warriors” of believing that “anything with government backing is an abomination and ought to be dismantled, from state-owned programing to state-run medical care, to state-sponsored film-making or cultural programing.”61 Tang highlights the reduction by foreigners of Chinese socialism to the Cultural Revolution, of Mao to a ruthless leader, and of modern Chinese history to a history of repression. One may note that the film’s avoidance of the post-1949 years does little to dispel such an impression, implicitly recognizing that institutional socialism in the form of PRC history remains too controversial for a mainstream narrative; however, Tang ignores this and concludes: “The making of the film The Founding of a Republic as well as its extraordinary box office success in 2009 underscores the convergence of the popular and the mainstream in contemporary Chinese culture. This robust mass culture, ever more integrated into the entertainment industry (especially TV programing), is

60. Chang Ping, “Jian guo da ye zou xiang shijie.” The idea of being “managed” refers to comments by Jackie Chan made not long before. 61. Tang Xiaobing, “Why should 2009 make a difference? Reflections on a Chinese blockbuster,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, mclc.osu.edu/rc/pubs/tangxb.htm, p. 3.

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not the subject of the many independent films that we are told we must see, but it reaches and entertains the general public, and generates its own star power.”62 Whatever one may think of his gratuitous attack against independent films, Tang is right to underscore the distinctly new dimension achieved by The Founding of a Republic, a viewpoint shared by a critic of different temper, Zhu Dake, who sees it as a turning point. Han Sanping’s unabashed endorsement of a state-owned cultural apparatus that he believes can counter the influence of Hollywood and McDonald’s63 not only wins endorsement from Tang Xiaobing, it also tallies exactly with Hu Jintao’s pronouncements on cultural specificity in the policy framework outlined in late 2011: “We must foster a backbone of strong, competitive cultural enterprises in order to raise the overall strength and competitiveness of our cultural industry, which should be structured on the base of state-ownership, developing together with various privately owned cultural enterprises. Whether they are public interest cultural institutions or cultural industries, both must maintain the advanced socialist culture as their leading direction and correctly handle the relationship between the interest of society and economic interest, while always placing society in the foremost position.”64

62. Ibid., p. 7. Tang also ironically dismisses the political reading in Time magazine, which is derided for suggesting there is any connection between the film and the thinking of the Chinese leadership: this reveals what can only be a deliberate blindness to the production process of such a film (see note 12 above). On the other hand, Tang derides Nanfang Zhoumo for describing Han Sanping as harbouring a “deep Mao-era complex,” which is perhaps unsurprising given his outspoken declarations (see note 7 above). 63. “I will not believe that 5,000 years of Chinese culture can simply be wiped out by a couple of Hollywood films! There are 1.3 billion Chinese people, so those stupid foreigners think China is great – if only 1 percent of the population goes to see their films, at 10 yuan a ticket, they will make 1.3 billion [sic] in the box office. But I maintain that 1.3 billion people will not go to watch American films!” See: “Han Sanping: Shuo Zhong Ying yizhiduda geng zhunque.” 64. Hu Jintao, “Jianshe shehui zhuyi wenhua qiang guo.”

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Hu underscores that even within the new commercial logic of fostering a “mainstream socialist culture” that is both financially viable domestically and potentially exportable to the world, the role of stateowned enterprises and state guidance remain paramount. These new forms of cultural production should not be seen as a concession to the commercial logic of profit, much less as comparable to state funding for independent productions (see note 26); rather they aim at coopting the most outstanding representatives of commercial pop culture within the state-led cultural system and the narrative it tries to promote. An unmistakable sign of the “sleek” quality the Mao films seek to achieve is their excision of any form of dialect, which had characterized all previous official films featuring Party-state leaders. Huang Jianxin attributes this to a changing view of “realism”: as fewer people have firsthand knowledge of the older generation of cadres, they could accept hearing them speak unaccented standard Chinese.65 The main reason, however, is very probably the desire to cater to a savvy urban generation that has grown up with the aseptic “Putonghua” of CCTV. The state production system, endorsed on the highest level, is thus able to prove its attractiveness and its porosity with mainstream culture: the patriotic enthusiasm of almost two hundred stars vying to perform for free reflects the power that the state apparatus has in shaping careers and providing access to markets.66 At the same time, it allows the apparatus to continue to repackage itself (as it has done since the 1990s) as modern and not ideological.67

65. “Huang Jianxin: Jian guo da ye jue bu shi xuanchuan pian,” see above, note 12. 66. As Zhu Dake writes, regardless of their nationality, the actors who participated in the film were procuring themselves a free “laissez-passer (Zheng Tong-xing) to the Chinese market.” Zhu Dake, “Jian guo da ye he zhuanxing Zhongguo de wenhua luoji – yipian liuchan de Nanfang zhoumo fangtan.” Huang Jianxin also quotes an episode in which Han Sanping convinces Zhang Guoli to agree to playing Chang Kai-shek by comparing this gift to the nation to a birthday present for his mother, a rather loaded analogy with ominous undertones. See “Jian guo da ye jue bu shi xuanchuan pian,” note 12 above. 67. Jackie Chan, in taking it upon himself to produce a spinoff film on his own, obviously took this proclivity to another level. But as Huang Jianxin recalls, the agents of all the actors were falling over each other making calls to ensure their champions would make the final cut: see “Jian guo da ye jue bu shi xuanchuan pian,” note 12 above.

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It is quite true that the huge success of The Founding of a Republic also hinges on subtle moments of irony aimed at the propaganda apparatus itself, which Zhu Dake calls the film’s self-referential and self-ironic dimension.68 The work of a seasoned Fifth Generation director who had authored several not uncritical films in the 1980s, Founding incorporates some irony into the mainstream narrative: Chiang Kai-shek’s mention of “flower-vase political parties,” his previously quoted sententia on corruption in the Party, Mao’s pronouncement that the CCP needs to unite with capitalists, otherwise workers will be unemployed. Song Qingling’s rejoinder to Deng Yingchao’s persistent efforts at bringing her to Beijing (“You Communists never stop before you reach your goal”) are all such moments, as is the strangely theatrical convening of the second plenum of the Seventh Central Committee with a sudden appearance by Xi Zhongxun, Xi Jinping’s father. However, as Zhu Dake underlines: “I do not think that [laughter at ironic moments] is a form of resistance; on the contrary, it is a form of compromise, because mockery not only dissolves propaganda slogans, it also dissolves the will to resist ... In the 1980s, this kind of laughter was a clear challenge; now it is a completely inoffensive existential attitude.” In this sense, the greater inclusiveness of The Founding of a Republic remains profoundly ambivalent: “It can make the authority of the state softer and easier to accept, but at the same time it can also dissolve its dignity.”69 Indeed, the space for some self-deprecation only strengthens the film’s most important message: the film’s box office results are meant to stand for the popularity of the Party that is its subject. By making ideology into a cultural commodity, the film also attempts to reap the political benefits of its marketing strategy, as an intertitle makes clear: “Because it responded to popular opinion (minyi), the Party has been able to achieve its present-day results” (1:30). This explains the tense reports about ticket sales for Beginning of the Great Revival, followed by the ban

68. See Zhu Dake, “Jian guo da ye he zhuanxing Zhongguo de wenhua luoji — yipian liuchan de Nanfang zhoumo fangtan.” 69. Ibid.

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on online discussions: the number of viewers was meant to function as a kind of implicit referendum, in which both the revolutionary past and the chic transnational sinophone stars contribute to buttressing the legitimacy of the state.

Conclusion: The Legitimizing Power of Parody In the drive to forge a “mainstream socialist culture”—“guided” by the State but commercially viable—the two Mao films retain a structure centred on Mao as the central icon of the CCP epic, but at the same time subtly reshape the persona of the Chairman himself. Not the meanest of their feats is the ability to incorporate self-referentiality, in the form of the gallery of cameos, and even occasional self-mockery, when the films seem to poke fun at some of the official missions with which they have been entrusted. The films not only aim to make propaganda more entertaining, but to reconceptualize propaganda as one with entertainment. Outraged reactions such as that of Tang Xiaobing suggest that some viewers at least are prepared to accept that this kind of “mainstream socialist” culture can no longer be understood as propaganda. This does not mean, of course, that it has relinquished its political goals, or lost its efficacy; on the contrary, the popularity won through star power is meant to invest these films with a whole new legitimacy. By encompassing its own parody, state discourse reaches a new level of inclusiveness. Jiang Wen’s Let the Bullets Fly, an even greater box office hit than The Founding of a Republic, released in December 2010, may seem an unlikely proposition for a parallel discussion with the two Mao films. However, they share several prominent actors; Chen Kun (Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhou Enlai), Ge You (Red Army officer in The Founding of a Republic), Chow Yun-fat (Yuan Shi-kai in Beginning), and not least Jiang Wen himself (Mao Renfeng, who plots to kill Mao in Founding), as well as the notorious Albert Yeung in the role of coproducer. Jiang Wen’s film was also widely discussed—though perhaps not viewed by everyone—as a form of political allegory, with a heated discussion as to whether its loyalties

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tilted towards the regime or against it, towards the revolutionary left or the liberal right. In either case, its box office success alone makes it an interesting object of study for probing how far the “mainstream socialist culture” advocated by the Mao films can influence the real mainstream. The “indie” flavour brought into the film by Jiang Wen’s background only makes the mix more potent. The storyline is simple enough: Zhang Mazi (Jiang Wen), a Robin Hood-like bandit, and his six acolytes bent on justice ambush the incoming governor of E’cheng (Goose Town) and Zhang decides to take his place to take money from the local despot, Huang Silang (Chow Yun-fat). After several strategic confrontations, by mobilizing the citizens of E’cheng (albeit with the help of a little deception), Zhang is able to confiscate Huang’s money, redistribute it to the people, and finally oust Huang himself. At this point, his comrades, tired of living in the “marshes,” decide to call it quits and head to Pudong to enjoy life. As it was pointed out in a review by Wo Chung-hau, Jiang Wen has given his two main characters a distinctly democratic background: Zhang Mazi is a former revolutionary who fought with Cai E in 1911 (and through his love of Mozart is unmasked as a Western-influenced intellectual); Huang Silang, a former student in Japan who took part in the Wuchang Uprising, is also a former revolutionary, but who has turned Republican politics to his financial advantage. This political background did not appear in the original novel Ye tan shi ji by Ma Shitu.70 In this way Jiang stages the main conflict not between revolution and counter revolution but between two revolutionaries: one idealistic and one materialistic.71 It seems safe to say that there is a resemblance between these two characters and the duel between Mao and Chiang Kai-shek in The Founding of a Republic, where the two heirs of 1911 fight over the future of the revolution. The political speculation ignited by the film consequently

70. Ma Shitu, Ye tan shi ji (Ten evening talks) (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1983). 71. See Wo Chung-hau, “Rang zidan fei yinbao zhengzhi yinyu kuanghuan” (Let the Bullets Fly unleashes a political-allegory craze), Yazhou Zhoukan, January 9, 2011.

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revolved around the question of how to interpret Mazi’s victory: should it be seen as the defeat of capitalism or the defeat of a dictator? As a victory for a Chongqing-style anti-corruption “strike the black” campaign or on the contrary as a liberal emancipation allowing the bandits to restyle themselves as Shanghai entrepreneurs (the left-wing website Utopia extolled Jiang Wen as a “left hero” and Zhang Mazi as a precursor of Mao who remains in the “marshes” to maintain the revolutionary flame)? So deeply engrained is the tendency to read politic allegory, fostered by years of propaganda, that the most far-fetched conclusions were drawn from random juxtapositions.72 More important, perhaps, is the film’s aesthetic model. Beyond the “clear traces of revolutionary heroism” pinpointed by Wo lies a deeper cultural logic. As noted by Kristof van den Troost, the film begins with an allusion to the struggle for the control of the land between peasant revolutionary Liu Bang and Xiang Yu, suggested just before the ambush by the sycophantic acolyte of the real governor of E’cheng, played in a cameo by Feng Xiaogang (Green Gang chief Du Yuesheng in The Founding of a Republic). This comparison of Zhang Mazi to Liu Bang, and of Huang Silang to Xiang Yu informs the historical reading of the film, and chimes with the allusion to Mao and Chiang.73 At the end of the film, Mazi is able to secure victory by mobilizing the inhabitants of E’cheng, but only by using a form of deceit: having first distributed money, which the frightened inhabitants return to Huang Silang, then guns, which they keep for themselves, Mazi, as a well read proto-Maoist, thinks he

72. Some highlighted a string of figures: in the eighth Year of the Republic, wearing the nine-coin mask, Zhang Mazi with six sworn brothers attacked Huang Silang, which spells out the date of the Tiananmen crackdown: 89-64. Another episode that was submitted to subtle exegesis was when Six opens up his stomach to prove he has only eaten one bowl of noodles – seen as an allusion to Zhang Haichao, a worker who had an operation performed to open his lungs, showing he suffered from a work-related disease. 73. See Kristof van den Troost, “Eastern Westerns,” paper presented at the Asian Cinema Studies Society Conference, The University of Hong Kong, March 17–21, 2012.

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can now take them to storm Huang’s diaolou,74 but finds, upon reaching the gate, that only the geese that give the town its name have followed him. However, when he conjures up Huang’s double and executes him, the cowardly inhabitants are suddenly empowered to pillage Huang’s residence, hardly noticing that the real Huang is still alive. This is of course a comment on human nature and on the nature of political power. As the political scientist Zhang Ming underlined, Jiang narrates a revolution built exclusively on heroes and exceptional characters who, in the end, succeed only by manipulating the ordinary people, essentially in agreement with the Party’s new reading of history, in which revolution is defined as a topdown enterprise.75 At the end of the day, Zhang Mazi shares the same contempt for the people as Huang Silang, despite his pithy pronouncement to Huang that what matters to him is “that there be no you.” In this sense, Jiang’s film is both a witty parody of the “subtle allusions” (weiyan 微言) practiced by the new style of propaganda film and a suave adaptation of the new zhuxuanlü aesthetics. History is, here too, decided in the absence of the ordinary people, represented by the geese that give E’cheng its name. Parody, in Jiang’s film, as in Han Sanping’s earlier endeavours, does not serve the critique of authority as much as it, too, is absorbed in the logic of commercialization. It shows that the cultural model put forward by Han Sanping can in fact be adapted and exploited in a privately-funded production. In this manner, “bankable dissent” and main melody have become almost undistinguishable. By incorporating their own critique and making it toothless, these films unabashedly aim to win over the broad masses of the Chinese audience for their own reading of history. This strategy is not without danger. As Yuezhi Zhao writes—echoing previously quoted critics such as Chang Ping or Han Han—one may wonder whether it is possible in the long run for the CCP to prolong its rule by drawing

74. Diaolou are Western-inspired, typically three- or four-storey constructions, built in the early twentieth century by Chinese emigrants returned from the West to the “Four Open Towns” in Guangdong that allowed emigration. Jiang Wen shot his film near Kaiping, on the western side of the Pearl River Delta. 75. Wo Chung-hau, “Rang zidan fei yinbao zhengzhi yinyu kuanghuan”.

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on the rhetoric and means of the Chinese revolution without being either forced to completely shed its revolutionary colour or being propelled to fulfil the revolution’s promises for an equal and just society.76 This, as of today, remains the last contradiction that is not entirely soluble in the slick new “mainstream” discourse actively promoted by the relevant organs hand-in-hand with the tycoons and stars of the new commercial culture. Mao is and remains the visual symbol of the Party and will probably continue to espouse all the ideological metamorphoses the CCP may be subject to. In this sense, Mao has become a more vacuous and also more prosaic figure, even appearing as passably foolish in Beginning of the Great Revival. While there is still a need to “guide” popular thinking about him, he seems to have lost a measure of the subversive force inherent even in the “totalitarian nostalgia” of the 1990s. However, the centrality of his role ensures that any critique of the present state of affairs that might venture to take propaganda discourse at its word remains framed within the limits of his all-encompassing and all-embracing persona.

76. Yuezhi Zhao, “Sustaining and Contesting Revolutionary Legacies in Media and Ideology,” p. 204.

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11 Renegotiating the Traumatizing Experiences Reemploying Images of Mao in Contemporary Art Minna VALJAKKA Postdoctoral Researcher, Academy of Finland Art History University of Helsinki

The Official and Unofficial Use of Mao’s Visual Images As it has been examined in detail in the other chapters of this volume, Mao’s image is effectively used by private citizens, institutions and political groups for uncountable—and even opposite—purposes. Usually, but not always, Mao’s legacy is kept alive by using his visual images, especially portraits, both in private and in public. Officially, deep respect for the father of the nation is still visible in numerous politically valuable sites, such as his unquestionable triple presence at the Tiananmen Square: his portrait, calligraphy on the Monument to the People’s Heroes and his mausoleum.1 While following the official line of proper interpretation of the importance of Mao’s image to the People’s Republic of China (PRC), new statues of Mao have been erected and people keep bowing to Mao’s image on his birthplace at Shaoshan.

1. For more detailed discussion on the relation between Mao, Tiananmen and art, see Hung Wu, Remaking Beijing (London: Reaktion Books Ltd., 2005); Minna Valjakka, “Performance Art at Tiananmen,” Kontur—Visualising Asian Modernity 12(20):19–28; Minna Valjakka, Many Faces of Mao Zedong, PhD dissertation (Helsinki: Unigrafia Helsinki University Print, 2011), 188–235.

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Instead of the official, approved use of Mao’s visual images in today’s China, my primary interest is to examine the unofficial, but not necessarily anti-official, use of Mao’s visual images that often emerge at the grassroot level. The primary focus of this chapter lies in analyzing the use of Mao’s visual and mental images in contemporary art and factors to be taken into account in the process. Through selected art works I will further examine in the latter part of the chapter how Mao’s images are used to reveal the traumatizing experiences in order to renegotiate and question the official interpretation and use of Mao’s image. To start with, however, I find it necessary to emphasize that there is far more diversity among the use and handling of Mao’s visual and mental images among the ordinary people than is usually acknowledged. The detailed analysis still remains outside of the scope of this chapter but the aim is to shed light to the interdependence of use of Mao’s image in everyday life and in contemporary art. For instance, Shaoshan is also an illustrative example on so-called unofficial, although not anti-official, popular usage of Mao’s visual images, namely reproductions for both commercial and touristic purposes. Despite the official announcement in October 1994 that Mao’s visual image cannot be used for advertising, Mao’s image has become too profitable to be avoided anymore. Well known examples of this commodification of Mao’s image are the numerous restaurants across the country.2 Another intriguing unofficial use of Mao’s visual images is the collecting of so-called Mao memorabilia which has become increasingly popular among Chinese and non-Chinese alike. Consequently, the prices of original visual images of Mao, created during his lifetime, have rocketed in national

2. The most peculiar usage of Mao’s visual image I have personally seen was the unusual application of a Mao bust: covered completely in red velvet the Mao bust was used to display expensive jewels in a jewelry shop at Xintiandi (新天地), a luxurious shopping and hotel area in Shanghai, in spring 2007. For the law, see Geremie Barmé, Shades of Mao: The Posthumous Cult of the Great Leader (New York: An East Gate Book, M.E. Sharpe, 1996), pp. 35, 64, note 158. On “Red Tourism” see for example, Elizabeth Perry, “Reclaiming the Chinese Revolution,” The Journal of Asian Studies, 67(4) (2008):1147–64. For the development of “Mao tourism” since the 1960s see Barmé, Shades of Mao, pp. 36–39.

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and international auction houses and the sales of famous paintings have caused dispute over copyrights and what can and cannot be sold. For instance, the mere handwritten envelope by Mao to Fu Yisheng and Bo Yibo, Bo Xilai’s father, was sold at the China Guardian’s Autumn Auctions in Beijing in 2013 for ¥6.55 million. The letter itself could not be sold.3 Without a doubt, motivations and the objects of collection vary greatly. For instance, for some of the Mainland Chinese collectors promoting their nationalism in this way can be merely a calculated method to earn more respect and influence in China, especially through a display of the collections to the public.4 Naturally, not all collectors reveal similar intentions but rather emphasize the values of preserving the visual history for the new generations.5 Furthermore, collectors focusing on contemporary art related to Mao might rather even wish to remain unknown and avoid all kinds of publicity.6 As examined in detail in previous chapters, Bo Xilai was known as a leftist who deliberately and publicly used Mao, and especially the mental images of Mao through music and poems, for legitimizing his own political actions. Intriguingly though, I have not been able to verify yet whether he personally collected Mao memorabilia and/or contemporary

3. Sijia Jiang, “Mao envelope for Bo Xilai’s father sold for 6.55m yuan,” South China Morning Post, November 25, 2013, available online at www.scmp.com/article/1365199/maos-envelopebo-xilais-father-sold-655m-yuan (accessed April 2, 2014). 4. Claude Hudelot, a French collector, has visited and interviewed the most famous Mainland Chinese collectors of Mao memorabilia and according to his opinion some of them use their collections for promoting their status and/or business. Hudelot in a telephone interview with author November 26, 2013. For the most recently published collection of objects and visual images related to Mao, see Claude Hudelot and Guy Gallice, Mao, trans. Edward Irby (London: Horizon Editions, 2012). 5. In 2008 in Shanghai, I have personally been able to examine the impressive Mao badge collection of Huang Miaoxin and the Shanghai Propaganda Poster Art Centre of Yang Pei Ming. See collection online: www.shanghaipropagandaart.com/home.asp?class=beautifuf_book (accessed April 14, 2014). 6. According to a staff member of a Mainland Chinese auction house, and who wishes to be unnamed, at least two Mainland Chinese collectors have been keen to obtain contemporary Chinese art works depicting Chairman Mao. Despite my requests they have refused to be interviewed.

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Figure 11.1 HENG, Caricature of Bo Xilai. Copyright by HENG/The New York Times Syndicate.

art or not.7 The buyers and the sellers are kept unknown by the auction houses. It would be quite likely that Bo Xilai might have obtained Mao memorabilia, based on his personal interests to glorify and use Mao in his own campaign. However, no evidence relating Bo Xilai in person to Mao’s visual images is available at the moment. Indeed, the media coverage and

7. The perceptions among the collectors of Chinese memorabilia vary about this question. While part of the collectors do not know whether Bo collected anything related to Mao, some say he did. However, there is no evidence available of his possible collection one available too much in public. Stefan Landsberger, email message to author, April 1, 2014; also Claude Hudelot, email message to author, April 1, 2014.

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the online resources are effectively cleaned in order to shape the reality as was examined by Emilie Tran and Greroire Muller. The only images expressing any connection between Bo Xilai and Mao’s visual image are the news reports of his supporters holding one poster of Mao outside the courthouse in Jinan8 and the illuminating caricature published originally in Lianhe Zaobao in Singapore (Figure 11.1).9 Heng’s caricature on Bo Xilai falling after his hot air balloon, shaped to resemble Mao’s head, has burst, sums up the primary issue of the case. It also reflects, how the main attention was ultimately turned to Bo and his “Red culture” campaign, although it was the murder case involving Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai, which triggered the whole chain reaction. The wife or anything implying to the murder of Neil Heywood is not included to the caricature either. It is also possible to interpret the caricature to reveal how the illusion based on Maoist legacy could have not been permanent construction: after all, hot air balloons are made to last in the air only for a limited time period. In mainland China, this kind of caricature would have not been tolerated. The issues of the proper handling of Mao’s visual images are still prominent. Although not related directly to Bo’s case in such, an interesting closure of this era of “Red culture” in Chongqing is implied by the relocation of an original Mao statue, erected in 1968. On February 25, 2014, this large statue, depicting Chairman Mao wearing his long overcoat and raising his right arm, was wrapped in red protective material, striped with yellow and white tape, and transported from urban space into a Museum of Chongqing Industry because of rebuilding the closed factory area.10 The decision to preserve the statue and even raise it status by replacing it into a museum reflects the complex handling of Mao’s visual

8. See, for example, Philip Wen, “Protestors rally at trial of fallen political hero Bo Xilai,” The Sydney Morning Herald, available online at www.smh.com.au/world/protesters-rally-at-trial-offallen-political-hero-bo-xilai-20130822-2sd9t.html (accessed April 2, 2014). 9. Available online at www.nytsyn.com/cartoons/cartoons/732608.html (accessed April 2, 2014). 10. See, for example, “Chongqing moves Chairman Mao Statue,” China Daily, available online at www.chinadaily.com.cn/photo/2014-02/26/content_17306936.htm (accessed April 2, 2014)

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images in today’s China. Although after the Cultural Revolution, many statues of Mao as well as other visual images were actually destroyed, knocking down Mao statue in present Chongqing is obviously something not wished to be done in such sensitive circumstances where it could still launch reactions from supporters of Bo Xilai. Disrespectful behavior and/or destroying a visual image of Mao was a severe crime during the Cultural Revolution. Although generally, the attitudes toward proper handling and reproduction of Mao’s visual images are somewhat relaxed, the levels of tolerance are continuously tested. Clearly iconoclastic and anti-official sentiments towards the most esteemed Mao’s visual image, the official portrait of Mao at the Tiananmen Square, have been expressed at least three times. Twice the internationally known attacks managed to damage Mao’s portrait: on May 23, 198911 and May 12, 2007.12 At least one more attempt was made on April 5, 2010,13 and without a doubt, based on discussion with Chinese artists, there have been more plans to deface this symbol of the nation, the Party and Mao’s status at the heart of Beijing than is publicly announced. For instance, violating the portrait in 1989 was reenacted in an art work entitled Counterrevolutionary Slogan (反標, Fanbiao) by Liu Anping (b. 1964) in 1992. In this work, which was both photographed and recorded in a video, Liu is wearing the Zhongshan suit, the so-called “Mao suit,” and he is made up to look slightly like Chairman Mao in the official

11. See, for example, Geremie Barmé and Linda Jaivin (eds.), New Ghosts, Old Dreams. Chinese Rebel Voices (New York: Times Books, 1992), pp. xxiv–xxv. For a more detailed account focusing on the event and imprisonment from the perspective of Lu Dechang, see Denice Chong, Egg on Mao: The Story of an Ordinary Man Who Defaced an Icon and Unmasked a Dictatorship, (Toronto: Random House Canada, 2009). 12. See, for example, “Fire attack on Mao’s Tiananmen portrait,” ABC News, Australia, available online at www.abc.net.au/news/2007-05-13/fire-attack-on-maos-tiananmen-portrait/2546738 (accessed March 29, 2013). At the time of the attack, I was in Beijing and personally observed the tightened security level on Tiananmen. 13. “Chinese protestor throws ink at portrait of Chairman Mao,” The Telegraph, London, available online at www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/7565768/Chinese-protestor-throwsink-at-portrait-of-Chairman-Mao.html (accessed March 29, 2013).

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Figure 11.2 Liu Anping, Counterrevolutionary Slogan, 1992. Copyright by the artist.

portrait. In addition, he throws ink at his own face and body (Figure 11.2).14 Originally, four photographs of this act were published under the title An Experiment in Impersonation: Throw Ink on Mao and with the pseudonym “Xiao Hong” meaning literally “Little Red” which was commonly used as a nickname for children of his age.15

14. Liu Anping (interview with the author, May 18, 2010) explained that he had not decided in advance in what format this art work would be displayed. The video of this work has not yet been made public, but it still exists. 15. Reproduced with the artist’s own statement in Valerie C. Doran (ed.), China's New Art, Post-1989. Exhibition catalogue. (Hong Kong: Hanart T Z Gallery). A different set of four photographs was sold at China Guardian Autumn Auctions, 20 Years of Contemporary Chinese Art, Beijing, November 22, 2006, with the title Fanbiao (Pomo di yi hao) (反標 (潑墨第一號)) See China Guardian Auctions website: www.cguardian.com/pic.php?sessioncode=&specialcod e=PZ0002882&picid=art43820322 (accessed November 27, 2010).

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According to art historian Francesca Dal Lago, “by reenacting this episode, Liu exposes how the harsh punishment imposed on the vandals revealed Mao’s still sacrosanct status in the eyes of Chinese rulers.”16 Liu however, does not agree with this description of his intentions. For Liu, conducting this act in 1992 was “undisguised repetition and imitation of the damaging of Mao’s portrait at Tiananmen in 1989” and already before the event at Tiananmen, after the “China/AvantGarde” exhibition, he had planned to go and throw color paints at Mao’s portrait himself.17 Liu considers himself as a painter in a traditional sense, but during that period at the end of the 1980s, artists felt that they “had a mission to realize an even more radical action, to challenge the current state of society and the form of art in this social system.” Liu further emphasized that he does not regard this kind of art involving splashing ink as video art or performance art, but for him, the genuine media of this work is the ink, which is an element of painting.18 As these abovementioned examples and especially, the iconoclastic actions at Tiananmen and Liu Anping’s art work already reveal, the use of Mao’s visual images in everyday life includes notions varying from deep respect to profit-making and to hatred. One of the most recent and illuminating examples of using Mao’s visual images against the official perceptions occurred in Hong Kong in March 2014. Demonstrators opposing the Mainland Chinese tourism and commercialism in Hong Kong employed Cultural Revolution memorabilia, bodily gestures and clothes

16. Francesca Dal Lago, “Personal Mao; Reshaping an Icon in Contemporary Chinese Art,” Art Journal, 58(2) (1999): 55. 17. 「弗蘭對這個作品的描述(主要是作者的動機)不是真實的,只能被看作她的猜測。對我來說,它 就是對89年在天安門廣場破壞毛畫像事件的不加掩飾的重複和模仿。因為這種方式(在天安門 對毛畫像的攻擊)和我在這個事件前的計畫是完全一樣的(注)。」Liu, email message to author,

October 6, 2010, also discussed in an interview with the author, May 18, 2010. 18. 「我和其他的中國藝術家還有一個任務，我們想通過一種更激進的行動攻擊當時的秩序，也 包括在這種秩序下的藝術形式。」 When these three men from Hunan carried out their attack, Liu’s classmates from the Zhejiang Art Academy immediately contacted him to tell him that someone had already done what he had been planning. Liu, email message to author, October 3 2010.

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imitating those of Red Guards to make their point.19 In particular, outside the officially established use of Mao’s visual image, people’s perceptions of Mao’s visual images is a complicated phenomenon depending on, for instance, generational differences, personal experiences and memories, collective memories of varying social groups, official historical narrative and its place of residence, educational and social background, and so on. In practice, the legacy of Mao is most strongly kept alive in Mainland China whereas for people born and/or living outside of Mainland China, Mao does not usually have the same relevance—especially if the person in question is not ethnically Chinese. Indeed, people who have actually lived in the visual culture of the PRC in 1960s and the 1970s, dominated by Maoist imagery, has essentially different premises to connect with Mao’s mental and visual images compared to the younger generations or foreigners who have not lived amongst that specific visual culture. First, there is the question of direct, personal experiences and both collective and private memories of Chairman Mao and his era: how they are managed afterward and how they differ from the official history.20 For the post-Mao generation the status of Mao and the appropriate perceptions on him as the father of the nation are taught and mediated primarily through secondary sources and the personal memories of Mao with more critical perception are actually missing. Second, the cultural meanings attached to Mao visual and mental images have remarkably changed. As it is well known fact, the

19. See, for example, Johnny Tam and Joanna Chiu, “‘Parody’ protesters march to urge mainlanders to ‘reignite with their patriotism... and shop at home,’” South China Morning Post, March 9, 2014, available online at www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1444313/parodyprotesters-march-urge-mainlanders-reignite-their-patriotism?page=all (accessed April 2, 2014); Ernest Kao and Lo Wei, “‘Patriotic’ protest leaves Mainland Chinese visitors bemused,” South China Morning Post, March 17, 2013, available online at www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/ article/1450190/patriotic-protest-leaves-mainland-chinese-visitors-bemused (accessed April 2, 2014). 20. The scholarly research on Cultural Revolution and revolutionary past overall is continuously growing. For recent study on collective memories in relation to revolutions see Ching Kwan Lee and Guobin Yang, Reenvisioning the Chinese Revolution: The Politics and Poetics of Collective Memories in Reform China (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2007).

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norms toward the proper treatment, interpretations and creation of Mao’s visual images were extremely strict especially during the early years of the Cultural Revolution. The impact of the generational differences can be even more significant among the artists themselves. The age of the artist and whether s/he has personal experience and memories from Mao’s period has a clear impact on their work and in the art works of the older artists.21 However, I am not implying by this that I regard generational groups as homogenous entities in terms of their relation to Mao’s images.22 Quite the contrary, age is only one of the variables to be taken into account when we examine the use of Mao’s images. Contemporary art works reflect this complex variety of attitudes toward Mao’s visual and mental images in illuminating ways. Through few selected examples, I will turn to exploring how contemporary artists have examined the meaning of Mao’s image to people today in relation to the traumatizing historical events.

Contemporary Art and Mao Critically pronounced notions on various sociopolitical issues are expressed through renegotiation of Mao’s visual and mental images especially in the realms of contemporary Chinese art since the 1970s. As I have argued elsewhere in detail, motivations to remodify and reface Chairman Mao’s

21. Dal Lago, “Personal Mao”, 50–51. In the context of art relating to Chairman Mao, this importance of generational differences has already been brough up in 1993. See Tsong-zung Chang, “Introduction: Into the Nineties” in China's New Art, Post-1989, ed. Valerie C. Doran. Exhibition catalogue. (Hong Kong: Hanart T Z Gallery), iii; Xianting Li, “Major Trends in the Development of Contemporary Chinese Art,” in China's New Art, Post-1989, ed. Valerie C. Doran. Exhibition catalogue. Hong Kong: Hanart T Z Gallery) xxi. 22. I agree with Barbara Mittler that similar methods has been applied in visual arts by artist from varying age groups although her reading of my argument in my dissertation slightly misses the point of the traumatic notions based on personal experiences. See Barbara Mittler, A Continuous Revolution: Making Sense of Cultural Revolution Culture (Harvard University Press, Asia Center, 2012), p. 303, footnote 65; p. 312 footnote 84. Cf. Valjakka, Many Faces of Mao Zedong, 30–31.

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visual and mental images vary greatly from artist to another.23 They can even change during and after the creation project, depending on the context in which the artist wishes the art work to be presented and what kind of feedback s/he receives. Consequently, art works and the way in which they are perceived reflect the extremely intricate and sensitive circumstances that still prevail in relation to Mao’s visual and mental images in China.24 One of the prevailing questions is what kind of visual images of Mao can be created and exhibited in Mainland China. As it is well known, because of the limitations imposed on visual arts during the Maoist period (1949–1976/78), it was not until the late 1970s that the remarkable sociopolitical changes, including gradual opening up, allowed the art scene to develop into more versatile forms in Mainland China. However, the earliest examples of the usage of Chairman Mao’s image in contemporary art were created outside of Mainland China in the early 1970s by Andy Warhol (1928–1987) and Antonio Mak (1951–1994). Intriguingly, both artists were apparently inspired by the President Nixon’s visit to China in 1972. Nonetheless, in contrast to Warhol, who became internationally known for his series of paintings and silk screens started in 1972, Mak’s collage entitled West Meets East, created during his studies at Goldsmiths College, London in the same year, has remained rather unknown to a larger audience, mainly because it was an early student

23. The employment of Mao’s visual images in contemporary Chinese art is based on four main strategies used by artists: to create a visual dialog with a traumatizing past, to employ transcontextual parody, to explore the importance of Tiananmen through site-dependent art and through employment of visual signs. These strategies are not exclusive, but instead complementary and interdependent. For more detailed discussion on three first strategies, see Valjakka, Many Faces of Mao Zedong. For a brief introduction to usage of parody and especially caricaturing of Mao’s image see Minna Valjakka, “Parodying Mao’s Image: Caricaturing in Contemporary Chinese Art,” Journal of Asian and African Studies XV(1) (2011): 87–112 (published by the Department of Asian and African Studies, University of Ljubljana). 24. For the changes of the art scene see Julia F. Andrews and Kuiyi Shen, The Art of Modern China (Berekeley: University of California Press, 2013). Maria Galikowski, Art and Politics in China 1949–1984 (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 1998); Ellen J. Laing, The Winking Owl: Art in the People’s Republic of China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988).

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work and presumably destroyed.25 While Warhol’s works on Mao continue internationally to raise attention and the auction sales records as well as inspiring Mainland Chinese artists—especially experimenting on painting —the original works are not yet allowed to be shown in Shanghai nor Beijing in 2013.26 Even the videotape that records Warhol painting large Mao portrait on a floor could not be showed in mainland.27 The first critical reproduction of Mao’s visual image in contemporary Chinese art, is one of the best known and most published examples of the genre, namely Wang Keping’s Idol (“偶像, Ouxiang”), created between 1978 and 1979, and displayed in the exhibition of Stars (“星星, Xingxing”) in Beijing in 1980.28 The sensitive sculpture is reproduced in numerous Chinese art history books and regularly exhibited outside of Mainland China, but still in autumn 2013, it could not be included in Wang Keping’s first solo show in at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing.29 Despite these earliest art works, it was not until the 1990s that the contemporary Chinese artists became more interested in renegotiating Chairman Mao’s images. Although it is usually argued that art works reusing Mao’s visual image represent only political pop or cynical realism, two of the most famous early styles of contemporary Chinese art for the global contemporary art scene, this is not the case. Indeed, a great

25. For discussion on Antonio Mak’s work, see David Clarke, Hong Kong Art. Culture and Decolonization (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002[2001]), pp. 25–34. 26. “Beijing says no to Mao on Warhol’s Mainland tour,” South China Morning Post, available online at www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1107223/beijing-says-no-mao-warhols-mainlandtour (accessed March 12, 2013). 27. Greg Pierce, Assistant Curator of Film and Video in The Andy Warhol Museum, email to author, June 25, 2013. 28. The date of the art work varies in previous publications. According to the artist, Idol was done either late 1978 or early 1979 but he cannot specify exactly when. Wang Keping, email message to the author, May 19, 2011. For further analysis of the work as a representative of transcultural parody see Valjakka, “Parodying Mao’s Image.” See also Martina Köppel-Yang, Semiotic Warfare: The Chinese Avant-Garde, 1979–1989 (Hong Kong: Timezone 8 Ltd, 2003), pp. 120–30. 29. Wang Keping, email to author, October 29, 2013.

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variety of styles, formats, techniques and intentions are involved in the multifaceted renegotiation processes of Mao’s mental and visual images, as is shown in this chapter in which none of the examples represent either of the two above mentioned categories of contemporary Chinese art. Before entering the detailed discussion of the selected examples of art works, I wish to elaborate the multilevel interaction between the visual and mental images, which is the basis of the creation and evaluation process of art works depicting or referring to Mao. My approach toward images is inspired by W. J. T. Mitchell’s notion of the family of images and James Elkins’ trichotomy of an image as writing, notation and picture.30 By combining and modifying these two approaches, I suggest the use of two concepts, namely (1) visual images of Mao denoting all material representations regardless of the medium or method used consisting of writing, notation and/or picture related to Mao, and (2) mental images of Mao implying the immaterial notions of him by a private person or a group of people. This delineation enables us to acknowledge the complex interactions between varying forms of images that enables us to analysis the visual images in more detail and depth. Multilayered interactions exist and define continuously the relation between the visual and mental images produced both during Mao’s lifetime and posthumously. Because of the limitations of two-dimensional graphics, Figure 11.3 is only a simplified reference aiming to depict some of the main interactions occurring in the creation and viewing processes. These multilayered relations are not only visible in the contemporary art works. Indeed, I argue that they are the basis for any visual reproductions relating to Chairman Mao whether reproduced in media, everyday objects, video games, advertisements or in any forms of visual arts, including films and live performances. Usually, the primary question is whether

30. W. J. T. Mitchell, Iconology: Image, Text, Ideology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986), pp.7–46, esp. pp. 9–11; James Elkins, Domain of Images (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999), esp. pp. 85–89.

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Figure 11.3 Interactions of the visual and mental images produced both during Mao’s lifetime and posthumously. Copyright by the author.

IMAGE(S) OF MAO Metal image(s) of Mao

Artist / Photographer

Original visual image(s) of Mao created during his lifetime

Viewer

Contemporary visual image(s) of Mao created post-humously

the posthumously created reproduction of Mao’s visual image follows, renegotiates or even violates the accepted official line or not. As elaborately discussed by Sebastian Veg in the previous chapter, the image of Mao presented in the recently released films, both follows but also modifies the official line toward Mao’s image. It is also essential to acknowledge that visual images related to Chairman Mao include much more than mere resemblance of his appearance. Portraits are just one limited form of Mao’s visual images, although they remain the most familiar and prominent ones, encountered on daily basis by people living in Mainland China. However, even today the presence of Mao can be implied with varying methods, without depicting the likeness of Mao at all. For example, similarly to the original

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visual images created during Mao’s lifetime,31 contemporary artists can use the visual signs, such as the red sun or slogans by Mao to refer to him. Furthermore, Mao’s handwritten calligraphy has been, and still is, enormously important representation of Mao and his power in the Chinese visual culture. The appreciation of calligraphy as a form of art, before and above ink painting, is an inherent part of Chinese culture deriving from the early centuries of the Common Era. To exclude the importance of Mao’s calligraphic writings, which still appear in Chinese society and in contemporary Chinese art, would inevitably result in a one-sided and limited investigation of the importance of Mao’s images today. Even more intriguingly, besides referring to Mao through visual signs, contemporary artists can even omit Chairman Mao from the composition completely and still be alluding to him through employing Mao’s mental image as, for example, Yue Minjun's (b. 1962) painting Chairman Mao Goes to Anyuan, 2005 (Figure 11.4) reveals. Yue’s work is a remodification based on the original visual image, Chairman Mao Goes to Anyuan, created by Liu Chunhua (b. 1944) in 1967. Liu’s painting was based on extensive research on Mao’s photographs and it was not until the

31. For more of Mao’s presence in political posters, see Robert Benewick, “Icons of Power: Mao Zedong and the Cultural Revolution,” in Picturing Power in the People’s Republic of China: Posters of the Cultural Revolution, ed. Harriet Evans and Stephanie Donald, 123–37 (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1999). A shorter version of the article was republished in Rebecca M. Brown and Deborah S. Hutton (eds.) Asian Art, 435–47 (Malden, MA, and Oxford: Blackwell, 2006). For the significance of mangoes, see Alfreda Murck, “Golden Mangoes: The Life Cycle of a Cultural Revolution Symbol,” Archives of Asian Art, Vol. 57(2007): 1–21 and Alfreda Murck (ed.), Mao’s Golden Mangoes and the Cultural Revolution (Zürich: Scheidegger und Spiess, 2013). For religious aspects in relation to Mao’s image, see esp. Stefan Landsberger, “Mao as the Kitchen God: Religious Aspects of the Mao Cult During the Cultural Revolution,” China Information no. 11 (1996): 196–214 and Stefan Landsberger, “The Deification of Mao: Religious Imagery and Practices during the Cultural Revolution and Beyond”, in China’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution: Master Narratives and Post-Mao Counternarratives, ed. Woei Lien Chong, 139–84 (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2002). For the most comprehensive historical study on Mao's image in Chinese, see Haocheng Yang, 楊昊 成, 毛澤東圖像研究 [Mao Zedong tuxiang yanjiu](Hong Kong: Shidai guoji chuban youxian gongsi, 2009).

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Figure 11.4 Yue Minjun, Chairman Mao Goes to Anyuan, 2005. Copyright by the artist.

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early 1990s that Liu could declare how he alone was the painter of this work.32 Liu’s painting is one of the most essential and widely distributed visual images of Mao during the Cultural Revolution. It is an illustrative example, as Ellen J. Laing maintains, of art as a political weapon because it conveys two politically significant messages, namely Mao’s shift of his dependence for the revolution onto the workers and his status as the leader of the strikes and the Party.33 In addition, the painting is a primary example of creating the visual myth of Mao through representations. It was declared a cultural relic in March 199834 and it has been estimated that over 900 million reproductions of this painting were printed.35 The importance and popularity of the original explains why it has been chosen for reemployment also by several contemporary artists.36 By omitting Mao’s likeness from the composition Yue Minjun demonstrates how essentially interrelated Liu’s painting is to people’s memories of Mao and the Cultural Revolution period and how the perception of the work is reciprocal to Mao’s mental images. At the same time, Yue’s painting exemplifies how the ability to recognize the contemporary art works referring to Chairman Mao depends usually on the familiarity of the viewer on the original visual images of Mao. People

32. Collective work was emphasized during the Cultural Revolution in order to avoid accusations of individualism. Liu Chunhua has written a detailed account of the creation process, which includes four early sketches for this painting. See Chunhua Liu, “The creation process and relevant circumstances of ‘Chairman Mao goes to An’yuan’(Mao zhuxi qu An’yuan’ chuangzuo guocheng ji xiangguang qingkuang)” Zhongguo Meishu (Chinese Art), No. 1 (2002): 21–23. For comparative perspective see Chunhua Liu, “Painting Pictures of Chairman is Our Greatest Happiness,” China Reconstructs, XVII(10) (1968): 2–6. See also Julia F. Andrews, Painters and Politics in the People’s Republic of China, 1949–1979 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 338–42; Laing, The Winking Owl: Art in the People's Republic of China, 67–70; Shanchun, Yan, “Painting Mao,” in Art and China’s revolution, ed. Melissa Chiu and Shengtian Zheng, 91–101 (New York: Asia Society. In association with Yale University Press, New Haven & London). 33 Laing 1988, 69. 34. Benewick, “Icons of Power,” p. 135. 35. Yan, “Painting Mao,” p. 95; Landsberger, “The Deification of Mao,” 152. 36. For several other examples, see Valjakka, “Many Faces of Mao Zedong”.

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living during the Cultural Revolution or shortly after it, or who otherwise are familiar with Chinese propaganda posters and Chinese art history, would immediately recognize Liu Chunhua’s original painting from the remodified version by Yue. Without question, the interrelations emerging between the new visual images of Mao and the original visual image are essential to acknowledge for any further analysis of the meaning. As philosopher Dominic Lopes has indicated, a pictorial variation is based on variation-recognition, and it is not reducible to mere subjectrecognition. Variation draws the viewers’ attention to the aspects that the original picture presents but creates a new meaning of its own that is not secondary to the original one. Borrowing his words, “[s]ince variation experience depends on the contents of both variation and original and the relationships between them, what is essential to understanding a variation is identifying its relationships with its original on the basis of visual encounter with both.”37 It is indispensable to be familiar with the original visual images of Mao and their canonical iconography in order to recognize the levels and forms of the visual dialogue emerging today regardless of whether the visual image in question is based on remodification of the original visual image or not. Although the clear majority of the posthumous visual images are recreations of the original ones, some artists are also exploring completely new ways of depicting Chairman Mao. In this visual dialogue, one of the most crucial questions is whether the posthumous visual image is breaking the norms related to Mao’s original visual images and if so, in what ways and to what extent. Secondly, the analysis must take into account how the contemporary visual image interrelates the mental images of Mao created during his lifetime. Whether there is respect, negotiation or criticism implied and toward which kind of mental images of Mao. As art critic Li Xianting declared as early as in 1994, “the important thing about the artistic use of the image of Mao Zedong in Mainland China, I

37. Dominic Lopes, Understanding Pictures (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 222– 225, quotation from p. 217.

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maintain, is not its political significance, but the way in which the image is manipulated. After all, an image is altered by the very fact that it is incorporated into an artistic work.”38 In the analysis on these art works, it is also important to examine the artists’ oeuvre and intentions as they can be demonstrated by another art work based on the same painting by Liu Chunhua. An attempt to explore his own understanding of this historical person and a wish to be in close contact with Chairman Mao is expressed by Yin Zhaoyang (b. 1970) throughout his series of works relating to Mao and historical sites painted with a blurred impression. Although these paintings are based on his personal experience, memory is barely a starting point. For Yin, this series of paintings represents “a collage of ideals” (“一個關於理想的拼貼, yi ge guanyu lixiang de pintie”).39 In several paintings, Yin has depicted himself as a child or an adolescent, sitting near, following after or running toward Chairman Mao. By observing these various imaginary scenes and the different relationships between Yin and Mao, it is possible to start to have an idea of the complexity of Yin’s personal relationship with Mao. His work entitled Chairman Mao Going to An’yuan, 2005 (Figure 11.5) is one example of this personal relation, although it is suggested by political historian Elisabeth Perry as an example of how the original painting by Liu Chunhua has become “a vehicle of . . . the devolution of China’s revolutionary

38. Xianting Li, “The Imprisoned Heart. Ideology in an Age of Consumption,” Art and Asia Pacific (Australia) (April 1994): 24–30. Includes illustrations. Republished with an introduction by Geremie Barmé and without illustrations with the title, “The Imprisoned Heart: Consuming Mao,”Chinese Sociology and Anthropology 28(1) (1995), 91–95; and Barmé, Shades of Mao: The Posthumous Cult of the Great Leader, pp. 215–20, quote at p. 217. Italics added. 39. Yin Zhaoyang quoted in Zhu Qi 朱其, “Interview with Yin Zhaoyang” (“尹朝陽訪談, Yin Zhaoyang Fang Tan”). Public Space. Yin Zhaoyang’s Solo Exhibition, Exhibition catalogue, 29–35 (New York: Max Protech Gallery, 2005). Quotation in Chinese on p. 35, in English on p. 29.

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Figure 11.5 Yin Zhaoyang, Chairman Mao Going to An’yuan, 2005. Copyright by the artist.

tradition into a commercialized caricature of its original aims.”40 However, in Yin’s work, the young boy running and waving after Mao is not “a worker” as Perry has suggested, but Yin Zhaoyang himself.41

40. Elizabeth J. Perry, “Reclaiming the Chinese Revolution,” Journal of Asian Studies 64(4) (2008) p. 1155 Perry’s main objective is to suggest more versatile examinations on the positive side of the Cultural Revolution and even if it is reclaimed. She does, however, express her critical attitude towards “red tourism” and also to avant-garde art (ibid., p. 1160). 41. Confirmed by Yin in an interview with the author, June 4, 2009. See also Zhu Qi, “Interview with Yin Zhaoyang,” p. 33, in English on p. 29.

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Consequently, Perry’s interpretation, although valid in its own rights, was completely different from the artist’s stated intention, to explore personal experiences and comment on Mao by adding himself to the composition. Furthermore, Yin has altered both the composition and the visual expression of the original art work. He has depicted it as if seen through smoky distance, and colored in a reddish sunset. In addition, Mao is gazing directly toward the viewer, not to the far distance as in the original painting. Due to these visual alterations, which Perry unfortunately ignores, the new painting is not a mere duplication of the original but a remodification. Although this painting is referring to a previous painting, according to the artist, it is primarily representing a respectful relation without ironic intentions. Yin chose to create these works in order to represent his adoration for Mao, who is still the only person Yin has idolized in this sense. His intention is not to mock or rebel against Mao, nor to distort history, but instead to express an involvement with and to extol Mao. In addition, Yin wanted to restore Mao as a normal human being, although he is without a doubt also a very significant and great historical person.42 Indeed, Yin’s method denudes the image of Mao of its divinity but does it turn the painting into a commercialized caricature? It is evident that Mao’s visual images do attract attention and boost the sales of any commodity from films, music, plays and contemporary art to scholarly books which do not even focus on Mao but still use his visual image on the cover to catch the eye of the reader. But are all these reproductions commercialized caricatures? Besides details, colors and intentions from the creator of the visual image, it is equally important to accept that Mao’s visual images are

42. Yin Zhaoyang, according to Wei and Lin in Wei Xing & Lin Jia, “Interview with Yin Zhaoyang” (“尹朝陽訪談, Yin Zhaoyang Fang Tan”) in Passing by Mao Zedong. Yin Zhaoyang’s works (“經過毛澤東：尹朝陽作品, Jingguo Mao Zedong. Yin Zhaoyang zuopin) ed. Qiushi Li, 26–41 (Bangkok & Beijing: Tang Contemporary Art Gallery, 2006). The translated interview in the catalog is shorter than the original and is not accurate. My translation differs from the original.

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inevitably part of the global visual culture used for uncountable purposes. It is even more essential to understand that Mao has not become a meaningless floating sign43 which is employed only for the purpose of defacing Mao. As Yin’s works show, to represent Mao as a human in contemporary art work is not necessarily to deface him—especially if the visual images of Mao created in the 1950s, and depicting him, for instance, as a kind fatherly figure among children, are taken into account. In addition, not all the contemporary art works represent pastiche nor even parody. Quite the contrary, Mao’s visual image is continuously refaced in order to give it new meanings, interpretations and relations. As Wu Hung has clarified in relation to his perception of three main strategies of Chinese artists in producing “counter images” of Mao and Tiananmen since the 1980s: the art scene “is far richer than a few abstract formulas. In fact . . . experimental artists have made such persistent efforts to appropriate Mao and Tiananmen precisely because they have found this an effective means to articulate their individual voices and to respond to broad social changes.”44 For younger generation artists, for instance, the relation situation with Mao’s image is very different. For those born in the 1970s and 1980s, the meaning of Mao’s image is learned from the sociopolitical and cultural context. It is an image mainly with historical and political status, although not necessarily completely emptied of personal experience or feelings toward Mao. However, these emotions are derived from secondary sources—images, documentaries, books and oral histories. In this case, I claim, creating art based on Mao is not then “emptying” the

43. Already in 1997, Lin Xiaoping suggested that “the Chinese masses and avant-garde artists in the 1990s treat the image of Chairman Mao as a ‘floating’ or arbitrary iconic sign that has little to do with its historical context or reality.” Xiaoping Lin, “Those Parodic Images: A Glimpse of Contemporary Chinese Art,” Leonardo Journal of the International Society for the Arts 30(2) (1997): 113–122. 44. The strategies used according to Wu are: “to rationalize or objectify Mao and Tiananmen,” “to reframe Mao and Tiananmen with contemporary references and/or the artist’s personal experience,” and “to ‘empty’ Mao and Tiananmen for perpetuity.” Wu, Remaking Beijing 2005: 183–195, quotations from p. 190.

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image as stated by Wu Hung.45 In fact, the image of Mao is already vague, although not empty, to some of these younger artists. Therefore, instead of “emptying,” they are actually exploring any possible meanings and values of Mao’s image to them, and even aiming to create some new connotations to it. Even if the recreation is based on humorous, ironic or even highly critical interpretations of Mao, it does not necessarily imply that Mao’s visual images were insignificant for the creators. If they were, no one would be recreating or renegotiating his image anymore. The prevailing critical perceptions toward contemporary Chinese art and its commercialism are valid to some extent because not all the art works created are artistically highly innovative, original or skillfully made. However, one main reason for the tendency to categorize all the contemporary Chinese art works into commodified pastiche might be the popular tendency to analyze them in relation to the Cultural Revolution and its memorabilia. Naturally, the Cultural Revolution period is an intrinsic context that has to be taken into account. As I have already mentioned, it is important to know the history and development of Mao’s images to understand the contemporary art works and the people’s perceptions toward Mao.46 Nevertheless, occasionally, it seems that the continuity of the use of Mao’s mental and visual images is somewhat oversimplified—especially when the notions of legacies deriving from the Cultural Revolution period are overemphasized. For instance, art historian Jiang Jiehong has

45. Wu, Remaking Beijing, 183–195. 46. For a detailed analysis of the Mao cult and how visual images were used to construct it, see esp. Daniel Leese, Mao Cult: Rhetoric and Ritual in China’s Cultural Revolution (Cambridge; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2011); Daniel Leese, “Mao the Man and Mao the Icon,” in A Critical Introduction to Mao, ed. Timothy Cheek, 219–39 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Laikwan Pang, “The Dialectics of Mao’s images: Monumentalism, Circulation and Power Effects” in Visualizing China, 1845–1965: Moving and Still Images in Historical Narratives, ed. Christian Henriot and Wen-Hsin Yeh, 407–435, (Leiden: Brill, 2013). For detailed examination of Cultural Revolution’s culture in China today see Barbara Mittler, A Continuous Revolution: Making Sense of Cultural Revolution Culture (Harvard University Asia Centre, 2013)

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suggested that “the subsequent emergence of a radical new Chinese art can be understood as an extension of Mao’s legacy to rebellion.”47 He further emphasizes that the effect of the Cultural Revolution on contemporary Chinese art is not just reusing nostalgic visual elements, but Mao’s “spirit of rebellion has continued in a subversive form of creativity that distinguishes the new Chinese art.”48 Basically Jiang’s argument is valid and the historical impact of the Cultural Revolution on the development of contemporary art is indisputable. It could also be argued that the spirit of the artists in the post-Mao era is not solely deriving from the Mao’s legacy to rebellion. Instead, it is actually derived from two sources, both the Chinese cultural context and the Western modern and contemporary art tradition which are further employed to target both earlier Chinese and Western art traditions, including art from Maoist period. Indeed, there is at least one essential difference in the rebellion provoked by Mao during the Cultural Revolution compared with this spontaneous rebellion of contemporary artists: during Mao’s lifetime, rebellion was primarily targeted to support Mao, both his image and power; in the contemporary art scene, artists are clearly negotiating and questioning his status. The intentions, motivations, the target and the context of the artistic rebellions are unquestionably changed. Although it seems to be a continuous process, it is not: it is a different rebellion.

The Importance of Mao’s Visual Images Today In addition, not all the contemporary art works are referring to the Cultural Revolution period. Instead, some artists and photographers have examined how people relate to Mao’s images in present China. One of the latest examples is a photographic series, The Chairman and I, created

47. Jiehong Jiang, The Revolution Continues (London: The Random House, 2008), 31. 48. Ibid., p.106.

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by André Eichman (b. 1961), a fine art documentary photographer living in Hong Kong. The six-year project was started in late 2003 when Eichman started to travel about Mainland China with a statue of Mao for photographs. Originally, Eichman had planned to make a humorous set of photographs using Mao’s statue under different circumstances and with varying visual elements in order to show how commercialized the usage of the image had actually come in China. Nonetheless, his intentions completely changed on January 1, 2004 when he met General Gu Yuping, a former bodyguard of Zhou Enlai’s Figure 11.6 André Eichman, General Gu Yuping, 2004. Copyright by the artist.

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wife (Figure 11.6). After listening to the experiences of General Gu from the Long March and seeing his devoted respect toward Chairman Mao’s statue, Eichman realized that for many of the older generation, Mao Zedong was still the hero who saved China. Consequently, he felt that he could not place Mao’s statue disrespectfully so he focused more on asking people whether they would like to hold the statue of Mao and have their picture taken. Whenever possible, while he was touring China for work, Eichman continued to ask people to hold the statue of Mao. From the series of photographs published, varying attitudes are revealed through varying bodily postures and the ways of holding Mao statue, but the majority are clearly respectful. One ex-soldier even made the effort to don his uniform before having his photograph taken. According to Eichman, usually people in the countryside were more willing to hold the statue and have their photographs taken than in the city, where busy people and especially the younger generation were more reluctant to pose for camera. It could have also been that some of them were not eager to be involved in a project created by a foreigner, or that some did not want to hold Mao. Almost all of the people who accepted the request and even wanted to share their notions on Mao made only positive remarks and many of them were very careful in what they said. Only one person, from Mao’s home village of Shaoshan, revealed negative opinions toward Chairman Mao and in order to protect this person, Eichman decided not to include his picture in the set of 66 photographs in the collection of around 300 to 400.49 Although the series does show people’s attitudes toward Mao’s image, it is nevertheless limited in its approach because it includes only those who were happy to pose with the statue. It would have been highly interesting to try to record the number, gender, age and location of the people who refused to take part into this project and, even more importantly, the reason why they refused. Moreover, for comparative research, it would be intriguing to examine whether the results and answers would have been different if the photographer was a

49. André Eichman, interview, March 12, 2013.

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Chinese person. An approach to explore the meaning of Mao’s images today can be found also in contemporary Chinese photography. By documenting the presence of the original Mao images in contemporary society, these artists reveal interesting interrelations. Time seems to be frozen when one encounters the original visual images of Mao in everyday life, as is the case in the series of photographs taken by Shao Yinong (b. 1961) and Mu Chen (b. 1970) during the years from 2002 and 2006. This couple traveled across Mainland China and photographed empty assembly halls, which are disappearing due to the economic development. The photographs depict public interiors, and in some an original visual image of Mao, a photograph or a political poster, is at present on the back wall as it is in The Assembly Hall—Changting and in The Assembly Hall—Pukou (Figures Figure 11.7 Shao Yinong and Mu Chen, The Assembly Hall – Changting, 2002–2006. Copyright by the artists.

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Figure 11.8 Shao Yinong and Mu Chen, The Assembly Hall – Pukou, 2002–2006. Copyright by the artists.

11.7 and 11.8). The mere presence of these visual images of Mao testifies to their lingering importance to the people who might still gather in these halls. As Shao and Yin have explained, they return repeatedly to the past in their art because “this rupture in our memory requires more reflection.”50

Reflecting A Traumatizing History One of the reasons for exploring the meaning of Mao’s image to contemporary people is related to the forms of trauma in China. As Wang

50. Yinong Shao and Chen Mu, “It Is Not Merely A Memory,” in Burden or Legacy: From the Chinese Cultural Revolution to Contemporary Art, ed. Jiang Jiehong, 85–91 (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2007). Quotation from p. 91.

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Ban has aptly pointed out, trauma in contemporary China is in two major forms. “One is the latent memory of past catastrophes of imperialism and colonialism as well as atrocities of the authoritarian political order. The other is the ongoing shock of the damaged older lifeworlds under the impact of transnational capital and the massive commodification of social relations.”51 Wang further clarifies that after the Cultural Revolution people were confronting the haunting trauma of the past, while in the 1990s a new shock deriving from sociocultural changes emerged.52 Both of these two forms of trauma suggested by Wang Ban interact with the use of Mao’s visual images in both Chinese society and the contemporary art scene.53 In some of the works, only one of the two forms are reflected, but quite often both forms are inseparably present. The photographs by Shao Yinong and Mu Chen communicate primarily Wang Ban’s suggestion of a traumatic notion caused by the continuing shock of a changing society. Even more evident is this shock of the damaged past lifeworlds in the lives of the elderly Chinese citizens as documented by Hu Yang (b. 1959). Since 2005, Hu has photographed several hundred Shanghainese homes and created a series known as Shanghai Living (“上 海人家, Shanghai renjia”). Hu’s intention was to reveal the social gaps in living conditions between Shanghainese, and therefore he has visited people from all social classes, from wealthy businesspeople to migrant workers. Hu has also asked these people to answer questions about their current situation, their wishes for the future, and their biggest concern. Captions based on these answers are occasionally published along with the photographs. In one of the photographs, taken in 2005, an elderly retired worker, Sun Bingchang, is standing in the middle of his tiny room and holding a framed portrait of Chairman Mao in his hands, while the portrait of Premier

51. Ban Wang, Illuminations from the Past: Trauma, Memory, and History in Modern China. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004), p. 8 52. Ibid., pp. 119–20. 53. For more illustrative examples of the visibility of these two traumas in contemporary Chinese art, see Valjakka, “Many Faces of Mao Zedong.”

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Figure 11.9 Hu Yang, Shanghai Living, Sun Bingchang, 2005. Copyright by the artist.

Zhou Enlai (1898–1976) is beside him, leaning against the bed (Figure 11.9).54 The significance and the close relationship between Sun Bingchang and Mao’s visual image is manifestly visible from this photograph, and is further emphasized by Sun’s own statement that he misses the past national leaders. It becomes obvious from the interior that Sun is poor and lives a modest life. His longing for the past leaders echoes the nostalgic beliefs among the elderly people that during Mao’s era, there was at least the intention to achieve an equal and secure society for everyone. Compared with the present situation revealed in Hu’s photographs—that some are extremely rich while the less fortunate are barely surviving—the past feels safer and more egalitarian. Consequently, as this photograph of

54. Hu Yang. 2005. Shanghai Living (“上海人家, Shanghai renjia”)(Shanghai: Shanghai Renmin meishu chubanshe, 2005), 115.

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Figure 11.10 Hu Yang, Shanghai Living, Claude Hudelot, 2005. Copyright by the artist.

Hu’s reveals, especially for the underprivileged elderly people, Mao’s visual image is a token of these dreams of the past. At the same time, it clearly shows how nostalgic notions for Mao, kept up also by the Party, have an impact to ordinary people’s lives. A completely opposite reflection of the current relationship with Mao’s visual image is expressed by another photograph from this same series. In this image, Hu has depicted a French diplomat, Claude Hudelot, dressed in a Chinese outfit, sitting in his elegant home furnished with Chinese objects from varying decades (Figure 11.10).55 While the majority of the interior decoration and his clothing create the notion of the past, two Mao statues on the side table reflect the Maoist period and, an untitled work by Wang Ziwei (b. 1963) depicting young Mao with a long term

55. Ibid., 114.

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political leader, Dong Piwu (1886–1975), from 2001,56 adds the notion of “contemporaneity” to this room. Hudelot’s statement emphasizes his enjoyment of both Chinese traditional culture and modern art. Compared with Sun’s private sphere and relation with Mao’s image, the difference is significant and obvious. For Sun, Mao’s image is something precious, while for Hudelot, it is rather a fashionable part of the interior decoration. Consequently, these two photographs represent two very different roles of Mao’s image in today’s China. In Sun’s case, the traumatic disbelief concerning the social situation is indicated through Mao’s image, while for Hudelot, there is no such a personal relationship with Mao, because he did not live in China during Mao’s era. In other words, there is no notion of trauma presented in the photograph of Hudelot. As these photographic works clearly reveal, one crucial difference in the relation with Mao’s visual images, depends on whether one lived through the events and has personal experience of them or not. Similar notions, but from a more personal perspective, have been expressed by contemporary artist Zhang Hongtu (b. 1943): “If one has never lived under a Communist government, Mao’s portrait means nothing: it’s just a popular image such as Warhol did, like Marilyn Monroe. But the first time I cut Mao’s portrait with a knife and put it back together to make a new Mao image, I felt guilty, sinful.”57 In a phone interview, Zhang further clarified that after leaving China he thought he could forget Mao’s visual image, but on the contrary, he felt that Mao’s image was following him like a shadow.58 In 1995, Zhang further transformed this notion into a mixed media installation entitled Front Door (Figure 11.11). An ordinary door is fortified with one real lock while the other locks are photographic

56. The authentication mentioned by Hudelot (in telephone interview, November 26, 2013) and details confirmed by Wang Ziwei (email to author, November 27, 2013). 57. Zhang, according to Jonathan Hay in Jonathan Hay, “Zhang Hongtu/Hongtu Zhang: An Interview,” in Boundaries in China, ed. John Hay, 280–298 (London: Reaktion Books, 1994). Quotation from pp. 294–95. 58. Since 1985, Zhang has created at least 60 art works relating to Mao (Zhang in a telephone interview with the author, March 15, 2008).

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Figure 11.11 Zhang Hongtu, Front Door, 1995. Copyright by the artist.

reproductions. Furthermore, it is equipped with an audio tape that replays fervent knocking on the door. Through a real peephole, one can see Mao demandingly staring right into one’s eye (Figure 11.12).59 This installation illustrates Zhang’s statement about Mao’s image following him and further confirms Cathy Caruth’s suggestion that “to be traumatized is precisely

59. Reproduced on Zhang Hongtu’s website, under the section Theatre as Door 1. Accessed December 25, 2010, www.momao.com. Zhang introduces the installation in the documentary film Making Mao by Yeo Galen (2009). Material details confirmed by the artist (Zhang Hongtu, email message to author, April 15, 2011).

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Figure 11.12 Zhang Hongtu, Front Door, detail, 1995. Copyright by the artist.

to be possessed by an image or event.”60 At least in this case, Mao’s visual image is the image that seems to haunt Zhang in his early years in New York. While Zhang’s work provokes the viewers to question their own relation to Mao and his visual image, an example questioning more the national, official narrative related to Mao is revealed in a work by a Taiwanese artist, Mei Dean-E (b. 1954). Already in 1990 and 1991, while in New York, he used a mix-media technique to create a work entitled Three

60. Cathy Caruth, “Exploration is Memory: Introduction.” In Trauma: Explorations in Memory ed. Cathy Caruth, 3–12 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995).

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Figure 11.13 Mei Dean-E, Three Principles Reunited China, 1990/91. Copyright by the artist.

Principles Reunited China (“三民主義統一中國(三聯作), Sanminzhuyi tongyi Zhongguo (san lian zuo)”), which shows a color portrait of Mao underneath a puzzle depicting a black-and-white photograph of Sun Yatsen (1866–1925) (Figure 11.13).61 The title of Mei’s work refers to the

61. According to Mei Dean-E (email message to author, January 25, 2011), this work was created in 1990 although in the collection of the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, the work is recorded by the date 1991. See museum collections online, www1.ntmofa.gov.tw/ collectionweb/eng98/ (accessed February 8, 2011). See also Li-qing Dai 戴廲卿, 1996. “如 果平民藝術與官方政治同聚一堂— 讀梅丁衍的 ‘哀敦砥悌’ 思維.” [Ruguo pingmin yishu yu guanfang zhengzhi tongju yi tang—du Mei Dean-E de ‘Aidunditi’ siwei. If art of ordinary people and governmental politics could congregate together—reading Mei Dean-E’s ‘Identity’ thinking.] in現代美術. [Xiandai Meishu.] Modern Art. 67(8–9): 12–17.

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famous policy developed originally by Sun Yat-sen. This doctrine was created to develop China into a modern and powerful nation. Basically, very similar intentions were advocated by Mao, although the political framework was different. It is important to remember that after Sun’s death, his portrait was distributed, displayed and honored widely among the Nationalists, and it became the image of the father of the nation.62 I argue that Mao’s visual image would never have gained the status it has, even today, if Sun’s visual image had not been respected and utilized in the way it was before Mao’s. And I agree that Mao’s visual images were also displayed to create a counter-hero to Chiang Kai-shek (1887–1975).63 Even more intriguingly, after establishing the PRC in 1949, Mao’s portraits were continued to be displayed with Sun’s portraits in order to show that Mao was the true leader of the country. In other words, they acquired power and status from Sun’s portraits. According to Mei Dean-E, the civil war was crucial for shaping the current situation of Taiwanese people and the form in which the possible reunion of China would completely transform the cultural values in Taiwan. At the time of creating the work, Mei was expecting the reunion to happen because he assumed that would clarify his own “identity.” Furthermore, the Taiwanese used the political slogan “Three Principles reunited China” against the Communist Mainland China, but it nonetheless also implied the notion of the lost motherland. However, today the majority of Taiwanese do not consider China as a motherland and Mei thinks that the gap after 50 years of separation is deeper than people can imagine. He concludes that “‘Three Principles reunited China’ will never

62. For an illustrative study on Sun Yat-sen’s cult and the use of his image, see Henrietta Harrison, The making of the Republican Citizen: Political Ceremonies and Symbols in China, 1911–1929. (Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 133– 152, 157–164, 173–201, 214–220. 63. Leese, Mao Cult, 97; Ross Terrill, Mao: A Biography. Rev. and exp. ed. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999[1980]), 188.

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come true, so my dream to be an international artist will never come true either.”64 Because this work is rather ambiguous—we cannot know whether the puzzle is being assembled or taken apart, whether Mao is emerging or disappearing under Sun’s image—it cleverly incites the viewer to ponder the interrelated importance of Sun and Mao, perhaps even to question who, after all, was the true father of the nation. Despite this ambiguity, it is Sun Yat-sen’s image that is shattered while Mao’s at least seems to be untouched. Consequently, it implies the notion that Sun’s image was damaged by the emergence of Mao’s image and can therefore be regarded as expressing the traumatic feelings among the Taiwanese caused by the civil war. Without a doubt, this work encourages further reevaluation of the national past of the PRC and the status of Mao’s visual images in it from a Taiwanese perspective. The work is even more intriguing if we consider it in relation to an article published in the South China Morning Post on March 29, 2011 which suggested displaying Sun Yat-sen’s portrait instead of Mao’s on the Tiananmen Gate as the founder of a republican China.65 Obviously, the suggestion was not accepted but its publication indicates that there are varying opinions about whose portrait should be on the Gate. These kinds of renegotiations have also been expressed in contemporary art works since the end of the 1990s. The Gao Brothers (Gao Zhen, b. 1956 and Gao Qiang, b. 1962) are well known for their controversial art works depicting Chairman Mao. Their objection to Mao is mainly caused by the trauma of their father’s death in unclear circumstances during the Cultural Revolution.66 This personal

64. Mei, email message to author, January 25, 2011. 65. Mark O’Neil, “Call for reassessment of Sun Yat-sen from ‘pioneer’ to ‘father of the nation’,” South China Morning Post, March 29, 2011, available online at www.scmp.com/article/742387/ call-reassessment-sun-yat-sen-pioneer-father-nation (accessed April 3, 2013). 66. The Gao Brothers in an interview with the author, June 6, 2009.

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Figure 11.14 Gao Brothers, Family Memory A, 1969/1999. Copyright by the artists.

Figure 11.15 Gao Brothers, Family Memory B, 1999. Copyright by the artists.

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trauma is most visibly revealed in two manipulated photographs, Family Memory A (“家庭記憶A, Jiating jiyi A”) and Family Memory B (“家庭記憶 B, Jiating jiyi B”), created in 1999 (Figures 11.14 and 11.15).67 In the first image, with digital manipulation, the official portrait of Mao at Tiananmen Gate is replaced with a family photograph, which was taken at their father’s funeral in 1969. In the picture, we see the six brothers and their mother gathered together. The second photograph shows the same people in same positions, but it was taken in 1999, about 30 years after the first one. The first image visibly communicates the bereft atmosphere among those left behind. By replacing the official portrait of Mao with these personal family photographs, the Gao Brothers are violating the common norms relating to Mao’s visual image: for the majority of Chinese people it is not likely to consider any other visual image to the Gate. However, through this work the Gao Brothers seem to be suggesting that instead of impersonal official memories, private memories should be revealed. In addition, although the Gao Brothers are not providing an image of the abuse or death of their father and not visualizing the trauma itself, they are, without doubt, able to express the loss and translate the trauma of it to the viewer. As revealed in the examples discussed above, the clear majority of the contemporary art works are recreations of the original images of Mao created during his lifetime. Nonetheless, also new interpretations and visual images are being continuously created by the artists. Some of the art works are considered so sensitive that they are censored or even confiscated by the officials. Because extremely strict iconographical norms concerning the visual reproduction of Mao’s visual images were followed in the Maoist era, violating these norms in the contemporary art scene can be used by artists to express their distrust for the official visual images. Several artists have created art works that question either the narrative itself, or the veracity of the visual representations, and as a result, the knowledge of history among the contemporary generations.

67. Reproduced in the Gao Brothers 2006a, 56–57.

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Conclusions As Yomi Braester has indicated, it was not until the post-Mao period that literature and films could invite audiences to form their own personal opinions and utilize interpretive authority.68 A similar tendency is strongly visible in these contemporary art works relating to Chairman Mao. The contemporary abundance of art works reflecting and questioning the official narrative of the Maoist past derives from the fact that during Mao’s era, visual arts were not allowed to depict the social reality but instead the utopian aspirations. Therefore, real experiences and feelings were left unpresented and unvoiced. These personal narratives are still been expressed in contemporary art and they are provoking the audience to form their own interpretations and opinions of the art works and furthermore, of the personal, collective and official memories. While the scar art created especially in the 1980s aimed often at depicting real events with relatively realistic imagery, contemporary artists are employing a more varied set of methods and techniques. In addition, they often seek more indirect expression with implied meanings instead of mimetic representations or realistic depictions of specific historical events. Despite this difference, there is an interrelation between these two trends, and scar art was an important precedent to inspire the contemporary trend. This chapter has examined basic features of the use of Mao’s mental and visual images used in contemporary Chinese art, both in and outside of Mainland China. First, the use of Mao’s visual and mental images in contemporary art is inseparably interacting with the other forms of cultural production and social norms relating to the proper handling of Mao’s legacy and images. Second, the Mao’s visual images are not limited to his visual likeness even today but the genre is far more variable. Third, it is essential to acknowledge the complex interrelations between visual and mental images created both during and after Mao’s lifetime.

68. Yomi Braester, Witness against History: Literature, Film, and Public Discourse in Twentiethcentury China (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2003), p. 139.

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Although especially the private mental images of Mao are continuously changing through encountering of new experiences and materials, some artists have found it beneficial to try to express them through visual arts. Fourth, there are numerous variables that have an impact on person’s perceptions toward Mao and his/her use and handling of Mao’s visual and mental images. Although generational differences are essential, they are only one variable among others. Fifth, although contemporary art relating to Mao is quite often considered as mere imitation of the past, nostalgic remembering or commodity pleasing foreign customers, the scene is far more diversified. Precisely because Mao’s visual and mental images are used by the contemporary artists for uncountable purposes to reflect, negotiate and question as well as private, collective, social, cultural, official, national or even international issues, they reveal a huge variety of themes and notions—if we only have the patience to pay attention to the details, artist’s oeuvre and intentions and especially to those deliberately made variations that distinguishes the posthumously remodified visual image from the original and/or the other remodifications. Through the discussed art works, I aimed to reveal a small selection of diversity, focusing mainly on the works that relate to traumatizing past. Indeed, feelings towards Mao and his image vary from deep respect and longing to neutral and to highly critical ones. The traumatic notions that these art works translate to the viewers originate from two major forms defined by Wang Ban. One derives from the past catastrophes and atrocities of the authoritarian political order, while the other is the continuing shock of the shattered older lifeworlds.69 As was demonstrated through the examples, both of these two forms of trauma interact with the use of Mao’s visual images in the contemporary art scene. The contemporary art works reflect a great multitude of personal attitudes, which are not necessarily fixed, but instead, continuously changing. What is highly important to remember is that Mao’s omnipresence in the past explains his presence also in the contemporary

69. Wang, Illuminations from the Past, 8.

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society as a historical image among the many others. As the closer analysis of various art works has undoubtedly revealed, including Mao’s visual image in contemporary artwork does not necessarily make it political, but instead, the art works depicting Mao can also be employed to reflect sociocultural and personal issues. Furthermore, besides the fact that these art works depicting Mao are primarily created for representing, invoking and questioning the traumatizing past, some are made in order to appeal to the audiences, both foreign and Chinese. In recent years, some Chinese art collectors have become highly interested in contemporary art works with nostalgic references to the past. This tendency is instigated by a larger nostalgia boom. As Kirk Denton has aptly suggested, the “memory of the revolutionary past has been Disneyfied and made to serve a culture of the commodity.”70 Primarily disneyfication is done by the Party in the creation of amusement parks and tourist attractions relating to the revolutionary past, but in addition, by the tens of thousands of entrepreneurs who have established Mao restaurants and supply a myriad of Maoist souvenirs for both foreign and domestic tourists. Bearing this in mind, it turns out to be quite hypocritical to criticize only contemporary artists for the commodification of Mao’s visual image, especially because many artists are actively employing visual art in order to prevent historical amnesia by deconstructing and reconstructing the historical narrative(s).

70. Kirk A. Denton, “Visual Memory and the Construction of a Revolutionary Past: Paintings from the Museum of the Chinese Revolution,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 12(2) (2000): 203–35, see esp. pp. 228–29.

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Name Index

B

G

Barack, Obama 7, 209

Gan, Yang 170

Barmé, Geremie 213, 239, 245–246

Gao, Qiang 313

Bo, Xilai 1–2, 4, 7, 11, 35, 55–60, 66–67, 89, 91, 96, 99, 101, 104, 114, 138–140, 145, 149–150, 153, 170–171, 181–189, 191–193, 195, 197, 199–200, 203–211, 214–215, 225–226, 230, 260, 279–282

Gao, Zhen 313

Bo, Yibo 67, 140, 279

Gao, Zhisheng 86, 99 Gu, Kailai 96, 281 Guo, Luoji 87

Brady, Anne–Marie 237, 244, 253

H

Braester, Yomi 316

Halliday, Jon 83, 154 Hamilton, Alexander 110

D Deng, Xiaoping 2–4, 12, 15–16, 18, 22–29, 33–36, 38, 41, 46–47, 53, 58, 60, 66–67, 70, 74, 77–78, 86, 89, 93, 111, 126, 132–133, 144, 148, 153, 155, 158–159, 168, 195–196, 199, 255, 262

Han, Sanping 239–241, 264, 268, 274 Han, Shaogong 171 He, Bing 102 He, Long 92 He, Xiaoming 92 Heywood, Neil 96, 281 Hu, Angang 61

F Feng, Xiaogang 241, 247, 273 Fu, Yisheng 279

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Hu, Jintao 3–4, 7–8, 18, 25–29, 38–40, 56, 66–67, 77–78, 88, 90, 98, 103, 120, 133–134, 139, 141, 144, 182–183, 194–199, 208, 211, 230, 238, 248, 250, 262, 268

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Hu, Sheng 24

Luo, Dongjin 92

Hu, Yaobang 15, 77–78, 84, 133, 202

Luo, Longji 258–259

Hua, Guofeng 2, 127, 133

Luo, Rongheng 92

L Laing, Ellen J. 293 Lau, Andy 252, 261 Lei, Feng 71, 82, 100, 217–220, 233, 256 Li, Changchun 98, 223 Li, Cheng 120, 133–135 Li, Honglin 84 Li, Jet 252 Li, Junru 73 Li, Keqiang 77, 136, 141–142, 147, 209 Li, Yuanchao 72, 101, 138, 143 Liang, Zhuge 48 Lin, Biao 32, 35, 145 Liu, Anping 282, 283–284

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M Mak, Antonio 287 Mannheim, Karl 122 Mao, Renfeng 256, 271 Mao, Yushi 83–85, 262 Mao, Zedong 1–4, 11, 13, 15–25, 27–43, 41, 51, 53–54, 58, 62–63, 65–67, 73, 79–81, 84, 88, 93–94, 100, 103, 113, 121, 132, 149, 153–154, 156–158, 161–162, 165, 169–172, 175–178, 193, 195, 202, 213–215, 222, 230, 242, 244, 255, 262, 294, 302 Mei, Dean–E 310, 311–312 Meisner, Maurice 36 Mo, Yan 171 Mu, Chen 303–305

Liu, Bang 273

S

Liu, Chunhua 291, 294–295

Shao, Yinong 303, 305

Liu, Shaoqi 1, 36, 201, 254–257

Soong, Mayling 257

Liu, Xiaobo 79, 86, 159, 162, 176, 229

Su, Tong 171

Liu, Xiaofeng 167

Sun, Bingchang 305–306

Liu, Ye 242, 248, 263

Sun, Yat–sen 254, 256, 311–313

Liu, Yuan 1, 91, 201, 255

Sun, Zhengcai 139

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Name Index

W

Wang, Shengjun 87

Wang, Hui 61, 167, 170–171, 177, 246, 264

Wang, Ziwei 307

Wang, Jinxi 82 Wang, Keping 288 Wang, Lijun 56, 99, 183, 262

Warhol, Andy 287 Wei, Jingsheng 87, 158, 162 Wen, Dao 82

Wang, Qishan 90, 138, 143, 146, 209

Wen, Jiabao 3–4, 7, 12–13, 43, 56, 77, 85, 90, 98, 109, 120, 144, 150, 171, 183, 186, 199, 207–208

Wang, Ruoshui 84

Wu, Hung 298–299

Wang, Meng 171

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321

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Index

A

B

Absolute power 53–54, 114

Beginning of the Great Revival 239– 240, 257, 260–265, 270, 275

Administration Hu Jintao 86, 194–195, Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao (Wu-Wen) 3, 74, 76, 183, 199 Internet 228 Obama 7, 209 State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) 238 Tourism 215 Anti-Rightist Movement (ARM) 86, 259 Anyuan 291–292 Art Chinese 286, 288–289, 291, 294, 299–300, 316, 318 Contemporary 9–10, 278–279, 286–300, 305, 313, 315–318 Fine 301 Historian 284 Independent Film 247 Performance 284 Pop 245 Splashing Ink 284 Video 284 Visual 10, 318 Assembly Hall 303–304

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Black Campaign 56 Bourgeois Dictatorship 254 Liberalization 54, 86, 231 Bureaucratic Capital 23 Business Community 174 Show 221

C Campaign against Confucius 49 (see also pi Lin pi Kong) Black 56 Five Anti 56 Maoist 79, 82, 88, 90, 96–102 Red 71 Singing Red 183, 192–197, 207 Sinicizing and popularizing Marxism 4, 82 Strike Black 192–197, 208 Capitalism Global 11, 42, 61 State 12

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Caricature of Bo Xilai 280 Central Committee 17, 22, 26, 65–66, 89–90, 97, 137, 194, 202, 222, 238, 248, 250, 261, 264, 270 Leadership 7, 56, 157, 171, 183, 186, 188, 191, 194, 196–197, 204, 207, 209, 210, 211 Party School (CPS) 73, 81, 143, 196 Central Commission of Legal and Political Affairs (CCPLA) 87

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Chongqing Model 1, 3, 6, 35, 98, 170, 181–183, 186–191, 197–211 Class Struggle 5, 28–31, 105, 107, 110–111, 113 Collective Party identity 13 Wisdom 19–20, 47 Collectivization 63 (see also decollectivization and de facto Decollectivization)

China film group (CFG) 239

Commercialization 4, 48–52, 57, 63, 239, 245, 274

China Internet Illegal Information Reporting Centre (CIIRC) 227–228

Commodification 8–9, 245, 250, 278, 305, 318

Chinese Academy of Social Science (CASS) 24, 80, 140, 143, 184, 195 Art 286, 288, 289–291, 294, 299, 300, 316, 318 Communist Party (CCP) 14, 20, 22, 65, 71, 153, 155, 162, 214, 222, 237, 265 (see also Communist Party of China) Elite politics 119–212 Leadership 5, 7, 111, 136, 182, 198, 209 Marxism 2–3, 13, 15–19, 22, 24, 28–30, 35–36, 38–43, 82, 157 People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) 185, 252 Politics 120, 148, 181–182, 211 Reconstruction 40 Regime 106–107, 109, 237 Socialism 3, 8, 40, 43, 82, 112, 246, 267

Communist Party Leadership 57 of China (CPC) 2, 8, 24, 30, 182 (see also Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ) Youth League (CYL) 4, 72, 77, 141, 147, 195, 211, 253 Concretization 42 Contemporary Art 9–10, 278–279, 286–300, 305, 313, 315–318 Consumer Culture 5, 112 Materialism 114 Corruption 12, 53, 60–61, 70, 78, 90, 97, 101, 108–109, 112–117, 150, 161, 165, 172–174, 183, 185, 192, 196, 224, 226, 257–258, 265, 270, 273 Crystallization 19–20, 73, 130

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Index

Cultural Revolution 2, 5, 12–19, 23, 27–37, 40, 46–47, 49, 54–57, 60–61, 65–66, 68–69, 77, 83–84, 89, 98, 102, 111, 113, 120–139, 145–147, 154, 158, 177–178, 192–193, 200, 202, 208, 215, 231, 243, 246, 267, 282, 284, 293–294, 299–300, 305, 313 Revolution background 145–147 Revolution generation 5–6, 121– 139 Culture Consumer 5, 112 Mainstream socialist 8, 250, 265– 272 Post–mainstream 247–251 Socialist 250, 265–272

325

Dictatorship of the proletariat 3, 17, 23–24, 47, 87, 155, 254 Single-party 5, 107, 110–111 Digital Maoism 233–235 Disneyfication 9, 318 Division 12, 124 administrative 230 deep 171 four generation 133 ideological 100 internal 127 tax 206 Dynamics Factional 67, 77 Ideological 13

E D De facto decollectivization 62 Deification 48–49, 52, 113 Deliberation 18, 264 Democratic Centralism 157, 214, 228–234 New democratic 13, 19, 22–23, 25, 28, 34–35, 254 Reform 5, 7, 116, 159, 162, 169, 208

Economic growth 1, 6–7, 114, 160, 178, 198, 203–204, 208, 210–211, 238 Egalitarianism 4, 11, 62, 73–77, 85 Eighteen Party Congress 5, 7, 260 Elite Chinese politics 119–121

F

Depoliticization 221, 235, 246

Financial Crisis 73, 98, 184, 202, 206 Tsunami 7, 199, 209

Developmentalism 1

First–generation Leadership 81

Demythification 4, 49, 63

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Five Anti Campaign 56 Foreign Policy 4, 92–96, 108, 194 Four Cardinal Principles 3, 47, 80, 86 Fourth Generation 66, 90, 132–136

I Icon of Modern 48–52, 254 Traditional 48–52 Idea of Mao 48–52, 61, 126, 170

G Gang of Four 3, 17, 46, 48, 51, 126, 202, 215 Princelings 4, 67, 77, 89–92, 95 Generation Cultural Revolution 5–6, 121–139 Fourth 66, 90, 132–136 Lost 121–124, 126, 128, 138–145 Mao 5, 121–124, 285 Generational Factor 5, 119–121, 148 Style 6, 149

Instrument 52–57, 111 Internal Division 127–132

J Jasmine Revolution 79 Judicial system 6, 161, 175

Global Capitalism 11, 42, 61

June Fourth Massacre 58–59, 84, 94

Great Leap Forward 32–33, 63, 158, 177

L

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) 66, 70, 73–77, 160, 190, 199, 211

H Hawkish turn 4, 92–96 High-level politics 136–139 Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao (Wu–Wen) Administration 3, 74, 76, 183, 199 Leadership 4, 102, 195

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Ideological Articulation (see also Chinese Marxism) 13 Dynamics 13 Orthodoxy 4, 182, 191, 197 Spectrum 197–203

Leadership Central 7, 56, 157, 171, 183, 186, 188, 191, 194, 196–197, 204, 207, 209, 210–211 Chinese 5, 7, 111, 136, 182, 198, 209 Collective 2, 21, 28, 31, 34, 36, 243 Communist Party 57 First-generation 81 Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao (Hu–Wen) 4, 102, 195

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Index

Leftist 31 Mao 12, 15 Party 2–5, 8, 33–34, 47, 57, 61, 87, 97–98, 100, 171 Political 6, 132, 136, 148, 170 Post-Mao 12, 15 Reform 35 Style 54, 140 Successive 15, 28 Leading Small Group (LSG) 238 Left Deviation 31 New 1–3, 47, 60–63, 83–84, 94, 114, 153, 166, 169–170, 177, 191, 197, 199–201 Leftist Leadership 31 Legacy of Mao 1, 175, 223, 285 Legitimacy 2–5, 15, 33, 40, 46–47, 50–51, 89–92, 105, 109–110, 112, 116–117, 150, 176, 182, 194, 200, 210, 229, 241, 250, 258–259, 261, 266, 271 Legitimizing power 271–275 Leninism 3, 17, 19–20, 22, 25–27, 29, 46–47, 73, 80–82, 115, 157, 193, 195, 230 Let the Bullets Fly 241, 250, 271 Liberals (see also rightist) 7, 78, 84, 109, 169, 173, 177 Limitation 113–116, 148, 211, 287, 289 Lost generation 121–124, 126, 128, 138–145

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327

M Mainstream socialist culture 8, 250, 265–272 Maitre á penser 3, 47 Mao Fever (see also Mao Zedong Re) 16 Generation 5, 121–124, 285 Idea of 48–52, 61, 126, 170 Legacy of 1, 175, 223, 285 Leadership 12, 15 References to 149–151, 216 Regime 5, 14, 105, 110, 113 Use of 244, 277–286, 299, 305, 316, 317 Mao Zedong Thought 1–3, 13–30, 32, 35–36, 38, 40, 43, 47, 51, 53, 58, 67, 73, 80–81, 88, 149, 157, 193, 195, 255, 262 Nostalgia for 4, 63 Re (see also Mao fever) 16 Maoism Digital 233–235 New 6, 153–154, 166, 170, 172, 175, 177–178 Maoist Campaign 79, 82, 88, 90, 96–102 Era 4, 60, 68, 74, 165, 183, 315 Mobilization 8, 216, 233–235 Restoration 67–790 Revival 4, 56, 66, 69–70, 73, 77–96, 102, 214 Revolution 113

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Maoism 6, 153–154, 166, 170, 172, 175, 177–178 Regime 110, 215, 259

March of Big Knives 71 Volunteers 71 Market Economy 55, 61, 111–112, 168–169, 174, 178, 182, 192, 197, 244

Nostalgia for Mao Zedong 4, 63 Red 8, 170, 173–174

Modern of Icon 254, 48–52 Modernization 32, 42, 85, 95, 158– 159, 177 Monopoly of political power 5, 7, 210 Movement Anti–rightist 86, 259 Red culture 7, 215 Smash the Four Old 49 Three–anti 56

Official Historiography 2, 24, 26–34 Use of Mao’s visual image 277–286 (see also unofficial use of Mao’s image) One-party rule 5, 107, 110, 112, 153, 159, 163, 165, 215, 229–230

N

Online Reactivation 8, 233–235

National Revolution 3, 15, 23, 34 People’s Congress (NPC) 76, 80, 86, 97–98, 185–186, 196, 207

P

Nationalism 9, 61, 78, 107–108, 111, 194, 200, 266, 279 Neoliberal Policy 6, 170, 173–174 New Democracy 1–2, 13, 15–16, 23–24, 27–28, 33, 35–38, 40–41, 43, 201, 251–261 Democratic Revolution 13, 19, 22–23, 25, 34–35 Left 1–3, 47, 60–63, 83–84, 94, 114, 153, 166, 169–170, 177, 191, 197, 199–201

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O

Parody 271–275, 298 Party Cadre 39, 57, 78, 126, 223 Collective Identity 13 Leadership 2–5, 8, 33–34, 47, 57, 61, 87, 97–98, 100, 171 Regime 3, 7–8, 194, 200 Pastiche 298–299 Patriotism 70–73, 95, 195 Peasant 50, 57–61, 74, 115, 125, 166, 204, 273

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Index

People’s Liberation Army (PLA) 1, 18, 83, 86, 90, 95–96, 100, 201, 218, 255 Republic of China (PRC) 2, 8, 11–16, 18, 20–21, 26–27, 88, 157–158, 171, 227–228, 231– 232, 242, 251–253, 258, 267, 277, 285, 313, 315

329

Propaganda 7–9, 55, 69, 82, 85, 100, 109, 112, 132, 147, 171, 193, 216– 219, 224, 231, 233–235, 237–239, 244–248, 250–253, 259, 267, 270, 271, 273–275, 294 Protecting the Yellow River 71 Protest 58, 172, 204, 244

Pi Lin Pi Kong (see also campaign against Confucius) 49

Q

Pluralism 6, 159, 161, 164

Quasi-Maoist renaissance 4, 66, 77, 89, 92

Policy Foreign 4, 92–96, 108, 194 Neoliberal 6, 170, 173–174 Politburo Standing Committee (PBSC) 72, 76, 90, 95, 98, 103, 182–183, 209, 211 Political Leadership 6, 132, 136, 148, 170

Red Aristocrats 4, 89–92 Campaign 71 Culture Movement 7, 215 Nostalgia 8, 170, 173–174

Power’s monopoly 5, 7, 174, 210

References to Mao 149–151, 216

Stability 2, 4, 67, 77, 117, 210

Reform and opening 2, 15, 17, 57, 84, 139, 158, 160, 162, 164–165, 169– 171, 173, 176 Democratic 5, 7, 116, 159, 162, 169, 208 Leadership 35 Program 73, 153, 158–163, 164– 172

Stars 139–145 Post-mainstream culture 247–251 Post-Mao Leadership 12, 15 Practicalization 42 Praise the Red and Strike down the Black 1 Proletariat Dictatorship of the 3, 17, 23–24, 47, 87, 155, 254 Paragon 68, 81, 100

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R

Regime Chinese 106–107, 109, 237 Communist 110, 114 Mao 5, 14, 105, 110, 113

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The Use of Mao and the Chongqing Model

New 110, 251, 259 Party 3, 7–8, 194, 200 Socialist 40, 115 Totalitarian 110 Reinvention 14–26 Religionization 48–52 Repression 61, 125, 232, 235, 267 Republic 2, 3, 8, 11, 17–18, 20, 26–27, 30, 46, 47, 53, 56, 65, 68, 72, 88, 121, 171, 216, 228, 239–242, 250– 261, 263–265, 267–268, 270–273 Resistance 7, 20, 57–63, 144, 159, 186–187, 208, 270 Return to Asia 7, 209 Revolution Cultural 2, 5, 12–19, 23, 27–37, 40, 46–47, 49, 54–57, 60–61, 65–66, 68–69, 77, 83–84, 89, 98, 102, 111, 113, 120–139, 145–147, 154, 158, 177–178, 192–193, 200, 202, 208, 215, 231, 243, 246, 267, 282, 284, 293–294, 299, 300, 305, 313

Scientific outlook on development 25–27, 29, 36, 38 Semi-feudal, semi-colonial 29, 265 Serve the people 49, 51, 53, 62, 76, 192 Sing Red campaign 183, 193–194, 207, 192–197 Single-party dictatorship 5, 107, 110– 111 Sinicizing and popularizing Marxism campaign 4, 82 Smash the Four Old movement 49 Social Equality 4, 73, 76, 244 Harmony 5, 87, 107, 111 Security 7, 75–76, 125, 183, 188, 198–200, 202, 204, 206, 208– 209, 211

Jasmine 79

Socialist Culture 268, 250, 265–272 Regime 40, 115 Road 17

Maoist (see also Maoism) 113

Solidarity 2

National 3, 15, 23, 34 New Democratic 13, 19, 22–23, 25, 34–35

Sovereignty 34, 94, 171, 175 Spiritual Civilization 4, 70, 220, 231

Rightist (see also liberals) 7, 78, 82–86, 201–202, 210, 258–259

State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) 238, 240

Rule

State Capitalism 12

One-party 5, 107, 110, 112, 153, 159, 163, 165, 215, 229–230

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S

State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) 55, 57, 169–170, 174, 184, 269

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Index

Status quo 78, 102–104, 112, 186, 209 Strike Black campaign 192–197, 208 Style Generational 6, 149 Leadership 54, 140 Successive Leadership 15, 28

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Three represents 5, 25–27, 29, 36, 38, 195, 262, Tiananmen Square 9, 45–47, 52, 68, 85, 171, 177, 282 Totalitarian regime 110 Traditional Icon 48–52 Traumatizing history 304–315

T Talk at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art 8, 232 The Dead 21, 217–222 The Fall of the Red Sun 83, 262 The Founding of a Republic 72, 78, 82–86, 201–202, 210, 258–259 The Great Helmsman (see also Mao Zedong) 3, 45–47, 52, 58, 60, 62– 63, 66, 69–70, 73, 83, 86, 92–93, 95, 101 The Living 217–222 The Mass Line 61, 115, 214, 222–228 The Number One 53, 141, 149–150 The Red Sun 3, 9, 45–46, 49, 52, 58, 83, 262, 291 The Virtual 217–222 Thought Mao Zedong 1–3, 13–30, 32, 35–36, 38, 40, 43, 47, 51, 53, 58, 67, 73, 80, 81, 88, 149, 157, 193, 195, 255, 262

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Twelfth Five-Year Plan 75

U Unofficial use of Mao’s visual image (see also official use of Mao’s visual image) 277–286 Urban-Rural Segregation 75 Use of Mao 244, 277–286, 299, 305, 316, 317

V Visual Art 10 Images 9, 10, 277–291, 293–294, 297–308, 310, 312–313, 315–318

W Web 2.0 7, 216, 220, 233–234

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