Chinese President Hu Jintao has revived a key Maoist concept - "correctly
handling contradictions among the people" - so as to more effectively tackle
China's growing socio-political instability.
In a speech to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) politburo on the eve of the
October 1 National Day, Hu urged party cadres to "boost [society's] harmonious
factors to the maximum degree" through implementing policies that "match the
wishes of the people, that take care of the people's worries, and that can win
over the hearts of the people".
The supremo also vowed that the CCP would render decision-making "scientific
and democratic" and that policies would be anchored upon "the fundamental
interests of the broad masses". While a number of CCP heavyweights, including
politburo member
and Chongqing party secretary Bo Xilai, have also re-hoisted the flag of
Maoism, the president's restitution of one of the Great Helmsman's most famous
slogans carries special significance.
To fully understand the import of Hu's message, it is instructive to compare
the background of Mao Zedong's 1957 landmark address - "On the correct handling
of contradictions among the people" - and the situation unraveling today.
The late chairman's speech on fomenting unity among the nation's disparate
sectors was made in the wake of the Hungarian Incident of 1956, an early climax
of Eastern Europe's rebellion against the communist yoke.
In China too, intellectuals were beginning to have misgivings about the
dictatorial rule of Mao and his comrades. By and large, Mao proposed
reconciliatory measures to iron out differences among social groupings. He
indicated that while there were signs of disaffection with the authorities,
these were "contradictions among the people" because even oppositionists shared
"the fundamental identity of [all] the people's interests". He recommended that
the CCP "use the democratic method of persuasion and education" to woo the
disgruntled elements.
Hu is invoking Mao's authority at a special juncture in his career - and in the
country's development. The 18th CCP congress - which will witness the wholesale
changing of the guard - is just two years away, and Hu wants to ensure his
legacy of having brought prosperity and stability to the country.
Moreover, the president admitted that owing to "unbalanced, uncoordinated and
unsustainable development" contradictions among the people - in particular
friction among different blocs of vested interests - will become exacerbated in
the foreseeable future. Several slogans raised during the first term of Hu's
tenure (2002 to 2007) - especially "putting people first" - have clear Maoist
roots. "Correctly handle the contradictions among the people" could become the
leitmotif of the CCP leadership's domestic policy at least until the 18th party
congress.
In his politburo address, Hu laid out multi-pronged tactics to attenuate
society's contradictions. Foremost are improving people's livelihood,
safeguarding people's rights and privileges, and "upholding social equality and
justice".
Secondly, Hu instructed officials "to acquit themselves well with
masses-oriented work". This is shorthand for being close to the masses
particularly with a view to promoting reconciliation. Hu pledged that
grassroots officials would spend more time talking to the masses and handling
their petitions so that cadres can "hear the people's voice in good time".
Thirdly, Hu proposed "strengthening social management and rendering social
management innovative". This included boosting "social coordination and
participation by the public" under effective party-and-government supervision.
Compared to the mid-1950s, Beijing has substantially more funds and other
resources to tackle social conflicts. In his politburo talk, Hu indicated that
fast economic growth in the past two decades had "laid down a solid
materialistic foundation" for raising living standards and ensuring social
equality.
Last month, politburo member and vice head of the Central Commission on
Political and Legal Affairs, Wang Lequan, cited a new emphasis in the
leadership's efforts to promote stability: puhui, or "spreading benefits
among the people".
Wang, who won notoriety for his harsh crackdown on dissidents and "splittists"
in Xinjiang, indicated that "a terminal solution" to the issue of social
stability would be "devoting more financial resources to solving practical
problems in which the masses are interested, such as housing, employment,
education, health care and social security".
In the first half of 2010, minimum wages in dozens of cities were raised by up
to 28%. New social-security benefits including old-age pension for farmers were
introduced for the first time. In select cities, education and social-welfare
provisions for migrant workers and their children have been augmented.
The government has also rolled out measures to cool down real-estate
speculation. This is in view of the fact that runaway property prices have been
cited as the number one problem facing members of the working as well as middle
classes. Anti-speculation measures have ranged from tightening criteria for
mortgages to preventing property developers from hoarding land. Last week,
central authorities issued a circular warning regional officials that they will
be penalized if housing prices in their areas of jurisdiction continue to rise.
Even the official media, however, has criticized the authorities for failing to
spread wealth more evenly. The major beneficiaries of two decades of
uninterrupted prosperity have been the central government and 130 state-held
conglomerates.
For example, state coffers are expected to rake in some 8 trillion yuan (US$1.2
trillion) in taxation and other incomes this year, or four times that of 2003.
Despite the global financial crisis, the 130 government-run corporations
realized revenues of 815 billion yuan ($121.64 billion) last year, up 17.1%
from 2008.
The four state-controlled banks made profits of 1.4 billion yuan ($208.95
million) per day in the first half of this year. People's Daily pointed out
that "the people are paying more attention to how the profits [of giant state
firms] are being distributed and used". "When can the entire people enjoy the
profits reaped by these enterprises?" asked the CCP's mouthpiece.
Indeed, laborers' salaries as a percentage of gross domestic product have been
declining for the past 20 years. At the same time, property prices in a number
of coastal cities have continued to rise in spite of the government's
cooling-down measures.
What is lacking, then, are clear-cut mechanisms and institutions to foster what
Hu called "social equality and justice". This is despite the fact that in his
remarkable politburo speech, Hu cited the word "innovation" four times when
talking about building institutions and systems to "safeguard the rights and
privileges of the masses".
Given that the CCP leadership has ruled out political reform, at least in the
near term, it is not surprising that there was no mention of radical steps such
as elections. Yet no concrete ways and means have been introduced for attaining
non-controversial goals such as a fairer distribution of the economic pie.
Take labor rights for example. At the height of the rash of industrial unrest
in the spring, scholars and government advisers advocated adopting
Western-style collective bargaining. Yet Beijing still shies away from allowing
workers to choose representatives to negotiate salaries and other benefits with
employers. Also deficient are institutionalized methods to prevent real-estate
speculation, which is partly due to collusion between developers and central-
and local-level officials.
Despite Hu's oft-repeated instructions about hearing the people's voices,
Beijing has also failed to come up with mechanisms to handle petitioners, the
legions of lower-class Chinese who seek to redress injustices they have
suffered at the hands of corrupt or callous officials. On the contrary, central
authorities seem to have acquiesced in brutal tactics adopted by regional
administrations to prevent petitioners from reaching Beijing.
Even the official media have reported about so-called "security companies"
employed by local governments to abduct petitioners, who are often illegally
detained in "black jails". It is partly due to such illegal activities that the
number of petitioners dropped by 2.7% last year compared to that of 2008.
Indeed, central and local officials seem most adept at using the government's
"solid materialistic foundation" to beef up the numbers and equipment of the
police and state-security agents as well as the People's Armed Police.
The 2010 national budget for police and other security units is 514.01 billion
yuan ($76.72 billion), 8.9% over that of last year. This law-enforcement outlay
is a mere 18 billion yuan ($2.69 billion) below that for the People's
Liberation Army.
Security-related expenditures in many localities have gone up dramatically. For
example, the police budget in Xinjiang this year is set at 2.89 billion yuan
($431.34 million), or 87.9% over that of 2009.
The party secretary of Lianjiang city, Guangdong province, caused a stir when
he proclaimed in August that senior officials "should not spare any expenses to
buy stability". In 2009, the city spent 31 million yuan ($4.63 million) on
police forces - as well as special squads to handle petitioners - or more than
similar outlays for the previous five years combined.
Here, disturbing parallels between Hu's and Mao's approaches to upholding
social stability become apparent. In his 1957 address, the Great Helmsman made
a distinction between contradictions among the people and "contradictions
between enemies and ourselves".
While Mao advocated "the democratic method of persuasion and education" with
regard to critics who shared the CCP's ideals, he indicated that so-called
people's foes - unreconstructed capitalists and "exploiters" as well as
elements bent on sabotaging the socialist order - should be put behind bars or
otherwise liquidated.
It seems evident, however, that the late chairman often lumped together these
two types of contradictions in accordance with political expediency. Just a few
months after his "contradictions" speech, Mao launched the infamous
"Anti-Rightist Movement", one of communist China's harshest campaigns against
liberal intellectuals. Victims of the movement included early advocates of
free-market reforms such as former premier Zhu Rongji.
Hu never mentioned "contradictions between enemies and ourselves" in his
politburo talk. Given the number of dissidents - in addition to other
"destabilizing elements" such as human-rights lawyers and non-governmental
organization activists - who have been harassed or detained in the past year,
however, it seems clear that the Hu leadership is using quasi-Maoist tactics
against its detractors.
In the past few weeks, the CCP's relentless attitude toward dissent was
evidenced by its high-decibel reaction to the nomination of Liu Xiaobo, China's
best-known dissident, for the Nobel Peace Prize this year.
Given Mao's residual appeal, Hu's re-hoisting of Great Helmsman's standards can
be interpreted as a stratagem to win over still-powerful conservative party
members. Yet unless viable measures are spelled out to better the lot,
particularly of disadvantaged sectors, the resuscitation of the late chairman's
"theory of contradictions" can hardly solve the increasingly serious problem of
social instability.
Dr Willy Wo-Lap Lam is a senior fellow at The Jamestown Foundation. He
has worked in senior editorial positions in international media including
Asiaweek newsmagazine, South China Morning Post, and the Asia-Pacific
Headquarters of CNN. He is the author of five books on China, including the
recently published Chinese Politics in the Hu Jintao Era: New Leaders,
New Challenges. Lam is an adjunct professor of China studies at Akita
International University, Japan, and at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
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