On July 1, Chinese President Jiang Zemin (江澤民) formally elaborated on his policy of "three represents" (三個代表), stating unequivocally that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) should allow capitalists and businessmen to join. This major policy announcement by Beijing makes clear that the party's nature is now undergoing radical changes.
Since its establishment in 1921, the party has always considered itself to be a proletarian vanguard organization composed of outstanding members of the working class. In the past, it vowed to eradicate the capitalist class in China and establish a dictatorship of the proletariat to struggle for the benefit of workers and farmers.
Not long after the party was established, a plan was put forth to topple the capitalist KMT regime and establish a new Chinese-Soviet Republic (中華蘇維埃共和國). The political view being advocated was to become a republic in the Soviet Union and to fight for the defense of the Soviet Union.
At the end of the 1920s, the KMT regime headed by Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) was characterized by one-party authoritarian rule, exalting the Three Principles of the People (三民主義), and the theory of holding the country, the people, and the leadership in highest esteem. The Communists referred to this as fascist rule. The KMT used the party to lead both the government and the military.
Capitalist financial consortiums, the landlord class, stalwart soldiers and liberal intellectuals were the elite core of the KMT, which was open to all the people. Anyone who acknowledged the Three Principles of the People and Chiang's leadership could join the KMT, and the regime took the path of allying with the US and opposing Japan and the Soviet Union. It accepted investment and loans from US and British financial consortiums. Numerous students went abroad to study in Europe and the US, and after returning home, they took positions in the government and universities. At the same time, Chiang tolerated the existence and public activities of the Chinese Youth Party (中國青年黨) and the Chinese Democratic Socialist Party (中國社民黨) in mainland China.
The post-1980 Chinese Communist Party is walking the same path that the KMT previously followed under Chiang. The Communist regime is characterized by one-party authoritarian rule, exalting socialism and nationalism, the party's leadership in the government, absolute party leadership of the military, and party control over a vast majority of the entire nation's property, capital and resources. The effect is that the bureaucracy monopolizes the capitalist class. Technocrats, intellectuals, military officers, and capitalists have become the party's elite core, and the party has begun to open up to the people.
Anyone who acknowledges socialism and the leadership of Jiang can join the party. The party is taking the path of allying with the US, accepting investment and loans from financial consortiums in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Europe, the US, and Japan. Numerous students are going abroad to study in the US, Europe, and Japan. After returning home, they take positions in the government and universities. Eight token political parties exist and operate under the control of leaders in the party's central committee.
The similarities are clear. The current style of authoritarian rule by the CCP is virtually the same as the previous style of authoritarian rule by the KMT. Permitting capitalists to participate in the party's policy implementation process is virtually a reprint of Chiang Kai-shek's regime.
There are still differences between the old KMT and the Communist Party, however. Chiang openly declared that the KMT would proceed with political reform from a system of martial law through a period of political tutelage to constitutional government and finally would return power to the people. He instituted legal provisions for local autonomy and required that the popular election of local leaders be implemented. Although the KMT had a system of news censorship, they still allowed China's Xinhua Daily (
After the KMT retreated to Taiwan, it implemented political and economic reforms. Under the direction of Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), the political promise to return power to the people was finally fulfilled. Laws against the formation of other political parties and newspapers were repealed, direct presidential elections were carried out, and finally there was a changeover in the ruling party. By comparison, the Communist Party still has not allowed these things to happen in China.
By proposing the political path of the Communist Party's "three represents," Jiang obviously showed that he wants to follow Nikita Khrushchev of the former Soviet Union, ie, turning the Communist Party into a party of all the people. Looking at the similarities in their political paths, Jiang's role and status are somewhat similar to those of Khrushchev. If Jiang's path of the "three represents" can be passed at the Communist's 16th Party Congress, then Jiang will truly be China's Khrushchev and it will be impossible to neglect or diminish his historical position.
The party's path of the "three represents" should be beneficial for China. It represents a change, after all, in the party's enormous body. The changes in the Soviet Union followed the eras of Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko, Gorbachev, and Yeltsin, finally leading to the disintegration of the authoritarian system and the establishment of a democratic Russian political entity. Looked at in terms of this series of comparisons, it appears that the current enormous changes in China at the economic and social level have already started to alter the political superstructure.
The results are predictable. The prospects on the path of the "three represents" will cause the party's ideology to gradually crumble or will cause the party to transform into a social-democratic party. This kind of prospect will have enormous and irreversible influence on China and its relations with Taiwan. The positive benefit should outweigh the negative influence. Jiang's policy of permitting capitalists to join the party will change the nature of the political body. This is a historically significant policy that causes the Communist Party to follow in the KMT's footsteps and come close to becoming a social-democratic party.
Completing an 80-year cycle, the Communist Party is currently doing what Chiang Kai-shek did in the past. Clearly when the communist movement toppled Chiang Kai-shek's KMT regime, it was nothing more than a struggle to seize political power. The "new democratism" (
We can predict that the historical tide will force it to follow the KMT. It may evolve into a party of all the people or a social-democratic party. Ultimately it will have to drop the prohibitions on forming other political parties and newspapers, and promote multi-party politics and the popular election of officials at all levels.
Jiang's acceptance of the proposal to allow capitalists into the party is largely due to pressure to acknowledge reality. He had no choice. In the past 23 years of reforms and opening up to the outside world, 130,000 party members and cadres have already become business leaders and capitalists. Young and promising private businessmen are surging forth in large numbers and taking control of the country's fiscal administration and economic power. To avoid a situation in which this group of young capitalists finds another political path and comes into conflict with the party's authority, these business leaders will be drawn into the party's fold so they can be used and controlled. This is truly a superior strategy for the party, which has already become a true capitalist political organization.
The change in the nature of the CCP will necessarily influence relations across the Taiwan Strait. The ruling and opposition parties in Taiwan have never been willing to accept China's policy of "one country, two systems" (一國兩制). One of the important reasons for this is that the political systems on the two sides of the Strait are different. The people in Taiwan fear that China would implement a communist system in Taiwan.
Now that Jiang has put forth the theory of the "three represents" permitting capitalists to join the party, protecting private property, and encouraging the development of private property, the Taiwanese people's fear of the Communist Party will gradually diminish. As the economic systems on both sides of the Strait draw closer together, the mutual influence between the two sides will expand. This will have a beneficial effect on mutual understanding and peaceful coexistence.
With the changes in the nature of the Communist Party -- including a leadership that is more youthful, more intellectual, more capitalist, and broader in its international vision -- leaders on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, particularly Communist Party and KMT officials, will gradually find a common language. A similar background will mitigate the historical grievances, and common economic interests will impel the ruling and opposition parties on both sides to build mutual respect and create conditions of peaceful coexistence on the basis of mutual equality.
The "three represents" theory and the policy of drawing capitalists into the party will reduce the anxiety that the Western world feels toward the Communist Party. The Western world will increase its investment in China and exchanges of all sorts with that country, which will in turn reduce conflict.
Completing an 80-year cycle, the Communist Party has returned to its origins. Although it has done numerous evil and despicable deeds in the past, if it can start out anew and learn the lessons of the KMT's failure and subsequent success, as well as the lessons of the world's other political and economic successes and failures, then it should take the road of social democracy in accordance with prevailing historical trends.
Kam Yiu-yu is a former editor in chief of the Hong Kong-based Wen Wei Po. Chris Wu is editor in chief of China Spring and China Affairs magazines. Translated by Ethan Harkness
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