Two months ago Qiushi, the central “theory” journal of the Communist Party of China, published a speech originally given by Xi Jinping several days after he was named General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. The speech is Xi’s attempt to answer questions that are smack-dab in the center of the Party’s current problems: why does the Communist Party exist? What is ‘socialist’ about socialism with Chinese characteristics? What should the Party’s attitude towards its Maoist history be? Is China in an ideological competition with the Western world, or not?
The minute I read it, I realized it needed to be translated into English.Yesterday Palladium Magazine published my translation of the speech and an introduction I wrote to contextualize it. From my introduction to the piece:
One of the most striking aspects of this speech is the language Xi Jinping invokes: party members must have “faith” (xìnyǎng) in the eventual victory of socialism; proper communists must be “devout” (qiánchéng) in their work; and Party members must be prepared to “sacrifice” (xīshēng) everything, up to their own blood, for revolutionary “ideals that reach higher than heaven” (gémìng lǐxiǎng gāo yú tiān).
Behind this religiously charged language is a man deeply worried that the cadres of his generation are not prepared to make the sort of sacrifices their parents and grandparents did for China’s revolutionary cause. Xi’s verdict is that such people do not have enough faith in the “eventual demise of capitalism and the ultimate victory of socialism.” Their “views lack a firm grounding in historical materialism,” leading them to doubt that “socialism is bound to win.” This has practical consequences. The cadre without communist convictions will act “hedonistically” and “self-interestedly.” Worst of all, he might begin to believe “false arguments that we should abandon socialism” altogether.
For Xi, this would be a grave betrayal of the Party’s heritage. The Communist Party of China is tasked with “building a socialism that is superior to capitalism” whose economic and technological prowess will give it “the dominant position” in world affairs. And though Xi asserts that this is inevitable, “the road will be tortuous.” Party members must fiercely fend off ideological attacks on socialism with Chinese characteristics. The most pressing ideological problems identified in this speech are two ‘false arguments:’ First, that the mass death, cruelty, and poverty of Maoist China undermines the credibility of the Party leadership today, and second, that socialism with Chinese characteristics is not really socialism at all.
More significant than Xi’s use of Marxist theory to justify any particular policy is his conviction that he leads an ideological-political system distinct from that of the capitalist world. Threats to this system are not framed in military or economic terms, but ideological ones. The Soviet Union fell, he declares, “because ideological competition is fierce.” If the faith of its cadres remains fervent, Xi believes his Party will succeed where the Soviet Union could not.
I encourage you to go and read the full thing. Based off of reactions on twitter, this has been an eye opening document for many. It was less eye opening for me, for I am about halfway through Xi Jinping’s two-volume Governance of China, and he repeats many of the same themes throughout that work. The difference is though is that in Governance these ideas are spread about his speeches a bit haphazardly–a paragraph here, a paragraph there, and then another paragraph five pages down the line. They are also often translated in a way which downplays the explicitly Maoist and Stalinist terminology that Xi is fond of using. This speech, in contrast, is a very concentrated dose of Xi’s communist convictions.
One thing which I did not emphasize in the introduction I typed up, but probably should have, is the intended audience for this document. The original speech was given behind closed doors to the Central Committee; this version, which may or may not be the same as the original, was published in the Party’s main theory journal. The average Chinese does not read Qiushi. Cadres read Qiushi. This speech is not intended to persuade the masses but to instruct and guide Party leadership. One practical consequence of this is that some passages are difficult and boring to read. Xi slips easily into sloganeering, replacing coherent thought with a stream of sloganized summaries of policy platforms and institutional arrangements of China’s party-state. I think Timothy Heath has offered the clearest explanation for why the Party leadership does this when they speak:
[In the Chinese theory system there are many] specialized concepts designed specifically to drive policy on very specific issues. For example, “socialist harmonious society.” There’s a major strategic concept. It is a very important term that the Chinese identified as an ideal that had the Marxist vetting and was grounded in Marxist theory needed to allow their bureaucrats to develop policy to address social welfare issues: healthcare, retirement, education. That’s all wrapped up in this word ‘socialist harmonious society.’ It is designed primarily for bureaucrats, officials and decision makers. It is not really designed to mobilize the people. In fact most people ridicule, deride, and make fun of these archaic sounding Marxist concepts. But here is the thing: the Communist Party does not really care all that much. What they really care about is that their officials get it. That they understand what to do with these concepts, how to develop them into policies, and how to implement them. That is really where a lot of the CPC’s energy is focused on today. Informing the bureaucratic elite instead of mobilizing the entire people.
When Xi speaks to non-Party audiences, especially foreign ones, he goes lighter on the slogans and heavier on allusions to classical sources. (I also suppose you will not hear Xi talking much at Davos about the ultimate defeat of the capitalist system either!)
There is still a lot to be done in this space. In the future I hope to tie together the things you read in this speech with other things Xi has said in interviews, other speeches, and other documents of note. Nor is Xi alone in this story—the importance of China’s revolutionary heritage matters to many of the Party’s current leaders. By and large it was their parents who made revolutionary China possible. It is naive to think that this has no bearing on their children’s ideological commitments today.
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