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Party in survival effort to restore links with people
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XI Jinping, Chinese president and general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, has called belief the “master switch” for the CPC. “Ideals and belief are like vitamins for Communists,” Xi said in January this year.
In 1925, Mao Zedong wrote, “I have faith in Communism and advocate a proletarian social revolution.”
Deng Xiaoping, who orchestrated reform and opening-up, told a CPC national conference in 1985 that: “In the past, however small or weak our Party was, and whatever difficulties it faced, we maintained a great fighting capacity thanks to our faith in Marxism and Communism.”
Addressing a symposium in 1999 to mark the 78th anniversary of the CPC, Jiang Zemin, then general secretary of the central committee, said “Communists should adhere to socialism and Communism as their fundamental political convictions, as well as Marxist dialectical materialism and historical materialism as their outlook on the world.”
In 2006, Hu Jintao, Xi’s predecessor, told a ceremony for the 70th anniversary of the Long March that, “a lofty ideal and firm belief should be upheld as a great banner for pooling cohesive force and inspiring people to advance, as well as the source of strength for overcoming difficulties and winning battles.”
In an exhibition at Xibaipo, Hebei Province, about its revolutionary past, there is a display of six restrictions the CPC imposed on officials 65 years ago: do not celebrate one’s birthday; do not give gifts; fewer toasts at dinners; less applause at meetings; do not name a place after a person; do not honor a CPC official in the same way as prominent Communist leaders such as Marx and Lenin.
The CPC has always believed the behavior of its members, officials in particular, plays a serious part in its rule.
The recently introduced eight-point rule may have its origins in the early 1980s, when Xi was party chief of Zhengding County in Hebei. Locals still recall how Xi reacted to officialdom when he was a county official.
In the summer of 1983, Xi’s vehicle got stuck in the mire on a rural road. When they noticed that the passengers were officials, villagers refused to lend a hand and swore at them. Xi stopped one of the officials from berating the villagers and told them to reflect on why villagers might react this way. The incident was a prelude to a regulation requiring officials to reject bureaucracy, take the lead in eschewing unhealthy practices, cut meetings and receptions; and value work efficiency.
Over the past year, Party discipline has repeatedly barred officials from giving and receiving gifts bought with public money, and stopped them from going to fancy dinners during festivals and holidays. Xi has taken the lead in these measures. There are no traffic controls nor closure of public places during Xi’s domestic inspection tours.
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