The 16-Point Decision on direct democracy

[celticfire]

I've been studying the detail accounts of the Cultural Revolution from several books, all with an array of different opinions about the 16-Point decision

The Resolutions of the Eleventh Plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/classics/mao/cpc/cc_res_11p.html)

First of all its an important historical document because it shows there were guide lines for behavior, etc. and disproves the myth that the Red Guards were "programmed" for violence.

But I want to talk about the ninth point, which talks about the new political system:


9. Many new things have begun to emerge in the great proletarian Cultural Revolution. The cultural revolutionary groups, committees and other organizational forms created by the masses in many schools and units are something new and of great historic importance.

These cultural revolutionary groups, committees and congresses are excellent new forms of organization whereby under the leadership of the Communist Party the masses are educating themselves. They are an excellent bridge to keep our party in close contact with the masses. They are organs of power of the proletarian Cultural Revolution.

The struggle of the proletariat against the old ideas, culture, customs and habits left over from all the exploiting classes over thousands of years will necessarily take a very, very long time. Therefore, the cultural revolutionary groups, committees and congresses should not be temporary organizations but permanent, standing mass organizations. They are suitable not only for colleges, schools and government and diner organizations, but generally also for factories, mines, other enterprises, urban districts and villages.

It is necessary to institute a system of general elections, like that of the Paris commune, for electing members to the cultural revolutionary groups and committees and delegates to the cultural revolutionary congresses. The lists of candidates should be put forward by the revolutionary masses after full discussion, and the elections should be held after the masses have discussed the lists over and over again.

The masses are entitled at any time to criticize members of the cultural revolutionary groups and committees and delegates elected to the cultural revolutionary congresses. If these members or delegates prove incompetent, they can be replaced through election or recalled by the masses after discussion.

The cultural revolutionary groups, committees and congresses in colleges and schools should consist mainly of representatives of the revolutionary students. At the same time, they should have a certain number of representatives of the revolutionary teaching staff and workers.


Some authors say it was have caused nothing but choas to have actually implmented it, being how factioned the red guards were, while others say it was the emergence of the real working class struggle for socialism in China.
(for those who don't know, the red guards were factionalized and would often violently attack eachother, the PLA was sent in to bring order, and the Triple Alliance or Revolutionary Committees were created, which included 40% representatives from the masses, 20% from the Party, and 40% from the PLA. There were also used in factories, schools, etc...)

What does everyone think?

I mean ultimately the Cultural Revolution failed to purge the capitalist roaders, and it might have been different if point 9 had actually been implemented. On the other hand it might have led to a HUGE blood bath...I don't know....

[Red Powers]

Well, I don't know either but since the GPCR did fail to eliminate the capitalists, maybe Paris Commune style democracy would have been better.

But I'm curious as to why you fear there would have been a HUGE bloodbath. Were the Chinese masses just homicidal maniacs? Would this bloodbath have any class content? Who would it be directed at? I'm no expert on China but it seems as if the elimination of capitalists in the 60s might have hindered their coup in the 70s no?

[celticfire]

I was actually being sarcastic about the blood bath thing, because a number of Cultural Revolution historians make the assertion that the Culutral Revolution was a Nazi-esque power grab by Mao who manipulated the masses, and thus you have the excess of the CR. Of course these historians completely ignore the victories and tremendous accomplishments of the CR.

But as far as implementing the direct democracy, I don't know.

Revisionism can still occur under direct democracy.

You'll notice that once in power, the revisionists were fast to abolish or deform the revolutionary committees, which indicates to me they really didn't like those.

Or even maybe China didn't have the material basis for socialism at all, and a bourgeois class was bound to take power.

I don't have any answers, just lots of questions....

[Punk Rocker]

In a big ass country like China, direct democracy would only work if it was local. Otherwise the minorities would have no voice.

It sucks that China is falling to free trade, but I like how their republic works, you just couldn't have direct democracy over the whole country there because there are so many different groups that would have no voice without their elected leaders.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 19 2005, 12:16 PM
First of all its an important historical document because it shows there were guide lines for behavior, etc. and disproves the myth that the Red Guards were "programmed" for violence.
How? Actions speak louder than words.


(from the resolution)It is necessary to institute a system of general elections, like that of the Paris commune, for electing members to the cultural revolutionary groups and committees and delegates to the cultural revolutionary congresses.

This, for example, had even less significance than some politician's campaign promise. As you seem to know, because you're talking about how it wasn't implemented.

Why do you assume the rest of the resolution meant anything at all?

There were two kinds of articles in the Chinese press of this period: articles giving the line, and articles showing how the line was to be implemented. Nobody was fool enough to try to implement the line based on the abstract sentiments in the first kind of article, or in resolutions, which might mean anything or nothing. Or if anybody was fool enough, they didn't last long.

Actually holding elections would not have served the interests of any faction in the Chinese Communist Party's leadership, particularly if there was freedom to campaign, advocate different views, and so forth. So there was never any possibility of any such thing happening.


(for those who don't know, the red guards were factionalized and would often violently attack eachother, the PLA was sent in to bring order, and the Triple Alliance or Revolutionary Committees were created, which included 40% representatives from the masses, 20% from the Party, and 40% from the PLA. There were also used in factories, schools, etc...)

It'd be more accurate to say: The CP leadership was factionalized - which is why there was a "Cultural Revolution" - and different factions organized different Red Guard groups to fight each other. Different elements of the PLA supported various factions, including by giving weapons to different Red Guard groups. Mao was sometimes able to use the army directly against his factional opponents, thanks to the support of army commander Lin Piao...who was later declared a "capitalist-roader" himself.

But Mao was not strong enough to wholly crush his opponents, so the "Revolutionary Committees" were set up as a compromise, in which the Red Guards, the traditional party bureaucracy, and the military were represented. The masses of working people were not, in fact, represented at all. The military under Lin Piao held the balance of power.

Leading to a situation where the military was so important to civilian politics in China, that Mao began to fear his declared heir, Lin Piao, would overthrow him....Lin Piao was accused of trying to organized a coup, and died while attempting to flee to the USSR. Leaving Mao very isolated and weak, so he reached out to Chou En-lai and even Deng Xiao-Ping.

Anyway, one reason for the "Revolutionary Committee" compromise: to some degree, the masses were becoming involved in politics through the Cultural Revolution. This would have been increased by any move towards elections or a smidgen of free speech. Conceivably a mass uprising might have upset the whole CCP apparatchik apple cart. That's probably the real basis of the fear of "bloodbath" which some Maoists use to justify Mao breaking his campaign promise. Repressive regimes that lighten up a little bit are often overthrown as a result.

If Mao was so afraid of the masses that he compromised with his opponents, he certainly wasn't going to do anything like hold elections, to increase the masses' role in Chinese politics...

I gotta ask, though: what makes you think it would have made any difference if the so-called "capitalist roaders" had been wholly eliminated? Even if accept the standard Maoist dogma on who is and is not a capitalist roader, it's amazing how often they kept popping up in the CCP...smash Liu and Lin emerges, smash Lin and Hua emerges...

***

"Direct democracy" has nothing to do with anything. Election of committees is representative democracy. Direct democracy means referenda and so forth, which were not proposed here nor used by the Paris Commune AFAIK.

But of course if you call the PRC's political system "democracy", you need some other term - "radical democracy" or "direct democracy", for what most people would call simply "democracy."

[celticfire]

Severian: Your assertions are mostly baseless. Lenin had to make some changes to the Soviet state during the Civil War - did that make his words just bourgeois campaign promises?

And there was many, many views being promoted among the great debates and big charecter posters, and other outlets. But I will admit, I wonder if things would have been better with more formal avenues to express views from below.

There were over 1,456 (see for example: The Chinese Communist Party in Power: 1948-1976, by Jacques Guillermaz, 1972) different groups calling themselves Red Guards. You forget, or completely ignore that it was a grass roots movement not a movement from the top, even if it was initiated from Mao himself.

As far as capitalist-roader, you're pointing to a very real problem and contradiction. Revisionism (as redstar2000 once said) is not a product of personal villany, but has an economic base. It wasn't just that Liu was a "bad guy", I think he was honest when he said he didn't understand what the Cultural Revolution was about.

And finally - there were elections in socialist China, and even more after the Cultural Revolution. It's amazing how fast and obediant you step into line with the bourgeois line of history.

Look - my attitude isn't "do everything China did!" But I think completely ignoring the attempts at building socialism there isn't going to help us in the future. I am interesting in solving the problems of the past to do better in the future, not ignoring the past to attempt an idealist future.

Part of your criticism is correct. Freedom of speech wasn't the attitude of the Cultural Revolution. Keeping in mind this (atleast to the people involved) was a struggle over the survival of socialism. That doesn't excuse the mistakes, especially how intellectuals were treated. But again, there were guidelines (from the 16-point decision):

Care should be taken to distinguish strictly between the reactionary bourgeois scholar despots and ‘authorities' on the one hand and people who have the ordinary bourgeois academic ideas on the other.
...

It is normal for the masses to hold different views. Contention between different views is unavoidable, necessary and beneficial. In the course of normal and full debate, the masses will affirm what is right, correct what is wrong and gradually reach unanimity.

The method to be used in debates is to present the facts, reason things out, and persuade through reasoning. Any method of forcing a minority holding different views to submit is impermissible. The minority should be protected, because sometimes the truth is with the minority. Even if the minority is wrong, they should still be allowed to argue their case and reserve their views.

When there is a debate, it should be conducted by reasoning, not by coercion or force.

In the course of debate, every revolutionary should be good at thinking things out for himself and should develop the communist spirit of daring to think, daring to speak and daring to act. On the premise that they have the same main orientation, revolutionary comrades should, for the sake of strengthening unity, avoid endless debate over side issues.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 21 2005, 12:05 AM
Severian: Your assertions are mostly baseless. Lenin had to make some changes to the Soviet state during the Civil War - did that make his words just bourgeois campaign promises?
What does that have to do with anything? This is not a change that was made, but rather a promised change which was not made.


And there was many, many views being promoted among the great debates and big charecter posters, and other outlets.

Of the posters, that may be true to a degree. 'Course that's a press of only a few copies - a fairly harmless outlet for frustration. Even that was cracked down on periodically.


There were over 1,456 (see for example: The Chinese Communist Party in Power: 1948-1976, by Jacques Guillermaz, 1972) different groups calling themselves Red Guards. You forget, or completely ignore that it was a grass roots movement not a movement from the top, even if it was initiated from Mao himself.

No, I deny that "it was a grass roots movement not a movement from the top, even if it was initiated from Mao himself."

The different Red Guards were all subsidized by different elements of the state machine (under control of different factions.) They received privileges like free travel which were significant in the context of China's economic level. They were even armed by different elements of the army! The Maoist element of the Red Guards were directed by the Cultural Revolution Group in Beijing, appointed by Mao; other elements were directed by other factions of the CCP leadership, includin the Liu/Deng faction.

The Red Guards were, in fact, state-sponsored means of extralegal repression. Elements of them may have escaped from state control and become something else...and certainly some genuine mass involvement developed in the course of the Cultural Revolution.

But the biggest example of genuine mass involvement was the Shanghai workers' strike...which the Red Guards "seized power" to suppress! If the Shanghai workers were supporting any element of the CCP leadership, it was the Liu faction, which was more inclined to make economic concessions to the working class. The Mao faction tended to condemn any wage or benefit increase as "material incentives".


As far as capitalist-roader, you're pointing to a very real problem and contradiction. Revisionism (as redstar2000 once said) is not a product of personal villany, but has an economic base. It wasn't just that Liu was a "bad guy", I think he was honest when he said he didn't understand what the Cultural Revolution was about.

When did Liu say that?

And what would that economic base be? Privileged administrators in the state apparatus, maybe? A social layer which tends to grow under conditions of economic and cultural backwardness and isolation, under the pressure of a capitalist world? Such bureaucrats do incline towards "revisionism" in its old meaning - seeking an accomodation with the capitalists. They serve as a conduit for capitalist values, and ultimately aspire to become capitalists themselves.

You'll get a much clearer explanation of this in "The Revolution Betrayed" by Trotsky than from Redstar, let alone any CCP document.


And finally - there were elections in socialist China, and even more after the Cultural Revolution. It's amazing how fast and obediant you step into line with the bourgeois line of history.

As you've admitted before, those elections were not contested. That is, there was one candidate chosen from above.


But I think completely ignoring the attempts at building socialism there isn't going to help us in the future. I am interesting in solving the problems of the past to do better in the future, not ignoring the past to attempt an idealist future.

I think completely ignoring the facts of what Mao actually did isn't going to help you do that.

Also, you're assuming in advance that Mao was attempting to build socialism....which does not fit the facts, and would not be in his class interest.'

If you want to study actual attempts to build socialism, there's the first few years of the Soviet Union...and there's Cuba. Leaving aside those revolutions which didn't get to the point of overthrowing capitalist ownership.


That doesn't excuse the mistakes, especially how intellectuals were treated.

It's necessary to distinguish between mistakes and crimes.


But again, there were guidelines (from the 16-point decision):

Which had nothing to do with what the Red Guards actually did.

Heck, you can't even apply that method of debate here! ("The method to be used in debates is to present the facts, reason things out, and persuade through reasoning.") Instead you use a faith-based method of debate.

I will point out the premise in those "16 points" is flawed: "The struggle of the proletariat against the old ideas, culture, customs and habits left over from all the exploiting classes". The culture inherited from the past is the only culture humanity has. It's necessary to build on it if anything more progressive it to be built.

If the old culture is "struggled against" and smashed under the slogan "the older, the more reactionary"...the result can only be a step backward to a lower level of culture. And of course it is precisely the low level of culture in China, Russia, etc. (illiteracy!) which was one of the most important factors in the growth of the bureaucracy....if Mao wanted to fight against that, he would have expanded the schools and universities, not shut them down! He would have published a greater range of books, rather than near-stopping all publication of anything but his own writing...

The resolution even speaks of "reactionary bourgeois" scientific theories...which smacks of Lysenkoist pseudoscientific quackery.

[celticfire]

severian: I will admit intellectuals and intellectual discourse in general wasn't permitted as it should have been. That was a real shortcoming.

On the elections: single-canidate elections are still elections. I think there should be contested elections under socialism, but I don't ignore that there were a form of elections in China - like you do. I think formal democracy needed to be expanded, and there needed to be some form of accountability of the party to the people. The CR was a primitive attempt at all of that.

My point with Lenin is that all of the "promises" he made didn't all materialize under his leadership. You ignore that and attack Mao? Don't get me wrong - I am not attacking Lenin. Plans don't always go through, it doesn't mean the intention wasn't there.
:marx:

I think we'd both agree we want a socialist democracy based on the Leninist principals (not a Stalinist one....!)

Lets agree on that, can we?

[Severian]

No, I don't think we do agree on that, or anything else here.

[celticfire]

From: Modern China (http://www.wsu.edu:8001/~dee/MODCHINA/COMM2.HTM)

The State
The government established by the Communists was centralized in a single body, the Central People's Government Council, which exercised all executive, legislative, and judicial powers. This council consisted of a chairman (Mao), six vice-chairmen, and fifty-six members elected by the People's Political Consultative Council. When the Central People's Government Council, which met twice a month, was not in session, its powers were assumed by a twenty member body called the State Administrative Council headed by a premiere (Chou En-lai); when this body was not in session, the state powers fell to the chairman of the state (Mao).

In 1953, voting rights were extended to all citizens over the age of eighteen except landlords and counterrevolutionaries. In 1954, the first local assemblies were elected and these assemblies in turn elected provincial assemblies, which in turn elected the National People's Congress, which approved a new constitution on September 28. This constitution ratified centralized democracy and spelled out a series of rights that all citizens would enjoy. Paramount, however, in this list of rights was the exclusion of counterrevolutionary individuals; the Chinese bill of rights also reserved for the state the power to "reform traitors and counterrevolutionaries." That is, every Chinese citizen had the full line of legal rights and guarantees unless they disagreed with the government.

From: History of the PRC (http://www-chaos.umd.edu/history/prc.html)

Major political developments included the centralization of party and government administration. Elections were held in 1953 for delegates to the First National People's Congress, China's national legislature, which met in 1954. The congress promulgated the state constitution of 1954 and formally elected Mao chairman (or president) of the People's Republic; it elected Liu Shaoqi ( 1898-1969) chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress; and named Zhou Enlai premier of the new State Council.

From: China Today (http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/20021/1950nian.htm)

The national election in 1953 was a great and unprecedented event in China. It indicated the participation in the administration of state affairs of hundreds of millions of Chinese, and their enthusiasm for building new China into a beautiful and prosperous country. The following article, written by Jin Zhonghua, first chairman of the editorial board of China Reconstructs, presents vividly to readers this great event.

In the elections, hundreds of millions of people have already begun to go to the polls. They will choose their own representatives to over 280 thousand people's congresses of the basic level mainly in the hsiang (villages) in which there is a deputy for every one or two hundred inhabitants. In subsequent rounds, deputies will be elected for the people's congresses of the 2,037 hsien (counties), the 30 provinces, the 153 major municipalities, the various national autonomous areas -- and finally for the National People's Congress.

The people's congresses will in turn elect the people's government of corresponding grades. The National People's Congress will adopt a national constitution, approve the outline of the first five-year plan and elect a new Central People's Government.

When the process is completed, organs of state power in China will become fully elective. The popular saying that gained currency after liberation, "We people have risen from our knees and are running our own house", will be truer than ever before. This will be the greatest extension of democracy, in terms of the number of people involved, ever to have occurred in human history.

(From "World's Biggest Election" by Ching Chung-hwa [Jin Zhonghua], July-August, 1953.)

From: Constitution of the PRC (http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/classics/mao/cpc/constitution1975.html) (1975)

The people's congresses at all levels and all other organs of state practise democratic centralism. Deputies to the people's congresses at all levels are elected through democratic consultation. The electoral units and electors have the power to supervise the deputies they elect and to replace them at any time according to provisions of law.

Obviously there were elections in socialist China. I have admitted there short comings, but they did exist. I do not and refuse to see that contested elections are paramount to a democracy. Yes, they are desirable, yes we should have them in future socialist societies, but I will not negate the history of socialist China to pander to bourgeois lies like you severian.

[Severian]

The mere fact that a country had elections and a parliament means nothing. Almost every country on earth today has some kind of elections. Even Saudi Arabia, now.

The Third Reich had elections, too. And a legislative body - the Reichstag. Hermann Goering was its speaker.

So frickin' what?

[celticfire]

Severian: This is true, just because there are elections doesn't make them valid ones. So what's your rule for measure as to what elections are ligit?

I also found this quote from Lenin - which is insightful for how the Soviets operated under Lenin:

"...if the working people are dissatisfied with their party they can elect other delegates, hand power to another party and change the government without any revolution at all..." (Lenin, Collected Works, Vol.26, Moscow, p.498).

I wonder if the RCP shares this view? I dunno...