Studies on the transformation of ideology in the Chinese Communist Party in Post-Mao China have been abundant and contentious. Perhaps that is why there so many differing viewpoints as to not only what degree socialism has been altered, but also the importance it has in CCP politics. While some scholars argue that socialist values altered but still remains influential in decision-making policies, many others argue otherwise, for they claim that ideology has been diluted to such a state that it no longer matters in the both the party as well as society. While this essay will not add any more confusion to the fray, it will attempt to analyze a sample of the differing opinions on this subjective dilemma. In taking a historiographical approach by analyzing the development of the literature from the late 1980s up to the present time, I will argue that no only has ideology changed in China as a result of historical and political circumstances, but so has the academic field.

Both published in 1986,[1] Arif Dirlik’s “Postsocialism? Reflections on ‘Socialism with Chinese Characteristics’” and Maurice Meisner’s “The Deradicalization of Chinese Socialism” examine the Chinese Communist ideological landscape prior to the Tiananmen protests. In contrast to the outrage and cynicism that scholars had about the CCP’s ideological intransigence after 1989, Dirlik and Meisner’s 1986 publications naively viewed the state’s gradual relaxation of its grip on society as indication that socialism was perhaps coming to an end in the CCP.

Arguing from a postmodern deconstructionist angle, Dirlik refers to the decline of ideology in China as “postsocialism.” Dirlik contends that Deng’s version of “socialism with Chinese characteristics” was a contradictory term, for pure Marxist ideology does not contain such “Chinese socialism.” Yet, because of the CCP’s continued support for such misshapen ideology, there was a “legitimation crisis” in the regime.[2] Dirlik argues that the CCP was merely using socialism “with Chinese characteristics” as a guard to prevent further descent into the amalgamation with the capitalist world system.[3] In doing so, the regime was returning to the “New Democracy” program that Sun Yat-sen and the Republicans proposed in early twentieth-century China.

Dirlik draws on the postmodern ideas of Jean-Francois Lyotard, particularly the opposition to grand metanarratives, in proposing that the CCP state was never “purely” socialist to begin with. Dirlik contends that Mao’s lifelong work of adapting socialism to suit the changing conditions in China, what Dirliks calls “localization of socialism,” was a violation and perversion of socialist theory.[4] In continuing Mao’s socialist vision, the Deng regime not only prolonging the fallacies of its predecessor, it also confronted the same indecision and uncertainties that plagued the CCP since its inception. In Dirlik’s view, “market socialism” was just aimless postsocialist lingo, with socialism but one of many possible alternatives.[5]

Meisner’s “The Deradicalization of Chinese Socialism” offers a less abstract approach of examining CCP ideology yet nonetheless agrees with Dirlik in that socialism had been “deradicalized” since the PRC’s inception in 1949. Unlike Dirlik’s cynical view, Meisner rationalizes that all states inevitably become conservative forces in order to preserve its power; indeed, the very concept of a “revolutionary state” is a contradiction in terms, a Leninist and Stalinist “invention” which is incongruous with original Marxist theoretical perspectives.[6] In Meisner’s view, because Mao had recognized this flaw, and thus devoted his career in resisting the regime’s deradicalizing tendencies, he was a unique and laudable post-revolutionary. Although he failed to create a socialist utopia, he kept the socialist goals and values alive as meaningful guides for his predecessors.[7]

However, Deng’s regime failed to live up the Mao’s socialist vision. While claiming that its reversion back to the “primary stage” of socialism was necessary for communism, it was actually used as a convenient justification in authorizing whatever policies it wished.[8] Meisner argues not only had the CCP’s cultivation of a wealthy class of entrepreneurs clearly violated socialist principles, its emphasis on creating a technocracy meant the regime had supported careerism and bureaucratism, goals which conflicted with the values of a socialist democracy.[9] Consequently, Meisner believes that the CCP stood in the way of the transition to socialism, for it had no longer adhered to its basic tenets.

Carl Linden’s “Marxism-Leninism in the Soviet Union and the PRC” similarly argues that socialism was in decline in the 1980s. In comparing the regime’s decline with the Soviet Union’s, he argues that the decline of socialism was a global phenomenon. While Deng Xiaoping and Mikhail Gorbachev turned to the West in search of pragmatic, non-doctrinal solutions in reforming their state-run command economies, both continued its Marxist-Leninist methods in suppressing opposition and reshaping their societies according to their agendas.[10] But in distorting Marxism-Leninism in order to suit the capitalist tendencies of a market economy without appropriate political reforms, Linden contends that the CCP and Soviet Russian regimes suffered a crisis of legitimacy and identity in the 1980s.

Written after the Tiananmen crackdown, Merle Goldman’s Sowing the Seeds of Democracy in China examines the internal CCP power struggles leading up to the 1989. However, unlike Dirlik or Meisner’s ideological theorizing, Goldman offers a historical approach in examining the regime’s ideological crisis by emphasizing the factionalism between the reformers and hardliners in the CCP elite leadership. Her analysis revolves around Hu Yaobang, who is portrayed as the main figure in pushing through not only political and economic modernization, but also ideological reforms. Following Deng’s ascension to power in 1978, Hu led the CCP’s shift away from hardline Marxist ideology as well as the repudiation of Mao’s anti-intellectual line. However, it was during the 1979 Theory Conference that marked the rift between Hu and the revolutionary elders that would initiate their clash in the 1980’s. While Hu and other reformers wanted to make radical revisions to Marxist ideology, conservatives such as Deng Liqun and Hu Qiaomu vehemently opposed such actions as “spiritual pollution.”[11] Yet, Deng’s support fluctuated between the two sides throughout the struggle, collaborating with one faction whenever he felt threatened by internal instability.

While Deng shifted support to the conservatives after the Second Plenum in 1983, he quickly relented from the hardliner’s revival of pre-Cultural Revolution campaigns when he observed withdrawal of foreign businesses and hostilities created by the factionalism. After Deng’s shift back to the reformers in November 1983, Hu and his associates such as Zhao Ziyang, Ding Xueliang, and Su Shaozhi continued their ideological reforms. Not only did they advocate recruiting intellectuals into the CCP, they also argued for the need to rely on laws rather than blindly following Marxist policies.[12] After a brief resurgence of Deng Liqun and Hu Qiaomu in 1985, the reformers won a second power struggle and subsequently became even bolder in their policies. Not only did Hu Yaobang consolidate his power by replacing conservatives with more liberal-minded officials into important positions, he also emphasized learning from the West, a selective adaptation of tiyong similar to the late Qing self-strengtheners.

For the first time since the Hundred Flowers campaign, unprecedented criticism of socialism was openly discussed. While Hu daringly remarked to foreign leaders that Marxism was “outdated” and had to be replaced,[13] other CCP reformers, such as Yan Jiaqi declared that there were solutions other than Marxism for the regime; Su Shaozhi argued for a downgrade of Leninism altogether.[14]

However, after another brief repression of the reformers, a third and final “push” for change leading up to the Tiananmen incident occurred in 1988. Using the Tenth anniversary of Deng’s leadership as their stage, the “democratic elites” as Goldman refers to them, not only criticized Mao’s “two whatevers,” but also the ideas of the hardliners. Su Shaozhi boldly challenged Hu Qiaomu and stated “Marxism was in crisis.”[15] The production of a television series, “River Elegy” (Hesheng) further inflamed the conflict, for it attacked traditional Chinese civilization while urging opening China to further Western influences, which in effect criticized the CCP and its socialist values. While the reformers celebrated the series, hardliners were livid at the defiance of Marxist principles. But was not until the Tiananmen incident that the hardline conservatives returned to power.

Because Deng sensed the threat of instability to the regime, he sided with the conservatives in its ideological crackdown. After June 4^th 1989, the regime not only monitored Beijing universities, media outlets, and think tanks for potential dissension, it also made mass arrests and purges of suspected critics. But in categorizing intellectuals into two distinct categories of reformer and hardliner, Goldman falls into the trap of simplifying Chinese politics to, as Charles Burton, calls it an “intellectual Manicheanism” of a struggle between the forces of good and evil.[16]

While many of the “democratic elites” escaped abroad, the remaining reformers were either imprisoned or replaced by a “less radical set of intellectuals” which sought gradual and practical changes rather than vast ideological restructuring. Su Shaozhi was one such cadre who escaped to the United States. Perhaps due to his disillusionment with the reform movement, Marxism and Reform in China takes a pessimistic outlook in analyzing the CCP between 1989 and 1995. Su argues that far from disappearing, the CCP’s control of ideology during this time was as rigid as in Maoist China. Su explains that the CCP used both “soft” and “hard” tactics in upholding socialist values. Soft tactics included “positive education” campaigns which attempted to “inoculate and sterilize” potential dissent through administering heavy doses of Marxism-Leninism and Mao’s thought in different levels of Party and trade union schools. However, after 1989, the CCP increasingly depended on hard tactics, particularly ideological campaigns such as the “anti-peaceful revolution” to quell the intellectuals’ dissension. Thought remoulding and academic criticism were revived from its Maoist days in order to coerce intellectuals to reproach and suppress their “bourgeois” thinking.[17] After 1989, the CCP tightened its press censorship to not only control public opinion, but as well as strengthening Deng’s personality in order to legitimize his theories.[18]

Despite its intentions, the CCP’s ideological onslaught had backfired. While the party monopolized information and all modes of thought while isolating its opposition, the majority of society did not believe the propaganda that were fed to them. As Su explains, even though the CCP’s totalitarian tactics had reduced the media to “mere apologists,” official news held little public confidence, as few individuals trusted the government. Hence, Su grieves that China continued to endure in “moral and ideological bankruptcy” that continue up to present-day China.[19]

Ding Xueliang is another cadre émigré who also laments at China’s ideological landscape. Yet, unlike Su’s view that ideology continued to drive the party, Ding’s The Decline of Marxism in China argues that Marxism was in decline even in the 1980s. Besides taking a theoretical approach in examining the inherent contradictions of Deng’s eclectic socialist theory, Ding also relies on personal experiences as a CCP official as well as his detailed interviews with intellectual dissidents who represented the as “counter-elite” in actively challenged the CCP’s official party orthodoxy.

In Ding’s view, the decline of ideology resulted from Deng’s emphasis of rationalism and “seeking truth from facts.” While Deng used such slogans to attain legitimacy by erasing Maoism, it permitted political discourse in society; more significantly, it also resulted in criticism against the regime.[20]

Furthermore, Deng’s design of economic pluralism was incompatible with a totalitarian dictatorship. According to Ding, Communist regimes must have a unified politico-economic ideology. Yet, when public discourse accompanied the openness of the new market economy, the CCP sought to rigidly suppress criticism through “Socialist Spiritual Civilization” campaigns. Unlike the Western regimes, which could renew its legitimacy through elections, Ding points out that authoritarian regimes such as the CCP was limited only to performance. But in using the campaigns to conceal and “deemphasize” its poor performance, the campaigns had no real ideological substance.[21]

Ding refers to the result of ideological decline as a result of “institutional parasitism,” for opposition came from both semiofficial organizations (rather than private ones) as well as from the “counter-elites” comprised of intellectuals and liberal-minded party officials.[22] In examining the interpenetration between the party-state and society, Ding reveals that communism was in a state of flux in the 1980s. In fact, the regime’s admission that it had returned to the “primary stage of socialism” signaled its retreat from its communist vision. Had the Tiananmen protests not interrupted the liberal thought movement, Ding suggests that socialism would have continued to fade. However, Ding’s analysis abruptly ends in 1989; he neglects to support his claim of the end of socialist ideology. Many reviewers have pointed out Ding’s limitation; Leslie Holmes even cites it as the “most frustrating aspect,” especially since Ding avoids mentioning the recovery of legitimacy that the regime had enjoyed up to 1994.[23]

In contrast to Ding’s approach, Hua Shiping’s Scientism and Humanism: Two Cultures in Post-Mao China is extremely theoretical and post-structural, so much so that Hua refuses to use interviews or correspondence with the intellectuals in order to keep his theories entirely objective.[24] In disputing general claims that the CCP had supplanted socialism with a variable form of pragmatism, Hua argues that Marxist ideology, although altered, still existed in China. In analyzing six intellectuals,[25] Hu explains that such scholar-officials represented not only the nexus that bridged both the ideals of the elite and the masses, but also the “outgrowth of Marxism.”[26]

Hence, unlike Merle Goldman’s differentiation of Hu Qiaomu and Su Shaozhi according to their ideologies, Hua groups them together under the rubric of scientism. While Hu’s “Marxist scientism” believed in a rigidly structured party-state that monopolizes society according to Communist ideals, Su’s “technological determinism” combined modernization and Marxism in arguing that technological innovation and material gains for society are necessary for the development of China. Jin Guantao’s “empirical scientism” was based on his background in the natural sciences; hence, he believed that since socialism had failed in the PRC, it should be replaced by a new ideology based on science that would “transcend socialism and capitalism.”[27]

In contrast to the scientists, Wang Ruoshi, Li Zehou, and Gan Yang’s humanism believed that the state’s main purpose was to serve its citizens. Wang’s “Marxist humanism” thus placed human nature at the center of his Marxist stance, for he argued that happiness was the main intent of socialism. In contrast to the scientists’ reasoning that restrictions on freedom was necessary for the benefit of the nation, Wang condemned the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, for they disregarded the people’s welfare. A part of the Neo-Confucian movement in the 1990s, Li Zehou’s “Confucianist humanism” believed in the restoration of Confucian principles such as li, or mutual human love in society. More importantly, he argued for selectively adapting Western ideas to Chinese culture similar to the xiti zhongyong movement by the late Qing reformers.[28]

For Gan Yang, who was a philosopher and not a CCP member, a postmodernist approach was taken in his “critical humanism.” Basing his arguments on the likes of Michel Foucault and J.P. Sartre, Gan characterized the younger generation of postmodernist intellectuals in China who argued for a “third way” alternative which opposed both Chinese (including Chinese socialism) as well as Western traditions. In Gan’s view, modernity’s products of “commodity fetishism” and “mass culture” had resulted in the rootlessness and degradation of spiritual life.

Michael Twohey’s Authority and Welfare in China (1999) regards Chinese political thought as a 2000 year-old continuing spectrum, for he argues that current Chinese Marxism derived from previous thinkers since the time of Xunzi. In Twohey’s view, Deng Xiaoping’s policies were a continuation of Sun Yat-sen’s “Three People’s Principles,” for both individuals challenged orthodox theories while favouring practical “action-oriented” knowledge.[29] Thus, just as Sun rejected Confucian abstract thought, Deng opposed Mao’s theoretical “two whatever” approach. Twohey surmises that because Sun and Deng witnessed the disunity, disorder, and poverty caused by previous regimes, both men realized the goal of prosperity required rational and pragmatic thinking.[30] Particularly after the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe, Deng realized that only material gains for society could save the future of socialism.

Twohey insists that Sun’s ideas had an immense influence on Deng’s thought. In analyzing Deng’s 1992 publication of his “Selected Works,” which includes speeches and writings between 1938 and 1965, Twohey reveals that Deng not only emphasized the utility of capitalism, industry, and commerce, but also developing socialism in accordance to the path of Sun Yat-sen “people’s livelihood.”[31] Deng’s supposed abandonment of Marxism during the 1980s was, in Twohey’s view, an attempt at reviving Mao’s Yan’an era “New Democracy” which was actually a blueprint of Sun’s political ideas. Moreover, Deng’s rationale of permitting material wealth as long as the state is strong enough to prevent polarization of wealth was influenced by Sun’s repudiation of laissez-fair economics.

But the most revealing aspect of Sun’s influence on Deng was the revival of Sun Yat-sen studies after 1978, which Twohey credits as Deng’s responsibility. While the regime encouraged the study and publishing of Sun in new academic journals such as Economics Research (Jingji Yanjiu) and also the reprinting of the Completed Works of Sun Yatsen, other intellectuals such as Chen Duxiu and Hu Shi were heavily opposed and criticized by Deng.[32]

In a broader perspective, Twohey argues that the neo-authoritarianism debates of the 1980s were a continuation of unresolved political debates from the past, and not just an isolated series of meetings by CCP intellectuals. In particular, such “cultural debates” revolved around the compatibility between socialism and Confucianism. While the positive school wanted to revive the Confucian system of li, the negative school not only rejected li, it also argued for the abandonment of Chinese tradition. However, Twohey’s approach is controversial in that it generalizes Chinese politicians as descendents of Xunzi. As Ramon Myers points out, Twohey’s argument is weak, for he “forces” a connection between the early Zhou thinkers and modern-day intellectuals using a simplistic model “based on selective, empirical evidence” that is unconvincing and often ambiguous.[33]

In contrast to the previous authors’ focus on the Dengist era, Kalpana Misra, Guo Sujian, Geremie Barme, and Joseph Fewsmith examines the ideological transition between the 1980s and 1990s. Written ten years after the Tiananmen trauma, the authors offer a less attached narrative of the CCP’s development. In assessing the ideology of post-Tiananmen China, Misra’s “Curing the Sickness and Saving the Party” argues that the political upheaval in 1989 coupled with the fall of communism in Easter Europe resulted in an intellectual scramble to find a “new ideology” to restore stability in the regime. But the emergence neo-Maoism and neo-conservatism as the two primary intellectual forces resulted in another, albeit less violent, struggle within the intellectual community. While both factions desired a stronger authoritarian state, the neo-Maoists, comprised of leftists in the political leadership and the intellectual community, wanted a return to the rigidly structured Maoist society. In contrast, the neo-conservatives, an offshoot of the neo-authoritarians of the 1980s, desired for greater economic marketization.

Because the neo-Maoists believed that economic reforms and unchecked intellectual liberalization led to social polarization that culminated in the chaos of Tiananmen, they advocated the return of such Maoist traditions as class struggle and personality cults in order to restore social cohesion and public morality.[34] CCP neo-Maoists such as Yang Fan, Cui Zhiyuan and He Xin voiced their opposition against China’s integration into the global capitalist economy in publications in academic journals.

While some ideas of the neo-conservatives such as the support for market reform and a commodity economy derived from the neo-authoritarians,[35] they differed from their predecessors in that they opposed democratization and decentralization. By the late 1990s, Misra argues that this “repackaged” form of neo-authoritarianism had attracted influential cadres, including Jiang Zemin.[36] Viewing the corruption, unemployment, socio-economic polarization, crises of values, and the erosion of central authority as products of hasty liberalization, the neo-conservatives turned to the East Asian “economic miracle” models such as Singapore and Taiwan for inspiration.

However, Misra contends that Jiang’s regime had actually benefited from ideological fragmentation, for it gave the CCP a great sense of legitimacy.[37] By “channeling” ideology in creating a stronger state, the party assumed the duty as defender of wholesale Westernization and protector of Chinese sovereignty. The regime effectively downplayed the issue of political reform while turning nationalist sentiment to its favour by acting as the last line of defense against American global hegemony.[38]

Guo Sujian’s Post-Mao China: From Totalitarianism to Authoritarianism? argues that the decline in the faith of the mass did not indicate a weakening of the CCP’s ideology. Far from abandoning Marxism-Leninism, Guo asserts that the regime had merely “modified” it.[39] Using party documents, policy statements, official speeches, official newspapers, Guo’s insight of the post-Mao regime’s ideology is based on empirical evidence rather than on theoretical hypothesizing.[40] Rather than examining the country’s intellectual landscape, Guo’s study focuses mainly on the CCP’s totalitarian potency in preserving socialist ideology.

In arguing that socialism remained strong in the 1990s, Guo outlines six major aspects of post-Maoist ideology. First, she argues that the regime constantly had to balance the ultimate goal of communism with the intermediate goal of modernization. Thus, to maintain legitimacy, it had to be tolerant to ideological change to facilitate this transition period. Second, referring to this transfer state as a “communist twin-goal culture,” Guo contends that modernizing was only a means to overcome China’s conditions of backwardness. The regime’s goal of industrialization and economic development did not deviate from Maoist goals; rather, it merely “inserted” a new historical stage, called “primary socialism,” into the evolutionary progression of communism. Indeed, the CCP’s totalitarian ideology during the Deng and Jiang regime remained dedicated to remoulding dissenting thought.[41] Thirdly, Guo argues that the regime’s devotion to Deng’s “Four Cardinal Principles” reveals its enthusiasm in continuing socialism.

In comparing the political and ideological campaigns of the Maoist post-Mao regimes, Guo argues that both were not only similar in strategies but also in scope. After 1989, nation-wide reeducational campaigns were revived in universities and army schools in which Deng Xiaoping Theory was integrated into most university curricula; the regime especially tightened its control over the content of the humanities and social sciences. Fourthly, Guo contends that the “socialist spiritual campaigns” were also evidence of the regime’s totalitarian tactics. Referring to Jiang’s method as “brainwashing campaigns,” Guo argues that the regime was responding to the detrimental impacts that economic liberalization had on people’s faith in party ideology.[42] Fifthly, Guo points out that the CCP never abdicated its control over the mass media. Central Propaganda Department not only maintained a vast monopoly in circulating socialist principles, it also continued its censoring of “bourgeois liberal ideas” in journals and publishing houses.[43] Finally, Guo points out that “Deng Xiaoping Theory” remained the supreme authority in most CCP decision-making, and in fact was “codified” into the PRC constitution. Although it may have appeared more “elastic” and pragmatic in its policies, Guo contends that the Jiang regime was in reality continuing the Maoist and Stalinist style of dictatorship in the totalitarian political tradition.[44]

In contrast to Guo’s examination of elite politics, Geremie Barme analyzes the interaction between the intellectual community and the party. Hence, “The Revolution of Resistance” observes the 1990s as a period of “ideological retreat” in which there was increased debates among contending schools of cultural and socio-political thought. Unlike Guo’s narrow view that ideology was prominent only in the CCP, Barme argues that state-sponsored ideology did not penetrate into society. As the numerous old guards retired or passed away in the 1990s, their younger cadre replacements did not share the same enthusiasm in preserving the socialist dogma; at the same time, with Jiang’s regime insistent in downsizing the CCP apparatus as part of its modernization program, there were also less resources devoted to censoring materials and promoting propaganda.[45] As ideological policing waned in the mid-1990s, Barme reveals that a “new enlightenment” movement emerged in 1997, which comprised of writers and intellectuals who not only discussed politics freely, but also advocated the need for independent thinking and democratic reforms.

Indeed, Barme likens this period to the May Fourth movement in early twentieth China, for both periods witnessed lively discussions among intellectuals for solutions in revitalizing the nation. Contentious issues raised by the neo-liberals and the neo-leftists were eerily similar to those of the 1920s. While the neo-liberals accepted mainstream views of the Western Enlightenment and late-twentieth century Euro-American market democracy, the neo-leftists drew on neo-Marxist, Marxist-Leninist, as well as Maoist thought which opposed China’s integration into the global economy.[46] However, Barme argues that the factional strife among the intelligentsia had prevented the movement from mounting a unified force that could fill in the intellectual vacuum. In fact, much of the issues raised by the intellectual community did not affect political change.

Compared to the others in this essay, Joseph Fewsmith’s China Since Tiananmen offers the most comprehensive and thorough assessment of the ideological transitions in post-Mao China. Therefore, it is appropriate that it is the last to be reviewed. In his view, intellectuals, particularly CCP members, are the “temperature check” of the Chinese regime and important to study, for they act as the nexus that connects the interests of both the regime and its people.[47]

According to Fewsmith, the Tiananmen massacres destroyed what little belief the people had left in Marxism-Leninism. The intellectual atmosphere changed in the 1990s in that “performance legitimacy” of the party became far more important than ideology.[48] Thus, a mixture of traditionalism, conservatism, utopianism, as well as nationalism emerged and supplanted the liberal thinking so prominent prior to Tiananmen. As these new intellectual currents reflected the disillusionment of the failed political reform in the 1980s, the regime also took increasing account of public opinion, sometimes absorbing certain ideas while suppressing others. [49]

In particular, intellectual advocates of the four main trends of neoconservatism, postmodernism, neostatism, and populist nationalism abandoned the emphasis on orthodox ideology, or “isms” and instead relied on pragmatic solutions as well as nationalism in revitalizing the nation. While the neoconservatives, descendents of the neoauthoritarians of the 1980s, compromised for a “middle path” approach between traditional conservatism of the Old Left and liberal democratization of the radical reformers, the postmodernists, or the “New Left” similarly rejected Western enlightenment values in favour of a “third way” which advocated building on Chinese traditional and socialist values.[50]

However, it was Jiang Zemin’s rise to power in 1992 that marked a turning point in ideological stabilization in the CCP. In preserving stable and viable institutions without stifling economic growth, Jiang took a “middle road” approach in compromising with the intellectual Left and Right; his permission for more space for political expression resulted in the resurfacing of liberal discourse in the intellectual community, so much so that calls for democratization reappeared in the media. Yet, in intimating that ideology remained relevant to the party, Fewsmith remains unclear whether socialism was still strong in Chinese politics.

Unfortunately, this seems to be one of the major areas of study that remains inadequately unanswered: to what extent has the change in ideology affected the party? As this paper has shown, both ideology and scholarship have changed since the Tiananmen crisis. While some scholars maintain that socialism remains influential in CCP politics even though it has been somewhat modified, many others disagree, for they allege that not only has ideology been diluted, it is in such a crisis that it no longer relevant to in the both the party as well as the general public. Whether for or against these arguments has China and the Communist Party benefited from ideological changes? Much of the literature seems to evade this issue, for they focus mainly on the change (or non-change) of ideology in the China. Hence, there remains much to be researched about this rather ambiguous area of Chinese politics.

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Marxism and the Chinese Experience. Ed. Arif Dirlik and Maurice Meisner. New York: M.E. Sharpe: 1989, 362-384.

Fewsmith, Joseph. China Since Tiananmen: The Politics of Transition. Cambridge:

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Perspectives. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999.

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Buckley, Christopher. “Review of Hua Shiping’s Scientism and Humanism: Two

Cultures in Post-Mao China.” The China Journal. 36 (July, 1996): 170-172.

Burton, Charles. “Review of Merle Goldman’s Sowing the Seeds of Democracy.”

Pacific Affairs. 68.1 (Spring, 1995): 100-101.

Holmes, Leslie. “Review of Ding Xueliang’s The Decline of Communism in China.”

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[1] In fact, both Dirlik and Meisner’s articles were written for a symposium in 1986 at Duke University, October 30-Nobember 1, 1986 called “From Mao to Deng: Marxism and the Chinese Experience.”

[2] Dirlik, Arif. “Postsocialism? Reflections on ‘Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.’”

Marxism and the Chinese Experience. Ed. Arif Dirlik and Maurice Meisner. (New York: M.E. Sharpe: 1989), p. 364.

[3] Ibid., p. 374.

[4] Ibid., p. 376.

[5] Ibid., p.377.

[6] “The Deradicalization of Chinese Socialism.” Marxism and Capitalism in the People’s Republic of China. Ed. Peter Cheng. (New York: University Press of America: 1988), p. 25.

[7] Ibid., p. 26-27.

[8] Ibid., p.33.

[9] In fact, as Meisner points out, the coveting of professionals and specialists for the CCP attempts to replace genuine socialist activists with a “routinized” and mundane group of bureaucrats and politicians which not only govern the regime in their own interests but is detached from the rest of society; something, which the socialist founders such as Mao (and even Deng in 1978) did not truly envision. (Ibid., p.29).

[10] Carl Linden. “Marxism-Leninism in the Soviet Union and the PRC: Utopia in Crisis.” China and the Crisis of Marxism-Leninism. Ed. Franz Michael, Carl Linden, Jan Prybyla, and Jurgen Domes. (San Francisco: Westview Press: 1990), p. 7.

[11] Merle Goldman. Sowing the Seeds of Democracy in China: Political Reform in the Deng Xiaoping Era. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press: 1994), p. 61-62.

[12] Ibid., p. 134-135.

[13] Ibid., p.168.

[14] Ibid., p. 182.

[15] Ibid., p. 264.

[16] Charles Burton. “Review of Merle Goldman’s Sowing the Seeds of Democracy.” Pacific Affairs. 68.1

(Spring, 1995): 100-101.

[17] Su Shaozhi. Marxism and Reform in China. (Nottingham: Spokesman Bertrand Russell House: 1993), p.144-145.

[18] According to Su, the press, journals, and publishing houses required stringent registration in China. Book publishing was assigned a number in advance; moreover, censorship was imposed prior to and after the publication. In fact, appointments of ideological officers must be approved by the CCP. (Ibid., p., 148).

[19] Ibid., p. 150.

[20] Ding Xueliang. The Decline of Marxism in China: Legitimacy Crisis, 1977-1989. (Cambridge: Cambridge of University Press: 1994), p. 90-92..

[21] Ibid., p. 125.

[22] Ibid., p. 196.

[23] Leslie Holme. “Review of the Decline of Communism in China.” American Political Science Review.

2 (Jun., 1995): 508-509.

[24] However, Christopher Buckley criticizes Hua’s approach, arguing that such “objectivity” only creates

confusion and ambiguity, for Hua’s sources and background material become severely limited to mere

guesswork. Chistopher Buckley. “Review of Hua Shiping’s Scientism and Humanism: Two

Cultures in Post-Mao China.” The China Journal. 36 (July, 1996): 170-172.

[25] Hu Qiaomu, Su Shaozhi, Jin Guantao, Wang Ruoshi, Li Zehou, and Gan Yang.

[26] Hua Shiping refers to this Marxist transmutation as “scientism” and “humanism.” Hua Shiping. Scientism and Humanism: Two Cultures in Post-Mao China (1978-1989). (New York: State University of New York Press: 1995), p. 30.

[27] Ibid., p. 84.

[28] Ibid., p. 116.

[29] Michael Twohey. Authority and Welfare in China: Modern Debates in Historical Perspectives. New York: St. Martin’s Press: 1999, p. 98.

[30] Hence, Deng came up with his pragmatic policy of “Seeking Truth From Facts” which sought to replace Mao and Hua Guofeng’s previous ambiguous “two whatever” principles. Ibid., p. 100-101.

[31] Ibid., p. 101-102.

[32] Ibid., p. 108-109.

[33] Ramon Myers. “Review of Michael Twohey’s Authority and Welfare in China: Modern Debates in

Historical Perspective.” The Journal of Asian Studies. 58.3 (August, 1999): 819-821.

[34] Kalpana Misra. “Curing the Sickness and Saving the Party: Neo-Maoism and Neo-

Conservatism in the 1990s.” Chinese Political Culture: 1989-2000. Ed. Shiping Hua. (Armonk: M.E. Sharpe: 2001), p. 135-137.

[35] The neo-authoritarians were in fact, opponents of the radical reforms such as Su Shaozhi, and Yan Jiaqi. Although both cliques were under Zhao Ziyang’s command in post-Tiananmen China, they disagreed on fundamental issues such as democratization and political pluralism. (Ibid., p. 146).

[36] Ibid., p. 146-147.

[37] Ibid., p. 154.

[38] Ibid., p. 155.

[39] Guo Sujian. Post-Mao China: From Totalitarianism to Authoritarianism? (Westport: Praeger: 2000), p. 35.

[40] In doing so, Guo takes a systemic survey of the regime, an approach quite unlike Arif Dirlik, Michael Twohey or Hua Shiping’s theoretical and often quite abstract hypothesizing.

[41] Yet, in doing so, she is basically disagreeing with Dirlik and Meisner’s claims that the CCP had abandoned socialism. Guo argues that CCP was critically aware that its reforms were temporary necessities. (Ibid., p.40-42).

[42] In Guo’s view, campaigns were Jiang’s such campaigns were Jiang’s justification of “bringing objectivity back to the subjectivity of the world.” In fact, Jiang initiated numerous nation-wide mass movements, including a reintroduction of the Lei Feng campaign in 1998, especially focusing on the countryside where the regime recognizes it has 80% of the country’s population. (Ibid., p. 48-52).

[43] In fact, Guo points out that the CCP continued to as it had in the Maoist days of overseeing and regulating all academic development, theoretical research, higher education, cultural education, literature and the arts, as well as political and ideological works and publications. (Ibid., p. 57).

[44] Ibid., p. 59-60.

[45] Geremie Barme. “The Revolution of Resistance.” Chinese Society: Change, Conflict and Resistance. Ed. Elizabeth J. Perry and Mark Selden. New York: Routledge: 2000, p. 209-210.

[46] Barme points out that there was great suspicion and polarization caused by the two side’s ideological differences. While the “leftists” were charged as being part of the CCP, the “rightists” were accused of serving the interests of international capital and new commercial elites within China. (Ibid., p. 213-214).

[47] Joseph Fewsmith. China Since Tiananmen: The Politics of Transition. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 2001), p. 11.

[48] Ibid., p. 9.

[49] According to Fewsmith, neoconservatism was represented by CCP intellectuals such as Wang Huning; postmodernism was represented by Cui Zhiyuan; neostatism by Hu Anyang; and populist nationalism by Wang Shan. Such CCP officials, although not always directly influential in party decision-making and policies, nonetheless had their influential ideas in academic journals read by CCP leaders, and thus their ideologies serve as a “litmus test” of ideological change in Chinese state and society. Ibid., p.160.

[50] Ibid., p.122.