Xing Lu & Herbert W Simons. Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 92, Issue 3. 2006.
For roughly the period since Deng Xiaoping’s ascension to power in 1976, China has moved increasingly toward capitalism and formed a strategic partnership with its former enemies in the West. Political transformations are always rhetorically problematic, involving tensions between the old and the new. Rhetoric is “transitional” in the sense that old rules and verities no longer hold sway while new ways of thinking and doing are not yet firmly in place. This has been particularly the case in China; its leaders have needed to introduce major changes—in China’s economic system, in its relations with the West, and in governance—and all the while they have been rhetorically required to honor tradition, deify Mao, champion socialism, pay lip-service to dialectical materialism, and maintain party control. How, asked A. R. Kluver, have China’s political leaders been able to “introduce a stock market and call it Marxism?” How, in general, have they managed to renegotiate the basis for their legitimacy?
Kluver maintains that “Asian politics, no less than Western, places an absolute primacy on language and rhetoric,” with top-down rhetoric during the post-Mao reform period playing a central role in re-crafting China’s dominant political ideology. We agree, and we would add that the rhetoric of reform has been persistently and perilously dilemma-laden. In what follows we train our rhetorical lenses on the reformist regimes of Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao (beginning in 1978 and concluding in March 2004), focusing on selected slogans and catchwords of each regime.
Particularly useful for our purposes has been Simons’ dilemma-centered “RPS” framework for analysis, adapted here from its original focus on the rhetoric of social movement leaders to top-down rhetoric by China’s party and state leaders. The modified framework attends to distinctive features of the Chinese context, identifying the requirements (R) that top-down Chinese rhetoric must fulfill in times of transition, the kinds of problems (P) that impede accomplishment, and the types of strategies (S) available to accomplish these requirements. By enumerating rhetorical requirements the framework identifies ends in light of which rhetorical strategies may be evaluated. By identifying predictable rhetorical problems, it renders understandable discourse that might otherwise seem anomalous. As in Simons’ original framework, our primary interest is in relations between recurring patterns of rhetoric and the dilemma-laden situations that give rise to them—less with individual acts of rhetorical artistry and their audience effects. With Kenneth Burke we share a view of politics as drama, of “scenic” elements as largely but not completely determinative of political actions, and of all action, including seemingly non-symbolic “moves,” as having a symbolic—i.e., rhetorical—dimension.
This essay also draws on the work of Sinologists, many of whom have weighed in on the role of language and culture in China’s post-Maoist economic and political transition. Communication scholars such as Kluver, D. Ray Heisey, John Powers, Xing Lu, and Shaorong Huang have conducted studies on Chinese political discourse and offered rhetorical analyses of Chinese political texts from different time periods in China’s recent history. Of the limited studies explicitly about top-down rhetoric in the period of reform, we have found Kluver’s particularly useful for our own purposes.
The essay is in two parts. Part I delineates dilemmas and strategies faced by the post-Maoist reform leaders. Part II focuses on selected slogans and catchwords by each regime leader in making the transition possible.
Part I: Dilemmas and Strategies in the Chinese Context
Dilemmas of CCP Leaders
Political leaders are constrained by situations in their efforts to accomplish certain persuasive tasks or ends. What they say and do rhetorically is in many respects prescribed and proscribed. Leaders of every kind may be rhetorically inventive, but their work is also in an important sense cut out for them. The strategies they select for seizing and wielding power are variants, says Burke, of what he called “the scene-act ratio.” Just what is required rhetorically in any given situation will ultimately depend on local, here-and-now considerations, but situations recur and theory may prepare the ground for rhetorical analysis by suggesting in broad outline what is rhetorically required in given types of situation and the rhetorical dilemmas likely to arise from conflicting requirements.
In the Chinese context, rhetorical requirements are principally derived from culture and history, and from the leader’s role within a collectivity—i.e., the Chinese Communist Party (the CCP) and, more broadly, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as nation-state—but are further shaped by factors external to the collectivity, such as China’s place in the world economy, its geopolitical position vis-à-vis other nations, and the actions of other world leaders. Having joined the World Trade Organization (WTO), for example, China is under increasing pressure to play by its rules. Having hitched its fortunes to global competition, it must be increasingly concerned about the competitiveness of its products in foreign markets, and the availability of markets in China for foreign goods. Having flexed its muscles as a regional and even global political player—asserting its views on Iraq in the Security Council, for example—it must defend against current and future threats from potential rivals and antagonists, some of whom would already like to construct China as an enemy nation.
Among the internal pressures on China’s leaders are the weights of tradition, including the influence of Confucian thought; the continuing deification of Mao despite years of misrule; and Marxist/Leninist ideology, on which the revolutionary state was founded. Each is a constraint on reformist rhetoric, yet each is also an inventional resource that can be appropriated to the cause of reform. As Tsou Tang states well,
[O]ne may see Chinese political development as the outcome of the interaction of a series of strategic choices made by the various actors in conflict or in cooperation with each other. The available alternatives are shaped by the perceived and/or actual structures of constraint and opportunity.
Heisey speaks similarly of incentives and constraints at structural and ideological levels as determinative influences on strategic choice.
Our analysis underscores the convergent pressures upon the regimes of Deng, Jiang, and Hu to bend Marxist ideology to the needs for reform. Much as the leaders themselves may have continued to identify with the revolutionary doctrines on which they were nurtured, pragmatism has required that they subordinate Marxist ideology to fulfillment of such service functions as feeding their people and protecting the nation’s borders. This is apparently true of other regimes with Marxist origins which have taken on the responsibilities of governmental leadership.
In the post-Mao period of economic and political reform, more pragmatic thinking has been promoted by the Party. This kind of thinking is characterized by Burke as melioristic—concerned, as he puts it, with better and worse rather than best and worst. Pragmatism has by no means replaced socialist idealism, but the CCP’s rhetoric has become increasingly de-radicalized after its succession of failed social experiments. Moreover, in the face of public pressures to improve the standard of living, Maoist/Marxist principles have had to be subordinated to its domestic service functions. Thus those within the Party who have held out for ideological purity have been destined to play a losing hand. Economic reform requires more sophisticated economic structures than those they had countenanced and a more rational, more transparent regulatory apparatus. Primary reliance on ideological appeals is no longer sufficient for what Andrew Nathan calls China’s “post-mobilization phase.” Likewise, China’s foreign policies have become more pragmatic, moderated by internal and external pressures to avoid prolonged confrontation.
In their efforts to balance competing interests and appeal to multiple audiences, CCP leaders have faced formidable dilemmas and challenges in the transitional period. Their rhetoric has been in large measure a response to the following problems.
- CCP leaders have faced the disparity of seemingly holding to an acclaimed Marxist/Leninist/Maoist ideology while moving increasingly to a capitalist economy which its ideologists had long maintained would lead to increased corruption, moral decline, and a widening of the gap between rich and poor. Because at least some of these prophecies have already come true, the CCP leadership has needed not only rationales for proposed change but also skillfully crafted apologetics for changes gone awry. Of course further reform has been theoretically possible, but has often proved difficult against powerful elites. It could not have been easy, for example, for Jiang Zemin to deal with evidence of corruption at the highest levels of his administration, including allegations that Deng Xiaoping’s family members had been enriching themselves under the Jiang Zemin regime.
- CCP leaders have needed to adapt to multiple audiences in China, each with their own interests and perspectives. These include such “new winners” as entrepreneurs, educated professionals, and technocrats, as well as such “new losers” as the urban unemployed, underemployed state-owned factory workers, and peasants displaced by mammoth hydroelectric projects. The list includes of course the ideologically orthodox as well as the ideologically pragmatic within the CCP itself. Needless to say, what pleases one audience may well offend another.
- CCP leaders have had to balance internal pressures against external pressures. Whatever the current success or failure of the opening to the West, CCP leaders are increasingly hostage to external pressures and demands—e.g., for greater conformity with World Trade Organization (WTO) rules, for privatization of property and respect for property rights, for greater accountability, for greater attention to the West’s human rights concerns, and for political and military support against what are alleged by the West to be international threats. Yet they are also under pressure to pursue their own course.
- CCP leaders have had to weigh the need for continued Party control against pressures for the liberalization of society and increased autonomy for its people. As China competes in global markets, it also opens itself to new ideas, some of which may threaten the established order. “Mr. Science” seems to have been accepted by the leadership without significant opposition, but what about “Mr. Democracy?” Party leaders have, since the Tiananmen Square uprising, increasingly talked about democracy, but they continue to exercise tight political control, and sometimes ham-fisted control, as in the case of internet use. At least for the sake of its image as a modernizing nation, increasingly responsive to its people, CCP leaders face the challenge of balancing the need for political control against demands for democracy from within China and from the international community. This includes not just demands for free elections, but also for greater transparency in administrative and judicial deliberations.
- Finally, political leaders of all kinds are engaged in non-zero sum games, involving admixtures of what Burke calls the “competitive use of the cooperative.” Trade negotiations epitomize the “mixed-motive” character of such conflicts—i.e., counter-posing the need to compete against the need to cooperate. The CCP leaders have played out such mixed motives in trade with the United States, shifting from “ideological enemies” to “strategic partners,” while alternating between the moralistic and the pragmatic in their negotiations.
Rhetorical Strategies of CCP Leaders
Political leaders of every kind face daunting rhetorical dilemmas, but they are not bereft of rhetorical resources, both for public performances and for behind-the-scenes maneuverings. While political communication often serves to change the national culture, it is from their culture that political leaders draw wisdom and derive rhetorical strategies. Many rhetorical studies have shown that culture is an important factor in shaping rhetorical discourse. Says Heisey, “National leaders use their own cultural backgrounds, and cultural arguments unique to their histories and national identities, in the construction of their political messages.” This has been the case, for example, with China’s rebuttal of charges of human rights violations, lodged by the United States. Chinese culture has traditionally defined human rights as serving the collective interest, as opposed to the American notion of the primacy of individual rights in the domain of political affairs.
Kluver shares Heisey’s view of Chinese political discourse as strongly influenced by its culture and history. In his study of post-Mao rhetoric in the legitimation of economic reform, Kluver observed that CCP leaders invoked popular myths and reinterpretations of the language of orthodox Marxism in urging the Chinese to develop a new political consciousness, one that would pave the way for rapid economic reforms. Long before the post-Mao reformers, Mao helped redefine what Kluver calls China’s “national myth,” a narrative that names and affirms the identity of a people, joining unarticulated values of the culture to the specific power relationships of society. Rather than resigning themselves to their fate, the masses of impoverished Chinese, in Mao’s Marxist reformulation, were to develop a new consciousness based on the idea of class struggle, eventuating in an egalitarian socialist society. China’s dominant mythic narrative continues to celebrate national heroes like Mao and the “Eminent Personage of Deng” while paying tribute to socialism and Marxist assumptions of historical progression. Little did Mao realize at the time, however, that its Marxist vocabulary and dialectical way of thinking would itself become the source of a new casuistry in the service of market-oriented capitalism. To reestablish governmental legitimacy, however, Chinese leaders have had to “carefully redraft the national myth so as to guarantee a place for the Chinese Communist Party” within the new economic system. Fortunately for these leaders, Chinese history and culture provides a rich repertoire of rhetorical possibilities on which to draw. These include old party slogans, recrafted or redefined for purposes of reform and relegitimation.
Rhetorical resources available to Chinese political leaders include time-honored and highly malleable storehouses of maxims, aphorisms, lines of arguments, forms of appeal, and modes of self-presentation. Examples include Confucian moral appeals, advice to rulers by Han Feizi on statecraft, tactical schemes as substitutes for force in Sunzi Bing Fa (The Art of War), and strategic thoughts and persuasive techniques in the famous Gui Guzi (The Master of Ghost Valley). Much as Mao broke from the Confucian tradition, he also cleverly exploited its conventional wisdom, as leaders of the transition have also been required to do. No Chinese leader who seeks change can dishonor tradition. In that sense every effective Chinese leader must be something of a dialectician and a chameleon.
Of particular interest to this paper are selected slogans and catchphrases that have had a pivotal role in the top-down rhetoric of transition. Slogans have been a longstanding rhetorical tool used by Chinese leaders, ranging from Sun Yet-Sen and Chiang Kai-shek to Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, and the currrent leaders. All these leaders used slogans to push social change as well as using them as vehicles for legitimizing their rule. The use of slogans can be traced to the Confucian concept of zheng ming (rectification of names). For Confucius, every name (e.g., slogans, set phrases, catchy words) carries with it a concept and a behavior. The new names initiated by the ruler and propagated by the government lead to a rectification of the social order and new way of thinking. Through the practice of zheng ming or invention of new terms, a new set of social norms are prescribed and new policies or actions are implemented.
Slogans have the virtue of suggesting a lot in a very few words. Ideographic in McGee’s sense of the term, they serve as simplified representations and reminders of ideological beliefs. Usually they are easy to memorize and repeat. For political purposes, they tend also to be ambiguous, amenable to multiple interpretations, and adaptable to multiple audiences (while also providing opportunities for reframing by opponents). Further, popular slogans and catchwords may be known to contain “code words,” a useful form of communication when there is a need to convey hidden political agendas while appearing to conform to the official ideology. During Mao’s period, Chinese political discourse was characterized by what Schoenhals called “formalized language,” a type of language in the form of slogans, clichés, jargon, and code words. The post-Mao regimes have continued employing these rhetorical tools in maneuvering for economic and political reforms in China.
Yet another set of strategic tools consists of bargaining chips. China’s economic fortunes, together with its strategic geopolitical position and globalized economy, give it considerable bargaining power on the world’s stage. In international relations, including trade relations, persuasion often takes place, implicitly or explicitly, within a context of power. Rhetoric, then, is not just about words, and the power of the carrot and the stick can add (or subtract) meaning to words. To Kenneth Burke’s credit, his sense of rhetoric as “symbolic inducement” included actions, not just words. The former include purely symbolic acts, such as ceremonial salutes to the flag, and actions that are at once symbolic and non-symbolic such as currency devaluations/appreciation, military deployments, crackdowns on corruption, and punishments for violations of intellectual property rights such as those that are recently being undertaken in China.
Rhetoric by political leaders is not inherently deceptive. Of the texts to be analyzed later in this study, critics ought to entertain the possibility that what is said cannot be taken at face value: for example, that it is designed to be vague or ambiguous, and perhaps to be taken differently by different audiences, or that the rhetor’s strategy is to talk one way, but act in another way. But yet another alternative presents itself: that the leader means what he or she says! This does not preclude selective reporting of what a leader means or intends. What it does suggest is that leaders are not always obliged to practice outright deception. Burke grants that rhetoric is an advantage-seeking activity. But to those prepared to dismiss rhetoric as immoral for just that reason, he adds that the gaining of advantage need not be at the expense of the other; it may be to mutual advantage.
Complicating matters for the analyst and the political leader is that rhetorical strategies often create new problems in the process of resolving old ones. When strategies succeed, they change the rhetorical landscape. China today is far more prosperous than it was in 1978, far better able to exercise power by use of the carrot rather than the stick, and far more powerful internationally as well as a result of successes in the global marketplace. Also, the CCP is far more institutionalized than it was when Deng Xiaoping assumed power in 1978. Finally, the new, better-educated middle class presents new opportunities for China but it could, with its increasing influence and capacity to voice its discontent, pose greater challenges for the CCP than those, such as the peasantry and the urban unemployed, who have many more reasons to complain but have far fewer resources with which to mount effective protests. The general point here is that the transition is itself a process, its leaders subject to ever-changing rhetorical requirements and problems, but also equipped with new rhetorical resources for meeting those demands.
Part II: Transitional Rhetoric in the Economic Reform Period
With Kluver we have contended that post-Maoist Chinese leaders introduced new linguistic formulations as a way to legitimize economic and political reforms as well as to relegitimize the Communist Party. As of this writing there have been three transitional regimes, each associated with a memorable slogan or catchphrase to guide the process of transition. The first, led by Deng Xiaoping, is most notable for Deng’s simultaneous rejection of capitalism in theory and embrace of important components of capitalism in practice, under the banner of “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics”. The second regime, presided over by Jiang Zemin and ably assisted by Premier Zhu Rongji, propelled China forward at a dizzying pace in economic development, but may also be remembered for the severe problems it could not overcome and may have exacerbated. These problems are given short shrift in the Jiang regime’s most celebrated manifesto The Three Represents which also comes in for our rhetorical scrutiny. The problems themselves are currently receiving considerable attention from Jiang and Zhu’s successors, Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao. Put forward under the banner of “Putting People First”, theirs is an effort to redirect priorities, from economic growth at any price to developmental balance, from encouraging entrepreneurship to crackdowns on corruption. Rhetorically speaking, it is an immensely challenging effort, and is by no means guaranteed of success. But that the effort is being made at all, and not just behind closed doors, is itself a sign of China’s progressive development.
Deng Xiaoping’s “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics”
As a long-term revolutionary comrade of Mao, Deng Xiaoping had been both loyal to Mao during his political career and resistant to some of Mao’s idealistic schemes. He was persecuted once prior to 1949 for his “wrongful doings” and purged twice during the Cultural Revolution for being a “Capitalist Roader,” epitomized in his famous saying “No matter whether the cat is black or white, it is a good cat so long as it catches mice.” After Mao’s death in 1976, Deng was regarded as “China’s architect of economic reform.” Deng’s own tragic experience made him realize the disastrous consequences of holding on to ideological orthodoxies and won him sympathy and support from other communist officials and populous. The Cultural Revolution, launched by Mao in 1966 and ending in 1976 after his death, brought the collapse of the state economy, along with disillusionment with many of Mao’s precepts—especially the principle of continuous class struggle. Mao’s failed social experiments also brought an aversion to the stridency of revolutionary-style rhetoric. Tu Wei-Ming notes that during this time China was “at an ideological crossroad, confronting a profound identity crisis which [would] fundamentally restructure her national character.” Deng was required by his role as China’s paramount leader to address this exigency within the framework of acceptable norms and values.
On his resumption of power in 1976, Deng took a variety of actions under the banner “Rectification of Disorders” (zhengdun). In a series of speeches addressing transitional issues, he urged a shift in emphasis from ideological battles to economic development, repeatedly citing Mao’s own words as the source of his ideas. For example, in a speech entitled “Upholding the Flag of Mao Zedong Thought; Adhering to the Principle of Seeking Truth from Facts,” Deng unabashedly criticized a Mao idolater named Hua Guofeng for his indiscriminate support of the so-called “double whatevers”:
We all know that there is a popular talk of “double whatevers:” Whatever comrade Mao Zedong has endorsed cannot be changed; whatever comrade Mao Zedong has done cannot be changed. Is this considered upholding the flag of Mao Zedong thought? No! If we keep doing this, we actually distort Mao Zedong thought. The basic principle of Mao Zedong thought is seeking truth from facts and is to apply the general principles of Marxism and Leninism to the practical situation of Chinese revolution.
In subsequent speeches and writings, Deng reiterated his belief in using practice as the sole criterion for measuring truth and emphasized the need for China’s modernization. Then, as though to ensure his bona fides with the old guard, Deng, on March 30, 1979, responded to charges of ideological laxity with what he called the “Four Cardinal Principles”: (1) adherence to the socialist road; (2) adherence to the proletarian dictatorship; (3) adherence to the Communist Party’s leadership; and (4) adherence to Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong thought. Scholars have different interpretations of the rhetorical implications of the “Four Cardinal Principles.” Sujian Guo considers it an act of preventing the CCP from losing its power and a signal to remain an authoritarian structure. Tang Tsou regards it as a strategy of taking a “middle course” between supporting the Party’s ideological legitimacy and Deng’s own economic agenda. Chang observes that Deng’s insistence on the Four Cardinal Principles was indeed a strategic response to Mao’s loyalists and to the lingering influence of communist ideology. It was a “political necessity,” says Chang, the purpose of which was to “disarm internal resistance.” By doing so, Deng could gain support from the old guard, unite the nation, and pave the way for rapid economic reform and an open-door policy. Further, Deng’s insistence on the Four Cardinal Principles served as a rhetorical strategy to create a stable environment for economic reform. Said Deng, “China’s stability is the overriding principle. Without a stable environment, nothing can be accomplished; the achievement once gained can get lost.” Promulgation of the Four Cardinal Principles would allow China to maintain stable under Communist Party control.
Deng’s rhetoric to this point illustrates what was required to reconcile the new push for reform with the old Maoist/Marxist doctrine. Using Mao to depart from Mao, as in his critique of the “double whatevers,” Deng reframed the problem such that, in Burke’s terms, what had been “apart from” could now be “a part of.” In his insistence on the Four Cardinal Principles, Deng probably sought to win over the ideologically orthodox and to provide rhetorical cover for those who welcomed his reforms.
In the early period of economic reform, Deng was rhetorically required to provide a new slogan that would indicate a departure from the Maoist idealist/utopian path, and yet still legitimize the Party’s rule. The new term, “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” first appeared in a speech Deng presented to Chinese visitors on June 18, 1983. It soon became the mantra for Deng-style reform, an all-encompassing “God” term used repeatedly by the Chinese media and politicians alike. Its coinage called to mind the Confucian concept of zheng ming, discussed earlier.
Several meanings of the term can be identified by examining various Deng speeches. First, Deng’s explained that “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” meant making decisions with consideration for Chinese contexts. Implicit here is a claim to Chinese distinctiveness and, by implication, an appeal to Chinese nationalism. In his words, “We can learn from other countries, but we cannot impose different social systems from foreign countries on to China.” China had to work out its own path to modernization and prosperity. Second, “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” meant combining a socialist system with a market economy. He stated, “Market economy is not owned by capitalism only. Socialism can have a market economy as well.” For him, what really matters was improving productivity and the Chinese standard of living, not ideological correctness. Yet implicit in the framing of Deng’s argument is an ideological appeal to a right of ownership. At the same time, staying on the path of socialism gave the CCP legitimacy to continue its rule. Third, “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” meant selectively borrowing from the capitalist countries “the good stuff,” primarily their scientific methods and management techniques.
While acknowledging China’s need to borrow selectively from capitalist countries, Deng nevertheless reiterated Maoism’s longstanding objections to capitalism as an economic system. “A capitalist system is profit-driven; it cannot rid itself of exploitation, pillage, and economic crisis,” Deng asserted. In another speech Deng reiterated that “China must adhere to socialism. Capitalism will not work in China. If China took the path of capitalism, its chaotic situation would never end; its poverty would never be changed.”
Deng recognized the repercussions of deviating openly from ideological orthodoxy, and wisely undertook the task of redefining socialism rather than repudiating it. During Mao’s era, socialism, understood as a system of state ownership and control of “productive forces” for the benefit of all, constituted the true path to a classless, stateless communist utopia. It was Mao’s belief that with correct conformity to Marxist-Maoist ideals, endless energy would be released for the production and subsequent distribution of newly created economic wealth.
Deng’s redefinition of socialism deviated from Mao’s version. Deng argued that socialism should aim at improving the standard of living of the Chinese people. Living in poverty is not characteristic of socialism. He made it clear that the primary task of socialism is the development of productive forces and moving out of poverty. Moreover, socialism, by definition, could not fail, even if success for a time meant increased inequalities through the selective appropriation of capitalist practices.
The slogan was sufficiently ambiguous, yet strikingly effective in that it enabled the nation to maintain a largely state-owned economy while allowing for some capitalist innovation. In a significant way, Deng’s coinage of the phrase “socialism with Chinese characteristics” was designed to rescue the CCP from its weakening mandate and reset the political agenda in China, from ideological purity to the improvement of the material well-being of the Chinese people.
Can a slogan as effective as Deng’s be taken at face value as a direct expression of his privately held beliefs? Probably not. All the while that he voiced support for the Maoist system, he managed to de-collectivize farms, reduce dependence on failing, government-owned industries, and permit some degree of private enterprise—under the ambiguous banner of “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.” On the one hand, Deng promised that “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” would benefit the majority of Chinese people, not create wealth for the few. On the other hand, Deng was against absolute equalitarianism; he allowed that some people and some regions could get rich first.
The economic reform launched by Deng Xiaoping and its initial success gained him a world-wide reputation for having lifted millions Chinese out of poverty and was viewed in the West as a step toward democracy. Deng was invited to visit the U.S. and made “Man of the Year” twice by Time magazine. Besides moving toward a market economy, Deng introduced other reforms. On the international front, Deng opened up relations with the West. His policy was one of “non-alignment and equi-distance” from the world’s powers. Deng’s foreign policy established the guiding principles of China’s international relations in the coming years.
Jiang Zemin’s Succession to Deng: Explication of “Three Represents”
Deng Xiaoping passed away in 1997, leaving China, as promised, with a booming economy, including vast improvements in per capita income, but also increased corruption, mounting unemployment, environmental degradation, and a widening gap between rich and poor. China’s economy continued to grow, especially its private enterprises, which now made up over 50% of GDP. The biggest winners from the reforms, largely entrepreneurs and educated professionals, posed a potential threat to the Party’s authority with their accumulated wealth and increasing demands for political participation. The new losers, mainly workers and peasants, began to lose faith in the legitimacy of the Communist Party’s leadership.
For Deng’s successors, the burden of defending economic reforms as ideologically correct has been progressively lessened. However, they still must pay lip service to Marxist theory and Maoist thought. In his speech to China’s 16th Party Congress, Jiang Zemin recalled ten chief lessons from the reform period, presenting them as having been consensually arrived at through a process of objective analysis. He began with a ritualistic tribute to his ideological predecessors, singling out Deng’s “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” as the new guideline for the CCP:
Uphold Deng Xiaoping Theory as our guide and constantly bring forth theoretical innovation. Deng Xiaoping’s Theory is our banner; and the party’s basic line and program are the fundamental guidelines for every field of our work. Whatever difficulties and risks we may come up against, we must unswervingly abide by the party’s basic theory, line, and program. We should persist in arming the entire party membership with Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong thought and Deng Xiaoping Theory and using them to educate our people. We should continue to emancipate our minds, seek truth from facts, keep pace with the times and make innovations in a pioneering spirit. We should respect the creativity of the general public and test and develop the party’s theory, line, principles, and policies through practices.
This is the first of the ten principles Jiang articulated, and it serves both to honor the old orthodoxies and to display Jiang himself as a Party loyalist whose reforms, like Deng’s, have been continuous with longstanding doctrine, rather than departures from it. The rhetorical style Jiang used is similar to the Party’s conventional clichés and catchy phrases in that it waved the flags of predecessors in justifying new moves.
The “new moves” in his new political agenda were subtlety camouflaged by Jiang’s coinage of the “Three Represents,” first introduced in a speech on February 25, 2000 during his trip to Guangdong Province. The slogan aimed at redefining the mission of the CCP under his leadership. The Party represents, he said: (1) the demands for the development of advanced productive forces; (2) the forward direction of advanced culture; and (3) the fundamental interests of the greatest majority of the Chinese people. Jiang regarded the “Three Represents” as innovations for party building, principles for governing the country, and a source of strength for party members. China’s official media have called the Three Represents, now written into the Party’s Constitution, “Jiang Zemin Thought.”
Having paid homage to Marxist theory, Maoist thought, and Deng’s theory, Jiang’s subsequent enumeration of lessons learned is relatively free from ideological strictures and focused on the Party’s first represent: the development of productive forces. For example, Principle Two defends economic reform in a pragmatic, straightforward manner: “Development is the final word. We must seize all opportunities to accelerate development. Development calls for new ideas. We should stick to the principle of expanding domestic demand and implement the strategy of national rejuvenation through science and education and that of sustainable development.” Compared with Deng’s rhetoric, Jiang’s remaining speech is more pragmatic and technocratic. Changes in rhetorical content and style reflect changed circumstances, not least changes in norms of governance.
In calling for adjustment to changing situations, Jiang frequently used the term “keeping pace with the times.” Of foremost importance was the rising wealth and social power of the new capitalists. One of the actions Jiang took under his second Represent—“The Party represents the forward direction of advanced culture”—was to recruit capitalist class members into the Party. Jiang first proposed to recruit private entrepreneurs to the CCP in his speech of July 1, 2001 in celebration of the 80th anniversary of the CCP, but met with resistance from veteran party members, who signed “a petition of ten-thousand words” (wanyanshu) to accuse Jiang of violating the Party’s cardinal principles in its representation of the working class. In his speech at the 16th Party Congress, Jiang replaced the phrase “private entrepreneurs” with a new phrase, “role models from other social strata.” In his words,
We should unite with the people of all social strata who help to make the motherland prosperous and strong. … We should recruit members of other social strata to the Party in order to increase the Party’s influence, adapting to the new situation, and explore new systems and new ideas in management.
Strategically, “other strata” was far less offensive to the old guard than the term “private entrepreneurs,” which is an equivalent of “capitalist” to the Chinese mind. In Wu’s view, Jiang’s move is a strategy to ensure his power position as well as the leadership of the Party. As the economic reforms had created accumulated wealth, the Party had to represent itself as the vanguard of both the working class and the entrepreneurs/capitalists. This signaled the changing nature of the Party’s original goal and mission, which was to serve the peasants and working class.
Apparently, this contradictory nature of the Party’s mission was Jiang’s innovation to “advance the culture” and a strategic move to rebuild the Party. The term “advanced culture” can be interpreted as a code word for forward thinking and learning from the West ways of political reform. It allowed Jiang to address problems of governance and stressed the need for “socialist democracy,” involving participation by ordinary citizens in governance, supervision of the government, and increased democracy within the Party, including elections to party posts and a greater degree of intra-party discussion and consultation. As for the third “represent,” serving the interest of the vast majority of the Chinese people, this was not really a Jiang invention. It was the fundamental principle of the CCP as articulated by pioneer communists and carried out by Mao’s revolution.
In a nutshell, “Three Represents” does seem to aim at redefining the Party’s mission so as to strengthen its authority in the pursuit of economic development (representing advanced productive force), at infusing the Party’s ideology with capitalist members and practices (representing advanced culture), and at re-legitimizing the moral position of the party (representing the vast majority of Chinese people). Strategically, it has provided a rhetorical vehicle by which to shift the Party further from an ideological guardian to a service-oriented institution, with economic prosperity as its primary goal.
Reaction to the “Three Represents” has been mixed. Jiang’s proposal for inclusion of the capitalist class into the Party was met with severe criticism by those who felt the CCP’s ideology had been betrayed and the Constitution violated. Even the Economist magazine characterized Jiang’s proposal as an “ideological distortion.” Many Chinese have viewed the “Three Represents” as just another set of party clichés. We agree with Wang and Zheng that it is a political strategy aimed at rebuilding the Party’s image as constantly adapting itself to China’s changing economic and social reality, and aimed at expanding political support for the regime.
Heisey observes that while Deng Xiaoping had found a way to build “economic pragmatism,” Jiang Zeming pursued a “‘path of development’ that would be based upon ‘strategic partnership’ with the West.” Jiang’s acumen in foreign diplomacy has been widely acknowledged, most notably in collaborating with other nations to deter America’s hegemonic impulses while at the same time making China indispensable in U.S.-led efforts to combat terrorism and halt North Korean nuclear proliferation. But Jiang was also no slacker at public diplomacy. Lam grudgingly credits him with having brought ties with the United States back to pre-Tiananmen levels, as the result of a “media-savvy” eight-day visit in late 1997. Jiang made headlines at home and abroad when he “played guitar, sang Karaoke, debated with Clinton, and harangued anti-Chinese students at Harvard.” In a subsequent visit to the West in 2000, Jiang presented himself as a liberal thinker, with a friendly, co-active style, eager to smooth over political differences. In his concluding remarks on Sino-American relations, Jiang made a plea:
China and the U.S. should look at and deal with our relationship from a strategic and long-term point of view … Chinese and American governments should act with the tide of history, listen to the voice of two peoples, seek commonalities while keeping our differences, expand our cooperation and make mutual efforts toward a constructive strategic partnership in the 21st century.
As in his initial visit, Jiang’s ameliorative rhetoric helped alter the dictatorial, tyrannical image of Chinese leaders, formed by news of human rights violations and by television footage of the Tiananmen massacre.
Hu and Wen’s “Putting People First”
Hu Jintao succeeded Jiang Zemin as the Party’s General Secretary in November 2002 and became the President of China in March of the following year. Wen Jiabao took on the premiership in March 2003 as well. Just how far they diverged from their predecessors could not have been immediately apparent at the time of their appointments, for they were rhetorically required, as underlings, to hew to the Party line on most matters. It was especially important for Hu and Wen to demonstrate acts of deference toward Jiang and his “Shanghai” faction, currying their favor, for example, on the issue of one-party rule. Like their predecessor, Hu and Wen exalted Marx, Mao, and Deng Xiaoping, but also testified repeatedly to the importance of Jiang’s “Three Represents.” However, Hu and Wen have distinguished themselves from Jiang by appealing to traditional Chinese values, by proposing a more cautious scheme for what they called “balanced” economic development, and by championing the cause of the poor and dispossessed.
A. Making the case for “putting [poor] people first”
Depending on the statistics one looks at, China’s turn toward capitalism has been an unqualified success or a mixed blessing. Jiang’s regime could legitimately boast that the rising tide of economic growth had brought China out of dire poverty, with per capita income having reached U.S.$1,000 in 2003. But per capita averages mask income disparities, and China’s have been as large, or greater, than any in the world. A report issued by the Chinese government’s own poverty task force acknowledged that China’s poverty rate increased in 2003 for the first time since 1978, with 85 million Chinese residents living on less than $77 per year. Using income distribution as a measure of a country’s economic inequality, China is apparently more unequal than most countries in the world. In the 2004 bestseller, An Investigative Report of China’s Peasantry, Chen and Shun reported shocking cases of the poverty of peasants in Anhui province as a result of heavy tax burdens imposed by local officials as well as unfair government policies. Moreover, a recent study by the Chinese Academy of Social Science concluded that China’s urban-rural income gap, factoring in education and health, is the worst on Earth.
While Jiang had continued Deng Xiaoping’s course of economic and political reform by prioritizing economic growth and Party restructuring, he did not give much attention to the third of his “represents,” slighting, in effect, the interests of the poor. Given the increasing disparity between rich and poor, Hu’s government chose to focus on Jiang’s third represent. However, instead of repeating Jiang’s term, Hu made repeated reference to the Confucian phrase “Putting People First” in Chinese as the manifesto of his government. In a speech on the 82nd anniversary of the CCP, Hu elaborated on this new/old term to party members:
Party officials at every level should solidly establish the mindset of serving the people and the spirit of honesty to and responsibility for the people. They must exercise their power for the people, build an emotional bond with the people, and seek benefits for the people. They must solve concrete problems for the people, make every effort to handle difficult situations for them, persistently doing good deeds for the sake of people, and always place people’s interest above everything else.
The slogan “Putting People First” echoes Confucian values, in particular those of Mencius (390-305 B.C.E.), a devout follower of Confucius, who applied the Confucian notion of ren or benevolence to ren zheng (benevolent government) and advised the state’s kings to think and act in the interests of the people. Hu repeatedly quoted Mencius’ sayings, such as, “Hardship and plain life can rejuvenate life; comfort and luxury can lead to death,” as a way of aligning himself with the people against official corruption. Huang agrees that Hu’s rhetoric has exemplified “Mencius’ heart-rooted and people-centered government,” whose rulers must care about the sufferings of the people and stay benevolent in order to sustain their legitimacy and control. In his book, The Ideal Chinese Political Leader: A Historical and Cultural Perspective, Guo notes, “In modern Chinese political thought, the notion of benevolent government is related to at least three central components: social equality, wealth of the people, and national greatness.” This thought has been exemplified in Hu’s government, which clearly has in mind the Chinese masses, especially those from the hinterlands, whose lives had not been materially improved by China’s rising GDPs, relative to the Eastern urbanites, and who could, in absolute terms, have suffered declines.
Like their predecessors, Hu and Wen had to exhibit lip-service adherence to Marxist/Maoist principles as a precondition for moving ahead, but now they were also rhetorically required to cite Deng and Jiang. Having identified problems that emerged as a result of the economic reforms, Wen Jiabao offered a declaration of intentions for 2004 that began by taking “Deng Xiaoping theory and the important thought of ‘Three Represents’ as our guide.” Only then could Hu and Wen place their own stamp on the reform process. It was at once technocratic and egalitarian, incorporating new scientific knowledge in support of the old Maoist value of “serving the people.” Their rhetoric was both new and old.
The disparity between the rich and poor, along with problems of corruption and moral decline, had created nostalgia for Mao’s era among many Chinese. Hu and Wen’s words also bespoke Maoist ideals, and so too have their symbolic actions. Significantly, Hu traveled to Xibanpo, Mao’s revolutionary base, in December 2002, where he used both traditional and Maoist slogans in calling for “arduous struggle” and “plain living.” Hu quoted Mao’s “two musts”: “[The party members] must keep the virtues of modesty, caution, humbleness, and calmness; [they] must continue to maintain the party’s tradition of plain living and arduous struggle.” Mao gave these admonitions to party officials when they took over China in 1949.
Hu and Wen’s example brought about copycat visits to historic revolutionary sites and poor sections of China by other officials. Besides linking the new order with its revolutionary ideals and thus gaining increased support, these visits sent an implicit warning to officialdom about complacency and corruption in high places. Their demonstrations of concern stood in sharp contrast with Jiang’s regime. In aligning themselves with Maoist values, Hu’s regime not only got out from under Jiang’s shadow, it also established its legitimacy and paved the way for policy change.
Hu and Wen’s leadership style has also exemplified the Confucian value of “matching your words with action.” They have made a series of policy moves favoring the poor, in addition to engaging in sympathetic symbolic actions. By such measures as the “Number One” decree eliminating a major tax on farmers, they have taken concrete steps to improve the standard of living among peasants. They have also registered unmistakable compassion for other constituencies, including those displaced from inefficient state-owned factories. Hu was shown on Chinese television visiting a herder’s tent in Inner Mongolia, voicing concern for the poor and the unemployed, spending the New Year with peasants. Wen did likewise, celebrating the Lunar New Year with mine workers down a 720-meter coal-mine shaft in China’s bitterly cold northeast. During the SARS epidemic, Hu and Wen were reported as risking their own lives in paying frequent visits to local hospitals and SARS patients, and giving concrete instructions about how to control the epidemic. Wen was covered in the media visiting the campus of Beijing University during the SARS epidemic. All this left the students with an impression of “Wen as ‘a people’s premier’ and built their confidence in the government.” Moreover, Wen’s image as “people’s premier” was further shaped by the reported stories of him growing up in an ordinary family, having visited 1,800 counties out of 2,000 throughout the country, and having helped migrant workers to have the default wage recovered. More recently, Wen was shown visiting an 83-year-old elementary school teacher on China’s Teacher’s Day. Through these symbolic acts, Hu and Wen established themselves as the “leaders for the people.”
B. Impact of rhetorical strategies
Watts has labeled Hu and Wen as “left-wing interventionists” and their predecessors, by comparison, as “right-wingers.” These designations are currently used by some Western observers to highlight the rhetorical problems faced by Hu and Wen in achieving their respective goals. Indeed, Jiang’s agenda seemed to favor the winners of the economic reform and lead to larger economic disparity, while Hu/Wen’s rhetoric and actions appealed to the losers of the reform and aimed to bridge the gap between the rich and poor.
While Hu and Wen still maintain one-party rule and government control, ordinary Chinese people enjoy unprecedented levels of freedom of speech in private and in limited public settings, particularly in their criticism of the Party and government. In fact, for the first time in Chinese history, the line “the government must respect and protect human rights” has been written into the Constitution. Dong called this a milestone in the development of Chinese human rights and a move from treating human rights as a political entity to a legal concept. In a March 2004 press conference, Premier Wen Jiabao emphasized that the Party leadership and its members must comply with the law and be made accountable for their actions. Such a move is compatible with Hu’s tenet “Putting People First” while at the same time promoting political reform within the Party. Hu’s efforts to overcome the moral bankruptcy of some Communist Party members can only be effective when they are combined with legal accountability and enforcement.
Fortunately for Hu and Wen, they seem to be operating in an international climate conducive to internal reform. On the international front, they have followed their predecessors with a pragmatic, reconciliatory, and accommodating approach, which appears to have paid off. During their visits to the U.S. they have garnered warm receptions, and have been able to celebrate improved relations with the West, emphasize commonalities, urge mutual respect, and call for dialogue to resolve future differences.
As Heisey points out,
Hu’s rhetoric in foreign affairs follows the established policy of strategic partnership through more effective and extensive dialogue with the U.S. and other regions of the world. Hu’s emphasis on dialogue with the U.S. as equal partners is a rhetorical strategy that constructs a sense of social cohesion, advancing the interests of the entire international community.
Conclusion
This paper has presented a dilemma-centered analysis of China’s transitional rhetoric during the period of economic reform. CCP leaders’ rhetoric in this period was characterized by reconciliation of the old and the new, as exemplified by their coinage or redefinition of Party slogans. Deng Xiaoping’s “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” epitomized his effort to reconcile Maoist ideals with new economic initiatives. Jiang Zemin pushed economic development forward while opening the CCP to entrepreneurial and managerial elites in the name of “advancing the culture” and “keeping up with the times.” And Hu furthered Party legitimacy and the interests of the poor with his efforts at “Putting People First.” All of these slogans created rhetorical space to facilitate the economic/social transition as well as justifying continued Party rule. On the international front, CCP leaders have made at least temporary peace with China’s former enemies in the West. At the time of writing, China and the U.S. are joined together in mutually advantageous trade relationships and in a “strategic partnership” on matters of mutual concern.
Over the years, the language of capitalist appropriation has become less tentative, less qualified, and less ambiguous, consistent with the reality of a private sector now responsible for at least half of China’s economic growth. In the early 1980s capitalism was smuggled in rhetorically under the banner of “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” and the private sector was officially recognized as a “complement to the state-owned economy”. In 1993, the term “market economy” became enshrined in the Constitution. By 1999, private enterprises were constitutionally elevated in status as an “essential part” of China’s economy. At the time of writing, the CCP’s new leaders are seeking to diversify exports to more regions in the world and aiming to achieve what they call “balanced development.” They are doing so in a highly professionalized, transparent manner, utilizing pragmatic “win-win” arguments in place of ideologically strident appeals for class struggle.
The dilemmas and strategies identified here have included some that are common to political leaders—e.g., those stemming from the need simultaneously to compete and cooperate with others, to appeal simultaneously to audiences with sharply divergent interests or opinions, and to appear principled and consistent while remaining flexible and even opportunistic. Yet the Chinese case seems in some ways unique, given the extreme disparities between the Marxist/Maoist ideology that brought the CCP into power, and its increasingly capitalist ideology.
In general, during the transition period, China’s leaders have had to wrestle with contradictions and paradoxes. Their rhetoric has had to exhibit moralistic but also utilitarian intentions. On one hand, it appears to be consistent with time-honored principles in its invocations of Marxian dialectical theory; Mao’s “truth from facts,” and the general principle that policy judgments must be “correct” and not simply wise or prudent. On the other hand, CCP leaders have encouraged innovative thinking in the pursuit of economic prosperity and political reform. Ironically, the rhetoric of consistency with time-honored principles has coincided with deviations from those principles in practice. In the face of these recurring tensions, CCP leaders have communicated vaguely and ambiguously at times, only hinting at goals and meanings, while at other times offering offsetting benefits to different constituencies, and thus blunting opposition. The CCP has had to make use of a wide array of rhetorical strategies, including deception, deliberate ambiguity, behavioral modeling, symbolically freighted moves, and, not least, straight talk.
Looking back at the Chinese reform process, Kluver sees “a clear trajectory of the justifications themselves.” In his words, “The early justificatory rhetoric relied primarily on the first principles of Mao’s authority and the national myth. The justification then advanced to an argument from historical progression and finally to an altogether different reconceptualization and definition of socialism. The common threads running through each of these stages are the continuous revising and retelling of history and a continuous subtle revision of ideological orthodoxy. Kluver’s “clear trajectory of justifications” for reform captures well, in our view, the period from Mao through Deng to Jiang Zemin. But, as we have argued, the Hu-Wen regime (which Kluver did not study) interrupts the rhetorical trajectory, prompting a return to Maoist egalitarian sentiments and Maoist slogans, but combining them with a language of ecological balance more akin to the technocratic theorizing of the Club of Rome. The arrow-like “trajectory” has thus been replaced by a rhetoric that magically moves forward and backward at the same time. This is a departure from Jiang but not from China’s larger narrative arc, wherein the old and the new seem forever required to find common expression.