The Socialist System
3 min readDeng Xiaoping:What is the ideological line?To adhere to Marxism and to integrate il with Chinese realities-in other words,to seek truth from facts,as advocated by Comrade Mao Zedong,and to uphold his basic ideas.It is crucial for us to adhere to Marxism and socialism.For more than a century after the Opium War,China was subjected to aggression and humiliation.It is because the Chinese people embraced Marxism and kept to the road leading from new-democracy to socialism that their revolution was victorious.
At the founding of the People’s Republic of China,we inherited from old China a ruined economy with virtually no industry.There was a shortage of grain,inflation was acute and the economy was in chaos.But we solved the problems of feeding and employing the population, stabilized commodity prices and unified financial and economic work,and the economy rapidly recovered.On this foundation we started large-scale reconstruction.What did we rely on? We relied on Marxism and socialism.Some people ask why we chose socialism.Our answer is that we had to,because capitalism would get China nowhere.If we had taken the capitalist road,we could not have put an end to the chaos in the country or done away with poverty and backwardness.That is why we have repeatedly declared that we shall adhere to Marxism and keep to the socialist road.But by Marxism we mean Marxism that is integrated with Chinese conditions,and by socialism we mean a socialism that is tailored to Chinese conditions and has a specifically Chinese character.
What is socialism and what is Marxism?We were not quite clear about this in the past. Marxism attaches utmost importance to developing the productive forces.We have said that socialism is the primary stage of communism and that at the advanced stage the principle of from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs will be applied.This calls for highly developed productive forces and an overwhelming abundance of material wealth.Therefore, the fundamental task for the socialist stage is to develop the productive forces.The superiority of the socialist system is demonstrated,in the final analysis,by faster and greater development of those forces than under the capitalist system.As they develop,the people’s material and cultural life will constantly improve.One of our shortcomings after the founding of the People’s Republie of China was that we didn’t pay enough attention to developing the productive forces.Socialism means eliminating poverty.
China’s socialist democracy recognizes the peoples as the masters of the country,the leadership of the party as the core and the rule of law as its guarantee.Only under the leadership of Chinese Communist Party and by rule of law can the people truly be the masters of the country.
The Chinese Communist Party,while leading the people to fight for the people’s democracy,combined with China’s history and national conditions,has created many socialist democratic systems such as…the system of people’s congress,the system of multi-party cooperation and political consultation led by the Communist Party,the system of regional ethnic autonomy system and various grass-roots democracy systems.
Socialist democracy requires full respect for the differences of citizens’views and ideas and their diversified interests and needs under the guidence of core socialist values,stresses the role of democratic discussion in consolidating the commor ideal:and emphasizes the importance of overall plans and consideration,negotiation and compromise in achieving interest integration and forming an interest pattern that gives priority to the overall interests and still takes care of
