Reports - 42. page

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has always been in absolute control of its Army. In recent years in Mainland China, even inside of the Army, there has already presented the viewpoint of “The Nationalization of the Army.”  In 2007, General Zhao Keming, of the PLA, in the following article reflected the concerns of the high-level officials whether the Army is loyal to the Party …” [1]
Beijing  (Zhongxin Net)—On April 17, 2008, General Zhao Keming, the Political Commissar, the National Defense University, published an article in Qiu Shi, analyzing the issues on how the PLA provides a strong safety control for building up a harmonious Socialist Society. In the Article, General Zhao emphasized the awareness of the army spirit be reinforce constantly; support a series of the basic essential systems that the Party absolutely is in command of the Army; make unremitting preparations for the military battles; do well in each preparation task; and prepare to complete the sacred missions given by the Party and the people to safeguard the unity of the homeland at all times.

The General pointed out in the Article that the high stability and the centralized unity of the Army are important cornerstones for structuring a harmonious Socialist Society; uphold the Party is totally in command of the Army; is the fundamental premise for the PLA to keep the nature and objectives of the people’s army; maintaining the quality and objectives of the PLA is the primary guarantee to achieve the goal of the magnificent modernization of the Army; also is a basic requirement for winning the regional wars under the future Internet Era; continuously reinforcing the awareness of the military spirit of the officers and solders of the entire army; support a series of fundamental systems the Party is in total control of the Army, and firmly resist the influence of the wrong-political viewpoints, “The Non-Party, the Non-Politicized and the Nationalized Army,” are the most important issues of the framework of the PLA; the long-term stability of the country and the fate of the socialism of China cannot be changed at any time.

In the article, the General emphasized:  Further making sure the principle of the Party is absolutely in control of the Army; to support a series of essential systems that the Party is unconditionally in controls of the Army; to intensify the making of the Party in the Army vigorously; constantly improving the overall quality, ability and level of the organization in every level of the Party; rally around the flag, support the central government; intensify the nurturing and selections of the young cadres, pay special attention to the administration of education for the high- and medium-levels of cadres, pay special attention to the team developments in each level of the leaders; guarantee the firearms are always in the hands of those who are loyal to the Party, guarantee the paths, strategies, and the implemented policies in the Army of the Party and guarantee the actions of all officers and soldiers of the entire Armed Forces must be answerable to the Central Party Committee and the Control Military Committee.

General Zhao emphasized in the Article that the reinforcement of the consciousness of the mission and the apprehension of dangers; pay close attention to the environment of the national securities and the changing situations of Taiwan and the Overseas; to be highly on the alert for the infiltration, destruction and subversive activities of the domestic and foreign hostile forces; insist on the preparations for the military battles with sustained efforts; do well in all the preparation jobs; and prepare to fulfill the sacred-missions given by the Party and the people to safeguard the reunification of the homeland at all times. Enhance the research on the important reality issues:  pay special attention to the issues of restricting the buildups and developments of our Army from the system mechanisms and policy systems. Truly enhance the combat effectiveness as the developing tasks and make use of the focal point of the resources; let all jobs and the resources of the Army have true effect on promoting the battle capability, and construct future military battles’ commanding point with the overall increase of the battle capability.

The General pointed out in the Article: to strengthen the regular combat readiness, adjust and perfect the system mechanisms of the national defense mobilization, expand the foreign military communications, actively participate in the international cooperation of peace-keeping, anti-terrorism, anti-nuclear proliferation. Launch joint maneuvers as to bring about an active role in promoting a peaceful-, harmonious-world development of China. Actively cooperate with the related national departments to strictly guard and firmly attack the racial segregation forces, the violent terrorist groups and the infiltration sabotage activities of the religious extremist groups. Actively cooperate with local governments to strengthen the community safety control tasks, deal with the urgent crises, strengthen the emergency system development, reinforce the capability of maintaining the social stability, the frontier security and stability, and the handling of the urgent crises.

In the Article the General pointed out: the innovative theory of the Party should be constantly used to unite the hearts and minds of the soldiers; molding firmly the minds of the soldiers to cultivate their fighting spirit; do well in all kinds of the preparations for military battles; guide the Army officers and soldiers to have a positive understandings of the developmental changes of today’s world; with a positive understanding of the socialisms with Chinese characteristics made the enormous achievement and the development directions; with a positive understanding and the view of the interest relation adjustment in the deepened reform; constantly reinforce the faith and confidence in the Party’s leaderships, the socialist system, the reform and the open policy movements and the comprehensively building up the goal of an affluent society; the officers and soldiers must be guided to fully understand the great missions that they shoulder; inspiring them fear not the sacrifice and nor the indomitable heroic spirit; firm their will to fight for the unification of their homeland; fighting to safeguard the sovereignty and the territorial integrity; fighting for the nation’s dignity, the will to take up arms is for the fundamental interests of the Chinese nation; strengthen their thoughts for the readiness to go to a war; strengthen their confidence in winning the war; develop the officers and solders firm fighting will, the tenacious fighting attitude, the perfect psychological quality at an approximately actual combat’s environment and in the difficult and strict training.

The General also emphasized in the Article:  insisted on abiding by the military law and order in administering the Army; training the troops strictly; realistically raise up the Army’s combat capabilities;
the improvement of the quality and ability to command the Armed Forces of the leading cadres and leading authorities in accordance with the military law and order must be focused; establishing and perfecting the surveillance and restraint mechanisms for monitoring the actions of the leading cadres and leading authorities of the law enforcement; the leading cadres and leading establishments must set an examples of taking the initiatives in strengthening, developing the unity, friendship, harmony, and purity of the internal relationships in the Army; form a fine internal environment beneficial for the overall development for officers and soldier in the Army; constantly enhance the internal attraction and cohesion of the Army; unceasingly reinforce the ability of the PLA in coping with crises.

Endnote:
[1] sina.net, April 18, 2007
http://mil.news.sina.com.cn/2007-04-18/1642440407.html

The following article has been posted on many Chinese websites under different titles. The extensive posting on China’s heavily censored websites and blogs indicates a widespread public acceptance of the article; it also indicates that the ruling regime feels a real sense of political crisis. In this scholarly article, both nationalism and the anti-western sentiment found in traditional propaganda have been blended together. China is portrayed as a grief-stricken victim, not of its own regime, or of the breakdown of morality in China, but of lustful western exploitation that has expended all its natural and human resources to contribute to the welfare of the West and of the rest of the world. The West is cited as a scapegoat for all the current problems that China faces: the prevalence of tainted food, slave-labor wages, the prevalence of crime and prostitution, the outrageous environmental degradations, wanton corruption, the lack of occupational safety, the heavy losses in the financial sector, and even why China’s wealthy transfer their assets abroad. Below is an unabridged translation of the Chinese original. Chinascope has not been able to verify the authorship. [1]

Author: Professor Zhang Hongliang of Central University of Nationalities

The third step is the bargain purchase, that is, using a very low price or even a zero price to buy out the core industries or the leading companies in various sectors. Foreign investment in China has already caused the proportion of the local manufacturing industry to drop to 26.5% in added value. Also the purchase price is so low that it is far below the asset purchase price after the Great Depression. The purchase price is less than 5% of the value of the assets if purchased on the open market. For example, strong domestic banking networks support the fund management companies linked to banks. They sold 1/3 of their stock at the price of 1 yuan per share to the foreign investment companies. The foreign investment companies invested only tens of millions of yuan. After one year, without including the increase in capital, just the annual profit was over hundreds of millions of yuan.

As for handling the financial nonperforming assets, the gain that foreign companies have made is even more alarming. Take Morgan Stanley, which was mentioned previously. During the cooperation process with China Huarong Asset Management Co., one of four largest asset management companies in the nation, it made a 900% profit, and formed the world-famous “Huarong Model.” In fact, among the current 4,000 billon non-performing financial assets, a considerable number were created due to the foreign investment companies taking advantaging of the tax-emption policies to defeat the state-owned enterprises. This is what happens: the first to step is to beat the other’s husband to death, then to take over the other’s body. The sad thing is, in the end not only do our 4,000 billon non-performing financial assets fall into the foreign investment companies’ hands, but we also pay the bill for those 4,000 billon non-forming financial assets. The reason is very simple. Many non-performing assets are non-performing in our hands, but when they fall into the foreigners’ hands, they are no longer non-performing assets. The foreigners know very well that the Chinese government officials are afraid of foreigners in China. They will go through a lawsuit to force the local government to give them these non-performing financial assets.
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Thirdly, currently the foreign investments in China not only loot the country’s economic resources, but they have also started to disintegrate and destroy China’s political system resources. The raiding investors have created great GDP achievements for local governments. This, together with officials’ enormous personal interests, has caused the local governments to crazily seek foreign investors. The preferential terms they offer to the foreign investments have exceeded the economic sphere. They even give political and legal privileges that were used by the past imperialist concessions in China, at the expense of our national sovereignty, to attract these foreign investments. Due to the increasingly complex components of capital, now the local political and legal privileges have also been extended to all capital.

According to a news report from Legal Evening News last week, Qinyang City in Henan Province provided 12 various political and legal privileges to all those who invested over 50 million. These include the following: they do not need to conform to the traffic regulations, they enjoy half price for hospital care, their sons and daughters can freely choose a school, and they are not subject to police inspections in the entertainment area (gambling, prostitution), etc. It has also been said that every month from the 1st day to 25th it is “Quiet Day” for foreign businesses. No government unit including the judiciary is allowed to access the business. Whoever violates this will be immediately expelled from his job. Right until the time the reporter finished this write-up, 7 civil servants had been expelled from work because they entered a foreign business. A regulation similar to this one in Qinyang City of Henan Province has already been seen in the southeast coastal areas. A secretary in Guangdong Province directly said in front of CCTV’s video camera, when he was explaining why he asked the court to sentence migrant workers so they would lose the case, “Very simple. I have plenty of migrant workers here. But it is very hard to attract the foreign investments. If I do not speak for the foreign investors, who will speak for them? Development is the hard truth.” It was Comrade Xiaoping who said this. Many foreign investment companies in China have also changed from simply bribing the government officials, to gradually controlling them and giving them lessons. It was said of Beijing Vice Mayor Liu xx, that because he violated one foreign investment company’s interest, his corruption and a tape showing his promiscuity were immediately made public.

5. As for IPOs in the overseas markets, unlike the foreign capital’s predatory acts in China, our companies entering the developed western countries have brought surprisingly huge returns to the local investors. China Petroleum Corporation initially had only 2.9 billion US dollars when it went IPO in the United States. Four years later, the overseas dividends accumulated had reached 11.9 billion US dollars. For China Petroleum, China Petrochemical, China Mobile, and China Unicom, just the four companies, their overseas dividends have reached 100 billion US dollar. What is worth mentioning is that the above companies’ profits have completely come from looting domestic consumers, or from lucrative rate charges on calls for incoming and outgoing calls. This is the equivalent of collecting money from Chinese and giving it to foreigners. It is already terrible how the foreign companies loot China’s wealth; it is not justified that the state-owned companies in China also help the foreigners to collect China’s wealth.
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There are more than 100 companies similar to the above 4 companies. If the corporate dividends are paid in this way, not only developing countries like China cannot afford it, but developed counties such as the United States will be ripped down to a developing country.

Currently our national social security expenditure is a little over 300 billion yuan. The minimum amount for cost-of-living funds in 2004, and for the central government and local government’s finances, together were just over 20 billion yuan. This amount is equal to only 10% of the dividends that the above 4 companies gives overseas. The state-owned enterprises belong to the nation; they should serve the whole nation, and should not just consider the foreign investors’ interests. According to the 3rd health service survey by the Ministry of Health, currently over 50% of the urban population, and 87% of the rural population, do not have any medical insurance. About 80% of the population in the west-central area cannot afford medical care, over 50% of the rural, primary, and secondary schools hardly have enough operating expenses, over 40% of primary schools use dilapidated buildings, over 40% of primary schools lack desks and chairs, close to 40% of rural primary schools cannot pay electricity; some dare not turn on the lamps. In the western area some rural schoolteachers’ monthly salaries are only about 40 yuan. Some female teachers have to do prostitution after class in order to make a living. According to a joint investigation by Renmin University of China and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, in 2004, China’s Gini coefficient was about 0.53. According to the National Bureau of Statistics’ survey of urban and rural households, the average gap between rich and poor in urban and rural areas has increased from 2.7 times in 1978 to 7.4 times in 2003. In 25 years the gap has gone up 4.7 times. After many years of sustained economic growth, it is shocking how rapidly the gap between rich and poor has been increasing. The root cause is no longer purely domestic factors, but rather the result of how international monopoly capital has colonized China.

6. Lastly looking from the economic developing zones, the hot trend of building economic zones across the nation for many years has already become a destructive force; it has become another way for foreign capital to loot China. According to the information provided by the Ministry of Land and Resources, from 1996 to 2003, the cultivated land in China decreased from 1.95 billion mu (note: mu is Chinese acre, 1 US acre = 6.07 mu) to 1.85 billion mu. It decreased by 100 million mu over 7 years; an average of 14.29 million mu each year has disappeared. This is larger than twice all of the cultivated land in Hainan Province. It is the equivalent of 2 of Hainan Province’s cultivated land disappearing per year. In China the cultivated land per person is only 1.43 mu, which is less than 40% of the world average. In 2003, there were 6 provinces whose average cultivated land per person was less than the 0.8 mu warning level. In 2004 the central government cleaned up close to 7,000 developing zones in the nation. The new projects in the developing zones occupy about 74 million mu of land. Among them 40% is not used for development. This has caused a large amount of land to remain idle. What’s even more sad is that a large amount of good fertile farmland has been completely destroyed.
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A Ministry of Land and Resources official said that the land occupied by the various developing zones has exceeded the total area of all of China’s cities and towns. More and more cities have embarked on the development of the “Suzhou City Mode,” i.e. using cheap land to attract foreign investment. According to a statistics report, in Suzhou City, every year when the GDP increases by 1%, it costs about 5,000 mu of cultivated land. With the speed of development being around 18%, cultivated land is disappearing at the speed of almost 100,000 mu per year. With cheap land used to attract foreign investment, we cannot count how much wealth has simply been given to foreign investment. However, it is reflected in the loss of farmers who have been deprived of their land. It is an amazing astronomical figure. According to some expert’s statistics, the farmers who are deprived of their land receive 5% to 10% of the value as compensation. In 10 years they have lost 10 trillion to 20 trillion yuan. Taking this land from the farmers who, for generations, have depended on the land to make a living, and giving the land to foreigners, this is a traitorous act. The foreign capital attracted by this cheap land, in turn, helps the real estate businesses by increasing the value of land. The increased value of land in China has become foreign investment’s profit. Pany Ming, director of the Department of Cultivated Land Protection, the Ministry of Land and Natural Resources, pointed out that from the situation in 2005, the land occupied by the new developing projects in the nation has resulted in a net income loss of 76.3 billion yuan, while the actual land use fees that the central and local governments have collected from the new developing projects, amounted to only 21.45 billion yuan. Of this money 55.0 billion flowed to the foreign investment real estate companies. That is, just in 2005, the land use fees in the new developing projects led to a loss of nearly 55.0 billion.

Let’s think about it. Our people’s wages have become the profit for foreign investments. Our future descendants’ resources have become the profit for the foreign investments. Our deteriorating environment has become the profit for the foreign investments. Our national land has become the profit for the foreign investments. In the end, what else do we have left for our nation?

Note: mu is Chinese acre, 1 US acre = 6.07 mu

Endnotes:
[1] Boxun, June 9, 2008
http://news.boxun.com/news/gb/china/2008/06/200806092153.shtml

Editor’s Note: This is an article published on Xinhuanet.com Website at the end of 2004. For the Chinese communist regime, giving up control over the army is equivalent to giving up its reign over the Chinese people. In the recent years, there have been different voices demanding for the nationalization of the Army from civilians, even from within the Army, but the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would make no concession in this aspect. The following is the translation for the Xinhuanet.com news article. [1]

[Xinhuanet.com News Center, Beijing, December 25th, 2004]  The Resolution released at the 4th Plenary Session of the 16th CCP Central Committee mandates: “Adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership of the Army; always put the ideological and political education in the forefront as top priority in order to maintain forever the nature, the unique characteristics and the style of the People’s Army.” The Resolution provided guidance for us to improve the Party’s capability in managing the Army. The Party’s absolute leadership over the Army is the never ever-changing spirit of our army as well as a unique political advantage. It is also the demarcation line between our army and any other armies in capitalist countries.

People’s Liberation Army of China is the People’s Army established by and under the absolute leadership of the Chinese Communist Party; it is an armed force serving to carry out the political tasks of the Party. The principle of adhering to the Party’s absolute leadership, which was the foundation upon which the Army was created, had been formed and gradually been fully developed by the Party on the basis of its scientific understanding of the objective principles of China’s revolutionary struggles.

To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army is, most fundamentally, to firmly uphold the banner [of the Party leadership], to support the core [of the Party], to keep consistent with the CCP Central Committee in ideology and political views, to strictly follow the instructions from the CCP Central Committee, and to firmly uphold the authority of the CCP Central Committee led by Comrade Hu Jintao as Secretary-General. This is the highest political discipline of our army, as well as the fundamental requirement to ensure the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army.

To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army, we must firmly take Mao Zedong’s military ideology and Deng’s ideology of military development in the new era as our guidance, and fully implement the important ideology of the “three represents.” We must persevere in taking the ideology of the “three represents” as the important guiding ideology in leading and developing the military, making sure it is carried out in all aspects of the development of the Party Committees within the Army, and implementing it in all activities of the Army’s preparation for military battles. We must do so to truly resolve the two historical tasks: always winning the battles and never changing the nature of the Army. It is the basic ideological guarantee to ensure the Party’s absolute leadership of the Army.{mospagebreak}

To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army, we must firmly resist the wrong ideological trends such as “Separating the Army from the Party,” “Depoliticize the Army” and “Nationalization of the Army.” We must further strengthen the Party’s absolute leadership and discipline ourselves in this respect.
 
To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army, we must firmly uphold and improve the fundamental principle of the Party’s leadership over the Army, which mainly includes: (1) the ultimate leadership and chain of command is under the CCP Central Committee and the Central Military Committee. The CCP Central Committee is the top leadership and decision-making regime, and the Central Military Committee is the Party’s top leadership body inside the Army. (2) The Party establishes CCP committees at or above the regiment levels, and establishes the Party grass-root committees at the battalion level. The CCP committees at different levels are the core of leadership at each level. (3) According to the principle of democratic centralism, under the collective leadership of each CCP committee with committee members responsible for different portfolios and duties. (4) General Political Department is set up for the Army. At or above regiment levels, there are political commissar’s offices. (5) At the company level or equivalent, there are CCP branch committees which are the grass root regimes of the Party in the Army – the core of leadership at its level.

To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army, we must stick to the practice of ideological and political education as top priority before any other agendas in the Army. It is the requirement to ensure that the Party will tightly control the Army in ideology and politics.

To adhere to the Party’s absolute leadership over the Army, we must continuously strengthen the development of CCP committees and cadres in the Army.

Endnote:
[1] Xinhua, December 25, 2004
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2004-12/25/content_2379107.htm

Gangs have penetrated into middle schools in China, according to lecturers from a seminar on crime prevention held in Guangzhou, China. Experts are calling for the justice system to get involved with these hate groups. The following is a translation of a report on the seminar published by Radio Free Asia. [1]

Some group members are actively recruiting students in middle schools to their organizations. Not only do they threaten students, but also force them to hand over their money. Their actions have created a bad image in the community. According to Hong Kong Takungpao [a Chinese-language newspaper], Liao Zongyi, Guangzhou City deputy prosecutor, said at the seminar that over the last several years the local juvenile crime rate continues to increase and these school gangs still exist despite being banned multiple times. Some gangs have more than one hundred members; thus, they are severely endangering society. These gangs have set up activities at many middle schools in Guangzhou City. There are more than 10 well-known gangs. They intimidate and lure other students to join their groups. According to the report, the main activities of gang members are recruiting people into their organizations, threatening people, and extorting money. They then turn the money into the leaders of these hate groups outside schools. Student members pay monthly membership fees from $4 to $10 (30 RMB to 80 RMB), thereby providing gang leaders approximately $120 (1,000 RMB) in cash just on membership fees alone.

Ms. Guo, professor of psychology at Zhongshan University, often volunteers to provide psychological counseling for juveniles. She said middle school-age students have a tendency to be group oriented and therefore want to be in groups, which makes them easy targets for gangs in society to manipulate.
 
"The characteristic of puberty (age 13 to 16) is that teenagers want to find a feeling of belonging from their peers to prove their lives have meaning and value. Even for an outstanding student, if his/her friends won’t accept him/her, he/she could feel that heaven was collapsing. This age group is deeply influenced by hormonal changes. In addition, regardless of country, during these teenage years (age 13 to 16) they are more likely to commit murders compared to other age categories.”

Dr. Liu Xiaozhu, a sociologist from the United States, said that the main reasons for juveniles to form unhealthy gangs were due to the rapid changes in social structures, poor economic conditions, and slow responses from the community.

"First of all, gangs from overseas come into China, especially from Hong Kong and Taiwan, making Guangdong province a rough place. If the social order is bad, the juvenile hate groups become attractive. Other factors are the stress coming from education and employment pressures. These environments allow for hate groups to easily develop.”
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According to official Chinese data, since 2000, the juvenile crime rate has annually increased 13 percent. Juvenile crimes make up 70 percent of national crimes; among these, 70 percent of juvenile crimes were committed by juveniles between the ages of 15 and 16. In other words, juveniles between the ages of 15 and 16 committed 50 percent of the overall national crimes. Normally, students with poor grades are more likely to join the gangs. However, a middle school “black dragon gang” from Guangzhou City shows that most of the outstanding students are also part of the gang. 

Liu Xiaozhu states that juveniles are full of energy. If they lack appropriate group activities, they create social problems easily. He concludes that the current juvenile education focuses too much on fame and that a lack of moral value is another reason for the increasing juvenile crimes.

"Our channels for guiding youth have become problematic. For example, it is said that religion is an important part in juveniles’ lives, but in China religion is depressed. If all the areas are blocked, and the newspaper is full of hypocritic propaganda, it will finally depress the juveniles to develop anti-social psychology. I think this is very sad."

Chinese experts have proposed to strengthen laws punishing juvenile offenders, lowering the age limits for the death penalty and criminal responsibility, and establishing a justice system for charging juvenile gangs. However, Liu Xiaozhu said that China has the world’s most severe criminal penalties. Therefore, the key to solving juvenile crime is not through severe punishment, but to rely on improving the quality of education and perfecting community support and family functions. 

Endnote:
[1] Radio Free Asia, June 24
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/campus-06242008104134.html?searchterm=None

The following article has been posted on many Chinese websites under different titles. The extensive posting on China’s heavily censored websites and blogs indicates a widespread public acceptance of the article; it also indicates that the ruling regime feels a real sense of political crisis. In this scholarly article, both nationalism and the anti-western sentiment found in traditional propaganda have been blended together. China is portrayed as a grief-stricken victim, not of its own regime, or of the breakdown of morality in China, but of lustful western exploitation that has expended all its natural and human resources to contribute to the welfare of the West and of the rest of the world. The West is cited as a scapegoat for all the current problems that China faces: the prevalence of tainted food, slave-labor wages, the prevalence of crime and prostitution, the outrageous environmental degradations, wanton corruption, the lack of occupational safety, the heavy losses in the financial sector, and even why China’s wealthy transfer their assets abroad. Below is an unabridged translation of the Chinese original. Chinascope has not been able to verify the authorship. [1]

Author: Professor Zhang Hongliang of Central University of Nationalities

A volunteer named Zeng Feiyang did an investigation within the Pearl River Delta, which is known as China’s export base, and found that every year 30,000 accidents occur in which punch worker’s fingers are severed. This totals more than 40,000 fingers. These figures are only for accidents happening to punch workers; it is just a small percentage of the accidents that happen to all machinery workers. As for the actual number of total machinery accidents, it is probably a number that no one will ever figure out. However, an investigation was conducted of the 8-million laborers in Shenzhen City. The results showed that one out of every five laborers has had either a work accident or an occupational disease. Therefore some factories in Shenzhen completely change their workers every two years. In order to deal with the disabled workers going to court, so that the state can “maintain the stability of society” and “avoid affecting economic profits,” the local government purposely prolongs the processing time of the cases in which the workers sue the employers so that they last three years or more. Consequently, these disabled workers usually end up giving up because they do not have enough money to stay for three years. They go back to the rural area and there goes the second half of their lives. Take a look at the rushing water of the Pearl River; it is full of laborers’ blood and tears!

As we talk about the laborers’ misery, one will at once remember the mine accidents in China. The entire world has found them shocking. From 2001 to 2005 in China, the mine accidents where 10 or more people were killed occurred on the average of once every week. The price of the 80 million tons of coal is the yearly death of more than 6000 mineworkers, which is an average of 17 workers per day. These numbers come from government statistics; the actual numbers should be much higher. Even according to these government statistics, China’s death rate for every million tons of coal is 100 times more than that of the US, and 10 times more than that of India or Russia. China’s death rate is ranked number 1 in the world and the total number of deaths is higher than the sum of the rest of the world combined. The mountainous bone ash of mine workers has stacked up a countless amount of treasure for the international monopolies and the Chinese mine owners. In this year’s Beijing International Automobile Exhibit, a mine owner with a running nose wanted to buy a Ferrari that costs several millions of yuan. When the lady told him that the car was very expensive, the mine owner sniffed out the snot and said, “Just let me know how much. I’ll buy the car as well as you.” In the end, several mine owners bought a total of more than 80 Ferraris. This extremely distorted scene of capitalists in a Communist country cannot be seen anywhere else in the world, even in a colony.
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3. From the aspect of foreign exchange, the enormous amount of treasure obtained by the laborers’ blood and tears as well as the mine workers’ mountainous bone ash are all completely offered and transferred to the US. However, facing the unprecedented resource disaster and the catastrophes suffering by the common people, China’s mainstream economists are cheering and saying that we have obtained a great amount of valuable foreign exchange. We indeed have 1,000 billion dollars in foreign exchange. However, rather than saying that these are China’s valuable treasure, it is better to say that these are the US’s valuable treasure. First of all, more than 2/3 of these 1,000 billion dollars are US money. What is US money? Basically it is some paper printed by the US printing firms. The US can print whatever amount they like. As there is more and more US money printed, the value of US currency drops, and China’s foreign exchange is greatly reduced in value. Calculating the US dollar’s value in Euro dollars, the US currency’s value has dropped by 50% in the past few years. Just like that, more than 700 billion dollars of China’s foreign exchange has evaporated by half. This half equals the total income of the entirety of China’s population. This year another 6% of the foreign exchange will evaporate. This is 60 billion dollars and exceeds the total amount of medical care for the aged people in China. Secondly, most of the foreign exchange that China bought is the national debt of the US. In the past there is a line used in China for mobilizing people to take action, “Buy the national debt to support the nation’s construction.” Today, we are buying the US’s debt to help the financial success of the US, and using extra foreign exchange to help stabilize US market prices, to lower the everyday living cost of the US people, and to support the national construction of the US.

Not only is this so, including the US, many developed Western countries say that China has a large amount of favorable balance of trade, thus pressuring China’s currency from gaining value. They also work with the companies within China and threaten China with the greatly reduced value of foreign exchange, so that the Chinese government imports western products with a very high price. It is shocking how high the prices of the imported products are and how low the prices of the exported products are. The luxury cars that China imports cost more than three times the prices on the oversea markets. Rolls-Royce Phantom Coupe costs about $400,000 overseas, but in China it sold for several million. Not long ago, a real estate businessman just bought one for over two million dollars. Prices of middle class cars in China are also around two times the price on the oversea markets. The imported makeup products and other luxury products are even more unbelievable. It is like publicly robbing away money from China.

In the China Southern Luxury Exhibit, an emerald was sold for over 11 million dollars. In the following luxury exhibit in Shanghai, within four days, more than 70 million dollars were exchanged in all the successful deals. Many luxury companies in the world rushed into China; so far there are more than 300 of them. Even things that are cheap overseas are selling in China as luxury products. For example, le vin rouge from France costs over 1,000 yuan (140 USD) in China, but in France some beggars often drink it even in the subway. The intellectual products have even higher prices. Microsoft Windows 98 costs $50 in the US, which is about 400 yuan. It is less than two hours salary of an American blue collar worker. In China, it is sold for 6,999 yuan, which equals a Beijing worker’s wages for 14 months, or a Shenzhen laborer’s wages for 20 months. Later, the XP system came out and it costs as much as 65,000 yuan. The pirate market has actually kept all these prices low. Otherwise, these monopoly prices would force 95% of China’s computer users to quit and China’s information technology level would retrogress by 20 years.
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Western developed countries have hired China’s business groups and mainstream economic experts and have already successfully established a system where China imports products with high prices and exports product with low prices. Through this system, they are converting China’s resources and the health of China’s citizens into the cheap products in their countries. As the consumption level gets higher and higher, these developed countries, including Japan, have not worsened their environment at all; instead these countries’ environments are getting cleaner and cleaner. By using China’s business groups, these countries have successfully separated profits and cost. Without costing themselves any bad outcomes, they still get good economic growth, and let China bear the bad consequences for them. This system can also be seen now with the conflict of China’s currency (Renminbi). Unlike US dollars, which are losing value both internally and externally, China’s currency is rising in value in relation to US dollars, but its buying power is reducing inside China. What this rising and dropping are doing is basically moving all the money of the common Chinese people into the pockets of the overseas employers.

4. Looking at the foreign capital, on one hand, China is using an enormous amount of money to support the US’s economic development; on the other hand, it is sacrificing our own resources and even our sovereignty, in order to attract foreign capital. Foreign capital is becoming the economic basis for the developed western countries to control China’s economics. Under the globalization today, the fact that foreign capital is flowing into China itself is a normal phenomena. However, the way we are drawing the foreign capital is becoming a historic catastrophe for the nation and the people.

First, the foreign capital economics is becoming a major way in sucking out China’s wealth. The foreign capital in China occupies more than 40% of our GDP, and the foreign firms take up 55.48% of the total imports and exports. This by far exceeds the normal ratio of the foreign capital for an export-oriented economy country. By the end of 2005, the total foreign capital that our country used was 662.405 billion dollars. According the estimate by the World Bank, the yearly profit margin rate of the foreign firms in developing countries is as high as 16% – 18%. From this, we can estimate that just in 2005, foreign firms gained more than 100 billion dollars of profit from China. The World Bank’s estimate is for the average developing countries. However, it is obvious that this number is far off from the actual number in China. This is because the foreign firms in China enjoy tax free, cheap land, super cheap labor, and all kinds of corrupt benefits. These do not exist in other developing countries.

How high is the actual profit margin rate? This is a highly confidential number to both the government and foreign firms. Therefore we can only try to estimate from various sources. The monopolies inside China (owned by the Chinese people) have a profit margin rate from 100% to 2000%. Usually, the profit margin rate of the foreign firms cannot be lower than these monopolies. This had been confirmed in many cases when foreign firms disclosed this information. For instance, Morgan Stanley had an internal conflict and some confidential information was disclosed as a result – their profit margin rate in China was 900%. If we calculate using the lowest rate of the monopolies, which is 100%, the total profit gained by the foreign firms in China each year should be around 700 billion dollars, which equals the sum of two years of all people’s salary in China.
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Also, nowadays when the foreign firms enter China, their main goal is no longer investing money into new projects. It is actually to collude with officials to purchase an enormous amount of state-owned assets at very low prices. This is a planned nation-wide murder. The first step is a tax-free system in which the foreign firms do not pay income tax for the first two years and pay half the income tax in the next three years. In the whole world, such a case only happens in China, where foreign firms enjoy something that the nation’s own citizens do not enjoy. This tax-free system has given the foreign firms the power to easily crush down any state-owned firms. The state-owned firms not only have to pay 33% (before it was 38%) of heavy taxation, but also have to cover the employee’s benefits. Consequently, when competing with the foreign firms, who do not pay tax or provide benefits to the employees, the result is already obvious. The second step is pressuring the desperate state-owned firms to “cut employees and increase efficiency.” Consequently, 60 million employees have been laid off from these state-owned firms. This is just like before trying to possess a woman, forcing her to throw away her kid. The result is that we have peeled off the barriers and separated out the clean capital. We are just waiting for foreign firms to come and swallow it.

Endnotes:
[1] Boxun, June 9, 2008
http://news.boxun.com/news/gb/china/2008/06/200806092153.shtml

The following article has been posted on many Chinese websites under different titles. The extensive posting on China’s heavily censored websites and blogs indicates a widespread public acceptance of the article; it also indicates that the ruling regime feels a real sense of political crisis. In this scholarly article, both nationalism and the anti-western sentiment found in traditional propaganda have been blended together. China is portrayed as a grief-stricken victim, not of its own regime, or of the breakdown of morality in China, but of lustful western exploitation that has expended all its natural and human resources to contribute to the welfare of the West and of the rest of the world. The West is cited as a scapegoat for all the current problems that China faces: the prevalence of tainted food, slave-labor wages, the prevalence of crime and prostitution, the outrageous environmental degradations, wanton corruption, the lack of occupational safety, the heavy losses in the financial sector, and even why China’s wealthy transfer their assets abroad. Below is an unabridged translation of the Chinese original. Chinascope has not been able to verify the authorship. [1]

Author: Professor Zhang Hongliang of Central University of Nationalities

Currently the Chinese people, taking establishing a harmonious society as a symbol, are returning to the struggle of the Garden of Eden. At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, politically the big Western powers carved China up. At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, China’s economy is, again, being carved up by the big Western powers. What’s different now is that at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, big Western powers used various treaties to carve us up. Now the big Western powers are using various regulations to carve us up. The main sign that China has been carved up is that China is becoming a heedlessly milked "cow" of the Western developed countries. International capital monopolies have inserted wealth-sucking straws fully throughout China’s body, which sustains destructive developments that cut off our offspring’s resources. The result is that gigantic wealth is flowing to the developed Western countries like a big river. China has upgraded the standard of life in developed Western countries and has led the economic growth of the entire world, but in doing so has solely sacrificed the benefits of the Chinese people—not only the benefits of the people of this generation, but even more scarily, it has exhausted the foundation of our offspring’s resources.

It can be said that sacrificing the foundation of our offspring’s resources in exchange for a generation’s riches is already a type of crime, much less that this generation of Chinese people has not even enjoyed the benefits. They have been completely consumed by this generation of westerners. This is why, while in thirty years of development, Japan’s wages caught up with the U.S.’s, but China’s wages are only 3% of the American wage. This is why (according to the latest statistics) the top 0.02% who control 70% of China’s wealth go all out to transfer their assets and their relatives abroad. This is why in the process of rapid economic growth, the Chinese people have again sunk under the oppression of the "three mountains."[2] Furthermore, international capitalist monopolies have already developed a plan to kill the cow after milking it dry. This is done through the use of hedge control of the stock market and the money market to roll up all the last capital remnants.
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1. Looking at it from the whole economic volume, the world economic engine that is China has contributed its resources, its environment and its citizens’ health to the astonishing growth of western countries’ wealth, so that three of the nine fortune forums were held in China. For the fourth consecutive year, China has driven the world’s 15% economic growth with only 4% of the world’s GDP. The four-year total contribution China has made to the world’s GDP is approximately 1.5 trillion USD, which is equivalent to 12 trillion Chinese Yuan. According to last year’s national wage standard, it is equivalent to more than six years of total wages of city and town workers in the entire country. China’s huge contribution to the world’s economy is most obviously seen in the frantic increase of international energy prices. China’s imports in recent years have resulted in a 70% average annual increase in the price of the world’s mining products. The cost of international sea transportation has increased even more, averaging a frantic 170% growth per year. The frantic rise in prices of goods imported into China and the frantic drop of China export prices has become one of the most inconceivable anomalies in the history of world economic development.

China’s contribution to Asia is even more astounding. One hundred percent of Asia’s export growth has come from China. It was China that pushed Asia out of its 1998 financial crisis. This is especially so with the major Asian economic power of Japan, which has kept its annual export growth to China at double digits ever since the turn of the 21st century. Exports to China have accounted for approximately 70% of Japan’s export growth. Japan admitted itself that "trade with China sustained Japan’s export-led economic rebound," and is an important reason for Japan’s freeing itself from the quagmire and for its recovery toward a prosperous economy.

But economic development has a price. In this world, there isn’t such a thing as a free lunch. The price for its huge contribution to the world, and Asia, including Japan, is the catastrophic destruction of China’s resources and environment. 80% of rivers and lakes have dried up; two-thirds of China’s grassland has been desertified; an overwhelming majority of China’s forests have disappeared; almost 100% of China’s soil has hardened and become impervious. According to statistics from Japan’s customs, for ten-plus years, China’s annual chopstick export to Japan required the cutting down of more than two million trees. The total number of chopsticks China exported to Japan in a decade was approximately 224.3 billion pairs. According to China forestry’s expert calculations, the amount of mountain forests destroyed to produce these chopsticks accounted more than 20% of China’s land.

At the same time that resources are being depleted, China’s ecological system is facing more and more threats. One-third of China’s soil has been polluted by acid rain; two-fifths of China’s major river systems have already become the five categories of bad water. More than 300 million farmers have no safe water to drink. More than 400 million city dwellers have been breathing in heavily polluted air. Fifteen million people have developed bronchitis and respiratory tract cancer as a result. The World Bank reported that China has sixteen of the twenty most seriously polluted cities in the world. Two-thirds of the 668 cities in China are surrounded by trash. This trash not only occupies ever more farming land, but threatens the basic living environment. Under the circumstance of not being able to treat the accumulating domestic trash, China is still wantonly importing trash from the developed Western countries. China has become the Western developed countries’ dump yard for emptying trash. One of three major U.S. exports to China is trash. It is also the one export with the largest growth rate. In some southern regions where trash has been imported, animals have become fully extinct; plants have been seriously mutated; and people’s health is deteriorating daily. In some regions, for many years there hasn’t been a single military enlistee who passed [his or her] physical examine.
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Looking at only the economic accounts, the losses are also quite astounding. In 2003 alone, the economic losses brought about by China’s environmental pollution and ecological destruction accounted for 15% of the year’s GDP. At the same time that we contributed to 15% of the world economic growth, we have deducted 15% from ourselves each year.

Not only has China’s natural environment worsened; so has its social environment. From 1979 to 2003, the crime rate rose six fold from 0.55 per thousand to 3.41 per thousand. Its annual growth rate is 7%. If we take into consideration the ever lowering standards for placing a file for investigation and prosecution, there is an even greater disparity. The societal death rate has increased from 44 per million in 1979 to 106 per million. The annual growth rate is 3.5%. In 2003, the rate of contagious disease outbreak announced by the Public Health Department increased 6.7% over the previous year; the death rate increased 37%. The Chinese people went from not knowing what an anti-burglary door and window were to installing anti-burglary doors and windows up to and above the 7th floor. Because ruffians are everywhere and are impossible to defend against effectively, industries nationwide have long stopped arranging night shifts for female workers. Poisonous food has already covered 100% of all industries. Only heaven knows what people are swallowing down their throats every day. Sexual promiscuity has spread to preschool-aged children. One can only imagine the future of their bodies and their lifespans.

Approximately 20 million young girls have been forced into prostitution. Their income accounts for 6% of the GDP, which is equivalent to over one trillion Yuan. This phenomenon is unique in world history. The average height of Chinese people is 2.5 cm shorter than Japanese people. Little Japan has really become "great Japan." According to GotoRead, there is one industrial accident related death for every 100 million Yuan GDP. In 2003, 136,000 people died from industrial injuries. At this rate, this year’s industrial deaths will reach 200,000. It is in reality as well as in name "a bloody GDP." Actually, this number is only the tip of the iceberg: a death figure from published statistics, which only includes state-owned industries and major accidents that involve a relatively large number of deaths. In private and foreign industries, ordinary deaths involving several people never make it to the statistics bureau at all. But the number of workers employed in private and foreign industries far surpasses the number in state-owned industries. When this factor is taken into consideration, the number of deaths each year is at least equivalent to a Nanking Massacre.

2. Looking solely from foreign trade, China’s astounding transfusion of wealth to developed Western countries has already made China sink into the saddest condition of colonialism. China’s export prices are so low that they’re almost free. Historically, other than the white people going to Africa to capture blacks for free, there has not been a single colony that has plundered in trade to such an extent. Referencing [prices] in foreign trade and prices in developed countries, one will find that foreign businessmen take over 95% of the profits of foreign trade. Last year, our country exported 17.7 billion articles of clothing. On the average, each garment costs only 3.51 USD, and each pair of shoes costs less than 2.50 USD. The price for a popular Barbie doll on the U.S. market is 10 USD. China’s industry in Suzhou only received 35 cents. Logitech sends to the U.S. 20 million "made-in-China" mice every year. The selling price for these mice is approximately 40 USD. China only receives 3 USD for each mouse. Workers’ wages, the costs of energy, transportation, and other regular costs are all included in this 3 USD.
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It is with this less-than-five-percent profit that we accumulated the one trillion USD foreign exchange reserve, which implies that we have, at the same time, contributed twenty trillion USD in capital to international monopolies. On the fifth anniversary of China joining the World Trade Organization (WTO), China Central TV repeatedly broadcasted that in the five years since China joined the WTO, it saved American families one-fifth of their living expenses. A survey by Morgan Stanley also indicated that American consumers have saved 100 billion dollars by buying China’s cheap products. The Japanese throw away Chinese chopsticks because buying is cheaper than washing. Also because it’s too cheap, Japan, which has long stopped burning coal; it has imported more than 20 million tons of coal to fill the sea and turn it into a man-made coal energy reserve. What the flood of China’s cheap disposable products into Western countries has destroyed is China’s resources. Even some people of conscience in the Western countries have been shocked, calling in succession for a change in disposable consumption, and sincerely advising China to protect its resources.

Foreign businessmen have taken an overwhelming majority of profits. Foreign industries operating in China have sucked the lifeblood of workers by lowering costs. After the Foxconn incident, America’s Apple Computer and UK’s Financial Times came to China in succession. Their reports indicated that Foxconn’s 150,000 female workers worked over 15 hours a day and earned less than 50 USD a month, which is less than two hours of wages compared to their American counterparts. The timeliness of receiving even such meager wages is a variable. Such low wages have turned workers in current society completely into slaves in a slave society. The reason that the overwhelming majority of young women and young men can work for next to nothing for a sustained period of time is because they dream of becoming a city dweller (i.e. a registered city resident) one day. To them, working for next to nothing is not scary. What’s scary is industrial injuries and disabilities. With 95% of the profits taken by foreign businessmen, proprietors can’t pay for labor protection at all. Injuries and disabilities have thus become a worker’s most fearful nightmare.

Endnotes:
[1] Boxun, June 9, 2008
http://news.boxun.com/news/gb/china/2008/06/200806092153.shtml
[2] The "three mountains" refers to the difficulties in seeing a doctor, in getting an education, and in securing a dwelling.

On May 11, 2006, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences published the first edition of The World Socialism Yellow Book. At the publication ceremony, Li Shenming, the deputy dean of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the director of the World Socialism Research Center, said, “We will have a relatively long time to coexist with the world of capitalism; we need to incorporate the constancy of our principles with the flexibility of our strategies. We are doing follow up research on world socialism to unveil the objective rules in history’s development with real historical facts – the twenty first century will be the century of socialism’s revival.” The following is a report on this event from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. [1]

On May 11, the Research Center for World Socialism and the Social Science Publications held a publication ceremony for The World Socialism Yellow Book, First Edition, and a discussion forum of the 2006 World Socialism and the Left Wing School of Thought. Li Shenming, the director of the Research Center for World Socialism and the deputy dean of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences was the keynote speaker. A hundred or so other directors, experts and scholars attended the forum, including: He Bingmeng, the deputy secretary of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the executive director of the World Socialism Research Center; Huang Haotao, the deputy director of the World Socialism Research Center; Wu Enyuan, the secretary of the Marxism Research Center; and Cheng Enfu, the deputy director of the Research Center for World Socialism and the deputy dean of the Marxism Research Center.

Li Shenming said that, since the Soviet Union’s drastic change, the world socialism movement has been in a declining mode. In 1994, the central government, with a high vision of the future, suggested not to give up doing research on the big topic of socialism. Based on this direction and led by the Central Propaganda Department, an overseas’ socialism follow up research coordination group was established. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences took the primary role for this group, with participation from the International Department Central Committee of the C.P.C, Central Translation Bureau, the Xinhua Agency, the Party School of the Central Committee of the C.P.C and the State Education Commission. In 12 years, the research effort has achieved significant results, and a series of high quality accomplishments. It has supported the central government’s policies with theories and references. Practice proved that the central government’s decision was absolutely correct.

Li Shenming said that we should continue to embrace the global strategy, finding evidence from the curved development of world socialism and it’s up and down moments to explain the future history that follows the laws of social development. Li also said that currently and in the future, the follow up research on world socialism needs to focus on the following issues to plan and execute the research: first, to apply Marxism, to systematically summarize the experience gained and lessons learned from the world socialism movements in the twentieth century, and to especially focus on the Soviet Communist Party and the Soviet Union’s history; second, to understand the main themes of current world development and to understand and summarize the latest state in the development of capitalism; third, to understand the fundamental differences and historical connections between capitalism and socialism.
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First of all, we need to recognize the fundamental difference between socialism and capitalism. Second of all, we also need to recognize the historic connections between capitalism and socialism. Third, capitalism’s strong development and socialism’s weakness is a temporary state; it could change. Socialism will develop from weakness to strength, and eventually surpass and win over capitalism. This is also an unavoidable objective principle. During this period, there may exist a fairly long time of cooperation, competition, struggle and even fighting process. Based on our research, when we pull together the accurate and real massive historical facts to explain the relationship between socialism and capitalism, to show the fundamental differences and connections, we can build people’s confidence in the success of establishing the Chinese style of socialism. Fourth, we need to analyze assess and have an overview of world socialism’s development in the 21st century. These are the most proper topics for the study of socialism.

Li Shenming believed that today, the study of world socialism should follow up on a number of factors, including: research on the reformation of the existing socialist countries, their trials, and their development in socialism, especially after the Soviet Union collapsed; the theories, the rebuilt administration cabinets and policy changes that the communist parties or worker parties have done differently from the western developed countries, the ex-Soviet Union areas and the third world countries to react to the drastic changes in the Soviet Union; the propaganda, development, research, and discussions of Marxism, socialism and other left wing thoughts around the world, and the union worker’s movements, farmer’s movements, student movements and other types of left wing activities in the capitalist countries. Of course, this follow up research may not cover each and every area. We need to have emphasis, and to focus on the important events and people, organizations and theories to conduct long term follow up research in order to discover its internal connections and patterns.

Li Shenming emphasized that the current unreasonable and unfair political and economic rules can only support a small group of western developed countries; and can only allow a small number of people to be in charge of the “business expansion,” “wealth,” and luxurious production style and life style. It can increase the distance between the rich and the poor from the north and the south; and it could accelerate the social separation into two extremes. We will have a relatively long time to coexist with the world of capitalism; we need to incorporate the constancy in our principles with the flexibility in our strategies. We are doing the follow up research on world socialism to unveil the objective rules in history’s development with real historical facts – the twenty first century will be the century of socialism’s revival.

Cheng Enfu, the deputy director of the Research Center for World Socialism and the deputy dean of the Marxism Research Center, and Xie Shouguang, the head of the Social Sciences Publications hosted the forum and publication ceremony. Chen Zhihua, the executive director of the World Socialism Research Center, introduced the content of the “The World Socialism Yellow Book.” Wu Enyuan, Wu Xiongcheng, Li Qiqing gave speeches at the forum. They shared their analysis on the theories used by the socialist countries in the world and exchanged their points of view on left wing activities in Europe, Latin American and Asian areas.
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The articles, collected in the newly published The World Socialism Yellow Book: Tracking Study of World Socialism – Listening to the new tides at a low ebb (vol 2), were the latest research results from the Research Center for World Socialism. The No. 1 series, Listening to the new tides at a low ebb: The Future of the World Socialism in 21st Century was an edition of outstanding articles published by the center since its startup ten years ago. It included several schools of thought on socialism and documented important global events led by the left wing. This book was reprinted as The World Socialism Yellow Book (2004 Edition). From now on, the research center will publish The World Socialism Yellow Book annually to introduce the new developments in world socialism and to publish new research results on world socialism study.

Endnote:
[1] Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, May 15, 2006
http://www.cass.net.cn/file/2006051559241.html

On March 2, 2007, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) held a forum on “The Marxism and the Rise and Fall of the State.”  From the background and ranks of the participants, it was obviously seen that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was aware of its own crises, and was searching for all sorts of solutions.  It was agreed in the Forum, The Marxism, is still a powerful ideological weapon to open up the just cause in the new epoch, and also is the theoretical guidance and the foundation to enrich and strengthen the Chinese nation.” Below is the translation of the entire report in English of the meeting [1]:

Beijing, China – On March 2, 2007, the Department of Marxism Research of the CASS and the World Socialist and Marxist Research Center, and the Marxism Research Institute co-sponsored “The 3rd Forum of the Thinkers on Marxism and the Rise and Fall of the State.” The Forum had in-depth discussions on multiple factors and inner mechanisms, regarding the rise and fall of the state in the history and in reality; analyzed and commented on the major theoretical and practical issues, such as the democratic socialism, the Neo-Liberal point of views, the lessons of metamorphoses of the Soviet Union, the Eastern European countries, and the developmental meridian of the world’s socialist movements.

The attendants were: Li Shenming, Vice President of the CASS;
Wu Yi, Chair of the National Party Construction Research Society;
Zhang Quanjing, the past Editor-in-Chief of Qiushi magazine;
Youlin; the former Executive Vice Editor-in-Chief of the People’s Daily;
Zhang Yunsheng, the Director of the State Social Science Planning Office;
Zhang Guoza, the Secretary-General of the Air Force Political Bureau;
 Luo Yichang, Yang Ke and Wu Jie-min, the former Leaders of the CASS, etc.;
Cheng Enfu, the Director of the Marxism Research Academy and the President of the Marxism Research Institute, chaired the Forum.

The Featured Presentations at the Forum Were:

Wu Enyuan: Controversies on the TV Series, “Lessons on the Disintegration of the Soviet Communist Party;”
Zhang Shuhua: “Warning on The Failure of the Russian Capitalism;”
Zhang Shunhong: “Reflections on the Rise and Fell of a Nation;”
Yu Yongding: A Few Thoughts on the Rise of Great Powers;”
Zhou Hong: “EU’s Neo-Liberalism and the Rise and Fell of the Welfare Nations;”
Wang Liqiang: “The Socialist Public Ownership Is the Basis of China’s Rise;”
Xu Jiankang: “Viewing the Rise and Fell of the Great Powers from the World System;”
Xu Chongwen: “The Historical Processes, Experiences and Lessons of the Swedish Model;”
Zhong Zheming: “How Can Bernstein’s Views Be Used to Rectify Marx and Engels;”
Cao Changsheng: “The Scientific Socialism and Democratic Socialism Should Not Be Confused;”
Huang Ping: “The Exploration on Contemporary Social Theory of Socialism;”
Tian Chenshan: “The Logic Basis of the Mainstream Consciousness of the Western Freedom and Democracy;" and
Liu Shulin: “The Developmental Meridian of the Democratic Socialist Ideology Trend of the Contemporary China.”
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The participants had separate group discussions on issues of disintegration of the Soviet Union, the democratic socialism and whatnot. All agreed that the materialization of China’s socialist modernizations and the harmonious developments depend upon the adherence to the guiding role of Marxism on various social trends of ideas, and further perfecting the economic, political, cultural and social of the socialist systems.

With regard to the democratic socialist ideological trend, the partakers believed that the democratic and scientific socialism possess a specified ideological origin. However, the democratic socialism should not be mistakenly regarded as a scientific socialist model system. The two systems are the best combination between capitalism in the field of production and socialism in the field of distribution. In fact, there are five major differences between the theories of democratic socialism and scientific socialism, including the guiding ideologies, the natures and roles of the different political parties, the ultimate goals, the roads to revolutionize the reality, and the views of ownerships. We must adhere to the road of scientific socialism with Chinese characteristics, and comprehensively implement the concept of scientific development.

In regards to the reasons of the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Soviet Communist Party, the Forum participants generally thought that the inspections should be done scientifically and the multiple domestic and foreign variables be analyzed comprehensively pertaining to the rise and decline of the state, such as the science and technology, the system, the culture, the education, the military and foreign affairs. The reasons of the drastic changes of the Soviet Union and the Eastern European countries were related to the highly centralized socialist economy and the political system were not timely reformed.  Yet, they were, mainly the consequences of the prevailing ideologies of the democratic socialism and the Neo-Liberation within the ruling Party, gradually broke away from, the deviation from the ultimate betrayals of the Marxism and the basic interests of the major masses. 

In summing up the experience and lessons of world socialist movements, the Forum participants generally viewed that the birth and development of socialist system have changed the historical process of the world situation. The brilliant achievements of socialism demonstrate the strong vitality of socialism. Therefore, as a worldwide alternative and choice, socialism is not merely a simple logistic reasoning or purely a subjective wish, but also has sufficient factual basis. Marxism is still a powerful ideological weapon to open up just cause for human being in the new century, and is the theoretical guidance, base to enrich and to strengthen the Chinese Nation.

More than 150 specialists and scholars hailed from over 20 institutes and universities, including the Central Compiling and Translation Bureau of the Central Committee, the Central Party School, the Chinese People’s University, Beijing University, Qinghua University and the affiliated Research Institutes of the CASS, attended the Forum.

Endnotes:
[1] Cao Suhong, “The Marxism and the Rise and Fall of the State.” The Journal of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), March 15, 2007, http://sym2005.cass.cn/file/2007032789596.html