On Policy

On December 25, 1940, the inner-Party directive titled "Instructions on Current Situations and Policies" was written by Comrade Mao Zedong on behalf of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. This part is about policy. It mainly aims at the anti-Communist climax raised by the die-hards of the KMT during the period of the stalemate of the Anti-Japanese War. It summarizes the historical experience of the Chinese revolution and systematically expounds the policies and Strategies of the Communist Party of China's Anti-Japanese National United Front.

This article is included in the Selected Works of Mao Zedong, Volume 2 under the title of "On Policy". The article points out that in the present high tide of anti-Communist attacks, the policy we adopt is of decisive importance. The emphasis is on "building our policy on distinctions", but many of our cadres still do not understand that the Party's policy in the present period should be significantly different from the policy during the Agrarian Revolution. Many of the policies adopted during the ten years of the Agrarian Revolution cannot just be duplicated today. In particular, many ultra-Left policies of the latter period of the Agrarian Revolution are not merely totally inapplicable today in the War of Resistance, but were wrong even then. It is necessary to overcome the vacillation between ultra-left and ultra-right on the question of tactics. However, the main dangerous tendency of the Party at present is still that the viewpoint of the ultra-left is creating trouble.

It emphasizes that the Party's general policy during the period of anti-Japanese aggression, " Today our Anti-Japanese National United Front policy is neither all alliance and no struggle nor all struggle and no alliance, but a combines alliance and struggle." This principle of unity and struggle is embodied in the policy of independence and autonomy under the united front, independent and autonomous guerrilla warfare under strategic unity, the policy "on just grounds", "to our advantage" and "with restraint" in the struggle against the die-hard elements, and the policy of developing progressive forces, winning over the middle forces and isolating the die-hard forces in domestic class relations.

This paper summarizes and restates the Party's concrete policies: the policy of political power organization, the policy of labor, the policy of land, the policy of tax revenue, the policy of eliminating traitors, the policy of protecting people's rights, the policy of economy, the policy of culture and education and the policy of military affairs.

Finally, the article points out that when the Japanese invaders are intensifying their aggression against China and when the big landlords and big bourgeoisie are pursuing high-handed policies and launching armed attacks against the Communist Party and the people, the application of the tactical principles and concrete policies outlined above is the only way to press on with the War of Resistance, broaden the United Front, win the sympathy of the whole people and bring about a turn for the better in the situation. This report expounds the importance of formulating and implementing the Party's policies, which plays an important role in improving the consciousness and level of the whole Party in implementing the Party's policies.