On the Party

In May 1945, Liu Shaoqi made the “Report on the Revision of the Party Constitution at the Seventh National Congress of the Communist Party of China”. In 1950, it was revised by the author himself and retitled "On the Party" and was published by People’s Press. The full text consists of nine parts. The first, second and fifth parts are included in the Selected Works of Liu Shaoqi (Part I) published by People’s Press. The full text is included in Liu Shaoqi on Party Building published by Central Party Literature Press in 1991.

The main contents of the article are as follows:

(1) Clarifying the reasons and significance of many major revisions and amendments to the Party Constitution made by the Seventh National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

Firstly, it is now seventeen years since our Party Constitution was revised in 1928 by the Sixth National Congress. Conditions both inside and outside the Party have changed significantly during these years. Today the Party is faced with the need to mobilize the whole Party membership to carry out entirely new political tasks.

Secondly, the experience which our Party has accumulated in directing the revolutionary struggle in China during the last seventeen years is extremely rich and vitally important. It is essential to sum up this experience and use it to enrich our Party Constitution and to strengthen the building of our Party.

Thirdly, because the Party Constitution was adopted by the Sixth National Congress under extraordinary circumstances, many of its provisions were inapplicable, and this resulted in the failure of many Party members to pay attention to it and implement it effectively. Therefore, it is incumbent upon the Seventh National Congress to fame a new Party Constitution entirely in conformity with the actual conditions of today.

(2) Discussing the features of the Party. It is pointed out that the present situation of our Party has certain outstanding features which have not existed in any of its previous historical periods.

Firstly, it has become a party that is national in scale and has a broad mass character, a party the people throughout the country are looking up to. With a membership totaling 1,210,000 and with its organizations and members operating in all parts of the country, it is regarded by the whole people as their sole liberator.

Secondly, it has become a party that has been steeled in prolonged revolutionary wars and has mastered the art of leading them.

Thirdly, it has become a party that has led the 95 million people living behind the enemy lines in setting up strong revolutionary base areas.

Fourthly, it has become a party that has overcome various kinds of erroneous ideas and achieved unprecedented ideological, political and organizational unity and solidarity through a Rectification Movement.

Fifthly, it has become a party that has a great leader of its own.

He is none other than Comrade Mao Zedong, the organizer and leader of our Party and of the present-day Chinese revolution. In short, our Party is already a Marxist-Leninist party which is national in scale, has a broad mass character, is fully consolidated ideologically, politically and organizationally and is under a leader of its own. It has now become the determining factor in China’s political life.

(3) Discussing the character and programme of the Party. It is pointed out that our Party is the organized vanguard of the Chinese working class and the highest form of its class organization. It represents the interests of the Chinese nation and people. At the present stage it is striving for new democracy in China and its ultimate aim is the realization of communism in China.

(4) Discussing the guiding ideology of the Party. It points out that the Party is guided in all its work by Mao Zedong Thought, the doctrine that integrates the theory of Marxism-Leninism with the practice of the Chinese revolution, and makes a complete summary and systematic exposition of Mao Zedong Thought. It is pointed out that the General Programme of the Party Constitution provides that Mao Zedong Thought shall guide the work of our Party.

The Constitution also states that it is the duty of every Party member to endeavor in studying the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought. This is a most important historical characteristic of our present revision of the Constitution.

(5) Discussing the characteristics of the Chinese revolution and the tasks of the Communist Party of China at the present stage. It is pointed out that the nature of the Chinese society, the fact that the basic motive forces of the Chinese revolution is the proletarian-led masses whose main force is the peasantry, the existence of the powerful Communist Party of China and the prevailing international situation are all factors which have come together to determine that Chinese revolution can be neither a bourgeois-democratic revolution of the old type nor a proletarian-socialist revolution of the newest type, but that it must be a bourgeois-democratic revolution of a new type.

Therefore, the task of the Communist Party of China at the present stage is to unite all classes, strata, ethnic nationalities and democratic personages that may take part in the revolution and fight for the complete elimination of oppression by both foreign imperialism and domestic feudalism and to fight for the establishment of a New-Democratic republic of China based on an alliance of all revolutionary classes and the voluntary alliance of all nationalities.

(6) Discussing the mass line of the Party. Another feature of the present revised Constitution is that particular stress has been laid on the Party’s mass line in the General Programme and in the detailed provisions of the Party Constitution, because the mass line is the fundamental political and organizational line of our Party. This means that all our Party organizations and Party work must be closely linked with the masses.

The following views of the masses must be firmly established in the thinking of every Party member, namely: the view that everything is for the people; the view of serving the people wholeheartedly; the view that everything is accountable to the people; the view of trusting the masses to liberate themselves; and the view of learning from the people.

(7) Discussing the democratic centralism of the Party. It is pointed out that our Party is not simply an aggregate of individual members. It is a unified, organic body established according to definite laws. It is a composite of its leaders and its rank and file. It is a unified body consisting of the Central Committee, Party organizations at all levels and the broad body of the membership, and it has been established in accordance with a definite law. This law is democratic centralism within the Party.

Democratic centralism within the Party, as laid down in the Party Constitution, is centralism on the basis of democracy and democracy under central guidance. It is both democratic and centralized. It reflects the relationship between the party leader and the LED, between the higher organizations and the lower Party organizations, between the individual Party members and the Party as a whole, and among the Party’s Central Committee, Party organizations at all levels and rank-and-file Party members.

In addition, the article also discusses the duties and rights of Party members, the problems of Party cadres, the basic organization of the Party, the rewards and punishments within the Party, the seriousness and flexibility of the Party and other important issues.

“On the Party” is an important treatise of the construction theory of the Communist Party of China, which has important guiding significance for the Party's construction.