Creating a New Situation in China's Socialist Modernization Construction in an All-Round Way

Contained in the Selected Works of Hu Yaobang, which includes the report made by Hu Yaobang on behalf of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Party to the Twelfth National Congress of the Party, 1 September 1982.

The report is divided into six parts:

(1) A historic change and our great new task. The report declares that China has accomplished, through the arduous efforts of the whole Party, the whole army and the people of all our nationalities, the difficult task of setting the Party's guiding ideology to rights and have won major successes in setting right our practical work on all fronts, thereby effecting a great and historic change. The general task of the CPC in this new historical period is to unite the people of all our nationalities in working hard and self-reliantly to achieve, step by step, the modernization of our industry, agriculture, national defense and science and technology and to make China a culturally advanced and highly democratic socialist country.

(2) Bring about an all-round upsurge of the socialist economy. The general objective of China's economic construction for the two decades between 1981 and the end of this century is, while steadily working for more and better economic results, to quadruple the gross annual value of industrial and agricultural production — from 710 billion yuan in 1980 to 2,800 billion yuan or so in 2000. This will place China in the front ranks of the countries of the world in terms of gross national income and the output of major industrial and agricultural products; it will represent an important advance in the modernization of her entire national economy; it will increase the income of her urban and rural population several times over; and the Chinese people will be comparatively moderately prosperous both materially and culturally. From an overall point of view, what is most important in our effort to realize this objective in economic growth is to properly solve the problems of agriculture, energy and transport and of education and science. In order to realize our objective for the next two decades, we must take the following two steps in our strategic planning: in the first decade, aim mainly at laying a solid foundation, accumulating strength and creating the necessary conditions; and in the second, usher in a new period of vigorous economic development. This is a major policy decision taken by the Central Committee after a comprehensive analysis of the present conditions of China's economy and the trend of its growth.

To bring about an all-round upsurge of China's socialist economy, we must continue to carry out in all our economic work according to the four cardinal principles: concentrating funds on key development projects and continuing to improve the people's living standards, upholding the leading position of the state economy and developing diverse economic forms, correctly implementing the principle of the leading role of the planned economy and the supplementary role of market regulation, persevering in self-reliance while expanding economic and technological exchanges with foreign countries.

(3) Strive to build a high level of socialist spiritual civilization. The report points out that socialist spiritual civilization is closely interrelated with material civilization in socialist construction. Socialism is advancing steadily towards the goal of its higher phase — communism. This advance depends not only on the increase of material wealth but also on the steady growth of people's communist consciousness and revolutionary spirit. The report points out that “The view that communism is but a ‘dim illusion’ and that it ‘has not been tested in practice’ is utterly wrong.” Roughly speaking, socialist spiritual civilization consists of two aspects, the cultural and the ideological, permeating and promoting each other. To build a socialist spiritual civilization is a task for the whole Party and the common task of our people in all fields of endeavor.

(4) Strive to attain a high level of socialist democracy. The report points out that the steady development of socialist democracy provides the guarantee and support for the building of socialist material and spiritual civilization. To attain a high level of socialist democracy is therefore one of our fundamental goals and tasks. Socialist democracy is incomparably superior to bourgeois democracy. Much time and work are needed to establish the system of socialist democracy and foster democratic ways. We must closely link the building of socialist democracy with that of the socialist legal system so that socialist democracy is institutionalized and codified into laws. Further promotion of the socialist relations of equality, unity and mutual assistance among all our nationalities constitutes an important aspect of the building of socialist democracy in our country. With regard to all China's democratic parties, non-Party democrats, national minority personages and patriots in the religious circles, our Party will continue to adhere to the policy of “long-term coexistence and mutual supervision” and the principle of “treating each other with all sincerity and sharing weal or woe”, and strengthen our co-operation with them. We must be very careful in distinguishing and handling contradictions between the enemy and the people and those within the ranks of the people, so as to avoid repeating the past mistake of enlarging the scope of class struggle. However, within certain limits, class struggle will continue to exist for a long time and may even sharpen under certain conditions. In the new period of the development of our socialist cause, we must attend, both in ideology and in action, to two aspects. On the one hand, we must persist in the policy of opening to the outside as well as in our policies for invigorating the economy domestically and, on the other, we must resolutely strike at the grave criminal activities in the economic, political and cultural spheres that endanger socialism.

(5) Adhering to an independent foreign policy. The report points out that integration of patriotism with internationalism has always been our basic point of departure in handling our external relations. The five principles of mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, non-interference in each other's internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence have consistently guided China in its effort to develop relations with other countries. The main forces jeopardizing peaceful coexistence among nations today are imperialism, hegemonism and colonialism. The most important task for the people of the world today is to oppose hegemonism and safeguard world peace. The common task confronting the Third World countries is, first and foremost, to defend their national independence and state sovereignty and actively develop their national economies so that they can back up the political independence they have already won with economic independence. Socialist China belongs to the Third World. China has experienced the same sufferings as most other Third World countries, and she is faced with similar problems and tasks. China regards it as her sacred international duty to struggle resolutely against imperialism, hegemonism and colonialism together with the other Third World countries.

Our Party develops its relations with other Communist or working-class parties in strict conformity with Marxism and the principles of independence, complete equality, mutual respect and non-interference in each other's internal affairs.

(6) Make the Party a strong leading core for the cause of socialist modernization. In order to step up Party building in the new period, we have made many fundamental changes in the Party Constitution. The general principle guiding the revision of the Party Constitution is to set more exacting demands on Party members, enhance the fighting capacity of the Party organizations and uphold and improve Party leadership, all in conformity with the characteristics and needs of the new historical period. As required by the new Constitution, we must strive to build the Party and make it a strong leading core for the cause of socialist modernization. In light of the present conditions in the Party and in the spirit of our new Party Constitution, we must now concentrate on solving the following problems in Party building: improve the Party's system of democratic centralism and further normalize inner-Party political life; reform the leading bodies and the cadre system and ensure that the ranks of the cadres become more revolutionary, younger in average age, better educated and more professionally competent; strengthen the Party's work among the workers, peasants and intellectuals and establish close ties between the Party and the masses; carry out Party consolidation in a planned and step-by-step manner so as to make the Party's style fundamentally better.

Consequently, as already said above, in the period to come we must systematically complete the organizational reform and reforms in the economic systems, go all out in building socialist spiritual civilization, hit hard at the serious criminal activities undermining our socialist economy and socialist system, and rectify the Party style and consolidate the Party organizations. Fulfilment of these four tasks will provide an important guarantee that we can adhere to the socialist system and succeed in socialist modernization. The whole Party, particularly Party committees at all levels, must lay great stress on these tasks and work unswervingly to accomplish them.