An excellent article. Not much I can add to it:
Forty years ago, Chinese communist chairman Mao Zedong launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. It's an unpleasant anniversary that official Beijing will not celebrate and most Chinese would rather forget.
[...]
Even from afar, when I learned that leaders such as President Liu Shaoqi, former defense minister Peng Dehuai and the colorful general He Long were tortured and killed, my heart sank.
I had gotten to know many of them in the 1940s, during seven months reporting for AP in Yanan, their revolutionary capital next to the Gobi desert. I saw them not as communists but as humans driven by a desire to end poverty, plagues, famines and inequality in China - goals which had turned to ashes under Mao's imperial, intolerant and vindictive rule.
Those objectives have nearly come true as a result of the two-and-a-half decades of free-market reforms enacted by those pragmatists in the party who survived Mao's purges.
[...]
"We finally learned that the whole cultural revolution had been part of a power struggle at the highest levels of the Party," she wrote in her 1997 memoir "Red Scarf Girl." "Our leader had taken advantage of our trust and loyalty to manipulate the whole country. This is the most frightening lesson of the Cultural Revolution."
14 comments:
"took advantage of our trust..." That's why one ought not trust the government.
You're right Stryker. What's odd is that it used to be that Republicans were loathe to trust the government, but now it seems that they believe it's actually unpatriotic to even ask questions. What's up with that?
There's also a difference between not trusting government and refusing to accept the benefits of government.
We don't "trust" company's either, in general. That's why we require annual reports to be audited. But just because we don't trust them doesn't mean we reject the benefits they offer offer us.
The Republican view seems to be strangely backwards. They trust government implicitely, but refuse to accept the good things that government can bring.
... Ami.
Lib,
Part of the change has to do with the tent-size of the (R ) party. There are a number of (R’s) who still hold the “old” ideas of distrust of government. The neo wing of the party, which now controls much of the machinery, joined largely because of similar social conservative feelings, as well as desiring a strong Reagan-esque foreign policy.
The phrase “unpatriotic to ask questions” is a little broad. I think you’d agree with me that it is unpatriotic to expect answers to questions like: “Where are all of our submarines right now?” And “how are we penetrating enemy spy networks?” However, I think very few (R’s) have a problem with asking questions like “Where is the rebuilding money going?” and “Where are the terrorists/insurgents/freedom-fighters getting their food, water, guns, and bombs from?” I really don’t have a problem with asking for set goals that need to be achieved for withdrawal.
When Bush ran in ’00, I said, “I don’t like Gore’s policies, but I don’t know Bush’s. That means I have to trust him. But I shouldn’t have to trust him.”
And in response to ‘04’s “Anybody but Bush,” “Do you expect me to vote for just anybody?”
Ami,
There are disagreements to the cost vs. benefits of an expansive government. I think we both agree that there are limits to what a government can/should do. (Building, supplying and assigning cars is probably NOT a good government function). Just about all benefits have costs, and most paleo-cons think that the total costs for some programs are too high.
Gee that last statement had a lot of dancing in it with three conditional statements for my five nouns (just about, most and some).
Take for example, an inheritance tax for healthcare. Is there a moral cost to taking one persons money and giving it to another? Is it moral to force doctors to serve anyone? Would more patients’ records be available to the government? (especially to other branches not dealing with healthcare) Is it more expensive for a government to provide this service than the private sector? Do those costs outweigh the moral, ethical and financial benefits of the system we have now?
'However, I think very few (R’s) have a problem with asking questions like “Where is the rebuilding money going?” and “Where are the terrorists/insurgents/freedom-fighters getting their food, water, guns, and bombs from?”'
That can't be true or there would be pressure on the Republican congress to ask precisely those questions.
That last post was from me.
Stryker: This issue I have with Republicans is that they (or at least the outspoken ones) take the libertarian stance on every issue except military spending.
So no matter what the real trade-offs are, you can always predict the answer: all non-military spending cuts are supported.
There is no real weighing of the costs and benefits.
On the specific issues you raise: I think dead people are beyond caring what you do with the money they once had. Given the choice, it's certainly it's better to tax them than to tax the living.
... Ami.
"The Republican view seems to be strangely backwards. They trust government implicitely, but refuse to accept the good things that government can bring."
Perhaps we just disagree on how much good those "good" things really bring. For example, you may think that providing unlimited welfare is a "good" that goverment can do. I think that such programs promote a destructive society and prefer temporary aids and encouraging people to get jobs to support themselves and become productive members of society...
Government and society aren't equivelent.
Lib,
"That can't be true or there would be pressure on the Republican congress to ask precisely those questions."
Those questions are being asked and the response from the likes of Gov Blanco amounts to "You evil racist Repulicans aren't giving us enough money..."
We seem to be off the original topic...
I'm thrilled that the Chinese people don't celebrate the Cultural revolution. They're starting to realize that communism is a path to destruction rather than a boon to society.
I was reading a business news story that had an item that also impressed me. It's about the chairman of the Indian company Infosys retiring:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/3A20B855-6711-4B09-BAC0-CDE2E6FA003F.htm
"The staunch capitalist was once a socialist who travelled to Europe in the 1970s to learn more about communism, but came away disillusioned.
"I was a strong socialist. By the end of 1970s I got to the conclusion that leftism is just bogus. Socialism in India is meaningless. Creation of jobs requires entrepreneurship," the soft-spoken Murthy said."
Brian: I wouldn't say the cultural revolution was about communism. I don't know what you'd call it - it was pretty much a phenomenon all its own. The the woman in the article calls it a struggle for power within the CPC - which sounds plausible to me.
At the end of the cultural revolution all the madness was blamed on the "Gang of four", basically to deflect blame from Mao. So they realized already in 1976 that the whole thing was a mistake. Note that the Soviets never did anything as stupid as this.
China hasn't been communist for a long time - it's not a recent development. The transition was started by Deng Xiaoping in 1978. After almost 28 years of change, I don't think there's much trace of communism left in the big eastern cities at least.
The less developed regions still have communal agriculture, but they're changing too. Just a decade or so behind the curve.
The Chinese people, at least in the East, have embraced capitalism wholeheartedly. In a way I'd say they're more enthusiastic about it than anywhere else I've ever been. I guess a sustained growth rate of over 10% per year has given people the mindset that there's lots of money to be made. They might be in for a shock when they get their first real recession, but for now they're pretty gung-ho.
... Ami.
"Note that the Soviets never did anything as stupid as this."
Haven't you ever heard of the Soviet pogroms or purges? Especially during Stalin's rule? There are estimates that somewhere between 10 and 60 million people died as a result of Stalin's attempts to purify his party. I think that qualifies as being as stupid as the Cultural Revolution.
If the Cultural Revolution wasn't about communism, it's at least a VERY common result when communists come to power.
And I'm pleased of your confirmation of China's success in converting to capitalism. Just don't tell the government that's what's happening. (They aren't stupid and they know what's happening, but they don't say it publically.) China is yet another confirmation that with all its flaws, capitalism is the only economic system that works.
Brian: the pogroms were evil, but the cultural revolution was evil and stupid. Education pretty much stopped for 10 years. Intellectuals stopped doing research and were sent out to plow fields. It was bizarre.
I'm curious what you mean about the government. They're the ones who initiated the transformation. It's happening because of them, not despite them. And it's certainly no secret.
You can actually get Chinese news in the U.S. Look for "CCTV9". Government controlled T.V. reports daily on market reforms.
... Ami.
Hi Ami,
It's more a question of terminology than what the actual reforms are. I've yet to see any official public acknowledgement that what they are doing is "capitalism" rather than just "market reforms". As I said, they're not stupid (far from it) and they know exactly what they are implementing. It's just not politically feasable for them to call it "capitalism".
I, for one, am happy to let them call it whatever they like... I've often thought the cause of the Tiananmen Square massacre was the result of the protesters pushing the government faster than they were willing to go. They were heading in the direction of more freedom until they were pushed too hard, then the government pushed back.
In the same way, I'm perfectly happy to let China's government implement gradual market reforms without pushing them too hard. They're heading in the right direction and things are getting better. If we try to force faster change, they are likely to react in an unpleasant way. Until they're ready to call it capitalism, I'll just smile and be happy with "market reforms".
I fail to see why killing 10 to 60 million people isn't as stupid as killing a half million or so... But I have to admit that the Soviets didn't stop education (even if they didn't trust their intellectuals). But other communists took the levels of murder and supression of education to even more extreme levels (the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia are a good example). I guess the communists are afraid that educated people will be able to see what a scam communism really is. It amazes me that so many educators in free countries are communists when the communist countries tend to execute the educators....
Brian: Ok, I understand what you're saying. The term "capitalism" has a lot of historical baggage here, in the same way "communism" still has historical baggage in the U.S. It's more productive to avoid such loaded terms and try to find the right balance between private and public sector.
The world appears to be settling on mostly market economies, with some limited functions, like health care, the police and military, and certain kinds of insurance handled by the public sector. You could call it capitalism with some bits borrowed from communism if you wanted to be provocative, but most of us just call it a mixed economy. Choose what works without worrying too much about ideology.
I don't think the pace of reform can or should be accellerated. They're moving quite quickly already, and anything faster risks creating a lot of instability. The sudden changes in Russia, for example, were a disaster. I can fault the Chinese government for a lot of things, but their economic management for the past 28 years has been remarkably good.
... Ami.
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