Li Gang and Cheng Xinlin: An Analysis of the Subjective Dimension of Comprehensively Deepening Reform
The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Advancing Chinese-path Modernization (hereinafter referred to as the Decision), adopted at the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, clearly emphasizes that further comprehensively deepening reform must implement the major principle of staying people-centered. It states: "We must stay people-centered and respect the people's principal position and pioneering spirit. We must respond to the people's calls with reforms, and ensure that reform is for the people and by the people, and that its fruits are shared by the people." [1]
As early as the Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Comprehensively Deepening Reform adopted at the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, this principle was summarized from an empirical level, asserting that comprehensively deepening reform must: "Stick to the people-oriented approach, respect the people's principal position, give play to the pioneering spirit of the masses, and rely closely on the people to promote reform" [2]. This demonstrates that the 20th CPC Central Committee's inclusion of "staying people-centered" as a major principle for further comprehensively deepening reform is a conscious recognition of the precious experience accumulated in reform and opening up since the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee. It profoundly reflects that the Party's understanding of "the people" as the primary subject of reform has reached a new height.
I. The People are the Practical Subject of Comprehensively Deepening Reform As a practical activity that promotes the better alignment of the relations of production with the productive forces, the superstructure with the economic base, and national governance with social development, comprehensively deepening reform must first answer the question of who constitutes the practical subject carrying out the reform. Both theoretical and empirical levels prove that the key to the victory of comprehensively deepening reform lies in relying on the masses of the people. In the Marxist view, "men make their own history," and "to organize the millions of the working masses—this is the most favorable condition for the revolution, this is the deepest source of the victory of the revolution." Therefore, the key issue in reform practice is how to effectively organize the masses and rely on them to carry out the great practice of reform.
China's reform and opening up is the choice of the Party and the people, embodying the aspirations of the vast majority. Thus, reform practice is essentially "the independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority." As Xi Jinping stated: "The fundamental reason why reform and opening up has won the sincere support and active participation of the broad masses of the people is that we rooted the cause of reform and opening up deeply among the people from the very beginning." In other words, the success of China's reform practice lies in its guidance by the CPC and its unification within the masses, organically and effectively combining the Party's role as the leadership core—oversight of the big picture and coordination of all parties—with respect for the people's principal position and pioneering spirit.
On one hand, reform practice must uphold the leadership of the Party. "The leadership of the Party is the fundamental guarantee for further comprehensively deepening reform and advancing Chinese-path modernization." History and practice prove that only by organizing dispersed masses can the victory of revolution and reform be achieved. Since the vast majority cannot organize themselves for reform, the Communist Party, representing the vast majority, must exercise its role as the leadership core to consolidate the active reformatory forces of the masses. Lenin emphasized: "The power of the working class lies in organization. Without organization of the masses, the proletariat is nothing. The organized proletariat is everything." Therefore, the prerequisite for reform practice to rely on the power of the people is to organize and unite that power through the leadership of the CPC, so as to better ensure that the practice of reform moves in the correct direction.
On the other hand, reform practice must stay people-centered. The purpose of organizing the masses is to unleash their collective power. "Nature builds no machines, no locomotives, railways, electric telegraphs, self-acting mules, etc. These are products of human industry," and the masses, as the creators of material and spiritual wealth and the decisive force of social transformation, are the subjective power of reform practice. Divorced from the masses, productive forces cannot develop spontaneously, nor can they spontaneously drive social transformation. Therefore, only by relying on the subjective power of the vast majority of the people can the victory of social practice be secured.
Looking back at the historical process of China's reform over more than forty years, it is not difficult to see that the masses have always been the primary subjective force of reform and development. After the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, Chinese Communists, with Deng Xiaoping as their chief representative, made a clear-headed judgment of reality and raised the curtain on China's reform and opening up. The basis for this historic decision first came from the practical explorations of the villagers of Xiaogang [3]. Thus, Deng Xiaoping emphasized: "In the final analysis, the household contract responsibility system in the countryside was the invention of the peasants. Many things in rural reform were created by the grassroots; we simply processed and refined them to serve as national guidance." This was an affirmation of the people's role as the practical subject.
As the scope of China's reform expanded and the needs of the socialist market economy system grew, Deng Xiaoping further pointed out that "we should be bolder in reform and opening up and have the courage to experiment," which profoundly reflected respect for the people's principal status and pioneering spirit. Since the New Era, the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has made the decision to comprehensively deepen reform based on widely soliciting opinions and suggestions from the masses and promptly summarizing the fresh experiences they created, thus opening a new chapter for China's reform and opening up. It is precisely because of this that comprehensively deepening reform has "achieved a transition from local exploration and breaking the ice to systemic integration and comprehensive deepening. The basic institutional frameworks in various fields have been established, and historic changes, systemic restructuring, and overall reconfiguration have been realized in many fields." [12]
However, "the current and future period is a critical period for comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese-path modernization." [13] From the domestic environment, Chinese-path modernization faces issues such as: "the market system is still imperfect, market development is insufficient, the relationship between the government and the market has not been fully straightened out, innovation capabilities do not meet the requirements of high-quality development, the industrial system is large but not strong and comprehensive but not refined, the situation of being dependent on others for key core technologies has not fundamentally changed, the agricultural foundation is not yet solid, and the gaps in urban-rural regional development and income distribution remain large. Shortcomings still exist in the guarantee of people's livelihoods and ecological environment protection."
From the international environment, as a brand-new undertaking, Chinese-path modernization will inevitably encounter various risks and challenges on the road ahead. "Particularly at present, as the world's great changes unseen in a century accelerate, local conflicts and turbulence are frequent, global problems are intensifying, and external suppression and containment are escalating. Our country's development has entered a period where strategic opportunities and risks/challenges coexist and uncertain, unpredictable factors are increasing. Various 'black swan' and 'gray rhino' events [4] may occur at any time." These realistic problems place higher demands on comprehensively deepening reform, meaning that the fields covered by further comprehensively deepening reform are broader, the patterns of interest touched are deeper, the contradictions and problems involved are sharper, and the institutional obstacles to be broken through are more arduous. Therefore, further comprehensively deepening reform requires the active participation and support of the broad masses even more: "fully mobilize the enthusiasm, initiative, and creativity of the masses in promoting reform, pool the wisdom and strength of the broadest range of people into reform, and push reform forward together with the people."
II. The People are the Value Subject of Comprehensively Deepening Reform The starting point and the ultimate goal of relying on the masses to promote comprehensively deepening reform is the people themselves. This is determined by the internal prescription of the proletarian movement as "the movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority." Therefore, in the process of promoting comprehensively deepening reform along the tracks of the rule of law and with institutional building as the main thread, we must embody the subjectivity of human value; we cannot "see the system but not the people." Because Chinese-path modernization is socialist modernization that "promotes the well-rounded development of the person," and communism as a higher stage is "a form of society in which the full and free development of every individual forms the ruling principle." [17] Thus, the key issue of comprehensively deepening reform taking the people as the value subject lies in how to create conditions for the free and well-rounded development of the person and to carry out the great practice of reform for the people.
That the people are the value subject of comprehensively deepening reform means that "the universal concept of 'value' arises from the relationship of people to the external objects that satisfy their needs"; detached from the subject of the person, things have no value. Therefore, when the person constitutes the sole subject of value, as an active and sentient being, they will always transform the real world in practical activities according to their own purposiveness and ideal requirements, thus making the existing world a reality that satisfies those needs. In the Marxist view, these requirements of purposiveness and idealism are actually the value pursuit of the people as the subjects of social and historical human activity—namely, human liberation based on the free and well-rounded development of every individual.
Based on the background of his own era, Marx examined the real lives of the vast majority of the proletariat in capitalist society, pointing out that people "do not affirm themselves in their work but deny themselves, do not feel content but unhappy, do not develop freely their physical and mental energy but mortify their body and ruin their mind," and "the more objects the worker produces the fewer can he possess and the more he falls under the dominion of his product, capital." Therefore, Marx turned the value pursuit of social-historical development toward communism, believing that communism is the sublation of human alienation and the re-appropriation of human value. Overall, the free and well-rounded development of the person is the fundamental value orientation of Marxism, a pursuit that can only be fully manifested in a communist society composed of an "association of free individuals." Therefore, as the transitional stage toward communism, the fundamental value orientation of socialist reform lies in creating conditions for the free and well-rounded development of every individual.
Taking the people as the value subject of comprehensively deepening reform means regarding the people as the end of reform, creating favorable objective and subjective factors for the free and well-rounded development of the person. Regarding the reform of objective factors, it mainly manifests as further enhancing the level of productive forces to provide good social conditions for human development. Thus, China's reform has always emphasized taking economic construction as the center and letting economic structural reform play a leading role. After the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, China's economic structural reform progressed from "a planned economy supplemented by market regulation" to a "planned commodity economy" combining planning and markets, and then to "letting the market play the basic role in resource allocation under socialist state macro-control." During this period, China moved from a state of relatively backward productive forces to a rapid development where its total economic volume jumped to second in the world.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress, economic structural reform has been actively and steadily pushed forward in breadth and depth, handing over matters the government should not manage to the market, promoting the maximization of benefit and efficiency in resource allocation, and further clarifying the decisive role of the market in resource allocation, creating a miracle of rapid economic development and achieving a significant leap in national economic strength. At the same time, the institutional system of whole-process people's democracy has been established and improved to reflect the people's status as masters of the country in all aspects of national political and social life. Mechanisms for the development of cultural undertakings and industries have been improved to promote cultural prosperity and enrich the spiritual and cultural lives of the people. History and practice prove that the fundamental purpose of our comprehensively deepening reform is not merely for the quantitative accumulation of productive forces, but to effectively answer the starting point and goal of "development for the people."
At the same time, comprehensively deepening reform has also created favorable subjective factors for the free and well-rounded development of the person. As Marx said: "Production not only supplies a material for the need, but it also supplies a need for the material." [21] That is, people can, on one hand, use the material results achieved through practical activities as extensions of their physical organs to enhance their capacity for manual labor, and on the other hand, use spiritual products as extensions of their subjective consciousness to enhance their capacity for mental labor. Only in this way can a broad mass of people with ideals, convictions, courage to innovate, and self-reliance continuously emerge.
III. The People are the Interest Subject of Comprehensively Deepening Reform Comprehensively deepening reform...
The value orientation of "for the people" gains its reality only through the realization of the people’s interests; simultaneously, only by fully guaranteeing the interests of the masses can we further stimulate their subjective power and better rely on them. Marxism holds that "everything for which people struggle is related to their interests." As a collective concept, "the people" is composed of a multitude of specific individuals, which necessarily involves the relationship between individual interests and collective interests among subjects. Therefore, the key issue in comprehensively deepening reform—with the people as the subject of interest—lies in how to correctly handle the contradictory relationship between collective interests and individual interests, ensuring that the fruits of reform are shared by the people.
Human interests are closely related to human needs. From a longitudinal dimension, the levels of human needs are constantly rising. Engels divided the hierarchy of human needs into the needs for subsistence, enjoyment, and development. He believed that under a new social system, "on the condition that everyone must work, everyone will also receive, equally and in ever-increasing abundance, the means of life, the means of enjoyment, and the means for the development and manifestation of all physical and mental capacities." From a horizontal dimension, human needs are rich and multifaceted. Based on different subjective needs, interests can be divided into individual, collective, and national interests, or into material, social, and spiritual interests. Facing different interest subjects and their diverse interests, Marx and Engels pointed out in the Communist Manifesto that "the proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority." They further maintained that "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all," which both clarified the status of the masses as the subject of interest and provided the methodological principles for correctly handling the contradiction between collective and individual interests.
"Each" represents the individual standpoint, while "all" represents the collective standpoint. The fundamental reason Marx and Engels emphasized the priority of the individual standpoint was to distinguish themselves from the "illusory community" [5] found in history—those constructs that, divorced from actual individual interests, deprived the majority of their freedom in the name of the "common interest." However, Marx and Engels did not thereby negate the collective standpoint; they believed that "only in community with others has each individual the means of cultivating his gifts in all directions; only in the community, therefore, is personal freedom possible." This indicates a dialectical unity between individual and collective interests: only after the interests of every individual are fully guaranteed can they more actively and initiatively promote social progress; meanwhile, the realization of every individual's interests cannot be separated from the progress of society as a whole. Thus, Mao Zedong further pointed out that "the basic principle of Marxism-Leninism is to enable the masses to recognize their own interests and unite to fight for them" [31]; Xi Jinping has also emphasized that if comprehensively deepening reform in the New Era "cannot bring tangible benefits to the common people, if it cannot create a fairer social environment or even leads to more inequality, reform will lose its meaning and cannot be sustained" [32]. It can be seen that Marxism has always possessed a distinct "people-oriented dimension." In the process of promoting social development, while facing the different interest needs of various subjects, it is capable of correctly handling the contradiction between collective and individual interests, always taking the masses as the subject of interest.
Taking the people as the subject of interest in comprehensively deepening reform means focusing on resolving the principal contradiction in society, correctly handling the dialectical relationship between collective and individual interests, and ensuring reform fruits are shared by the people. Based on the new reality of China's current development and accurately grasping new changes in the people's needs, the report to the 19th CPC National Congress made the historic judgment that the principal contradiction in our society has been transformed. It is now the contradiction between the people’s ever-growing need for a better life and unbalanced and inadequate development. This assertion demonstrates that the practice of comprehensively deepening reform in the New Era must take the people's need for a better life as the focus of practice to transform factors of unbalanced and inadequate development. On the basis of satisfying the people's material interests, it must further satisfy their interests in political, spiritual, cultural, and ecological spheres. Therefore, comprehensively deepening reform in the New Era always "plans and promotes reform proceeds from the people’s collective, fundamental, and long-term interests" [33].
For instance, whole-process people’s democracy is the specific institutional form for guaranteeing that the people are masters of the country. In its practical form, it emphasizes participation throughout the entire process, which contains respect and trust for the people's individual capacity for political participation, thereby providing effective conditions for the people to be masters of the country. The "people's logic" of the socialist market economy system requires that the market play the decisive role in resource allocation, but not the only role. It is necessary to exert the regulatory role of the "visible hand" of the government to compensate for market failures, prevent polarization, promote sustainable development, and advance common prosperity. Therefore, the practice of reforming the socialist market economy system both gives full play to individual free personality in economic activities to guarantee individual interests and simultaneously allows the government to better exert its macroeconomic regulation to guarantee the collective interests of the people.
IV. The People are the Subject of Evaluation in Comprehensively Deepening Reform
In the process of comprehensively deepening reform, whether the people's interests are truly realized must be evaluated by the people. Addressing this issue, Xi Jinping profoundly pointed out: "The ultimate criterion for judging whether reform and development are successful is whether the people collectively enjoy the fruits of reform and development." That is to say, our reform is guided by the problems that the masses find most urgent, distressing, and long-awaited [6]. We aim to enhance the people's sense of fulfillment, happiness, and security; ultimately, whether this is achieved can only be decided by the masses. This indicates that the key issue in taking the people as the subject of evaluation lies in how to improve the evaluation mechanisms for the masses to effectively promote reform, development, and stability.
First, we must respect the evaluation capacity of the masses. "A state is strong only when the masses know everything, can judge everything, and do everything consciously." This ability of the masses to judge everything stems from their status as the subject of practice, the subject of value, and the subject of interest formed during the reform process. First, as the subject of practice, the rich practical experience accumulated by the people makes their evaluation more realistic. Situated at the forefront of reform, the people have the deepest perception of the developmental stages and degrees of reform in our country, having accumulated rich experience and wisdom over long-term reform. Therefore, the people have the greatest right to speak in judging whether reform decisions have been implemented and whether they are realistic. Second, as the subject of value, the rich "philosophy of man" significance inherent in the people makes evaluation more value-oriented. It is commonly believed that as long as the productive forces develop, society progresses and reform is successful; however, this view evaluates reform only through laws of necessity without value-based interpretation. The serious consequence is that money becomes the measure of all things. Therefore, upholding the people's status as the subject of value helps enhance the value-orientation of reform evaluation, ensuring it is both scientific and value-laden, effectively avoiding the trap of "economic determinism." Third, as the subject of interest, the direct and real interests obtained by the people make the evaluation more objective. As the enjoyers of reform results, the people can directly and truly feel whether they have received benefits and to what extent. From a quantitative perspective, the people constitute the vast majority of society. Evaluations made by the majority based on their own tangible interests can minimize the subjectivity and arbitrariness of evaluation to the greatest extent, resulting in a more objective assessment of reform achievements. Thus, in further comprehensively deepening reform, we must fully trust the masses' evaluation capacity, follow the Party's mass line in the New Era, bring reform measures deep into the masses, and let the people evaluate and "grade" them.
Second, we must improve the positive incentive mechanism for evaluation. Facing the current problem of insufficient motivation for evaluation in the reform process, the protection of interests is particularly important. If Party committees and governments at all levels can respond to the people's evaluations in a timely manner and further transform their opinions and suggestions into measures for comprehensively deepening reform, an effective positive incentive will be formed. In this process, the people's need for respect is satisfied, further stimulating their enthusiasm and initiative. This requires leading cadres to view the results of the people's evaluations dialectically and respond promptly. Positive evaluations should be summarized and transformed into valuable experience for further reform; for prominent problems that provoke strong reactions from the masses, reflection is needed to turn these into the primary directions for further reform. Thus, the Decision [7] summarized the valuable experiences of reform and opening up—especially in the New Era—from six aspects, and pointed out the main directions for further reform from seven aspects, which is a concentrated manifestation of respecting the people’s status as the subject of evaluation.
Finally, we must eliminate institutional barriers that hinder evaluation. Taking the people as the subject of evaluation is intended to better utilize their evaluative role, and the key lies in breaking all institutional and mechanistic barriers to ensure the people can effectively evaluate all aspects of reform. "Comprehensively deepening reform involves the overall work of the Party and the state, every field of economic and social development, and many major theoretical and practical issues; it is a complex systemic project" [36]. Such a complex project requires unobstructed evaluation channels to ensure the people can promptly convey their opinions and suggestions. The people do not evaluate for the sake of evaluating, but to see their opinions transformed into experience and measures. Therefore, whether channels are unobstructed is the "last kilometer" for successful evaluation. We must dare to break the institutional barriers hindering timely evaluation, moving forward with both online and offline channels simultaneously. On one hand, we must exert effort on the "quantity" of channels by innovating platforms. For reform in the New Era, the role of online evaluation is increasingly important; we must seize the opportunity of the new technological revolution, utilize modern network technology, and provide diverse online platforms to collect public opinions to the maximum extent. On the other hand, we must exert effort on the "quality" of channels to ensure opinions reach the relevant departments accurately and promptly, simplifying processes and procedures. This allows for hearing the masses' opinions on new measures and situations as they arise, thereby enhancing the timeliness and effectiveness of evaluation.
Source: Theoretical Horizon (《理论视野》), Issue 12, 2024 Web Editor: Bao Luo