Regimenting the Public Mind
| Author | Anne-Marie Brady |
| Published date | 01 December 2002 |
| Date | 01 December 2002 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070200205700404 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
ANNE-MARIE
BRADY
Regimenting
the
public
mind
The
modernization
ofpropaganda
in
the
PRC
CCP
©
C
hina
in
the
21st
century
is a
post-communist
society
with
a
com-
munist
government.
How
does
the
Chinese
Communist
party
(CCp)
maintain
its
political
acceptability
as
it
goes
about dismantling
the
socialist
system?
How
can
the
government
maintain popular
support
when
the
uniting
force
of
Marxist-Leninist-Maoist
ideology
is
spent
and
discredited?
And what
has
taken
the
place
of
communist
ideology?
Since
the
two
major
political
watersheds
of
the
last
ten
years
of
the
Mao
era
and the dramatic
events
of
1989,
the
CCP
has
undergone
a
repackaging,
similar
to
the
re-invention
of
the
British
Labour
party
under
Tony
Blair.'
The
CCP
would
like
to
extend
its
rule
over
China
indefinitely;
to
do
so,
it
is
attempting
to
move
from
a
revolutionary
party
to
a
political
party. In
the
post-
1989
era
the outward
symbols
and
the
all-important
name
brand
CCP©
remain,
but
the
content
and
mean-
ing
of
the
party's activities
have
changed
significantly.
Lecturer
in Political
Science,
University
of
Canterbury
Christchurch,
New
Zealand.
The
researchfor
this
article
was
begun on
apost-doctoralfellowship
at
the
Centrefor
East
and
Southeast
Asian
Studies,
Lund
University
Sweden,
and
completed
with
the
help
ofa
research
grantfrom
the
University
of
Canterbury.
1
Indeed,
the
transformation
of
the
British
Labour
party
and
other
European
left
wing parties
has been
a
topic
of
study
for
the
ccP
in
recent
years.
See
Oliver
August
and
Philip
Webster,
'China
turns to
Blair
for
tips
on
transformation,'
Times
on
line,
available
at
http://www.timesonline.co.uk
(accessed
29
May
2002).
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Autumn
2002
Anne-Marie
Brady
Rather
than
the
revolutionary romanticism
of
the
Mao
period,
'sci-
entific
guidance'
is
the
new
theme
of
ccP
rule. Party strategists
now
acknowledge
the
collapse
of
faith
in
Marxist
revolution
and
in
the
dic-
tatorship
of
the
proletariat
and
Marxist economics,
but
they
have
yet
to
find
another
means
to
justify
the
one-party
state
in
China.
The
new
economic
and
political
goals
of
the
post-Mao
era
are
symbolized
by
the
Four
Cardinal
Principles
and
the
Four
Modernizations
of
Deng
Xiaoping.
In
practice this
has
meant
adopting
marketization
and
other
capitalist
style systems
-
but
never
calling
them
that
-
while
maintain-
ing
the
CCP
dictatorship.
Post-1989
and
throughout
the
1990s,
Prime
Minister
Jiang
Zemin
attempted
to
forge
a
new consensus in
China,
a
logic for
continuing
CCP
rule
indefinitely.
The
party
leadership
is
determined
that
the ccP
will
avoid
the
fate
of
the
Communist
party
of
the
Soviet
Union
and
that
it
will
learn from
its
mistakes.
2
Party
think-
tanks
are
also
studying
the
fate
of
other long-term
one-party
states,
such
as
Mexico,
and trying
to
learn
from
their
mistakes
and
successes.
In
1999
Jiang
Zemin announced
the
'three represents,'
which
called
for
the
party to
represent
the
'advanced
social
productive
forces,
the
forward
direction
for
Chinas
cultural advancement,
and
the
truest
rep-
resentative
of
the fundamental
interests
of
China's
vast
population.'"
Now
party
leaders
are
refining
notions
of
turning
the
CCP
into
a
'party
for
all
the
people'
(quanmin
dang.
At meetings
for
senior
leaders
at
the
resort
of
Beidaihe
in
September
2001,
Jiang
hinted
that
the
CCP's
long-
standing
goal
of
class
struggle
had
been
abandoned.
He
said
that
the
party
had
to
open
its
door
to
the
'new
classes'
of
private
business peo-
ple
and
professionals
and that
in
the
current
era
business
people
and
professionals
had
displaced workers
and
peasants
as
the
'vanguard'
of
society.
4
Propaganda
is
playing
a
central
role
in
the
repackaging
of
the
CCP.
Propaganda
-publicizing the
government's
activities
and
educating
the
population
-
has
always
been
an
essential
element
of
the
CCP
hold
on
2
Yu
Yunyao,
'Fully
strengthen party
building
in
the
new
era
in
accordance
with
the
requirements
of
the
Three
Represents,'
in
Central
Organization
Department
Research
Issue
Group,
ed,
China
Investigation
Report
2000-2001
-A
Study
of
Contradictions Among
the People
Under
New Conditions
(Beijing:
Central
Compilation
and
Translation
Press
2001),
1;
FBIS
translation,
CPP2OOlo824000o43.
3
bid,
i.
4
Willy
Wo-Lap
Lam,
'China
progresses
with
the
times,'
5
September
2001,
CNN.COm
(accessed
5
September
2001).
564
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Autumn
2002
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