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The Ideal Local Party Secretary and the “Model” Man

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

A. S. Chen
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Extract

In what light does the Communist Party wish to project itself to the people? Is the local party secretary presented as the remote symbol of authoritarian efficiency, a reflection of the absolute power above? Or is he supposed to be a model of the nutrient “helper,” responsive to the people's needs and governed by humanitarian considerations? The actual quality of these relationships is of course inaccessible for direct observation, but we can examine some of the Communist presentations of the image and expectations in officially approved literary publications.

Type
Research Article
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 17 , March 1964 , pp. 229 - 240
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1964

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References

1 In so far as Communist literature in China is a leader of social change, it fulfils a similar mission as the “New Literature” of the 1920s and 1930s—that is during the early Republican period. Writers were then personally involved in freeing themselves from the impediments of tradition and in promoting ideas and behaviour patterns of a modern industrial world. Of course an essential difference between the two literatures of social change lies in the question of freedom of choice in the range of themes, characters and ideals.

2 In 1951, 45,000 copies were claimed to be printed each month. By 1957, the number had increased to about 300,000 copies per issue. Of course the audience reached is larger than the number of printed copies. After 1957, no circulation figures were available. We may compare the size of its reading audience with that of some other periodicals: Hsüeh-hsi or Study magazine, published fortnightly by the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party for the training of cadres, claimed a circulation of 300,000 in 1950, said to be the largest at the time (Walter, Gourlay, The Chinese Communist Cadre, Cambridge, 1952, pp. 38–39).Google Scholar Another fortnightly, Chung-kuo ch'ing-nienor China Youth, official organ of the new Democratic Youth League, had a circulation in 1950 of 150,000 (Chao Kuo-chun, The Mass Organization in Communist China, monograph distributed by Center for International Studies, MIT, 1953, p. 81).

3 For an authoritative translation of extracts of the speech, see Brandt, , Schwartz, and Fairbank, , A Documentary History of Chinese Communism (Cambridge: 1952), pp. 408–419. The full text is translated by Ch'en Chia-k'ang and Betty Graham, in Mao Tse-tung, On Literature and Art, published by the Chefoo News(no date), 42 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Chao, Chung, “On Literature and Art,” in Communist China 1956(Union Research Institute: Hong Kong, 1957), p. 150.Google Scholar

5 Ibid. p. 153.

6 Weakland, John H., “The Organization of Action in Chinese Culture.” Psychiatry, XIII (08 1950), pp. 361–370.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMedFor a detailed discussion of the history of orthodox philosophical concepts on action and thought, and their modern developments in the thinking of political leaders down to Mao Tse-Tung, see Nivison, David S.and Wright, Arthur F.(ed.), Confucianism in Action(Stanford University Press: 1959).Google Scholar

7 See Hsien-chin, Hu, “The Chinese Concept of Face,” American Anthropologist, XLVI (January–March 1944), pp. 45–64.Google Scholar

8 This paper was written early in 1961, drawing upon Communist publications in the first half of 1960. Caution must be exercised in extrapolating these problems to either earlier or more recent phases of Chinese Communist society.