Standing on the side of the people: as it has fought to establish and consolidate its leadership over the country, the Party has in fact been fighting to earn and keep the people’s support
In late December 2012, a little over a month after the conclusion of the 18th National Congress of the CPC, Xi Jinping visited Fuping in Hebei Province. During the visit, he remarked, “A lot has been said about what our purpose is, but it ultimately comes down to a single phrase – serve the people. Our Party exists to serve the people, and what the Central Committee cares about is working for the people. Officials at all levels must make sure that in everything they do, they should not only be responsible to the higher-ups?but also to the common people. We must regularly ask ourselves: are we busying ourselves with things that have nothing to do with the Party’s fundamental purpose? Are we working wholeheartedly for the people? And are we working with a focus on the central tasks of the Party and the state?”
What Xi Jinping was asking here was whether or not Party officials were taking the Party’s nature and purpose to heart. The Constitution of the Communist Party of China makes it clear from the outset that the CPC is the pioneer?of the Chinese working class, the Chinese people, and the Chinese nation. It also explicitly stipulates that the Party shall be dedicated to wholeheartedly serving the people, and that it shall, at all times, give top priority to the interests of the people, share weal and woe with them, and maintain the closest possible ties with them. Xi Jinping has pointed out, “Public sentiment is the greatest test of political efficacy. Ours is a party that is dedicated to serving the people wholeheartedly, that is committed to serving the public good and exercising power in the interests of the people, and that takes the people’s aspirations for a better life as its abiding goal.” He has also stressed, “Prosperity for the people is the basic political position of the CPC, and it is the prominent feature that distinguishes Marxist parties from other parties.” Years ago in Yan’an, a banner that read “serve the people” hung high on the wall of the Zaoyuan assembly hall. Today, the words “serve the people” appear bold and bright on the screen wall at the Xinhua Gate that leads into the office of the CPC in Zhongnanhai.
The nature and purpose of the CPC originated from Marxism. In the Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels proclaimed, “All previous historical movements were movements of minorities, or in the interest of minorities. The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority.” All of the broad and profound knowledge of Marxism can be simply summarized as the pursuit of humanity’s liberation. An affinity with the people is the fundamental attribute of Marxism, and its most distinctive character. Ours is a party equipped with Marxism, and therefore an affinity with the people is also the fundamental attribute of the CPC. As Xi Jinping said at the ceremony for CPC’s centenary, “This country is its people; the people are the country. As we have fought to establish and consolidate our leadership over the country, we have in fact been fighting to earn and keep the people’s support. The Party has in the people its roots, its lifeblood, and its source of strength. The Party has always represented the fundamental interests of all Chinese people; it stands with them through thick and thin and shares a common fate with them. The Party has no special interests of its own – it has never represented any individual interest group, power group, or privileged stratum. Any attempt to divide the Party from the Chinese people or to set the people against the Party is bound to fail. The more than 95 million Party members and the more than 1.4 billion Chinese people will never allow such a scenario to come to pass.”
The people are the rightful masters of socialist China. Ours is a socialist country of people’s democratic dictatorship under the leadership of the working class based on an alliance of workers and farmers; it is a country where all power of the state belongs to the people, and where the people participate, in accordance with the law and in various ways and forms, in the management of state, economic, cultural, and social affairs. Xi Jinping has said, “The supremacy of the people constitutes the core and essence of socialist democracy,” and, “Respecting the principal position of the people and guaranteeing their status as masters of the nation is the consistent position of our Party.” China’s socialist democracy is the broadest, most genuine, and most effective democracy to safeguard the fundamental interests of the people. The name of our country and the names of our state organs at all levels start with “the people,” which indicates the basic orientation of China’s socialist government. State organs at all levels and their employees, regardless of their function, are ultimately working in service of the people. We must ensure that this basic orientation never wavers or weakens. To?develop socialist democracy is precisely to give full expression to the will of the people, protect their rights and interests, spark their creativity, and provide systemic and institutional guarantees to ensure the people run the country.
