THE history of the Communist Party of China (CPC) over the past 100 years has been the history of the trials, tribulations and achievements of the Chinese people. 

After Sun Yat-Sen’s proclamation of a republic in 1912, the foundation of the CPC in 1921 was the second great event of the 20th century in China. 

The party’s chief founders such as Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao espoused Marxism, drew enormous inspiration from the Bolshevik Revolution and answered the call from Lenin and the Communist International to form communist parties.

But it should not be overlooked that in China, as in Britain and other countries, these parties emerged organically from the conditions and struggles of their own people, usually with the industrial working class at their core. 

The CPC arose from the struggles of the Chinese people — it was not established from outside and imported as some kind of alien body.

The fight against Guomindang betrayal, the “Long March” and the struggle against Japanese occupation were all noteworthy episodes which culminated in the declaration of the People’s Republic in 1949, the third decisive event in China’s modern development. 

The yoke of imperialism was finally thrown off and Sun Yat-Sen’s unfinished patriotic and democratic revolution was elevated and transformed into socialist revolution led by Mao Zedong.

Nobody who learns anything of the Long March of the CPC can fail to be deeply impressed by the dedication, steadfastness and courage shown by Mao Zedong and his comrades on their epic journey.

In the pre-revolutionary period, the capacity of China’s communists to survive periods of terrible adversity, such as those after the Guomindang’s treachery and the Japanese invasion, and then to strike back, is testimony to the physical courage and ideological strength of the CPC’s cadres and leadership.

Having been to Yan’an and seen its remoteness and beauty, the work done by the CPC to gather, organise and educate its forces for the victorious 1949 revolution strikes me as all the more extraordinary.

Just 12 months later, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army had to intervene in the Korean war to defend its newly won sovereignty, assist the Korean people and turn back US-led aggression. 

This marked a turning point in that desperate struggle and Western imperialism.  

Since then, there have been many significant achievements, together with some setbacks. 

The economic and social remnants of China’s pre-capitalist modes of production were progressively eliminated. 

Women were helped to cast off their chains. The mass campaign for literacy swept the country. 

With assistance from the Soviet Union, the foundations were laid for the development of a modern industrial society.

However, the miscalculations of the “Great Leap Forward” and the ultra-leftism of the “Cultural Revolution” created substantial disruption and dislocation in China’s economic, social and political life. This was related to the Sino-Soviet split and Mao’s underestimation of the necessity for peaceful co-existence with the main imperialist powers in the nuclear age. 

Nonetheless, these positions can also be seen as an overreaction to Soviet arrogance and bureaucratisation.

From our vantage point in the 21st century, it can be claimed with confidence that the fourth world-historic event in modern Chinese development was Deng Xiaoping’s initiation of the “Reform and Opening Up” process in 1978. 

Combining Communist Party rule, central planning and public ownership of key sectors of the economy with market mechanisms, an influx of emigre and foreign capital and an internationalisation of China’s trade and investment strategies has undoubtedly turned China into the world’s foremost economic and political powerhouse.

The transformation of China’s economy — not least its infrastructure — has been on a scale not seen anywhere else since the most dynamic periods of capitalism’s Industrial Revolution.

However, whereas industrialisation in Britain was based to a large extent on the slave trade, slavery and imperial plunder, and in the US on genocide and the super-exploitation of immigrants and ex-slaves, China’s industrial and technological transformation has not been at the expense of any section of the population at home or abroad.

Ending the predatory, corrupt and distorting interference of foreign imperialist powers on China’s own territory has been a precondition for healthy social development. 

Restoring national sovereignty must therefore rank among the greatest of the CPC’s achievements, although there is unfinished business as far as Taiwan is concerned. 

Since 1949, the CPC has pursued economic development strategies intended to benefit the mass of working people and their families. 

The overall result is that infant mortality has fallen by 95 per cent, average life expectancy has doubled to almost 80, and since 1978 more than 850 million people have been lifted out of extreme poverty.

In April 1987, Deng Xiaoping said to Lubomir Strougala, prime minister of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic: “To build socialism it is necessary to develop the productive forces. Poverty is not socialism. To uphold socialism, a socialism that is to be superior to capitalism, it is imperative first and foremost to eliminate poverty … Not until the middle of the next century, when we have reached the level of the moderately developed countries, shall we be able to say that we have really built socialism and to declare convincingly that it is superior to capitalism.”

In the light of these wise and prescient words, there can be no room for complacency. 

Criticising the previous line of the CPC, Deng himself emphasised how important it is to acknowledge mistakes in order to learn from them. 

Of course, this presumes that the means are available for policies to be reviewed honestly and collectively, with the freedom to raise possible errors in a critical but constructive way.

Hence it was possible to introduce the Reform and Opening Up policies and amend them in the light of subsequent experience. 

It is one of the great strengths of the CPC that it has set and pursued long-term aims while also showing the flexibility to amend shorter-term objectives and targets. 

Not allowing theory to become dogma has also enabled the CPC to engage with the international economy, adjusting policies in accordance with external shocks such as the 2008 financial crash and the subsequent recession in the capitalist world. 

Thus we have seen amendments to the Chinese government’s Five Year Plans to protect the Chinese economy and people since then.

In these vital respects, the CPC has avoided some of the most serious weaknesses and errors of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union which contributed substantially to the collapse and counterrevolution in the former socialist countries.

Of course, successes can give birth to new problems. The enormous advances since the late 1970s have brought some negative consequences, notably increases in wealth inequality, housing speculation and corruption. 

The response, intensified under President Xi Jinping, has been swift and thoroughgoing, including measures to stamp out corruption and tackle the economic and social inequalities between the largely rural interior and the more developed urban and industrial regions.

Thus the CPC has shown itself capable not only of recognising problems and admitting to errors, but also of taking resolute action to rectify them. 

This is possible because the party can utilise state power combined with economic control and public ownership of key economic sectors and enterprises. 

Most recently, social insurance has been extended to cover the majority of the population.

Now, in the finest internationalist tradition of the communist movement, China wishes to assist other countries and peoples to accelerate their own economic and social development through the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank and the overland and maritime Belt and Road initiatives. Evocatively, President Xi talks of the “Silk Road spirit.” 

I have been privileged to visit China six or seven times, often for extensive travel to different villages, towns, cities and provinces. 

I have met and talked with many Chinese people, from state and municipal officials to intellectuals, women activists and trade union representatives. 

My abiding impressions have been of a society going through breathtaking changes, but doing so in a planned and orderly way. 

I’ve witnessed many examples of a vast, trained and educated working class in the process of development and expansion.

Particularly impressive have been the technological innovations and applications, not least those designed to produce and safeguard a cleaner, safer environment. 

From urban planning and housing to waste management and renovation in the countryside, I have seen the results of this determination to pursue “green” policies. 

My time in Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Autonomous Region, was an eye-opener. 

Everywhere our Communist Party of Britain delegation went, we heard people speaking the Uighur language, including on our unaccompanied trip to the local open-air market. 

Uighur was the first language on public signs and notices and our interpreters from the CPC International Department in Beijing had to be replaced by local interpreters — because the municipal and party leaders we met in Urumqi preferred to speak in their own native Uighur language. 

Imagine our surprise when arriving back in Britain, to read a report in the Guardian newspaper about an address to the EU Parliament by the president of the World Uighur Congress. 

He told MEPs that in Xinjiang the Uighur language was banned, public notices were in Han Chinese only and the top officials there were all Han Chinese.

The moral of the story? Never take Western reports about China at face value. 

This is even more necessary today, when ruling-class circles in the West are bent upon prosecuting a new cold war against China and Russia. 

China’s stunningly successful drive to combat the Covid-19 epidemic showed the world how to do it. 

Some of the world’s governments took notice and adapted the Chinese approach to their own national circumstances. 

Others, as in Britain, failed to take the necessary action soon or adequately enough and their people have paid a terrible price in terms of unnecessary deaths. 

These differing performances reflect the different priorities and values of different governments and systems. 

The CPC prides itself on staying close to the people, being part of the people, having its deep roots in the mass of the people and implementing strategies and policies that are “people-centred.”

Continuing to fulfil that aspiration will enable the CPC to achieve its goal of building a “modern socialist country” that is “prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious and beautiful” by 2049.

Robert Griffiths is general secretary of the Communist Party of Britain. This article is adapted from one published on china.org.