Talk at the Opening Ceremony for the
Second Class of the Central Party School
(August 8, 1943)
The second class of the Central Party School begins today. Most of the comrades
come here from the front, directly from the battlefield; some come here from
various places in the border region, in the midst of their work there; and some
were in Yan’an and have left work in order to study. Now that you are all
attending the same school, you must reach a consensus and unified thinking in
order to reach a unified goal. Otherwise, if some want to study economics, some
philosophy, others fiction, and still others foreign languages, it will be difficult to
run this school, and we will not run it well. Our whole Party should be unified, as
should the study and all the activities in the school. We need a consensus. My
major purpose in attending today’s opening ceremony is to do this propaganda
work.
What kind of consensus and unified goal should we reach? As Comrade Peng
Zhen1 said just now, it is the four criteria for cadres that Dimitrov talked about at
the Seventh Congress of the Communist International [Comintern]: boundless
loyalty, close links to the masses, ability to work independently, and observance
of discipline.2 Our study should follow these four criteria; all the students,
faculty, and staff of the school should strive to achieve such a goal.
All of you have been working for a long time without opportunities for study
and research, and some of you are still not in very good health. This visit to the
Party School not only provides an opportunity for study and research, but will
also allow time for convalescence for those comrades who are exhausted from
overwork. Good rest and good study will enable you to achieve something in the
future.

You are studying at a time when the world is undergoing a tremendous
change. Every age witnesses changes in the world. Chinese society has already
experienced several great transformations, from primitive society to slave society,
from slave society to feudal society, and from feudal society to semicolonial and
semifeudal society. The nature of our society has already undergone three
rearrangements, and now the fourth one is about to take place.
What tasks should the Chinese Revolution complete? In the final analysis,
what is the Chinese Communist Party going to accomplish? We aim at two
accomplishments, to change dynasties twice.
First, we want to turn the semicolonial and semifeudal society into a
democratic society, namely, the new democratic society. This is different from
the transformation of feudal society into democratic society that took place in
France, England, or any other countries (with the exception of the February
Revolution in the Soviet Union). The old democratic revolutions occurring in
those countries were under the leadership of the bourgeoisie. They did not
mobilize the masses completely because they were afraid that once the
consciousness of the masses was aroused, the revolution would be beyond the
control of the bourgeoisie. The basic nature of the new democratic society that
we are going to establish is still capitalist; it breaks up the feudal order and
overthrows the oppressive feudal system and imperialism. The Chinese
Revolution, however, is under the leadership of the proletariat, and the popular
masses have been fully mobilized.
China already entered the phase of a feudal society over three thousand years
ago. Until the present, our country has been a semifeudal society in which feudal
relationships dominate. Now we want to transform this society into a democratic
society. During the democratic revolution to accomplish this transformation, no
matter what the proletariat should not give up the leadership.
In our Party School, there also exists a kind of struggle for the leadership,
namely, using proletarian thought to overcome petty-bourgeois thought and any
other nonproletarian thought. Among the various kinds of nonproletarian
thought, the most important is petty-bourgeois thought, such as individualism,
liberalism, aversion to discipline, and spontaneity. Since last year, the comrades
participating in the first class of the Party School have spent a year and a half
rectifying the Three Styles and receiving education on the Party line and

Marxism-Leninism. This is part of the struggle of the proletariat for ideological
leadership with the petty bourgeoisie and other classes.
The Guomindang recently published a book written by Chiang Kaishek titled
China’s Destiny, in which he claimed that there would be no China without the
Guomindang. It is not clear where he got his evidence. Any of you who have
read books on history and fiction will recall that there is no Guomindang in The
Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin, Investiture of the Gods, or
Dream of the Red Chamber, and yet China has always existed. The Guomindang
has a history of fifty years and has done some good things in China’s old
democratic revolution. It has, however, definitely not accomplished the first step
in China’s revolution, which is to transform China from a semicolonial and
semifeudal society into a democratic society. Under the leadership of Sun Yatsen,
the Guomindang held its first congress in Guangzhou in 1924, following the
suggestion of the Chinese Communist Party and the Soviet Union. At that time,
some people in the Guomindang approved of its cooperation with the Communist
Party for its own purposes. But when the time came, they wanted to attack the
Communist Party and the masses. Naturally, upon the death of Sun Yatsen,
Chiang Kaishek gradually seized power. In 1927, as soon as he reached Nanjing,
he issued an unambiguous order to “purify the party,” suppress the Communist
Party, and crack down on the masses of workers and peasants. The War of
Resistance Against Japan came ten years after the Guomindang became
reactionary and began to engage in civil war. Is the War of Resistance a
revolution? It is. But while it fights against Japan, the Guomindang is also
dabbling in fascism. The Chinese Fascists are, however, different from the
Fascists in foreign countries. The foreign Fascists are expansionist and imperialist;
the Chinese Fascists are comprador and feudalistic; they are not expansionist
because they have no power to invade other countries. The Chinese Fascists are,
however, against the people. From the beginning of the War of Resistance, the
Guomindang adopted an orientation of partial resistance because it was not
willing to see the people participate in the war. It holds that the War of
Resistance is the responsibility of the government. So as long as the ordinary
people are willing to be enlisted and to provide money, that will do. The Chinese
Communist Party adopts the orientation of a comprehensive war of resistance,
maintaining that China cannot win the War of Resistance unless we mobilize and

rely upon all our popular masses. On this issue we contradict the Guomindang’s
stance and we struggle against it. You do not want the ordinary people to rise up,
but we do. One wants it, but the other does not. So, there is conflict.
The Guomindang also needs the ordinary people and pays lip service to
“cherishing the people.” Whether in China or in foreign countries, in ancient
times or in the present, the exploiting classes cannot live without the ordinary
people. The Guomindang pays lip service to “cherishing the people” merely out of
its intention to exploit and squeeze the ordinary people. This is similar to feeding
oxen. Why do they feed oxen? They do so because they can milk them and make
them plow the fields. The exploiting classes “cherish the people” in the same way
as they cherish oxen. We are different from the exploiting classes because we
ourselves are part of the people. Our Party is the people’s representative. We
want to raise the people’s consciousness and unify them. It is on this issue that
we oppose the Guomindang—we want to join the people, whereas they want to
detach themselves from the people.
Eighty percent of China’s population are peasants. When we say the people,
we refer mainly to the peasants. Do we want the peasants or not? If we were to
align ourselves with the political orientation of the big landlords and the big
bourgeoisie and fall captive to them, that is, if we were to become the prisoners
of the big landlords and the big bourgeoisie and milk the ordinary people like
oxen, would there ever be such a Communist Party? There may be, but there
should not be. Does this exist in reality? The answer is positive. In our Party,
there used to be some members who deserted the peasants and sacrificed the
interests of the peasants in order to accommodate the big landlords and the big
bourgeoisie. These Party members abandoned not only the peasants but also the
middle bourgeoisie. We must struggle against such a phenomenon. Our major
enemy at present is Japanese imperialism, which prevents China’s transformation
from a semicolonial and semifeudal society to a democratic society. Our chief
slogan is “down with Japanese imperialism.” At the same time, the Guomindang
daily opposes our mobilization of the people and tries by every means to sabotage
our efforts. We must fight against it and compete with it for leadership. Who
should the millions of Chinese peasants follow? If they follow the big landlords
and the big bourgeoisie, China will still remain a semicolonial and semifeudal
society; if they follow the proletariat and the Communist Party, China will

change from a semifeudal society to a democratic society and from a semicolony
to an independent state. One of our reasons for setting up this Party School is to
effect this change of dynasty.
Second, the Communist Party wants to do another thing, to change this
dynasty yet again, namely, to change a bourgeois democratic society into a
proletarian socialist society. Some comrades, including some senior cadres, are
only aware of the first change but not the second. They have experience in
facilitating the first change, which they identify as attacking local tyrants and
redistributing land. They support these activities, as well as the present war
against Japanese imperialism, the anti-spy campaign, and stopping Hu Zongnan3
from invading the border region. All of these, however, fall under the scope of
the first change I have just talked about. The Chinese Revolution has gone
through three periods, namely, the Northern Expedition, the ten-year Civil War,
and the War of Resistance Against Japan. The revolution during these three
periods constitutes part of the first change. Is it right to say that the first change
will be completed right after we win the War of Resistance? It will not be
completed at that point. By then, Japanese imperialism will be driven out, but the
establishment of the new democratic society in China will not be completed. The
implementation of new democracy is incomplete even in our anti-Japanese base
areas.
The Chinese democratic revolution is very difficult. Sun Yatsen devoted forty
years to the old democratic revolution without achieving success. Later we began
to engage in the new democratic revolution, the course of which is also arduous
and torturous. The cooperation between the Guomindang and the Communist
Party for more than three years, from 1924 to 1927, was followed by the
Guomindang’s counterrevolution for ten years. Currently, in the War of
Resistance, the Guomindang adopts a two-pronged policy—fighting against
Japan, on the one hand, and against the Communist Party, on the other.
Therefore, the Communist Party must be in charge so that victory can be
achieved in the Chinese democratic revolution. What is meant by the victory of
the Chinese democratic revolution? It is the establishment of a new democratic
China. We are now taking the first step in the revolution, which is in essence a
bourgeois democratic revolution, a revolution in which the whole people
participate and which is under the leadership of the proletariat, but essentially

does not destroy the system of private property.
This first step, however, is not enough. Our cadres must understand that the
system of private property will be abolished in the future. Of course, that will
take place under certain economic and political conditions, including the
condition that the majority of people in the whole country trust the leadership of
the Communist Party. Leadership power cannot be demanded of the people, still
less can it be forced upon them. It is acquired by making the masses realize which
party is good and promising for them to follow on the basis of their own practical
interests and political experience. Of course, our Communist Party should make
propaganda, too. To achieve good results, our propaganda should proceed from
the actual situation of the masses rather than from dogmatism.
Thus, the two revolutions we are talking about refer to the new democratic
revolution taking place at present and the socialist revolution to be launched in
the future.
To carry out these two revolutions, we need to study the four criteria that
Dimitrov talked about. Boundless loyalty should be measured by objective
standards. Dimitrov is perfectly right in saying that one’s boundless loyalty is
tested in battle, during imprisonment, and in the court. Your boundless loyalty
should be tested in struggles such as these. Rectification of the Three Styles, cadre
screening, fighting against Hu Zongnan’s attacks, the six years of the War of
Resistance so far, and the ten-year Civil War are all struggles. Opposing
opportunism and petty-bourgeois ideology are also struggles. The criterion of
maintaining close links with the masses should also be measured against
objective standards, an example of which is how the masses react at a memorial
service for a cadre who has died. Some cadres have very high positions and are
addressed as the leading cadres as if all the ordinary people support them.
Actually this doesn’t mean a thing. We can pass the final judgment on a person
only when the lid is placed on his coffin, which means that we need to wait and
see whether the ordinary people shed tears at his memorial service. I do not think
that ordinary people will shed tears for the deaths of certain cadres who regard
themselves as the leaders of the masses. It is merely because they are government
officials that ordinary people have to show courtesy to these officials. In fact,
after their business is done, people will turn their backs on these officials and
ignore them. At a memorial service for a real leader of the masses, people will

feel sad about his death rather than feeling relieved that he no longer needs to be
fed and thus millet can be saved. People in northern Shaanxi went into deep
mourning over the death of Comrade Liu Zhidan.4 This proves that he was a real
leader of the masses. Is a leader of the masses named by the masses or by us?
According to Dimitrov, he needs to be named by the masses and confirmed by
the masses on the basis of their own experience.
To carry out the two revolutions just discussed we must create a revolutionary
party which truly corresponds to these four criteria. Our Party has been in
existence for twenty-two years and has gone through three revolutionary periods,
but it has not yet matured. Our Party is not unified, and its standards are still
low. I am sure that the Chinese Revolution would not be what it is today if our
Party were more unified and had reached a higher level. The twenty-two years of
history are already behind us, so we must start taking action beginning today.
We set up this Party School in order to raise our comrades’ political and
theoretical levels and to make our Party more unified. There are many “theatrical
troupes”—or “drama groups,” to use a slightly more vulgar term—in our Party
because of the social and economic situation in China. Within a troupe, they are
all very friendly with one another, regardless of whether a person is playing a
major role, a minor role, or a bit part. But they share one principle, namely, that
“my troupe may criticize your troupe, but not vice versa.” This is called
sectarianism. There are two kinds of sectarianism in our Party. One is dogmatic
sectarianism, which borrows dogmas from abroad and shows them off. The other
kind is empiricist sectarianism. We have been fighting in the mountains for a
long time. From the ten-year Civil War to the present War of Resistance, which
has lasted for six years, friendship in adversity has brought factions into
existence. The activities of different factions are not unified, and their levels are
rather low. Our task of making and finishing the two revolutions by ourselves is
a heavy burden. We must raise our political and theoretical levels so that our
Party will become more unified and form a big party without any factions. Each
one of us should be able to sacrifice himself, to show infinite loyalty, to maintain
close links with the masses, to work independently, to observe discipline, and to
fight the enemy in a resolute and unified way. We shall devote our lives to these
two revolutions.
Comrades! The accomplishment of these two revolutions is not as easy as

making a meal or building a house. It is meant to overthrow our class enemies.
We must overthrow foreign imperialism and big Chinese landlords and big
bourgeoisie because they intend to oppress us. Today, however, we mainly want
to wipe out Japanese imperialism, not to overthrow big landlords and big
bourgeoisie of any kind, because they are still fighting in the War of Resistance.
We are unwilling to fight against them even after the collapse of Japanese
imperialism. But it seems as if the Guomindang is resolved to fight against us.
They spend every single minute thinking about how to wipe us out.
Consequently, we should take precautions not to be fooled by them as we were
fooled during the first cooperation between the Guomindang and the Communist
Party. Many of you present experienced that occasion, including Comrade Zhou
Enlai, some other comrades, and me. We held meetings in Guangzhou with the
Guomindang. At that time, they did not understand the principles of revolution
and had no power at all. It was the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist
Party that helped them build their party. But, after it started, they kicked us out.
In his book published in March 1943, Chiang Kaishek was still cursing the
Communist Party. In the current cooperation between the Guomindang and the
Communist Party we should not be taken in again like that.
In your two years at the Party School, you are going to take part in the
rectification of the Three Styles, in cadre screening, and in the study of our
Party’s history and the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin. Furthermore,
students in the military class will have military lessons, and those in the cultural
class will take classes in culture. In all, there are six courses. After the school
opens today, you will begin the rectification of the Three Styles and cadre
screening. Some of you have already gone through rectification at the front, but
not in Yan’an. Once you have gone through rectification, one of your eyes will be
opened; once you have gone through cadre screening, the other eye will be
opened. How can you fail in any revolution once both eyes are opened?
Moreover, we need to study our Party’s history, analyzing and doing research on
every year of the Party’s twenty-two-year history. As for the methodology of
study, as Dimitrov said, there are two ways of training cadres at Party schools.
One is the dogmatic way of studying theories in the abstract. The other way is to
combine the study of theories with concrete examples of struggle. The
methodology used in the past belongs to the first way, which made students all

the more stupid. Now we are adopting the second way, which will enable you to
acquire a full comprehension of the issues and will guarantee that you will make
progress within two years.
I give this talk today at the beginning of your course in order to make this
direction clear, so that you can be assured that studying in this way will benefit
you and the whole Party. We must wage the two revolutions and achieve victory
in these two revolutions by our own hand. We must have this confidence as
Communists and as cadres of the Communist Party, and, moreover, we must
master the skills so that we can achieve these two tasks for the toiling masses.
Notes
Our source for this text is Mao Zedong wenji, Vol. 3, pp. 55–63, where it is reproduced from a transcript of
the talk preserved in the Central Archives.
1. Peng Zhen (1902–1997) was at this time vice president of the Party School of the Central Committee of
the Chinese Communist Party.
2. On Dimitrov’s essay, included in the Yan’an Zhengfeng wenxian, see above, note to the text “Resolution
of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party Regarding Methods of Leadership,” June 1, 1943.
3. Regarding Hu Zongnan, see above, note to the text of February 20, 1942.
4. Regarding Liu Zhidan, see above, note to the text of May 2, 1943.