Mensheviks of the East: Revisiting the Chinese Democratic Left

The opinions expressed by the authors do not necessarily represent the views of the China Institute or the University of Alberta.

In the contemporary understanding and teaching of Greater China's 20^th century political history, the predominant framing of political actors is set between a nationalist, right-leaning Kuomintang (KMT) and their steadfast enemies in Mao Zedong's communist camp (CCP). A deeper inspection of the political landscape of late modern and contemporary China, both within the republican period and throughout its civil war, will bear testimony to the existence of a broadly contested political landscape whose actors are spread across ideological categories. The divisions in ideology that are evident today in the societies built by the KMT and CCP can trace their roots to the political commitments and visions of the respective party founders. While there is some empirical validity in the convenient heuristic of a market-driven and Western-oriented KMT standing in sole opposition to the socialist and anti-imperialist program of the CCP, a deeper analysis is needed to transcend this false dichotomy.

The historical record demonstrates that China's laws of political gravity work in strikingly similar ways to other countries which have experienced the emergence of a left-right axis. Understanding left-wing movements and parties whose platforms and ideologies do not neatly conform to either major camp in China's divide will prove to be immensely instructive in this regard. As it is now widely understood that Lenin's authoritarianism stands in drastic contrast to the Social Democratic tradition of the Mensheviks, there is great value in examining Chinese parallels to various other democratic socialist and left-liberal forces in the modern world.

What is the nature of China's democratic left? Addressing this question requires a (re-)visitation of relevant historical forces while tackling secondary questions such as the salience of Marxist thought (or lack thereof) in these political formations and instantiations, the nature of foreign interests and alignments in left parties, the dynamism of specific personalities, the parties' respective bases of social support, and the relationship of ideology with Confucian values. This provides a fruitful starting point with which to evaluate the historical presence and impact of the democratic left in China.

In the context of what became the People's Republic of China (PRC), it bears mentioning that while political parties ostensibly committed to non-communist ideology do exist and have, in theory, modest levels of input on the governing process, all of them operate under the direct guardianship of the CCP (Martin & Lawrence, 2013; Wang, 2018). In tracing the history of the Chinese democratic left, the most relevant movements are those that existed during the Republican period and in the emerging regime in Taiwan. These include the China Democratic Socialist Party (CDSP), the left-leaning factions of the early KMT, the independent Tangwai movement and its most influential political heir, the contemporary Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

While there are clear differences in political positioning between these forces, a lineage can be traced to KMT-founder Sun Yat-Sen's Three Principles of the People. Minzuzhuyi ('nationalism'), Minquan ('democracy', or 'the power of the people', and Min sheng ('socialism' or 'people's livelihood/welfare') are concepts which find clear parallels in the principles of nations within the liberal democratic orbit. It has even been suggested that they are a reformulation of Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg formula (Brook, 2011). Of these three principles, even Minzuzhuyi, the ideal that might seem least compatible with left-wing thought, is articulated in such a way so as to mention and explicitly include minority groups such as Tibetans and Mongolians in its vision. The principle of Minquan can best be understood as democracy although, in the Confucian spirit of the cultural times, as well as a function of Sun's own devotion to traditional values, it is articulated as a balance between the fundamental rights of citizens and the natural leadership of enlightened figures (Wells, 2001: 131).

The most pertinent of the Three Principles, described in detail by Wells (2001) in The Political Thought of Sun Yat-en, is Minsheng, which can loosely be understood as an ideal reminiscent of Buddhism - 'livelihood' (Wells, 2001: 91). Extensive research has indicated that Sun Yat-sen held clear attitudes towards Marxism, which seemed to reconcile soft economic determinism not only with Chinese traditional values but also a mixed-market society with the sort of civil liberties espoused by John Stuart Mill (Wells, 2001: 92-100). Though it is arguable that the principle of liberal democracy was severely undermined by the KMT's decades-long authoritarian rule under Chiang Kai-shek and his son Chiang Ching-kuo, or that the ideals of social justice embodied in the principle of Min sheng might not be compatible with the free-market tendencies that the KMT came to display, there remains much to be said about the seeds of a modern democratic left having been sown in the early days of Chinese republicanism.

Although the KMT held great aspirations for the development of a democratic Taiwan, those plans were displaced by the politics of pragmatism and the need to establish the firm foundations of a strong governing authority. This pivot may have appeared to turn the logic of the KMT on its head, which consequently came to rule the island in authoritarian style for roughly four decades. The KMT's authoritarian path was marked by a practice of governing through a 'coercive apparatus' that included martial law, international security agents to keep close watch to watch over political figures and citizens, and the surgical removal of perceived threats, some of which played a role in the souring of Taiwan's relations with other countries. KMT behavior and actions during the formative years of the ROC translated into a game of chance for those living in Taiwanese society who could find themselves falling victim to the KMT's 'indiscriminate repression' at any time (quoted in Greitens, 2016: 188). Indeed, the very practices witnessed immediately after the KMT arrived and established itself on the island assumed a trajectory which ran contrary to Sun Yat-sen's philosophical writings on democracy and the concentration of power(s) in a democratic system. The KMT's policy pursuits during the early days of ROC in response to ideological exigencies of the consolidation of power echoes some of the principles of Vladimir Lenin's policy of War Communism.

Turning to the KMT itself, we see that it had initially identified itself as squarely on the left in the initial stages of the Republic of China's establishment. Despite the lackluster fighting record that it would later display during the civil war that was part and parcel to its deflated popularity, the KMT was perceived initially as a bulwark against Japanese and axis imperialism, notes Fenby (2005: 73) in Chiang Kai-shek: China's Generalissimo and the Nation He Lost. Revealingly, the party's leftist identity and geopolitical alignenment earned it a letter of support from the Communist Party of Great Britain. Much of the development and industrialization which the KMT attempted in its early rule of the Chinese mainland, was undertaken with the intent of nationalization, land and income redistribution, and financing of public welfare.

Indeed, in republican Shanghai the KMT enforced a policy of price controls in an attempt to gain a social base among the urban working class, channeling its political energy against middle-class shopkeepers (Fenby, 485). Ideologically, there was a view that the masses were to be mobilized not as passive consumers of downwardly-channeled information but as citizens with agency in a new republican society, with a mass party serving as collective conduit for political action (Rahav, 2017). Those party members whose vision of republican nationalism was more in keeping with class-oriented redistributive policies in a broader context of respect for democratic liberties were to later find political expression in a movement that explicitly identified itself as existing quasi-clandestine external opposition to the KMT - the Tangwai movement (Lee, 2003).

There was one small party in Republican China which was explicitly committed to Democratic Socialism - Zhang Junmai's (also known as Carsun Chang) CDSP. Having followed Chiang Kai-shek to Taiwan in the wake of the civil war, they were one of only two opposition parties that operated legally and relatively freely on the island but which were not expected to challenge the KMT's grip on power (Copper, 1993). Prior to his move over to Taiwan, Junmai jointly organized a National Socialist Party (with no relation whatsoever to Nazi Germany), as well as the Chinese Democratic League with the help of Huang Yanpei (Winter, 2014). It was the latter of these two that was tightly connected to core liberal values and ideologies practiced in many Western democracies, including a separation of powers doctrine, the freedom of expression as a fundamental tenet, and social protections such as rights to equality and non-discrimination.

The CDSP maintained a platform that ambitiously targeted women's rights, a comprehensive social safety net with health benefits, and the egalitarian development of the Chinese economy with a view towards empowering the working class to join the ranks of the middle class (Jeans, 1997: 208). Ultimately, it stands to reason that despite their clear enunciation of policies which represented a change in direction from the KMT, their previous status as a legal entity quelled their appeal to militants and intellectuals who sought to form viable opposition institutions as Taiwan began to democratize. The weight and influence of the CDSP as a groundbreaking formation in the advocacy of human rights, freedom of expression, and social-democratic policies against unrestrained capitalism is worth mentioning, yet ultimately is a mere footnote in comparison with the movement that came to be known as the Tangwai.

Initially a movement of intellectuals and upper middle-class professionals whose primary political activity consisted in the publishing of journals, the Tangwai movement would prove to be a vector of Chinese democracy. The movement's name is indicative of social conditions it had to face, as 'Tangwai' means 'outside the party' (Chu, 1993: 175). Though it presented independent candidates for elections at the local and congressional level, it did not have the legal right to incorporate as a party (Chu, 1993: 175). It published articles and research under a think-tank operating above-ground by 1986, though at this point it had been over a decade since its members had openly written in favor of full democratization of Taiwan's elections, media, and public service (Chu, 1993: 175). Unlike dissidents in the PRC who viewed the expression of culture as a means of channeling political opposition, the Tangwai's view of its own purpose was to build institutions, despite the state's structural limitations (Chiou, 1995: 90-95). The precise opportunity for such an institution to be built came with the end of martial law in 1987, when former Tangwai members incorporated the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which sought to represent both the middle-class interests of a western-looking educated populace while maintaining a base of support in organized labor (Chu, 1993).

The DPP has been the most powerful opposition force to the KMT from its founding days until the present era, and as of 2016 is now at the head of a majority government in Taiwan. Examining the DPP's policies as the product of decades of intellectual and political struggle, as well as exposing its democratic and progressive character, illuminates much of the strength and nature of democratic leftist thought in the Republic of China from the early 20^th century to the present. The early days of Taiwanese multiparty democracy saw the DPP working alongside organized labor, vigorously pressuring the KMT to assume action on wage growth and social protections for employees (Taipei Times, 2019). This balanced, yet consistent advocacy for the economic concerns of the working class would not be out of place in the outlook of Europe's Social Democratic parties. Throughout the late 20^th century, the party has advocated for forest and wildlife conservation, a proactive approach toward climate change, and a commitment to phasing out nuclear power, in keeping with the environmental commitments of its educated, middle-class base (Grano, 2005).

Furthermore, under its recently constituted government, the DPP has led Taiwan to become the first jurisdiction in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage (BBC News, 2019). A preoccupation with equality, coupled with progressive engagements in social and environmental policy, are measures that could credibly classify the DPP as a left-liberal party. In terms of its international alignment, its support for Taiwanese autonomy has yet to curry favor in the foreign ministries of its western allies, yet on a partisan level, it is a full member of the Liberal International, the same international federation of parties to which Canada's Liberals and the US Democrats belong (Liberal International, 2019). Viewed in the context of a worldwide turn towards nationalist populism, the DPP stands out as a successful bulwark in defense of left-liberal political ideals. In the context of a relatively conservative background culture rooted in Confucianism, this stands as a noteworthy feat.

The existence and prominence of a democratic and progressive left, rooted in the efforts of intellectuals on the mainland and put into power across the Taiwan strait, sustains the futility of applying a false binary of Greater China's politics such that Nationalists and Communists are the only relevant actors playing a role in the socio-political trajectory of these societies. In understanding the direction of diaspora movements that challenge state power in the PRC, and similarly in the context of pro-democracy movements in contemporary Hong Kong, researchers and citizens are better served in viewing the political dynamic at play as greatly influenced by long-standing traditions of the Chinese democratic left.

[1] Christophe Fairon is a political writer based in Edmonton studying applied linguistics at the University of Alberta.

[2] Scott N. Romaniukis a Postdoctoral Fellow in Security Studies at the China Institute, University of Alberta.

References

BBC News. (May 17, 2019). 'Taiwan gay marriage: Parliament legalises same-sex unions'. Available at: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48305708

Brook, T. (2011). 'One hundred years of waiting,' Asia Pacific Memo, Institute of Asian Research, University of British Columbia. Available at: https://apm.iar.ubc.ca/one-hundred-years-of-waiting/

Chiou C. L. (1995). Institutionalizing the Tangwai: The DPP. In: Democratizing Oriental Despotism. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Chu, J. J. (1993). 'Political liberalization and the rise of Taiwanese labour radicalism', Journal of Contemporary Asia, 23(2): 173-188. Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00472339380000111

Copper, J. F. (1993). 'The role of minor political parties in Taiwan', World Affairs, 155(3): 95-108. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20672349

Fenby, J. (2005). 'Chiang Kai Shek: China's generalissimo and the nation he lost. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers.

Greitens, S. C. (2016). Dictators and their secret police: Coercive institutions and state violence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Jeans, R. B. (1997). Democracy and socialism in Republican China: The politics of Zhang Junmai (Carsun Chang), 1906-1941. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield.

Lee, S. (December 10, 2003). 'Lessons from the Kaoshiung incident', Taipei Times. Available at: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/print/2003/12/10/2003079061

Liberal International. (2019). 'Asia'. Available at: https://liberal-international.org/our-members/regions/asia/

Martin, M. F. & Lawrence, S. V. (March 20, 2013). 'Understanding China's political system'. Congressional Research Service, US Library of Congress. Available at: https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R41007.pdf

Rahav, S. (2017). 'Predicated on the people': Legitimating mass politics and parties in early Republican China', Cross-Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review, 22: 106-143. Available at: https://cross-currents.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/e-journal/articles/rahav.pdf

Simona, G. (November 9, 2005). 'Environmental issues facing Taiwan', Brookings Institution. Available at: https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/environmental-issues-facing-taiwan/

Taipei Times. (February 17, 2019). 'Editorial: Unions must be expanded, improved'. Available at: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2019/02/17/2003709857

Wells, A. (2001). The political thought of Sun Yat-sen. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Winter, R. M. (2014). 'The Politics of Opposition: China 's Moderates at the Political Consultative Conference of 1946', Constructing the Past, 15(1): 70-80. Available at: https://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/constructing/vol15/iss1/12/

Xiaofeng, W. (March 3, 2018). 'What do China's democratic parties actually do?', The Diplomat. Available at: https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/what-do-chinas-democratic-parties-actually-do/