Disenfranchised by Andreas Joel

Author:Andreas, Joel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2019-07-31T16:00:00+00:00

7

Reforming the Work Unit System

The initial reforms carried out during the early years of the post-Mao era enhanced the role of the market but maintained the essential characteristics of the work unit system—public ownership and permanent employment. In fact, some features of work unit communities were reinforced during this period. As Deng Xiaoping, who took over leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1978, relaxed central planning and allowed enterprises to retain an increasing portion of the revenues they generated, factory leaders—responding to internal pressures—built more apartment blocks as well as cafeterias, schools, childcare centers, and recreational facilities to serve the needs of work unit members. They also hired members’ spouses and children in large numbers, often to work in these expanding service operations. Thus, work units continued to function as “small societies”—insular, self-reliant, and responsible for the employment and welfare of their members.

If, for the time being, the basic social structure of industrial work units remained in place, the political environment changed dramatically. Members of the radical faction, from the political bureau down to factory workshops, were removed in a series of increasingly thorough purges between 1976 and 1983, dismantling the division of labor between radicals and administrators over which Mao had presided. Thousands of former rebel leaders and activists were imprisoned, many for lengthy terms. In Henan alone, petitioners have since claimed that over 1 million people were detained and some 4,000 imprisoned.1 Many of the former rebel leaders I interviewed had served long prison terms. Workers who had been admitted as party members during radical recruitment drives in the mid-1970s were thrown out of the organization in large numbers after the radical faction was routed. Order and centralized authority returned to factories that had been riven by factional contention for over a decade.

Like Mao, Deng viewed monitoring from below as essential for controlling abuse of power by local cadres, but the kind of popular participation he favored was very different from the kind favored by Mao. Deng and his associates had no interest in the tumultuous mass supervision movements that had punctuated the Mao era. Soon after they had consolidated power, they signaled their intention to suppress any activity that recalled the Cultural Revolution, eliminating from the Constitution the right to strike and the right to exercise the Four Big Freedoms.2 Deng declared, “Speaking out freely, airing one’s views fully, writing big character posters and holding big debates have never played a positive role.”3

While Mao had insisted that workers engage in political struggle, Deng wanted them to focus on production. “Extracting more oil is the politics of the petroleum industry,” he insisted, “producing more coal is the politics of coal miners, growing more grain is the politics of peasants, defending the frontiers is the politics of soldiers, and working hard in study is the politics of students.”4 Deng was intent on improving industrial efficiency, and to do this he was determined to put an end to the intensive emphasis on politics of the Mao era, especially disruptive and divisive political campaigns.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.