Battle for China's Past : Mao and the Cultural Revolution

The fact that rural Chinese did not possess this or that consumer
good in the past was not the fault of Mao, they would argue. The fact
that they do have them now is not to Deng’s credit either, they would
say. Some of these consumer goods were not even invented then. The
fact that grain yields are higher now than those during the era of Mao
was not because they had no incentive to work hard then, as suggested
by economic rationalists. The land yields more now because chemicals
are used more extensively and intensively.
China’s future direction
THE BATTLE FOR CHINA’ S PAST
How is China likely to develop in the future? No revolution is visible on
the horizon. Resistance and isolated insurrections do, and will continue
to, take place, but collective actions that will overthrow the current
regime are unlikely. The more extensive and intensive use of chemicals
is set to continue. China as the world assembly factory will continue to
produce cheap commodities for the world’s rich. More and more of
China’s industries and enterprises will be taken over by international
capital. While China has become entrenched in the global capitalist
system the plunder of natural resources, the thirst for raw materials and
environmental abuse will worsen. In this scenario China’s future may
well be the future of global environmental catastrophe. This is one likely
development.
The second scenario is that scientific and technological inventions
will come quickly enough to phase out the existing production technology
so that environmental deterioration can be halted. Some would
argue that the replacement technology is already there. But the
problem is how to get human beings all over the world to act together
quickly enough when our national and international policies are
guided by not only the evolutionary instinct for survival of the fittest,
but also the animal desire for instant satisfaction here and now. This
second scenario is possible, but its likelihood depends on our efforts.
The dialectics of human competition rationalized by economic
rationalism may in fact lead to disastrous military conflicts between
China and the rest of the world over limited resources, or spheres of
influence and control. This worst scenario is not unlikely, and certainly
not impossible, especially if China is not ready to submit to Western
dominance.
The fourth scenario is that Mr Democracy comes along to take over
China. For many of the Chinese elite intelligentsia of the Enlightenment
tradition, once China becomes democratized the Chinese people
will live happily ever after. Leaving aside the issue of whether democracy
one way or another will provide solutions to the contemporary
problems in China that require urgent solutions, it is far from clear how
[ 200 ]