We rarely get to witness an event, which represents a story so magnificent yet so shady. We all have heard of stories of powers rising and falling, empires building and collapsing, but rarely do we get to hear a story of a rise of a juggernaut, yet to be roped by the ravages of time or the externalities of outside powers.
A story of just simple pure power accumulation and growth. Such is the story of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), or the Communist Party of China (CPC), as it is popularly called. It is a behemoth, which has grown 100 years old. The party even predates the existence of modern-day China.
It is the force that has carved out a niche for itself and for China on the global platform. The CCP has single-handedly made what China is today, whether you consider it to be a bully or a miracle story, there is no doubt that China’s rise out of shambles, or the so-called ‘Century of Humiliation’, is akin to the rise of a phoenix.
The catch here is that this phoenix bores allegiance to not only the red colour but also to the hammer and sickle of Communism. China, and more specifically the CCP, is the pinnacle of resistance to the Western-led Capitalist model of development.
Today when China flaunts its speckless infrastructure and super-high skyscrapers, no one questions its loyalty towards ‘Free Market’ or ‘Freedom of Choice’, all that matters now is the irresistible story of China’s much debated and speculated rise in the global order. Let us start our story, right from the beginning, from the birth of the CCP.
The Birth of the Giant
Unlike the current scenario of the world, where China exports almost everything to everyone around the globe, the foundational ideas of the CCP were influenced, or ‘imported’, from the events happening in Russia at that time.
Chinese intellectuals, then, were deeply impacted by the groundbreaking events happening in Russia, where a new system of administration, and even thought process, was taking shape in the form of Communism, spearheaded by Vladimir Lenin.
Together with the influenced Chinese intellectuals, Russian forces also played an active role in trying to enforce a Pro-Communist government in China, which would act as a buffer between Russia and its arch-nemesis, Japan.
The great Chinese leader then, Sun Yat-Sen, was also made to pledge loyalty towards the Communist ideology, after which the idea spread rapidly among the intellectuals as well as the labourers inside China’s mainland.
It was finally in the latter half of 1949, after a bloody and furious civil war, that the Chinese Communist Party was finally able to establish itself as the sole power in the People’s Republic of China.
Since then what has followed, has been termed as one of the brightest marvels in the economic history of the world, as China successfully pulled millions out of extreme poverty and changed the face of the once broken country.
What Lies Ahead
Anyone who still doubts the potency of the CCP, to bring in a change for the better in their country, is either blissfully ignorant or is in complete denial of the changing power dynamics of the world, but beyond the shimmer and glimmer of China’s success story lies a dark and a terrible secret, known to all yet acknowledged by none.
The gross human rights violation that the CCP has done throughout its rule is gut-wrenching and downright atrocious. From Tiananmen Square to Hong Kong, from Tibet to Uighurs, from Inner Mongolia to Taiwan, every voice which has stood in front of the CCP’s idea of modern China has been jailed, crushed, silenced and killed. The totalitarian system nurtured by the CCP has no scope for dissents, leave alone a functional Democracy.
Some might argue that it is perhaps exactly due to its authoritarian control over every aspect of the Chinese society, which has rendered it a massive success, but of what use is development, if the citizens can not enjoy its fruits in a society free of fear and aggression.
If the CCP wants to portray itself as the supreme model of development, it has a lot to amend under its belly, but, shockingly, neither the CCP is nor it intends to reform itself in any way towards that direction, if anything they are doubling down in their authoritative ways, and building the foundation of a surveillance state.
What remains to be seen is whether the CCP will also be able to survive the next 100 years, as effortlessly and powerfully, as it has done in the last 100 years. Until then we can just admire, with all its horrendous and excruciating flaws, the rise of an unapologetic China.
Written by - Piyush Pandey
Edited by - Adrija Shah
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