Comrades,
I now wish to deliver the following report to the Eighteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China on behalf of the Seventeenth Party Central Committee.
The Eighteenth National Congress is one of great importance being held when China has entered the decisive stage of completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects. The underlying theme of the congress is to hold high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics, follow the guidance of Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important thought of Three Represents and the Scientific Outlook on Development, free up the mind, implement the policy of reform and opening up, pool our strength, overcome all difficulties, firmly march on the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and strive to complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects.
At this moment when I address you, we are convinced that thanks to over 90 years of hard struggle, our Party has rallied and led the people of all ethnic groups of the country in turning the poor and backward old China into an increasingly prosperous and powerful new China and opening up bright prospects for the great renewal of the Chinese nation. We are all the more proud of the historic achievements of the Party and the people, we are all the more firm in the ideal and conviction of the Party and the people, and we are all the more aware of the historic responsibility of the Party.
At present, as the global, national and our Party’s conditions continue to undergo profound changes, we are faced with unprecedented opportunities for development as well as risks and challenges unknown before. The whole Party must keep in mind the trust the people have placed in us and the great expectation they have of us. We must aim higher and work harder and continue to pursue development in a scientific way, promote social harmony, and improve the people’s lives so as to complete the glorious and arduous tasks bestowed on us by the times.
I. Our Work in the Past Five Years and the Basic Experience We Have Gained in the Past Ten Years
Over the past five years since the Seventeenth Party Congress, we have marched boldly on the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. During these five years, we have overcome numerous difficulties and risks and achieved new successes in building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.
The Seventeenth Party Congress adopted a comprehensive plan for promoting reform and opening up and socialist modernization and attaining the grand goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. To implement this decision of the Seventeenth Party Congress, the Central Committee has held seven plenary sessions, at which decisions were made and implementing steps adopted on the following issues of underlying importance: deepening reform of the administrative system, promoting rural reform and development, improving and strengthening Party building in a new environment, formulating the Twelfth Five-Year Plan and promoting reform and development of the cultural sector. During the past five years, we have fulfilled the goals of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan and made good progress in implementing the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, and we have made new and major achievements in all fields of our work.
The economy has developed steadily and rapidly. China’s overall national strength has grown considerably. The gross domestic product (GDP) reached 47.3 trillion yuan in 2011, and government revenue increased by a wide margin. The overall agricultural production capacity has increased and grain output has gone up year after year. Fresh progress has been made in adjusting the industrial structure, and the infrastructure has been extensively upgraded. Urbanization has been steadily advanced, and development between urban and rural areas and between regions has become better balanced. Notable progress has been made in making China an innovative country, and major breakthroughs have been made in manned spaceflights, the lunar exploration program, and in the development of a manned deep-sea submersible, supercomputers and high-speed railways. Solid steps have been taken to promote ecological progress, and comprehensive progress has been made in resource conservation and environmental protection.
Major progress has been registered in reform and opening up. China’s overall rural reform, the reform in tenure of collective forests and the reform of state-owned enterprises have been deepened, and the non-public sector of the economy has registered sound growth. The country’s modern market system and macro-regulatory system have been steadily improved, and its reform of finance and taxation, banking, prices, science and technology, education, social security, medicine and public health, and public institutions has progressed steadily. China’s open economy has reached a new level, and its import and export volume now ranks second in the world.
Living standards have been significantly improved. Efforts to improve the people’s wellbeing have been intensified; urban and rural employment has continued to increase; individual income has increased rapidly; household assets have grown steadily; people’s need for daily necessities such as clothing, food, housing and transportation is better met; subsistence allowances for both urban and rural residents and the rural poverty line have been raised by a big margin; and basic pensions for enterprise retirees have increased continually.
New strides have been made in developing democracy and the legal system. Further progress has been made in reforming the political structure. Urban and rural deputies to people’s congresses are now elected on the basis of the same population ratio. Community-level democracy has steadily developed. The socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics has been established, and notable achievements have been made in building a socialist country based on the rule of law. The patriotic united front has been consolidated and expanded. The reform of the administrative system has deepened, and further progress has been made in the reform of the judicial system and the work mechanisms of the judiciary.
Development of the cultural sector has reached a new stage. Intensive efforts have been made to promote core socialist values; comprehensive progress has been made in the reform of the cultural system; important headway has been made in providing public cultural services; the cultural industry has grown rapidly; cultural creation and production is flourishing; and people enjoy richer intellectual pursuits and cultural entertainment. New progress has been made in public fitness programs and competitive sports.
Fresh progress has been made in social development. Basic public services have improved markedly, and access to them has become much more equitable. Education has developed rapidly, and free compulsory education is now available in all urban and rural areas. Marked progress has been made in developing the social security system; the basic old-age insurance system covering both the urban and rural population has been fully established, and a new type of social assistance system is taking shape. The whole population is now basically covered by medical insurance; the basic urban and rural healthcare systems are taking shape. Construction of low-income housing has been accelerated. We have strengthened and made innovations in social management and maintained social harmony and stability.
A new stage has been reached in efforts to strengthen national defense and the armed forces. Significant achievements have been made in the revolution in military affairs with Chinese characteristics. Coordinated and all-around progress has been made in efforts to ensure the revolutionary nature of the armed forces and that they are modern and follow standard procedures in all operations. Military preparedness has been enhanced. The armed forces have greatly enhanced their capability of carrying out their historic mission in this new stage in the new century, and they have accomplished a host of urgent, difficult, dangerous and arduous tasks.
Work related to Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan affairs has been further strengthened. Hong Kong and Macao have remained prosperous and stable, and their exchanges and cooperation with the mainland have reached a new stage. We have achieved a major transition in the relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits, with direct and two-way links of mail service, transport and trade fully established, and the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement between them has been signed for implementation. All this has promoted extensive mutual contacts and ushered in a new stage of peaceful growth of cross-Straits relations.
New progress has been made in China’s diplomacy. We have staunchly protected China’s interests and the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese nationals and legal persons overseas. We have increased exchanges and cooperation with other countries. We have promoted reform in global governance, enhanced world peace and development, secured more representation and a greater say for China in international affairs, and created favorable international conditions for China’s reform and development.
All-around progress has been made in Party building. Further progress has been registered in strengthening the Party’s governance capacity and its advanced nature. Notable results have been achieved in strengthening the Party theoretically. Significant achievements have been made in studying and applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. Major progress has been made in conducting reform and innovation in Party building. Intra-Party democracy has been further expanded. Major progress has also been made in strengthening the ranks of Party officials; and new progress has been registered in managing qualified professionals. We have intensified activities to encourage Party members and organizations to excel in their work and to build learning Party organizations. Community-level Party organizations have been strengthened. New progress has been made in improving Party conduct, promoting integrity and combating corruption.
On the other hand, we must be keenly aware that there is still much room for improvement in our work and there are a lot of difficulties and problems on our road ahead. They include the following: Unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable development remains a big problem. The capacity for scientific and technological innovation is weak. The industrial structure is unbalanced. Agricultural infrastructure remains weak. Resource and environmental constraints have become more serious. Many systemic barriers stand in the way of promoting development in a scientific way. The tasks of deepening reform and opening up and changing the growth model remain arduous. The development gap between urban and rural areas and between regions is still large, and so are income disparities. Social problems have increased markedly. There are many problems affecting people’s immediate interests in education, employment, social security, healthcare, housing, the ecological environment, food and drug safety, workplace safety, public security, law enforcement, administration of justice, etc. Some people still lead hard lives. There is a lack of ethics and integrity in some fields of endeavor. Some officials are not competent to pursue development in a scientific way. Some community-level Party organizations are weak and lax. A small number of Party members and officials waver in the Party’s ideal and conviction and are not fully aware of its purpose. Going through formalities and bureaucratism as well as extravagance and waste are serious problems. Some sectors are prone to corruption and other misconduct, and the fight against corruption remains a serious challenge for us. We must take these difficulties and problems very seriously and work harder to resolve them.
Our work in the past five years is an important part of our endeavor to build a moderately prosperous society in all respects in the past ten years since the Sixteenth National Congress of the Party.
During these ten years, we have seized and made the most of the important period of strategic opportunities for China’s development, successfully met major challenges and brought socialism with Chinese characteristics to a new stage of development. Facing a volatile global environment and fierce competition in overall national strength unseen before in this new stage in the new century, we have deepened reform and opening up and accelerated development. We took China’s accession to the World Trade Organization as an opportunity to turn pressure into motivation and turn challenges into opportunities, and we have forged ahead in building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. While we were on the way, we overcame the unexpected outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). On the basis of reviewing China’s development practices, we gained a good understanding of the essential features of its development in the current stage, set forth in a timely way major strategic thinking including the Scientific Outlook on Development, and have fully applied it, and thus greatly expanded the space for economic and social development. After 2008, the global financial crisis caused acute difficulties to China’s development. By making resolute decisions and taking major countermeasures on the basis of sizing up the overall development in a scientific way, we made China’s economy the first in the world to make a turnaround, and we have gained important experience in effectively defusing external economic risks and maintaining steady and robust growth. We successfully hosted the Games of the XXIX Olympiad and the XIII Paralympic Games in Beijing and the World Expo in Shanghai. We won great victories in responding to the massive Wenchuan earthquake in Sichuan Province and other natural disasters and in post-disaster recovery and reconstruction and settled major emergencies. Bracing ourselves against complex domestic and international developments, our Party and people have stood severe tests, consolidated and developed the cause of reform and opening up and socialist modernization, and raised China’s international standing. All this shows the superiority and vitality of socialism with Chinese characteristics and has enhanced the pride and cohesiveness of the Chinese people and nation.
Over the past ten years, we have achieved new historic successes and laid a solid foundation for completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects. China’s economy has risen from the sixth to the second place in the world. The country has undergone new historic changes: Its productive forces and economic, scientific and technological strength have increased considerably, the people’s living standards, individual income and social security have improved significantly, and its overall national strength and international competitiveness and influence have been enhanced substantially. During this period, China has seen continuous economic development, steady improvement in democracy, and increasing cultural prosperity and social stability, and we have worked hard to ensure and improve the people’s wellbeing and brought them more benefits than ever before. And all this is widely recognized. These historic successes are attributable to the correct guidance of the Party’s basic theory, line, program and experience; they have been achieved on the firm foundation laid since the founding of New China in 1949 and particularly since the adoption of the policy of reform and opening up in 1978; and they are the fruits of the united efforts of the whole Party and the people of all ethnic groups in China.
Here, on behalf of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, I wish to express our heartfelt thanks to the people of all ethnic groups in China, to the democratic parties, people’s organizations and patriots from all walks of life, to our compatriots in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the Macao Special Administrative Region and Taiwan as well as overseas Chinese, and to our foreign friends who view favorably and support China’s modernization drive.
The most important achievement in our endeavors in the past ten years is that we have formed the Scientific Outlook on Development and put it into practice by following the guidance of Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory and the important thought of Three Represents and by making courageous theoretical innovations on the basis of practices and developing closely interconnected new ideas and viewpoints on upholding and building socialism with Chinese characteristics. The Scientific Outlook on Development was created by integrating Marxism with the reality of contemporary China and with the underlying features of our times, and it fully embodies the Marxist worldview on and methodology for development. This theory provides new scientific answers to the major questions of what kind of development China should achieve in a new environment and how the country should achieve it. It represents a new level of our understanding of the laws of socialism with Chinese characteristics and reaches a new realm in the development of Marxism in contemporary China. The Scientific Outlook on Development is the latest achievement in developing the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and it is the crystallization of the collective wisdom of the Communist Party of China and a powerful theoretical weapon for guiding all the work of the Party and country. Together with Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory and the important thought of Three Represents, the Scientific Outlook on Development is the theoretical guidance the Party must adhere to for a long time.
As we advance toward the future, thoroughly applying the Scientific Outlook on Development is of major immediate significance and far-reaching historical significance for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics. We must apply it throughout the course of modernization and to every aspect of Party building.
The whole Party must more purposefully make promoting economic and social development the top priority in applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. We must pursue economic development as the central task and concentrate on it with every determination. We should master the laws of development, develop new thinking on development and solve problems hindering development. We must implement the strategies for making China strong by developing science and education and training competent personnel and the strategy for pursuing sustainable development. We must step up efforts to create development models as well as institutions and mechanisms that facilitate development in a scientific way. We must continue to release and develop the productive forces and promote scientific, harmonious and peaceful development so as to lay a solid foundation for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics.
The whole Party must more purposefully take putting people first as the core requirement for thoroughly applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. We must always make realizing, safeguarding and developing the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the people the starting point and goal of all the work of the Party and country. We must respect the people’s creativity, protect their rights and interests, and make continued progress in enabling the people to share in the fruits of development and in promoting well-rounded development of the person.
The whole Party must more purposefully make pursuing comprehensive, balanced and sustainable development the basic requirement for applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. We must fully implement the overall plan for promoting economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological progress, ensure coordinated progress in all areas of endeavors in the modernization drive, balance the relations of production with the productive forces as well as the superstructure with the economic base, and continue to expand the path of development that leads to increased production, prosperity and a good ecosystem.
The whole Party must more purposefully take the holistic approach as the fundamental way of thoroughly applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. We must base ourselves on reality in everything we do, gain a full understanding of the major issues in the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics and handle them properly. We must take a holistic approach to our work relating to reform, development and stability, to domestic and foreign affairs as well as national defense, and to running the Party, the country and the military. We must coordinate urban and rural development, development between regions, economic and social development, relations between man and nature, and domestic development and opening to the outside world. We must balance the interests of all parties and keep them fully motivated so that all people do their best, find their proper places in society and live in harmony.
Freeing up the mind, seeking truth from facts, keeping up with the times and being realistic and pragmatic - these are the salient features of the Scientific Outlook on Development. There is no end to practice, to seeking truth, or to making theoretical innovations. The whole Party must boldly engage in practice and make changes and innovations. We must respond to the call of the times, follow the aspirations of the people and explore and master the laws of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We must ensure that the Party is always full of vigor and that China always has the driving force for development. By doing so, we will open up a bright future for developing socialism with Chinese characteristics through the creative practices of the Party and the people.
II. Achieving New Victory for Socialism with Chinese Characteristics
Looking back at China’s eventful modern history and looking to the promising future of the Chinese nation, we have drawn this definite conclusion: We must unswervingly follow the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics in order to complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, accelerate socialist modernization, and achieve the great renewal of the Chinese nation.
The issue of what path we take is of vital importance for the survival of the Party, the future of China, the destiny of the Chinese nation, and the wellbeing of the people. Exploring a path to national renewal in China that was economically and culturally backward is an extremely arduous task. Over the past 90-plus years, relying firmly on the people and adapting the basic tenets of Marxism to China’s conditions and the underlying trend of the times, our Party has pursued its own course independently. It has, enduring untold hardships and sufferings and paying various costs, achieved great success in revolution, development and reform, and created and developed socialism with Chinese characteristics, thus fundamentally changing the future and destiny of the Chinese people and nation.
The Party’s first generation of central collective leadership with Comrade Mao Zedong at the core led the whole Party and the people of all ethnic groups in China in completing the new-democratic revolution, carrying out socialist transformation and establishing the basic system of socialism, thereby accomplishing the most profound and the greatest social transformation in China’s history. This created the fundamental political prerequisite and systemic foundation for development and progress in contemporary China. In the course of socialist development, the Party developed distinctively creative theories and made tremendous successes despite serious setbacks it went through, thus providing invaluable experience as well as the theoretical and material basis for launching the great initiative of building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new historical period.
The Party’s second generation of central collective leadership with Comrade Deng Xiaoping at the core led the whole Party and the people of all ethnic groups in China in conducting a thorough review of China’s experiences in building socialism, both positive and negative. On this basis and drawing on the experience of world socialism, they made the historic decision to shift the focus of the Party and country’s work to economic development and to pursue the policy of reform and opening up. They gained a keen appreciation of the underlying goal of socialism and established the Party’s basic line for the primary stage of socialism. They called for taking our own road and building socialism with Chinese characteristics and provided scientific answers to basic questions in this regard. On this basis, the great initiative of building socialism with Chinese characteristics was successfully launched.
The Party’s third generation of central collective leadership with Comrade Jiang Zemin at the core led the whole Party and the people of all ethnic groups in China in adhering to the Party’s basic theory and line. Standing the severe tests posed by complex domestic and international developments and major setbacks in world socialism, they upheld socialism with Chinese characteristics. Based on China’s new realities, they reaffirmed the Party’s basic program and its basic experience, set the goal of reform and developed a basic framework for achieving this goal, namely, developing a socialist market economy. They reaffirmed the basic economic system and the system of income distribution in the primary stage of socialism, ushered in a new phase in carrying out all-around reform and opening up, and pressed ahead with the great new undertaking of Party building, thus advancing socialism with Chinese characteristics into the 21st century.
In the new stage in the new century, the Party Central Committee has seized this important period of strategic opportunities and promoted innovation in practice, theory and institutional building in the course of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. We have emphasized the need to put people first and to pursue comprehensive, balanced and sustainable development; we have called for building a harmonious socialist society and speeding up ecological progress, and we have adopted overall implementing steps for advancing the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We have strived to ensure and improve the people’s wellbeing, promoted social fairness and justice, worked to build a harmonious world, and strengthened the Party’s governance capacity and advanced nature. We have thus upheld and developed socialism with Chinese characteristics from a new historical starting point.
Throughout the past 30-plus years of continuous exploration for reform and opening up, we have held high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics and rejected both the old and rigid closed-door policy and any attempt to abandon socialism and take an erroneous path. The path of socialism with Chinese characteristics, the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the socialist system with Chinese characteristics are the fundamental accomplishments made by the Party and people in the course of arduous struggle over the past 90-plus years. We must cherish these accomplishments, uphold them all the time and continue to enrich them.
Taking the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics means we must, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and basing ourselves on China’s realities, take economic development as the central task and adhere to the Four Cardinal Principles and the policy of reform and opening up. It means we must release and develop the productive forces, develop the socialist market economy, socialist democracy, an advanced socialist culture and a harmonious socialist society, and promote socialist ecological progress. It also means we must promote well-rounded development of the person, achieve prosperity for all over time, and make China a modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious. The system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics is a system of scientific theories that includes Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important thought of Three Represents and the Scientific Outlook on Development, and this system represents the Party’s adherence to and development of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought. The socialist system with Chinese characteristics includes the following: the fundamental political system - the system of people’s congresses; the basic political systems - the system of multiparty cooperation and political consultation under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, the system of regional ethnic autonomy, and the system of community-level self-governance; the socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics; the basic economic system in which public ownership is the mainstay and economic entities of diverse ownership develop together; and the specific economic, political, cultural, and social institutions based on these systems. The path of socialism with Chinese characteristics is the way to reach the goal, the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics offers a guide to action, and the socialist system with Chinese characteristics provides the fundamental guarantee. The three function as an integral whole in the great practice of building socialism with Chinese characteristics, and this is the salient feature of the long-term endeavors of the Communist Party of China leading the people in building socialism.
In building socialism with Chinese characteristics, we base ourselves on the basic reality that China is in the primary stage of socialism. Our overall approach is to promote economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological progress, and our general task is to achieve socialist modernization and the great renewal of the Chinese nation. Socialism with Chinese characteristics both upholds the basic principles of scientific socialism and has distinctive Chinese features that reflect contemporary conditions. It offers from new perspectives a deeper understanding of the laws of governance by the Communist Party, laws of building socialism, and laws of the development of human society. By integrating theory with practice, it has systematically addressed the fundamental questions of what kind of socialism we should build and how we should build it in China, a big country in the East with a huge population and a weak economy to start with. Socialism with Chinese characteristics has brought about fast development and rising living standards in China. This fully shows that socialism with Chinese characteristics is what we must pursue if we are to achieve development and make progress in contemporary China and that only socialism with Chinese characteristics can enable China to develop itself.
Developing socialism with Chinese characteristics is a long-term arduous task of historic importance, and we must be prepared to carry out a great struggle with many new historical features. We must unswervingly adhere to socialism with Chinese characteristics, develop it as required by the times, constantly enrich it in both practice and theory and enhance its distinctive national features in keeping up with the times.
To achieve new victory for socialism with Chinese characteristics under new historical conditions, we must have a firm grasp of the following basic requirements and make them shared convictions of the whole Party and the people of all ethnic groups in China.
– We must maintain the people’s principal position in the country. Socialism with Chinese characteristics is a cause for the people in their hundreds of millions. We should ensure that the people are the masters of the country and we should uphold the rule of law as a fundamental principle by which the Party leads the people in running the country. We should mobilize and organize as many people as possible to manage state and social affairs as well as the economy and cultural programs in accordance with the law and to devote themselves to socialist modernization, and we should better protect the people’s rights and interests and ensure that the people determine their own destiny.
– We must continue to release and develop the productive forces. This is the fundamental task of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should take economic development as the central task and pursuing development in a scientific way as the underlying guideline, advance in an all-around way economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological progress and achieve in a scientific way development that puts people first and is comprehensive, balanced and sustainable.
– We must persevere in reform and opening up. Reform and opening up are crucial to adhering to and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should always apply the spirit of reform and innovation to all aspects of governance, keep improving the socialist market economy, adhere to the basic state policy of opening to the outside world, continue to make innovations in theory, in institutions, in science and technology, in culture and in other fields, and continuously promote the self-improvement and self-development of China’s socialist system.
– We must safeguard social fairness and justice. Fairness and justice are inherent requirements of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We must, relying on the concerted efforts of all the Chinese people and based on economic and social development, step up efforts to develop institutions that are vital to ensuring social fairness and justice; establish in due course a system for guaranteeing fairness in society featuring, among other things, equal rights, equal opportunities and fair rules for all; and foster a fair social environment and ensure people’s equal right to participation in governance and to development.
– We must strive for common prosperity. This is the fundamental principle of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should adhere to the basic socialist economic system and the socialist income distribution system. We should adjust the pattern of national income distribution, tighten its regulation by secondary distribution and work hard to narrow income gaps so that all the people can share in more fruits of development in a fair way and move steadily toward common prosperity.
– We must promote social harmony. Social harmony is an inherent attribute of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should give higher priority to ensuring and improving the people’s wellbeing, strengthen and conduct social management in an innovative way, strike a balance between reform, development and stability, rally all the forces that can be rallied, maximize factors conducive to harmony and increase the creative vitality of society. We should ensure that the people live and work in contentment, society is stable and orderly, and the country enjoys enduring peace and stability.
– We must pursue peaceful development. Peaceful development is the sure choice of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should pursue development through opening up and cooperation to benefit all. We should develop ourselves by securing a peaceful international environment and uphold and promote world peace through our own development. We should expand common interests with all others and work to build a harmonious world of enduring peace and common prosperity.
– We must uphold the leadership of the Party. The Communist Party of China is the leadership core of the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should uphold the principle that the Party was founded for the public good and that it exercises state power for the people, enhance and improve the Party’s leadership and ensure that the Party plays its role as the leadership core in exercising overall leadership and coordinating the efforts of all. We should maintain the Party’s advanced nature and purity, strengthen its creativity, cohesiveness and capability and enhance its capacity to govern in a scientific and democratic way and in accordance with the law.
We must be soberly aware that China is still in the primary stage of socialism and will long remain so. This basic condition of China has not changed; nor has the principal problem in our society, that is, how we can meet the ever-growing material and cultural needs of the people with backward social production; nor has China’s international position as the largest developing country in the world. We must bear in mind under any circumstances the paramount reality that China remains in the primary stage of socialism and will long remain so and base ourselves on this reality in pursuing all of our endeavors of reform and development. The Party’s basic line is the lifeblood of the Party and country. We must adhere to the central task - economic development - and the two basic points - the Four Cardinal Principles and the policy of reform and opening up - in our great endeavor to develop socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should neither look down upon ourselves nor be arrogant. We must take solid steps to achieve new victory for socialism with Chinese characteristics.
As long as we remain true to our ideal, are firm in our conviction, never vacillate in or relax our efforts or act recklessly, and forge ahead with tenacity and resolve, we will surely complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects when the Communist Party of China celebrates its centenary and turn China into a modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious when the People’s Republic of China marks its centennial. The whole Party should have every confidence in our path, in our theories and in our system.
III. The Goal of Completing the Building of a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and Deepening Reform and Opening Up in an All-Around Way
An examination of both the current international and domestic environments shows that China remains in an important period of strategic opportunities for its development, a period in which much can be achieved. We need to have a correct understanding of the changing nature and conditions of this period, seize all opportunities, respond with cool-headedness to challenges, and gain initiative and advantages to win the future and attain the goal of completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects by 2020.
Basing ourselves on China’s actual economic and social development, we must work hard to meet the following new requirements while working to fulfill the goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects set forth at the Sixteenth and Seventeenth National Congresses of the Party.
– The economy should maintain sustained and sound development. Major progress should be made in changing the growth model. On the basis of making China’s development much more balanced, coordinated and sustainable, we should double its 2010 GDP and per capita income for both urban and rural residents. The contribution of scientific and technological progress to economic growth should increase considerably and China should become an innovative country. Industrialization should be basically accomplished. IT application should be significantly expanded. The quality of urbanization should improve markedly. Notable progress should be made in modernizing agriculture and building new socialist rural areas. The basic mechanism for promoting balanced development between regions should be in place. Opening up should be further improved and China’s international competitiveness should increase significantly.
– People’s democracy should be expanded. The institutions of democracy should be improved and its forms enriched. People’s enthusiasm, initiative and creativity should be fully leveraged. The rule of law should be fully implemented as a basic strategy, a law-based government should be basically in function, judicial credibility should be steadily enhanced, and human rights should be fully respected and protected.
– The country’s cultural soft power should be improved significantly. Core socialist values should take root among the people, and both the level of civility of citizens and the moral and ethical standards of the whole society should be significantly raised. More cultural works should be created; a system of public cultural services should be basically in place, and the cultural sector should become a pillar of the economy. Even greater progress should be made in taking Chinese culture to the global stage. By taking these steps, we will lay a more solid foundation for developing a strong socialist culture in China.
– Living standards should be fully raised. Equal access to basic public services should be generally achieved. The educational level of the entire population should be significantly raised and training of innovative professionals markedly improved. China should have a large pool of competent professionals and be rich in human resources, and it should basically modernize its education. There should be more employment opportunities. Income gaps should be narrowed, middle-income groups should keep growing, and the number of people living below the poverty line should drop by a large margin. Social security should cover all the people. Everyone should have access to basic medical and public health services. The system of housing for low-income groups should take shape, and there should be social harmony and stability.
– Major progress should be made in building a resource-conserving and environmentally friendly society. The establishment of functional zones should be basically completed, and a system for recycling resources should begin to take shape. Energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP as well as the discharge of major pollutants should decrease sharply. Forest coverage should increase, the ecosystem should become more stable, and the living environment should improve markedly.
To complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, we must, with greater political courage and vision, lose no time in deepening reform in key sectors and resolutely discard all notions and systems that hinder efforts to pursue development in a scientific way. We should set up a well-developed, scientific, procedure-based and effective framework of systems and ensure that operating institutions in all sectors are fully functioning. We should speed up improvements to the socialist market economy. We should improve the basic economic system in which public ownership is the mainstay of the economy and economic entities of diverse ownership develop together, and we should improve the system of income distribution in which distribution according to work is the main form that coexists with other forms of distribution. We should leverage to a greater extent and in a wider scope the basic role of the market in allocating resources, improve the system of macro-regulation, and perfect the open economy to ensure more efficient, equitable and sustainable economic development. We should work harder to enhance socialist democracy in a systemic way by adopting due standards and procedures, expand people’s orderly participation in governance at all levels and in all fields, and ensure that all governance functions are performed in accordance with the law. We should accelerate improvement of the system for managing the cultural sector and the mechanism for cultural production and operation, establish the basic framework of a modern cultural market system, improve the system for managing state-owned cultural assets, and foster a cultural environment that encourages creativity. We should step up efforts to form a scientific and effective social management system, improve the social security system, and strengthen networks of community-level public services and social management. We should establish institutions and mechanisms to ensure that society is full of vigor, harmonious and orderly. We should move faster to set up a system for ecological progress, improve institutions and mechanisms for developing geographical space, conserving resources and protecting the ecological environment and promote modernization featuring harmonious development between man and nature.
Completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects by 2020 is an arduous task, and all the comrades in the Party must work single-mindedly and with fortitude to reach this goal. The state should give more support to rural areas and the central and western regions to accelerate their reform and opening up, strengthen their capacity for development and raise their living standards. We should encourage areas with good conditions to keep taking the lead in pursuing modernization and to make greater contribution to nationwide reform and development.
IV. Accelerating the Improvement of the Socialist Market Economy and the Change of the Growth Model
Taking economic development as the central task is vital to national renewal, and development still holds the key to addressing all the problems we have in China. Only by promoting sustained and sound economic development can we lay a solid material foundation for enhancing the country’s prosperity and strength, improving the people’s wellbeing and ensuring social harmony and stability. We must unwaveringly adhere to the strategic thinking that only development counts.
In contemporary China, pursuing development in a scientific way best embodies the thinking that only development counts. Taking the pursuit of development in a scientific way as the underlying guideline and accelerating the change of the growth model as a major task is a strategic choice we have made for promoting China’s overall development. In response to changes in both domestic and international economic developments, we should speed up the creation of a new growth model and ensure that development is based on improved quality and performance. We should fire all types of market participants with new vigor for development, increase motivation for pursuing innovation-driven development, establish a new system for developing modern industries, and create new favorable conditions for developing the open economy. This will make economic development driven more by domestic demand, especially consumer demand, by a modern service industry and strategic emerging industries, by scientific and technological progress, by a workforce of higher quality and innovation in management, by resource conservation and a circular economy, and by coordinated and mutually reinforcing urban-rural development and development between regions. Taking these steps will enable us to sustain long-term development.
We should keep to the Chinese-style path of carrying out industrialization in a new way and advancing IT application, urbanization and agricultural modernization. We should promote integration of IT application and industrialization, interaction between industrialization and urbanization, and coordination between urbanization and agricultural modernization, thus promoting harmonized development of industrialization, IT application, urbanization and agricultural modernization.
1. Deepen economic structural reform across the board
Deepening reform is crucial for accelerating the change of the growth model. The underlying issue we face in economic structural reform is how to strike a balance between the role of the government and that of the market, and we should follow more closely the rules of the market and better play the role of the government. We should unwaveringly consolidate and develop the public sector of the economy; allow public ownership to take diverse forms; deepen reform of state-owned enterprises; improve the mechanisms for managing all types of state assets; and invest more of state capital in major industries and key fields that comprise the lifeline of the economy and are vital to national security. We should thus steadily enhance the vitality of the state-owned sector of the economy and its capacity to leverage and influence the economy. At the same time, we must unswervingly encourage, support and guide the development of the non-public sector, and ensure that economic entities under all forms of ownership have equal access to factors of production in accordance with the law, compete on a level playing field and are protected by the law as equals. We should improve the modern market system and strengthen institutional procedures for setting macro-regulation targets and employing policy tools. We should accelerate the reform of the fiscal and taxation systems and ensure that the central and local governments have sufficient financial resources to exercise their respective powers and fulfill their respective responsibilities. We should improve the public finance system to ensure equal access to basic public services and promote the building of functional zones. We should also institute local tax systems and improve the structure of the taxation system to promote social fairness. We should establish a mechanism for equitable sharing of proceeds from public resource transfers. We should deepen reform of the financial system and improve the modern financial system so that it will better contribute to macroeconomic stability and support development of the real economy. We should accelerate development of a multilevel capital market, take steady steps to make interest rates and the RMB exchange rate more market-based, and promote the RMB’s convertibility under capital accounts in due course. We should speed up the development of private financial institutions. We should improve financial supervision and oversight, promote financial innovations, improve the competitiveness of banking, securities, insurance and other sectors, and ensure financial stability.
2. Implement the strategy of innovation-driven development
Scientific and technological innovation provides strategic support for raising the productive forces and boosting the overall national strength, and we must give it top priority in overall national development. We should follow a path of making innovation with Chinese features and take steps to promote innovation to catch up with global advances. We should increase our capacity for making original innovation and integrated innovation and for making further innovation on the basis of absorbing advances in overseas science and technology, and place greater emphasis on making innovation through collaboration. We should deepen reform of the system for managing science and technology, promote close integration of science and technology with economic development, and speed up the development of the national innovation system. We should establish a system of technological innovation in which enterprises play the leading role, the market points the way, and enterprises, universities and research institutes work together. We should improve the knowledge-based innovation system, and strengthen basic research, research in frontier technologies, and public benefit-oriented research and development; and we should improve research and our capacity for applying research results to production to ensure that we can obtain the leading strategic position in research and development. We should launch important national science and technology projects to remove major technological bottlenecks. We should speed up the research, development and application of new technologies, products and production processes, strengthen innovation in integration of technologies and develop new business models. We should improve standards for evaluating scientific and technological innovations and mechanisms for rewarding such innovations and applying them to production. We should implement the strategy concerning intellectual property rights and strengthen their protection. We should efficiently allocate and fully integrate innovation resources, and ensure that the wisdom and strength of the whole society are directed toward promoting innovation-driven development.
3. Carry out strategic adjustment of the economic structure
This is the major goal of accelerating the change of the growth model. We must strive to remove major structural barriers to sustained and sound economic development, with a focus on improving the demand mix and the industrial structure, promoting balanced development between regions and advancing urbanization. We should firmly maintain the strategic focus of boosting domestic demand, speed up the establishment of a long-term mechanism for increasing consumer demand, unleash the potential of individual consumption, increase investment at a proper pace, and expand the domestic market. We should focus on developing the real economy as a firm foundation of the economy. We should adopt policies and measures to better facilitate the development of the real economy. We should make the economy more demand-driven, promote the sound growth of strategic emerging industries and advanced manufacturing industries, speed up the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, develop and expand the service sector, especially modern service industries, and make the geographical and structural layout of the development of infrastructure and basic industries more balanced. We should develop next-generation information infrastructure and modern IT industry, better ensure information security, and promote the application of information network technologies. We should enhance the core competitiveness of large and medium-sized enterprises and support development of small and micro businesses, especially small and micro science and technology companies. We should continue to implement the master strategy for regional development and fully leverage the comparative advantages of different regions. We should give high priority to large-scale development of the western region, fully revitalize old industrial bases in northeast China, work vigorously to promote the rise of the central region, and support the eastern region in taking the lead in development. We should increase support for old revolutionary base areas, ethnic minority areas, border areas and poor areas through pairing assistance and other means. We should make scientific plans for the scale and layout of urban agglomerations; and we should make small and medium-sized cities and small towns better able to develop industries, provide public services, create jobs, and attract population. We should accelerate reform of the household registration system, conduct registration of rural migrant workers as permanent urban residents in an orderly way, and endeavor to ensure that all permanent urban residents have access to basic urban public services.
4. Integrate urban and rural development
Resolving issues relating to agriculture, rural areas and farmers is the number one priority in the Party’s work, and integrating urban and rural development provides the fundamental solution to these issues. We should better balance urban and rural development, boost rural development, work to narrow the gap between urban and rural areas, and promote their common prosperity. We should continue to encourage industry to support agriculture in return for agriculture’s earlier contribution to its development and encourage cities to support rural areas. We should give more to farmers, take less from them and lift restrictions over their economic activities. We should increase policy support to boost agriculture, benefit farmers and increase rural prosperity, and encourage the rural population to participate in modernization on an equal footing and share in its fruits. We should speed up the development of modern agriculture, raise the overall production capacity of agriculture, and ensure food security and effective supply of major agricultural products in China. We should give high priority to rural areas in developing infrastructure and social programs in the country. We should work harder to build new rural areas, carry out programs of poverty alleviation through development and fully improve rural working and living conditions. We should ensure sustained and fast growth of rural income. We should uphold and improve the basic system for rural operations and protect in accordance with the law farmers’ rights to farm the land they have contracted, to use the land on which their houses sit, and to share in the proceeds from rural collective operations. We should strengthen the collective economy, develop specialized cooperatives and joint stock partnerships for farmers, foster new types of agricultural business entities, and develop large-scale agricultural operations in diverse forms. We should establish a new type of system for intensive agricultural operations that are specialized, well organized and commercialized. We should reform the land expropriation system and increase the share of gain in land value to farmers. We should speed up improvements to institutions and mechanisms for promoting integrated urban and rural development, with a focus on integrating urban and rural planning, infrastructure and public services. We should ensure equal exchange of factors of production between urban and rural areas and balance allocation of public resources between them. What we aim to achieve is a new type of relations between industry and agriculture and between urban and rural areas in which industry promotes agriculture, urban areas support rural development, agriculture and industry benefit each other, and there is integrated urban and rural development.
5. Promote all-around improvements to China’s open economy
In response to new developments in economic globalization, we must implement a more proactive opening up strategy and improve the open economy so that it promotes mutual benefit and is diversified, balanced, secure and efficient. We should move faster to change the way the external-oriented economy grows, and make China’s open economy become better structured, expand in scope and yield greater returns. We should make innovations in the mode of opening up; encourage coastal, inland and border areas to draw on each other’s strengths in opening up; develop open areas that take the lead in global economic cooperation and competition; and form leading areas of opening up that drive regional development. We should continue to attach equal importance to export and import, better coordinate trade and industrial policies, and make China’s exports more competitive in terms of technology, brand, quality and service. We should transform and upgrade processing trade, develop service trade, and promote balanced development of foreign trade. We should make full use of our overall advantageous position in utilizing foreign capital and make better use of such investment. We should step up efforts to attract investment, technology and high-caliber professionals from overseas. Chinese companies should expand overseas presence at a faster pace, enhance their operation in an international environment, and develop a number of world-class multinational corporations. We should make overall planning for bilateral, multilateral, regional and sub-regional opening up and cooperation, accelerate implementation of the strategy of building free trade areas, and promote infrastructure connectivity with our neighboring countries. We should become better able to defuse international economic risks.
We must have firm confidence in winning the tough battle of deepening reform of the economic structure across the board and of accelerating the change of the growth model so as to increase the vitality and competitiveness of China’s economy.
V. Keeping to the Socialist Path of Making Political Advance with Chinese Characteristics and Promoting Reform of the Political Structure
People’s democracy is a brilliant banner that has always been held high by our Party. Since the policy of reform and opening up was introduced, we have reviewed our experience, both positive and negative, in developing socialist democracy and reaffirmed that people’s democracy is the life of socialism. We have ensured that all power of the state belongs to the people and worked to steadily promote reform of the political structure. As a result, we have made major progress in developing socialist democracy and opened up and kept to the socialist path of making political advance with Chinese characteristics, thus charting the correct course for achieving the most extensive possible people’s democracy in China.
The reform of the political structure is an important part of China’s overall reform. We must continue to make both active and prudent efforts to carry out the reform of the political structure, and make people’s democracy more extensive, fuller in scope and sounder in practice. We must ensure the unity of the leadership of the Party, the position of the people as masters of the country and law-based governance. To guarantee the fundamental position of the people as masters of the country and to reach the goal of enhancing the vitality of the Party and country and keeping the people fully motivated, we should expand socialist democracy, accelerate the building of a socialist country based on the rule of law, and promote socialist political progress. We should place greater emphasis on improving the way the Party exercises leadership and governance to ensure that it leads the people in effectively governing the country. We should attach greater importance to improving the system of democracy and diversifying the forms of democracy to ensure that the people conduct democratic elections, decision-making, administration and oversight in accordance with the law. We should give greater scope to the important role the rule of law plays in the country’s governance and in social management, uphold the unity, sanctity and authority of the country’s legal system and ensure that the people enjoy extensive rights and freedoms as prescribed by law. We should place high importance on systemic building, give full play to the strength of the socialist political system and draw on the political achievements of other societies. However, we will never copy a Western political system.
1. Support and ensure the exercise of state power by the people through people’s congresses
The system of people’s congresses is China’s fundamental political system for guaranteeing that the people decide their own destiny. We should make good use of legal procedures to turn the Party’s propositions into the will of the state. We should support people’s congresses and their standing committees in fully playing their role as organs of state power, in exercising legislative, oversight, policymaking, and personnel appointment and dismissal powers in accordance with the law, in strengthening organization and coordination of legislative work, in stepping up their oversight of people’s governments, courts and procuratorates, and in tightening examination and oversight of all government budgets and final accounts. The proportion of community-level deputies to people’s congresses, particularly those elected from among workers, farmers and intellectuals on the frontlines of various fields of endeavor should be raised, while that of deputies from among leading Party and government officials should be reduced. Deputy liaison offices should be established in people’s congresses to improve the mechanism for deputies to maintain contact with the people. The organizational system for organs of state power should be improved. The age mix of the members of the standing committees and special committees of people’s congresses should be improved and the areas of their expertise should be widened. The proportion of the full-time members of these committees should be raised. Deputies to people’s congresses and members of these committees should enhance their capability to perform their duties pursuant to law.
2. Improve the system of socialist consultative democracy
Socialist consultative democracy is an important form of people’s democracy in our country. We should improve its institutions and work mechanisms and promote its extensive, multilevel, and institutionalized development. Extensive consultations should be carried out on major issues relating to economic and social development as well as specific problems involving the people’s immediate interests through organs of state power, committees of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, political parties, people’s organizations and other channels to solicit a wide range of opinions, pool wisdom of the people, increase consensus, and build up synergy. We should adhere to and improve the system of multiparty cooperation and political consultation under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and make the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference serve as a major channel for conducting consultative democracy. The Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference should, focusing on the themes of unity and democracy, improve systems of political consultation, democratic oversight, and participation in the deliberation and administration of state affairs, and deliver a better job in coordinating relations, pooling strength and making proposals in the overall interests of the country. We should strengthen political consultation with the democratic parties, make political consultation a part of the policymaking process, conduct consultations before and when policy decisions are made, and make democratic consultation more effective. We should conduct intensive consultations on special issues with those who work on these issues, with representatives from all sectors of society, and with relevant government authorities on the handling of proposals. We should actively carry out democratic consultation at the community level.
3. Improve community-level democracy
An important way for the people to directly exercise their democratic rights in accordance with the law is for them to conduct self-management, self-service, self-education, and self-oversight in exercising urban and rural community governance, in managing community-level public affairs and in running public service programs. We should improve the mechanism for community-level self-governance under the leadership of community-level Party organizations to make it full of vitality. We should broaden the scope and channels of such self-governance and enrich its content and forms, with the focus on expanding orderly participation, promoting transparency in information, improving deliberation and consultation on public affairs, and strengthening oversight of the exercise of power, to ensure that the people have greater and more tangible democratic rights. We should rely wholeheartedly on the working class, improve the democratic management system in enterprises and public institutions with workers and employees’ congress as its basic form, and protect workers and employees’ democratic rights to participate in management and oversight. Community-level organizations of various types should also get involved to integrate government administration and community-level democracy.
4. Promote law-based governance of the country in an all-around way
The rule of law is the basic way for running the country. We should make laws in a scientific way, enforce them strictly, administer justice impartially, and ensure that everyone abides by the law. We must make sure that all are equal before the law and that laws are observed and strictly enforced and lawbreakers are prosecuted. We should improve the socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics, strengthen legislation in key areas, and expand channels for people’s orderly participation in the legislative process. We should exercise government administration in accordance with the law and ensure that law enforcement is conducted in a strict, fair, and civilized way according to due procedures. We should continue to deepen reform of the judicial structure, uphold and improve the socialist judicial system with Chinese characteristics, and ensure that judicial and procuratorial bodies independently and impartially exercise their respective powers pursuant to law. We should carry out intensive publicity and education about the law, foster socialist spirit of the rule of law, and adopt the socialist concept of law-based governance. We should enhance the whole society’s awareness of the need to study, respect, observe, and apply the law. We should ensure that leading officials are guided by law in both thinking and action in their effort to deepen reform, promote development, solve problems, and maintain stability. As the Constitution and laws are adopted by the Party and the people under its leadership, the Party must act within the scope prescribed by the Constitution and laws. No organization or individual has the privilege of overstepping the Constitution and laws, and no one in a position of power is allowed in any way to take one’s own words as the law, place one’s own authority above the law or abuse the law.
5. Deepen reform of the administrative system
Reform of the administrative system is a necessary requirement for making the superstructure compatible with the economic base. To reach the goal of establishing a socialist administrative system with Chinese characteristics, we should separate government administration from the management of enterprises, state assets, public institutions, and social organizations, and build a well-structured, clean and efficient service-oriented government that has scientifically defined functions and satisfies the people. We should deepen the reform of the system concerning matters subject to government examination and approval, continue to streamline administration and delegate more power to lower levels, and make the government better perform its functions of creating a favorable environment for development, providing quality public services, and maintaining social fairness and justice. We should steadily advance the reform to establish larger government departments and improve division of functions among them. We should improve the structure of administrative setup and geographical administrative divisions, experiment with the reform to place counties and county-level cities directly under the jurisdiction of provincial governments where conditions permit, and deepen reform of the administrative system at the town and township level. We should exercise government administration in an innovative way, increase public trust in the government, and improve its competence so as to make the government performance-oriented. We should strictly control the size of government bodies, cut the numbers of their leading officials, and reduce their administrative costs. We should continue the reform of public institutions based on the classification of their functions. We should improve the mechanism for coordinating structural reforms and conduct major reforms in a holistic way according to the overall plan.
6. Improve the mechanism for conducting checks and oversight over the exercise of power
To ensure proper exercise of power, it is important to put power, Party and government operations and personnel management under institutional checks and uphold people’s right to stay informed about, participate in, express views on, and oversee Party and government operations. We should make sure that decision-making, executive and oversight powers check each other and function in concert and that government bodies exercise their powers in accordance with statutory mandate and procedures. We should continue to conduct scientific, democratic, and law-based policymaking, improve decision-making mechanisms and procedures, seek advice of think tanks, and establish sound mechanisms for decision-making accountability and remedy. Whenever we make a decision involving the immediate interests of the people, we must solicit their views on it. We must not do anything that may harm the interests of the people and must correct any action that causes damage to their interests. We should make the exercise of power more open and standardized, and increase transparency of Party, government and judicial operations and official operations in other fields. We should improve the systems of inquiry, accountability, economic responsibility auditing, resignation and dismissal. We should tighten intra-Party, democratic and legal oversight as well as oversight through public opinion to ensure that the people oversee the exercise of power and that power is exercised in a transparent manner.
7. Consolidate and develop the broadest possible patriotic united front
The united front is a powerful instrument for winning new victory for socialism with Chinese characteristics by pooling the strength of all quarters and harmonizing relations between political parties, ethnic groups, religions, social groups and compatriots at home and overseas. We should hold high the banner of patriotism and socialism, consolidate the theoretical and political foundation of the united front, and strike a balance between commonality and diversity. Guided by the principle of long-term coexistence, mutual oversight, treating each other with sincerity and sharing of both good and bad times, we should strengthen unity and cooperation with the democratic parties and public figures without party affiliation, pursue the common goal with unity in thought and action, strengthen the ranks of non-Party representative figures and select and recommend more outstanding individuals with no Party affiliation for taking up leading positions in government bodies at all levels. We should fully and faithfully implement the Party’s policies concerning ethnic groups and uphold and improve the system of regional ethnic autonomy. We should, keeping to the goal of all ethnic groups working together for common prosperity and development, conduct intensive education about ethnic unity and progress, speed up development of ethnic minority areas, and protect the legitimate rights and interests of ethnic minorities. We should consolidate and develop socialist ethnic relations of equality, unity, mutual assistance and harmony so that all ethnic groups in China will live and develop together in harmony. We should comprehensively implement the Party’s basic policy on religion and fully leverage the positive role of religious figures and believers in promoting economic and social development. We should encourage and guide members of new social groups to contribute more to the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should continue to implement the Party’s policy on overseas Chinese affairs and support overseas Chinese, returned overseas Chinese and their families in endorsing and participating in China’s modernization endeavors and its great cause of peaceful reunification.
The socialist path of making political advance with Chinese characteristics is a correct path that rallies people in their hundreds of millions in pursuing a common cause. We must advance unwaveringly along this path to ensure that China’s socialist democracy has ever greater vitality.
VI. Developing a Strong Socialist Culture in China
Culture is the lifeblood of a nation, and it gives the people a sense of belonging. To complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects and achieve the great renewal of the Chinese nation, we must create a new surge in promoting socialist culture and bring about its great development and enrichment, increase China’s cultural soft power, and enable culture to guide social trends, educate the people, serve society, and boost development.
To develop a strong socialist culture in China, we must take the socialist path of promoting cultural advance with Chinese characteristics. We should adhere to the goal of serving the people and socialism, the policy of having a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend, and the principle of maintaining close contact with reality, life and the people. We should fully promote socialist cultural and ethical progress and material progress, and develop a national, scientific, and people-oriented socialist culture that embraces modernization, the world, and the future.
To develop a strong socialist culture in China, it is critical to inspire the cultural creativity of the whole nation. We should deepen reform of the cultural sector, release and develop cultural productive forces, foster a democratic atmosphere in both academic research and artistic pursuit, create a vast cultural arena for the people and encourage the free flow of cultural inspiration from all sources. By doing so, we will open up a new horizon in promoting China’s cultural advance: The Chinese nation’s cultural creativity will continuously burst forth; China’s cultural life will flourish as never before; people’s basic cultural rights and interests will be better protected; the ethical and moral standards as well as the scientific and cultural standards of the people will be fully raised, and the international influence of Chinese culture will steadily increase.
1. Strengthen core socialist values
Core socialist values are the soul of the Chinese nation and serve as the guide for building socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should carry out thorough study of and education in these values and use them to guide social trends of thought and forge public consensus. We should continue to adapt Marxism to China’s conditions in keeping up with the times and increase its appeal to the people, work hard to equip the whole Party with the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics and educate the people in these theories. We should further implement the national project to study and develop Marxist theory, build an innovation system in philosophy and the social sciences, incorporate the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics into the curriculum and make it a way of thinking. We should carry out extensive education about our ideal and conviction, and rally the people under the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should vigorously foster China’s national character and promote the underlying trend of the times, intensify education in patriotism, collectivism and socialism, and enrich people’s cultural life and enhance their moral strength. We should promote prosperity, democracy, civility, and harmony, uphold freedom, equality, justice and the rule of law and advocate patriotism, dedication, integrity, and friendship, so as to cultivate and observe core socialist values. We should maintain leadership and initiative in theoretical work, provide correct guidance, enhance our ability to guide public opinion, and strengthen the influence of the underlying trend of thought in our country.
2. Improve civic morality in an all-around way
This is the basic task for strengthening socialist morals. We should integrate the rule of law with the rule of virtue, intensify education in public morality, professional ethics, family virtues, and individual integrity, and advocate traditional Chinese virtues and new trends of the times. We should press ahead with the program for improving civic morality, exalt the true, the good, and the beautiful and reject the false, the evil, and the ugly. We should encourage people to willingly meet their statutory duties and obligations to society and family. We should create a social atmosphere in which work is honored and creation is lauded, and cultivate social trends of recognizing honor and disgrace, practicing integrity, encouraging dedication, and promoting harmony. We should carry out thorough education to address serious ethical problems, and step up efforts to enhance government integrity, business and social ethics and judicial integrity. We should strengthen and improve education in values, provide compassionate care and psychological counseling, and cultivate self-respect, self-confidence, a sense of being rational, composure, and a desire to excel oneself among the people. We should conduct more public activities to promote cultural and ethical progress, encourage volunteer service, and carry out regular activities to learn from paragons of virtue such as Lei Feng and publicize their exemplary deeds.
3. Enrich people’s intellectual and cultural lives
Enabling the people to lead healthy and rich intellectual and cultural lives is an important part of our efforts to complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects. We should pursue people-centered cultural creation, and create better cultural products to provide the people with more and better nourishments for the mind. We should be community- and people-focused in our cultural work, carry out at a faster pace key cultural projects that benefit the people, increase support for promoting cultural progress in rural areas and underdeveloped areas and open more public cultural service facilities to the public free of charge. We should develop a system for carrying forward fine traditional culture and promote outstanding traditional Chinese culture. We should extend and standardize the use of the standard Chinese language. We should promote the development and flourishing of cultural activities of ethnic minorities. We should carry out public cultural activities and guide the people to express, educate, and serve themselves in the course of developing culture. We should launch reading programs for the general public. We should improve the contents of online services and advocate healthy themes on the Internet. We should strengthen social management of the Internet and promote orderly network operation in accordance with laws and regulations. We should crack down on pornography and illegal publications and resist vulgar trends. We should extend scientific knowledge, foster respect for science, and make the whole nation better educated in science. We should carry out fitness activities across the country and fully promote both recreational and competitive sports.
4. Enhance the overall strength and international competitiveness of Chinese culture
The strength and international competitiveness of Chinese culture are an important indicator of China’s power and prosperity and the renewal of the Chinese nation. We should promote rapid development and all-around flourishing of the cultural industry and cultural services and ensure both social effect and economic benefits, with priority on the former. We should develop philosophy and the social sciences, the press and publishing, radio, television and films, and literature and art. We should launch more major public cultural projects and programs, improve the public cultural service system, and make such services more efficient. We should promote integration of culture with science and technology, develop new forms of cultural operations, and make cultural operations larger in size and more specialized. We should develop a modern communications network to improve our capacity for communications. We should invigorate state-owned non-profit cultural institutions, improve corporate governance of profit-oriented cultural entities, and create a thriving cultural market. We should open the cultural sector wider to the outside world and draw on cultural achievements of other countries. We should foster a fine environment that enables a large number of talented cultural figures, particularly eminent cultural figures and representatives of Chinese culture, to distinguish themselves in artistic pursuit. We should honor cultural personalities with outstanding contribution.
We must adhere to the goal of advancing socialist culture, deepen our awareness of and confidence in Chinese culture, and strive to meet the grand goal of developing a strong socialist culture in China.
VII. Strengthening Social Development by Improving the People’s Wellbeing and Making Innovations in Management
Strengthening social development is an important guarantee for maintaining social harmony and stability. We must intensify our efforts to improve the basic public service system, strengthen and make innovations in social management, and boost the building of a harmonious socialist society in order to uphold the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the people.
In strengthening social development, we must give high priority to ensuring and improving the people’s wellbeing. To improve people’s material and cultural lives is the fundamental purpose of reform and opening up and socialist modernization. We should bring as much benefit as possible to the people, resolve as many difficulties as possible for them, and solve the most pressing and real problems of the greatest concern to them. We should keep making progress in ensuring that all the people enjoy their rights to education, employment, medical and old-age care, and housing so that they will lead a better life.
To strengthen social development, we must accelerate social structural reform. With the aim of establishing a socialist system of social management with Chinese characteristics, we should quicken the pace of building the following mechanisms and systems: a law-based social management system featuring Party committee leadership, government execution, nongovernmental support and public participation; a basic public service system that is government-led and sustainable and covers both urban and rural areas; a system of modern social organizations in which functions of the government are separated from those of social organizations, rights and responsibilities are clearly established, and social organizations exercise autonomy in accordance with the law; and a social management mechanism that resolves public complaints at the source, exercises dynamic administration, and responds to emergencies.
1. Work hard to run education to the satisfaction of the people
Education is the cornerstone of national renewal and social progress. We must give high priority to developing education, implement the Party’s education policy to the letter, ensure that education serves socialist modernization and the people, take fostering integrity and promoting rounded development of people as the fundamental task of education, and train participants of and successors to the socialist cause who develop morally, intellectually, physically and aesthetically. We should provide well-rounded education for all students, deepen overall education reform, focus on improving the quality of education, and cultivate in students a sense of social responsibility, a spirit of innovation and the ability to acquire practical skills. We should develop preschool education, promote balanced development of nine-year compulsory education, make senior secondary education basically universal, accelerate development of modern vocational education, and bring out the full potential for development of higher education. We should actively develop continuing education, improve the system of lifelong education, and build a learning society. We should vigorously promote fairness in education, and ensure balanced allocation of educational resources with a focus on rural, remote, poor and ethnic minority areas. We should support special education, increase subsidies to students from poor families, and ensure that children of rural migrant workers in cities have equal access to education. All this is designed to help all children gain required knowledge and skills. We should encourage and guide nongovernmental entities to run educational programs. We should strengthen the ranks of teachers, and enhance their work ethics and professional competence as well as their sense of honor and responsibility as teachers.
2. Deliver a better job in creating employment
Employment is crucial to the people’s wellbeing. We must implement the principle of promoting self-reliant employment, market-regulated employment and government-backed employment and entrepreneurship, the strategy of giving top priority to employment and a proactive employment policy. We should ensure that people have realistic expectations about employment, encourage creating employment through multiple channels and forms, and expand job opportunities by creating new businesses. We should increase job opportunities for young people, especially university graduates, the rural migrant labor force, urban residents who have difficulty finding jobs, and ex-servicepersons. We should strengthen vocational skill training; improve people’s ability to find jobs and start up their own businesses; and enhance employment stability. We should improve the human resources market and employment services, and make unemployment insurance play a bigger role in promoting employment. We should improve the system of labor standards and the mechanism for harmonizing labor relations, strengthen supervision of labor protection and labor dispute mediation and arbitration, and build harmonious labor relations.
3. Make every effort to increase individual income
To ensure that the people share in the fruits of development, we must deepen reform of the income distribution system, and increase individual income in step with economic development and work remuneration in step with improvement in labor productivity, and we should raise the share of individual income in the distribution of national income and increase the share of work remuneration in primary distribution. A proper balance should be struck between efficiency and fairness in both primary and secondary distribution, with particular emphasis on fairness in secondary distribution. We should improve the primary distribution system to allow factors of production such as labor, capital, technology and managerial expertise to have their due share of income according to their respective contribution; and we should take speedy steps to improve the mechanism of secondary distribution regulating income distribution mainly through taxation, social security, and transfer payments. We should deepen reform of the wage and salary system in enterprises, government bodies and public institutions, promote collective bargaining on wages in enterprises, and protect income earned through work. We should increase proprietary individual income through multiple channels. We should improve the way in which income is distributed, protect lawful income, increase the income of low-income groups, adjust excessively high income, and prohibit illicit income.
4. Promote coordinated development of the social security system in urban and rural areas
Social security is a basic system for ensuring people’s livelihood and adjusting social distribution. We should institute a complete, multi-tiered and sustainable system for providing basic social security for both the urban and rural population, with emphasis on making the system more equitable and sustainable and ensuring the smooth transfer of social security accounts between localities. We should reform and improve the social insurance system for enterprises as well as government bodies and public institutions, integrate the basic old-age insurance and basic medical insurance systems for non-working urban residents and the rural population, provide sufficient funding for personal accounts for old-age insurance in a phased way, place basic pensions under unified national planning, and establish mechanisms for setting standards on social security benefits and regularly adjusting them that give due consideration to the interests of people from all walks of life. We should widen channels for raising money for social security funds, introduce a system to manage investment operations of social insurance funds, and ensure that these funds are safe and appreciate over time. We should improve the social assistance system and the social welfare system, support the development of charities, and ensure preferential treatment to entitled groups. We should put in place a housing system that combines market supply and government support, strengthen construction and management of low-income housing, and better meet poor families’ basic housing needs. We should adhere to the basic state policy of gender equality and protect the legitimate rights and interests of women and children. We should actively address population aging and vigorously develop old-age services. We should improve the social security and service systems for the disabled and effectively protect their rights and interests. We should improve the mechanism for supervising the work of social security agencies and make social security services more convenient and efficient.
5. Improve people’s health
Good health is a prerequisite for promoting well-rounded development of the person. Keeping to the goal of improving people’s health, we should put disease prevention first, make rural areas the focus of our work, support both traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine, establish a sound mechanism for basic medical and health care and strengthen such endeavor at the community level. We should give high priority to carrying out overall reform in medical insurance, medical treatment, public health, drug supply, and the mechanism of monitoring and supervision, and we should improve the policy for enhancing people’s health and provide them with safe, effective, convenient and affordable public health services and basic medical care. We should improve the medical insurance system that covers the whole population, establish a mechanism to provide insurance and aid in treating major and very serious diseases, and improve mechanisms for handling public health emergencies and for preventing and controlling major diseases. We should consolidate the system for using basic drugs. We should improve the rural medical and health service network at county, township and village levels and the system of urban community health services, deepen reform of public hospitals, and encourage the development of private hospitals. We should support the development of traditional Chinese medicine and the traditional medicine of ethnic minorities. We should ensure that medical personnel provide better services and improve their work ethics. We should reform and improve institutions and mechanisms for managing and supervising food and drug safety. We should launch patriotic sanitation campaigns and ensure that people have good health and a sense of contentment. We must adhere to the basic state policy of family planning, improve the health of newborns, steadily improve the population policy and promote long-term and balanced population growth.
6. Strengthen and make innovations in social management
To conduct social management in a more scientific way, we must improve the laws, institutions and mechanisms concerning and capacity for social management, and train more personnel and promote IT application in this field. We should improve the way in which the government provides public services, strengthen the system of social management and services at the community level, and ensure that urban and rural communities provide better services. Enterprises, public institutions and people’s organizations should play a better role in conducting social management and providing related services. We should guide social organizations to develop in a healthy and orderly way and fully leverage the fundamental role of the people in social management. We should improve and make innovations in the management relating to and services for the floating population and special groups. We should correctly handle problems among the people, and put in place a sound mechanism in which the Party and the government play the leading role in upholding the rights and interests of the people. We should improve the system for handling people’s complaints expressed in letters or visits, and improve the integrated system of mediation by the people, administrative mediation and judicial mediation. We should maintain regular and open channels for the people to voice their demands, for coordinating their interests and for protecting their rights and interests. We should establish a sound mechanism for assessing potential risks major policy decisions may pose to social stability. We should improve the public safety system and the workplace safety environment in enterprises to curb major and very serious accidents. We should strengthen and improve the Party’s leadership over the work of judicial, procuratorial, and public security organs, and strengthen their ranks, so that they can fulfill their duties in carrying forward and protecting the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should intensify efforts to ensure law and order, improve the multi-dimensional system for crime prevention and control, strengthen the infrastructure of judicial bodies, and prevent and punish criminal and illegal activities in accordance with the law to protect the people’s lives and property. We should improve the national security strategy and its work mechanism, and keep high vigilance against and resolutely forestall separatist activities and activities of infiltration and subversion carried out by hostile forces, so as to ensure national security.
As long as the whole Party and all the people make concerted efforts, we can foster a dynamic environment in which everyone contributes to social harmony and benefits from a harmonious society.
VIII. Making Great Efforts to Promote Ecological Progress
Promoting ecological progress is a long-term task of vital importance to the people’s wellbeing and China’s future. Faced with increasing resource constraints, severe environmental pollution and a deteriorating ecosystem, we must raise our ecological awareness of the need to respect, accommodate to and protect nature. We must give high priority to making ecological progress and incorporate it into all aspects and the whole process of advancing economic, political, cultural, and social progress, work hard to build a beautiful country, and achieve lasting and sustainable development of the Chinese nation.
We should remain committed to the basic state policy of conserving resources and protecting the environment as well as the principle of giving high priority to conserving resources, protecting the environment and promoting its natural restoration, and strive for green, circular and low-carbon development. We should preserve our geographical space and improve our industrial structure, way of production and way of life in the interest of conserving resources and protecting the environment. We should address the root cause of deterioration of the ecological environment so as to reverse this trend, create a sound working and living environment for the people, and contribute our share to global ecological security.
1. Improve development of China’s geographical space
It is in geographical space that ecological progress can be advanced, and we must cherish every bit of it. Guided by the principle of maintaining balance between population, resources and the environment and promoting economic, social and ecological benefits, we should keep the pace of development under control and regulate its space composition. We should ensure that the space for production is used intensively and efficiently, that the living space is livable and proper in size, and that the ecological space is unspoiled and beautiful; and we should leave more space for nature to achieve self-renewal. We should keep more farmland for farmers, and leave to our future generations a beautiful homeland with green fields, clean water and a blue sky. We should ensure the speedy implementation of the functional zoning strategy and require all regions to pursue development in strict accordance with this strategy, and advance urbanization, agricultural development and ecological security in a scientific and balanced way. We should enhance our capacity for exploiting marine resources, develop the marine economy, protect the marine ecological environment, resolutely safeguard China’s maritime rights and interests, and build China into a maritime power.
2. Promote all-around resource conservation
Resource conservation is an important way to protect the ecological environment. We should conserve resources and use them efficiently and bring about a fundamental change in the way resources are utilized. We should strengthen conservation efforts all the way, drastically reduce energy, water and land consumption per unit of GDP, and use such resources in a better and more efficient way. We should launch a revolution in energy production and consumption, impose a ceiling on total energy consumption, save energy and reduce its consumption. We should support the development of energy-efficient and low-carbon industries, new energy sources and renewable energy sources and ensure China’s energy security. We should better protect water sources, impose a cap on total water consumption, promote water recycling, and build a water-conserving society. We should ensure that the red line for protecting farmland is not crossed and strictly control land uses. We should strengthen exploration, protection and proper exploitation of mineral resources. We should develop a circular economy to reduce waste and resource consumption, reuse resources and recycle waste in the process of production, distribution and consumption.
3. Intensify protection of the ecosystem and the environment
A sound ecological environment is the fundamental basis for sustainable human and social development. We should launch major projects for restoring the ecosystem, increase our capacity for producing ecological products, take integrated steps to control desertification, stony deserts and soil erosion, enlarge forests, lakes and wetlands, and protect biodiversity. We should accelerate construction of water conservancy projects, and enhance our capacity for responding to floods, drought and waterlogging in urban and rural areas. We should improve the system for preventing and mitigating natural disasters and become better able to respond to meteorological, geological and seismic disasters. We should take a holistic approach to intensifying prevention and control of water, air and soil pollution, putting prevention first and placing emphasis on serious environmental problems that pose health hazards to the people. We will work with the international community to actively respond to global climate change on the basis of equity and in accordance with the common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities of all countries.
4. Enhance system building to promote ecological progress
System building is crucial to protecting the ecological environment. Resource consumption, environmental damage and ecological benefits should be covered by the system of standards for evaluating economic and social development, and related goals, evaluation methods and reward and punishment mechanisms should be adopted in keeping with the need of promoting ecological progress. We should establish a system for developing and protecting China’s geographical space and improve the system for providing the strictest possible protection for farmland and systems for managing water resources and protecting the environment. We should deepen reform of prices, taxes and fees for resource products, and establish a system for paying for resource consumption and compensating for ecological damage - a system that responds to market supply and demand and resource scarcity, recognizes ecological values and requires compensation in the interests of later generations. We should carry out trials for trading energy savings, carbon emission rights, pollution discharge rights and water rights. We should strengthen environmental monitoring and improve the system of accountability for ecological and environmental protection and the system of compensation for environmental damage. We should increase publicity of and education in ecological progress, raise public awareness of the need to conserve resources, protect the environment and promote ecological progress, and foster a social atmosphere of practicing moderate consumption and cherishing the ecological environment.
We must treasure nature more consciously, protect the ecosystem more actively, and strive to usher in a new era of socialist ecological progress.
IX. Accelerating the Modernization of National Defense and the Armed Forces
Building strong national defense and powerful armed forces that are commensurate with China’s international standing and meet the needs of its security and development interests is a strategic task of China’s modernization drive. China is faced with interwoven problems affecting its survival and development security as well as traditional and non-traditional security threats. To address these problems and threats, we must make major progress in modernizing national defense and the armed forces. We must, responding to China’s core security needs and following the three-step development strategy for modernizing national defense and the armed forces, ensure both economic development and development of defense capabilities, intensify efforts to accomplish the dual historic tasks of military mechanization and full IT application, striving to basically complete military mechanization and make major progress in full military IT application by 2020.
To modernize national defense and the armed forces, we must follow the guidance of Mao Zedong’s military thinking, Deng Xiaoping’s thinking on enhancing our military capabilities in the new historical period, Jiang Zemin’s thinking on strengthening our national defense and armed forces, and the Party’s thinking on strengthening our national defense and armed forces under new conditions. We should act to meet the new requirements of China’s national development and security strategies and ensure that the armed forces fully carry out their historic mission in the new stage in the new century. We should implement the military strategy of active defense for the new period, and enhance military strategic guidance as the times so require. We should attach great importance to maritime, space and cyberspace security. We should make active planning for the use of military forces in peacetime, expand and intensify military preparedness, and enhance the capability to accomplish a wide range of military tasks, the most important of which is to win local war in an information age.
We should follow the guideline of strengthening national defense and the armed forces in a scientific way, take faster change of the way of raising military combat effectiveness as a major task, fully enhance the revolutionary nature of the armed forces and ensure that they are modern and follow standard procedures in all operations. We must unwaveringly adhere to the principle of the Party’s absolute leadership over the armed forces and continue to educate them in the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We should constantly cultivate the core values of contemporary revolutionary service personnel, vigorously promote advanced military culture, and preserve the nature and the character of the military as the people’s army. We should unswervingly pursue full IT application as the goal in achieving military modernization and step up this effort. We should strengthen the development of new- and high-technology weapons and equipment, speed up the complete development of modern logistics, train a new type of high-caliber military personnel in large numbers, intensively carry out military training under computerized conditions, and enhance integrated combat capability based on extensive IT application. We should increase efforts to run the armed forces with strict discipline and in accordance with the law, and raise their standardization to a new level.
We should closely follow the new global military revolution that is gathering pace, advance reform of our national defense and armed forces in a both active and prudent way, and deepen military transformation with Chinese characteristics. With innovative military theories taking the lead, we should enhance our capacity for innovation in defense-oriented research and industries, modernize the military organizational structure, and build a system of modern military forces with Chinese characteristics.
We should continue to follow a Chinese-style path that integrates the development of military and civilian sectors, combine efforts to make the country prosperous and the armed forces strong, and strengthen strategic planning, system building as well as related laws and regulations to boost the development of military and civilian sectors in an integrated way. We should speed up the building of a modern armed police force. We should raise public awareness of the importance of national defense and improve the capacity for national defense mobilization and the capability of our reserve forces. We should consolidate and increase unity between the military and the government and between the military and the civilians.
China pursues a national defense policy that is defensive in nature. Our endeavors to strengthen national defense aim to safeguard China’s sovereignty, security and territorial integrity and ensure its peaceful development. China’s armed forces have always been a staunch force upholding world peace and will continue to increase cooperation and mutual trust with the armed forces of other countries, participate in regional and international security affairs, and thus play an active role in international political and security fields.
X. Enriching the Practice of "One Country, Two Systems" and Advancing China’s Reunification
Since their return to the motherland, Hong Kong and Macao have embarked on a broad road along which they and the mainland draw on each other’s strengths and pursue common development, and the success of the "one country, two systems" principle has won global recognition. The underlying goal of the principles and policies adopted by the central government concerning Hong Kong and Macao is to uphold China’s sovereignty, security and development interests and maintain long-term prosperity and stability of the two regions. We must fully and faithfully implement the principle of "one country, two systems," under which the people of Hong Kong govern Hong Kong and the people of Macao govern Macao and both regions enjoy a high degree of autonomy. We must both adhere to the one-China principle and respect the differences of the two systems, both uphold the power of the central government and ensure a high degree of autonomy in the special administrative regions, both give play to the role of the mainland as the staunch supporter of Hong Kong and Macao and increase their competitiveness. At no time should we focus only on one side to the neglect of the other.
The central government will act in strict accordance with the basic laws of the special administrative regions, improve work mechanisms for their enforcement, and firmly support the chief executives and governments of the two special administrative regions in governing the two regions in accordance with the law. The central government will firmly support them in leading the people from all walks of life in focusing on economic development, taking effective steps to improve the people’s wellbeing, and advancing orderly and phased-in democracy as well as inclusiveness, mutual support and harmony. The central government will increase economic ties and trade between the mainland and the two regions, and promote exchanges and cooperation between them in all fields. The central government will also firmly support the chief executives and governments of the two special administrative regions in promoting the unity of our compatriots in Hong Kong and Macao under the banner of loving both the motherland and their respective regions and in guarding against and forestalling external intervention in the affairs of Hong Kong and Macao.
We are convinced that our compatriots in Hong Kong and Macao not only have the wisdom, ability and resourcefulness to successfully govern and develop the two regions; they can certainly also play an active role in national affairs and share with other people of all ethnic groups in China the dignity and glory of being Chinese.
To resolve the Taiwan question and achieve the complete reunification of China is an irresistible historical process. Peaceful reunification is in the best interests of the Chinese nation, including our compatriots in Taiwan. To achieve peaceful reunification, we must, above everything else, ensure peaceful growth of relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits. We must adhere to the principle of "peaceful reunification and one country, two systems" and the eight-point proposal for growing cross-Straits relations and advancing peaceful reunification of the motherland. We must put into full practice the important thought of peaceful growth of cross-Straits relations, consolidate and strengthen the political, economic, cultural and social foundation for such growth, and create even better conditions for achieving peaceful reunification.
We must continue to adhere to the one-China principle. Although the mainland and Taiwan are yet to be reunified, the fact that both belong to one China has never changed. China’s territory and sovereignty have always been indivisible and no division will be tolerated. The two sides of the Taiwan Straits should uphold the common stand of opposing Taiwan independence and of following the 1992 Consensus. Both sides should increase their common commitment to upholding the one-China framework and, on this basis, expand common ground and set aside differences. We are ready to conduct exchanges, dialogue and cooperation with any political party in Taiwan as long as it does not seek Taiwan independence and recognizes the one-China principle.
We should sustain cross-Straits exchanges and cooperation. We should deepen economic cooperation to increase common interests. We should expand cultural exchanges to enhance a common sense of national identity, and further people-to-people contacts to cultivate mutual goodwill. We should promote consultation on an equal footing and strengthen institutional building. We hope that the two sides will jointly explore cross-Straits political relations and make reasonable arrangements for them under the special condition that the country is yet to be reunified. We hope the two sides will discuss the establishment of a cross-Straits confidence-building mechanism for military security to maintain stability in their relations and reach a peace agreement through consultation so as to open a new horizon in advancing the peaceful growth of these relations.
We should encourage the compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Straits to unite and pursue a common endeavor. The compatriots on both sides belong to the same Chinese nation and form a community of common destiny bound by blood ties; and we have every reason to care about and trust each other, jointly advance cross-Straits relations, and share in the fruits of development. We will make every effort to do anything that will promote the common wellbeing of the compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Straits. We should fully protect the rights and interests of our Taiwan compatriots and work with them to safeguard and build the common home of the Chinese nation.
We resolutely oppose any separatist attempt for Taiwan independence. The Chinese people will never allow anyone or any force to separate Taiwan from the motherland by any means. Any separatist attempt for Taiwan independence, which undermines the common interests of the compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Straits, is doomed to fail.
Working hand in hand, we, the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation, will surely accomplish the great cause of China’s reunification in the course of our common endeavor to achieve the great renewal of the Chinese nation.
XI. Continuing to Promote the Noble Cause of Peace and Development of Mankind
The world today is undergoing profound and complex changes, but peace and development remain the underlying trends of our times. The global trends toward multipolarity and economic globalization are deepening. Cultural diversity is increasing, and an information society is fast emerging. New breakthroughs are in the making in the scientific and technological revolution. Global cooperation is expanding at multiple levels and on all fronts. Emerging market economies and developing countries are gaining in overall strength, tipping the balance of international forces in favor of the maintenance of world peace. All this has created more favorable conditions for ensuring general stability in the international environment.
On the other hand, the world is still far from being peaceful. The global financial crisis is producing a far-reaching impact on the world. World economic growth is overshadowed by growing factors of instability and uncertainty, and imbalance in global development has widened. There are signs of increasing hegemonism, power politics and neo-interventionism, and local turmoil keeps cropping up. Global issues such as food security, energy and resource security and cyber security are becoming more acute.
Mankind has only one earth to live on, and countries have only one world to share. History teaches us that the law of the jungle will not lead to the coexistence of human society and that the arbitrary use of force cannot make the world a better place. To pursue peace, development and cooperation and oppose war, eliminate poverty and avoid confrontation in order to build a harmonious world of enduring peace and common prosperity - this is what the people of all countries long for.
We call for promoting equality, mutual trust, inclusiveness, mutual learning and mutually beneficial cooperation in international relations and making joint efforts to uphold international fairness and justice. In promoting equality and mutual trust, we should observe the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, and support equality among all countries, big or small, strong or weak, rich or poor. We should advance democracy in international relations, respect sovereignty, share security, and uphold world peace and stability. In promoting inclusiveness and mutual learning, we should respect diversity of civilizations and development paths, respect and safeguard the rights of all peoples to independently choose their social system and development path, learn from others to make up for our shortcomings, and advance human civilization. In promoting mutually beneficial cooperation, we should raise awareness about human beings sharing a community of common destiny. A country should accommodate the legitimate concerns of others when pursuing its own interests; and it should promote common development of all countries when advancing its own development. Countries should establish a new type of global development partnership that is more equitable and balanced, stick together in times of difficulty, both share rights and shoulder obligations, and boost the common interests of mankind.
China will continue to hold high the banner of peace, development, cooperation and mutual benefit and strive to uphold world peace and promote common development.
China will unswervingly follow the path of peaceful development and firmly pursue an independent foreign policy of peace. We are firm in our resolve to uphold China’s sovereignty, security and development interests and will never yield to any outside pressure. We will decide our position and policy on an issue on its own merits and work to uphold fairness and justice. China is committed to peaceful settlement of international disputes and hotspot issues, opposes the wanton use of force or threat to use it, opposes any foreign attempt to subvert the legitimate government of any other countries, and opposes terrorism in all its manifestations. China opposes hegemonism and power politics in all their forms, does not interfere in other countries’ internal affairs and will never seek hegemony or engage in expansion. China will continue to keep in mind both the interests of the Chinese people and the common interests of the people of all countries, get more actively involved in international affairs, play its due role of a major responsible country, and work jointly with other countries to meet global challenges.
China will unwaveringly follow a win-win strategy of opening up and promote robust, sustainable and balanced growth of the global economy through increased cooperation. We are committed to narrowing the North-South gap and supporting other developing countries in enhancing their capacity for self-development. China will strengthen coordination with other major economies on macroeconomic policy and resolve economic and trade frictions with other countries through consultation. China upholds the principle of balancing rights with obligations. We will take an active part in global economic governance, promote and facilitate free trade and investment, and oppose protectionism in all its forms.
China is committed to growing friendship and cooperation in all fields with other countries on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. We will improve and grow our relations with developed countries by expanding areas of cooperation and properly addressing differences with them; and we will strive to establish a new type of relations of long-term stability and sound growth with other major countries. We will continue to promote friendship and partnership with our neighbors, consolidate friendly relations and deepen mutually beneficial cooperation with them, and ensure that China’s development will bring more benefits to our neighbors. We will increase unity and cooperation with other developing countries, work with them to uphold the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries and support efforts to increase their representation and voice in international affairs. China will remain a reliable friend and sincere partner of other developing countries. We will actively participate in multilateral affairs, support the United Nations, G20, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, BRICS and other multilateral organizations in playing an active role in international affairs, and work to make the international order and system more just and equitable. We will take solid steps to promote public diplomacy as well as people-to-people and cultural exchanges, and protect China’s legitimate rights and interests overseas. We will conduct friendly exchanges with political parties and organizations of other countries and encourage people’s congresses, national and local committees of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, local governments and people’s organizations to increase overseas exchanges so as to consolidate the social foundation for enhancing China’s relations with other countries.
The Chinese people love peace and yearn for development. We are ready to work with the people of other countries to unremittingly promote the noble cause of peace and development for mankind.
XII. Making Party Building More Scientific in All Respects
Rallying and leading the people in completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, in advancing socialist modernization and in achieving the great renewal of the Chinese nation is an important mission for our Party. When the Party maintains its strength and close ties with the people, China enjoys prosperity and stability and the Chinese people live in peace and happiness. Facing the new developments, the progress in our cause and the expectation the people have of us, we should comprehensively carry out the great new undertaking of Party building in an innovative reform-driven manner and make Party building more scientific in all respects.
The whole Party must bear in mind that only by taking root among the people and delivering benefits to them can the Party remain invincible, and that only by being on guard against adversity in times of peace and forging boldly ahead can the Party remain in the forefront of the times. Under new conditions, the Party faces complicated and severe long-term tests in exercising governance, carrying out reform and opening up and developing the market economy as well as tests from the external environment. And the whole Party is confronted with increasingly grave dangers of lacking in drive, incompetence, being out of touch with the people, corruption and other misconduct. We should steadily improve the Party’s art of leadership and governance; and increase its ability to resist corruption, prevent degeneration and ward off risks - this is a major issue the Party must solve in order to consolidate its position as the governing party and carry out its mission of governance. All Party members must heighten their sense of urgency and sense of responsibility and focus on strengthening the Party’s governance capacity, advanced nature and purity. We should continue to free up our minds and carry out reform and innovation, and uphold the principle that the Party should supervise its own conduct and run itself with strict discipline. We should make all-around efforts to strengthen the Party theoretically and organizationally and improve its conduct. We should become better able to fight corruption, uphold Party integrity and improve Party rules and regulations. We should enhance our capacity for self-purity, self-improvement, self-development and self-innovation and build the Party into an innovative, service-oriented and learning Marxist governing party. By taking these steps, we can ensure that the Party is always the firm leadership core guiding the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
1. Be firm in our ideal and conviction and remain true to the faith of Communists
Communists’ faith in Marxism, socialism and communism is their political soul and sustains them in all tests. We should give high priority to developing the Party’s theory, which is essential for Party building. We should study Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought and the system of theories of socialism with Chinese characteristics and intensively study and apply the Scientific Outlook on Development. We should build learning Party organizations, educate Party members and officials in our shared ideal of socialism with Chinese characteristics and encourage them to unremittingly pursue this ideal. We should intensify education in the Party spirit, which is at the core of Party building, study Party history, and gain a full understanding of the experience and lessons reviewed in the Party’s two resolutions on certain questions in its history. We should carry forward the Party’s fine traditions and conduct and make its members and officials develop a firm and correct worldview and a firm and correct attitude toward power and career, take a committed political stand and become better able to tell right from wrong on major issues of principle. We should raise the moral standards of Party members, which are the foundation of Party building, encourage Party members and officials to become role models in practicing socialist views on honor and disgrace, and urge them to observe the Party spirit and ethical standards and set good examples for the public. We should encourage Party members and officials to become paragons of socialist ethics, lead in fostering a social trend of honesty and integrity, uphold fairness and justice, and thus demonstrate with concrete actions the moral integrity of Communists.
2. Put people first, exercise governance for the people and always maintain close ties with them
Serving the people is the fundamental purpose of the Party, and putting people first and exercising governance for the people is the ultimate yardstick for judging all the Party’s performance in this regard. At all times we must put the people’s interests above everything else, be of one mind with the people, share a common destiny with them, and rely on them to propel history forward. To maintain the Party’s advanced nature and purity, we should carry out intensive activities throughout the Party to study and practice its mass line, with the focus on the need to serve the people and to be down-to-earth, honest and upright in conduct. We should solve pressing problems of keen concern to the people, and raise our ability to do people-related work well under new conditions. We should improve the system for Party members and officials to maintain direct contact with the people. We should consult the people on governance, learn about their needs, seek their advice, and draw wisdom and strength from their great practices. We should endeavor to bring prosperity to the people and promote national renewal, be eager to blaze new trails and live up to our responsibility, and deliver more concrete services to the satisfaction of the people. We should always work hard and practice economy. We should make determined efforts to improve the style of writing and the conduct of meetings, and reject undesirable practices such as mediocrity, laziness, laxity and extravagance, the practice of just going through formalities, and bureaucratism. We should use the Party’s fine conduct to enhance Party cohesiveness, win popular support and improve the conduct of the government and the general public. We should support people’s organizations such as trade unions, the Chinese Communist Youth League and women’s federations in fully playing their roles as bridges linking the Party and government with the people, voicing public concern and protecting people’s legitimate rights and interests.
3. Vigorously promote intra-Party democracy and enhance the Party’s creative vitality
Intra-Party democracy is the life of the Party. We should adhere to democratic centralism, improve institutions for intra-Party democracy, and promote people’s democracy with intra-Party democracy. We should uphold the principal position of Party members, better protect their democratic rights, and conduct criticism and self-criticism. We should foster comradely relations based on equality and democratic principles, a political atmosphere that encourages democratic discussion, and an institutional environment for democratic oversight. We should ensure that Party members have the right to stay informed of, participate in and oversee Party affairs, as well as the right to vote. We should improve the system of Party congresses, raise the proportion of delegates from among workers and farmers to them, implement and improve the tenure system for delegates to Party congresses, experiment with a system of annual sessions of the Party congresses at the town and township level, proceed with trials of the system of Party congresses with a fixed term in selected counties and county-level cities and districts, and introduce the system for delegates to Party congresses to submit proposals. We should improve the system of intra-Party election, and standards governing multi-candidate nomination and election, and create procedures and a climate that fully embody the will of voters. We should strengthen the decision-making and oversight role of plenary sessions of Party committees and improve procedural rules and decision-making procedures of their standing committees. We should also improve the system for local Party committees to make decisions on major issues and appoint key officials by ballot. We should expand intra-Party democracy at the community level, improve the system for Party members to assess the performance of leading bodies of community-level Party organizations on a regular basis, make arrangements for Party members to sit in on meetings of community-level Party committees and for delegates to Party congresses to attend relevant meetings of Party committees at the same levels, both in non-voting capacity, and thus conduct intra-Party activities in strict accordance with these principles and make them more transparent.
4. Deepen reform of the system for the management of officials and personnel and build a contingent of competent key officials for governance
To uphold and build socialism with Chinese characteristics, it is imperative to build a contingent of key officials for governance who are firm in political conviction, competent and energetic and have fine conduct. We should adhere to the principle of the Party supervising the performance of officials. We should appoint officials on their merits without regard to their origins, select officials on the basis of both their moral integrity and their professional competence with priority given to the former, and promote officials who are outstanding in performance and enjoy popular support. We should deepen reform of the system for the management of officials and personnel so that officials with outstanding performance in all fields will come to the fore in large numbers, and we should tap their potential to the full and put their talent to best use. We should fully and strictly implement the principle of selecting officials in a democratic, open, competitive and merits-based way, make the management of them more democratic, enhance democracy, improve the way of selecting officials through competition, increase public trust in the selection and appointment of officials and ensure that honest people are not disadvantaged and schemers do not have their way. We should improve the system for assessing the performance of officials and require leading officials to view their performance for what it is. We should improve the system for the management of officials, conduct strict supervision over them, strengthen training and selection of officials as heads of Party and government bodies or for other key positions, and improve the public servant system. We should improve the composition of leading bodies and the mix of the ranks of officials, give high priority to training and selecting officials from among those working on the frontline or in local communities, and widen the channel for outstanding individuals from society at large to become Party and government officials. We should reform the personnel management system in state-owned enterprises and public institutions. We should strengthen and improve education and training of officials to enhance their competence. We should make greater efforts to train and select outstanding young officials, attach importance to training and selecting officials from among women and ethnic minorities, and encourage young officials to work and gain experience in local communities and in hardship areas. We should provide full services for retired officials.
5. Adhere to the principle of the Party exercising leadership over personnel management and attract outstanding individuals from all over for the cause of the Party and country
Widening channels to attract talent is important for advancing the cause of the Party and people. We should respect work, knowledge, talent and creation, pursue at a faster pace the strategy of training competent personnel as a priority to build a large contingent of such personnel, and turn China from a country with large human resources into one with a large pool of competent professionals. We should coordinate the training of all types of personnel, implement major projects for training and attracting high-caliber personnel, give more support to the training of innovative and entrepreneurial personnel, prioritize the training of people with practical skills, and encourage the flow of talents to the frontlines of research and production. We should fully develop and utilize human resources both at home and abroad, and actively attract high-caliber personnel from overseas and turn them to good use. We should accelerate reform of institutions and mechanisms for talent development, adopt innovative policies for this purpose and establish a national system of honors. We should form an internationally competitive personnel system that is capable of firing the creativity and talent of people, and thus foster a dynamic environment in which everyone can fully tap their potential and put their talent to best use.
6. Promote community-level Party building in an innovative way and consolidate the organizational foundation for the exercise of governance by the Party
Community-level Party organizations play a key role in rallying and leading the people in implementing the Party’s theories, line, principles and policies and in carrying out its tasks. We should implement the system of responsibility for Party building, strengthen Party organizations in both rural and urban communities, step up efforts to establish and strengthen Party organizations in non-public economic entities and social organizations, and carry out community-level Party building in all areas. We should expand the coverage of Party organizations and Party work, fully leverage the role of community-level Party organizations in enhancing development, serving the people, rallying public support and promoting harmony, and ensure that efforts to strengthen community-level Party organizations also spur the development of all other community-level organizations. We should improve the network of community-level Party organizations, enhance the competence of their leaders, further integrate Party building resources in urban and rural areas, and ensure sufficient funding for community-level Party organizations. We should make community-level Party organizations more service-oriented, with serving the people and engaging in people-related work being their main tasks. We should strengthen and improve education and management of Party members, with a focus on enhancing their Party spirit and raising their overall quality, improve the permanent mechanism for encouraging them to excel in their work, and encourage them to be vanguards and role models. We should ensure that Party members participate in Party activities regularly, and improve regular review of Party members’ Party spirit and democratic evaluation of their performance. We should improve education and management of Party members among the floating population and provide better services for them. We should recruit better qualified people into the Party, and give high priority to recruiting new members from among young workers, farmers and intellectuals. We should perfect the mechanism for recruiting and disqualifying Party members so as to improve the composition of Party membership.
7. Unswervingly combat corruption and preserve Communists’ political character of integrity
Combating corruption and promoting political integrity, which is a major political issue of great concern to the people, is a clear-cut and long-term political commitment of the Party. If we fail to handle this issue well, it could prove fatal to the Party, and even cause the collapse of the Party and the fall of the state. We must thus make unremitting efforts to combat corruption, promote integrity and stay vigilant against degeneration. We should keep to the Chinese-style path of combating corruption and promoting integrity. We should persist in combating corruption in an integrated way, addressing both its symptoms and root causes, and combining punishment and prevention, with emphasis on the latter. We should advance in an all-around way the establishment of a system of combating corruption through both punishment and prevention and see to it that officials are honest, the government is clean, and political integrity is upheld. We should strengthen education about combating corruption and promoting clean government and improve the culture of clean government. Leading officials at all levels, especially high-ranking officials, must readily observe the code of conduct on clean governance and report all important facts concerned. They should both exercise strict self-discipline and strengthen education and supervision over their family and staff; and they should never seek any privilege. We should ensure that strict procedures are followed in the exercise of power, and tighten oversight over the exercise of power by leading officials, especially principal leading officials. We should deepen reform of key areas and crucial links, improve the system of anti-corruption laws, prevent and manage risks to clean government, avoid conflict of interests, prevent and fight corruption more effectively and in a more scientific way, and increase international anti-corruption cooperation. We should rigorously implement the system of accountability for improving Party conduct and upholding integrity. We should improve the system of discipline supervision and inspection, improve the unified management of representative offices of Party commissions for discipline inspection, and enable discipline inspectors to better play their role of supervision. We must maintain a tough position in cracking down on corruption at all times, conduct thorough investigations into major corruption cases and work hard to resolve problems of corruption that directly affect the people. All those who violate Party discipline and state laws, whoever they are and whatever power or official positions they have, must be brought to justice without mercy.
8. Strictly enforce Party discipline and willingly uphold centralized leadership of the Party
Centralized leadership of the Party is the source of its strength and a fundamental guarantee for China’s economic and social development, ethnic unity and progress, and enduring peace and stability. The more complexities the Party faces and the more arduous the tasks it undertakes, the more imperative it is for the Party to strengthen its discipline and uphold centralized leadership. Party organizations at all levels and all Party members and officials, especially principal leading officials, must willingly abide by the Party Constitution as well as its organizational principles and guiding principles for its political activities; and no one is allowed to place oneself above the Party organization. All Party organizations and members must resolutely uphold the authority of the Central Committee and maintain a high degree of unity with it theoretically, politically and in action. We must faithfully implement the Party’s theories, line, principles and policies and ensure that the decisions of the Central Committee are carried out effectively; and we will never allow anyone to take countermeasures against them or disregard them. We will strengthen oversight and inspection, strictly enforce Party discipline, political discipline in particular, and take stern actions against violations of Party discipline. We must ensure that all are equal before discipline, that nobody has the privilege of not observing it and that no exception should be made in its enforcement. This will enable the whole Party from leadership to the ranks to advance in unison as a great force.
Comrades,
We are striving for the great renewal of the Chinese nation along the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics - this is what countless patriots and revolutionary martyrs yearned for. Through protracted and arduous struggle, our Party has, relying closely on the people and making the utmost sacrifice, made epic accomplishments. Our Party brought an end to, once and for all, the misery of old China, a poor and weak country that had suffered from both domestic turmoil and foreign aggression in modern times, and launched the Chinese nation’s irreversible historic march to development and great renewal. It has thus enabled the Chinese nation, which has a civilization of over 5,000 years, to stand rock-firm with a completely new image in the family of nations. Shouldering heavier responsibilities and tasks on our new journey forward, we must become firmer in our conviction and make more determined efforts to accomplish the three historic tasks of advancing modernization, reunifying the country, and upholding world peace and promoting common development.
To live up to the people’s trust in and expectation of us and stand new tests under new historical conditions, the whole Party must be keenly aware of potential dangers, be modest and prudent, guard against arrogance and impetuosity, and remain clear-headed. We must be innovative in our thinking, uphold truth and correct mistakes, and always maintain energy and drive. We must uphold the fundamental purpose of the Party, trust and rely on the people, and always put them above everything else. We must heighten our sense of mission, be realistic and pragmatic, defy difficulties and work hard, and preserve the political integrity of Communists.
The cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics holds great promise for the future, and its success hinges on continuous hard work of generations of young people with aspirations. The whole Party should care about young people, learn about what they have in mind, encourage their growth and support them in pursuing careers in an entrepreneurial spirit. Young people should respond to the Party’s call, foster a correct worldview, outlook on life and sense of values and always cherish deep love for our great country, our great people and our great nation. Let their youthful vigor shine with radiance as they endeavor to advance the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
The success of the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics cannot be achieved without the concerted efforts of all the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation. Our common cause depends on unity, and our strength lies in unity. All Party members should improve their Party spirit so as to ensure unity, promote unity through pursuing our common cause, willingly uphold the unity of the whole Party, strengthen the unity of the people of all ethnic groups in China and the unity of all the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation, both here in the country and overseas, and promote the great unity of the Chinese people with the peoples of other countries.
Let us hold high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics, rally more closely around the Party Central Committee, strive to complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, continue to win new victories for socialism with Chinese characteristics, and make joint efforts to create an even brighter future for the Chinese people and nation.
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