Glo Minh Dong And The Left example essay topic

It is sometimes maintained that the conflicts of the twentieth century (war and international contests in general) might best be characterized as between the left and right political persuasions (e. g., "communism" against "fascism" or "democracy" against "fascism"). Defend or dispute such a characterization using the two socioeconomic and political systems that have been the central concerns of our readings and discussion: that of Sun Yat-sen (The Kuomintang on the Chinese mainland and on Taiwan) and that of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (the Chinese Communist Party) in the People's Republic of China. Your answer should include (1) ideological components (both domestically and internationally relevant), (2) structural features (leadership and political party properties), (3) economic strategies (both domestically and internationally relevant) and (4) general consequences. What are you prepared to argue are the major differences between the two systems here discussed?

Now, answer that question in a coherent fashion. Don't try to answer each question in particular, except where the questions are numbered, for example, #1 ideological components, #2 structural features, #3 economic strategies, make sure that is clear so the readers understand that's what you are answering. For example you say, as for ideological components, so something to indicate that you are answering that specific part of the question. Now, I think the question is relatively clear. It is a complex, but relatively clear question. I don't know exactly what experience you have.

You know again, as I told you, I am sort of visiting the planet sodospeak. I mean you are completely outside the range of my comprehension. I don't know what you know, what you don't know. Education nowadays has become so impoverished, I'm not even sure that you have the prejudices that we used to have. So right on this campus, my sense is, the world is divided between the left and the right.

And so when they look back on the past experience of the preceding century, they think that the conflicts of the preceding century were on the left and the right, you see? And somehow the world is divided into the left and the right. Now, part of this, and if you read any of the material, again I am being very generous in my expectations, but if you read any of the material, for years, the second World War was characterized as a conflict between the left and the right. That carried over into Asia. The Japanese were spoken of (you know) as the Fascist (The Right). So the confounding element of all this was that China was considered ridden by the left and the right [5: 00] and the Right was the Glo Minh Dong (that is the followers of Sun Yat Sen), and the left were followers of Mao Say Dung.

Now the literature of that period, I mean I had to suffer it, was "Mao Say Dung could do no wrong". I mean here was the brilliant revolutionary from the left, entering the world scene, and resisting the fascism of the Glo Minh Dong. And Chong Kai Shiet (of course) was the Chinese Hitler [spoken sarcastically]. I mean that was so common a feature, that I am sure you still get it nowadays.

I am sure you hear it in some history courses. I am sure you hear it in some "political sciences". Now the question is, is that a plausible construction of the conflicts of the 20th century? Now, the basic argument that I have given (and I've been giving it for years) is that the distinctions between operative political systems in the 20th century was not left and right. The notion that Adolph Hitler was a rightist is really very difficult to defend if you imagine (and most people do), that the right defends private property.

Hitler didn't defend private property. In fact, Hitler dominated private property. He dominated capitalists and he brought them to ruin, as they all knew, as they all expected. The fast is, that Hitler was not a right wing fanatic, as is usually characterized. He was a fanatic, but he certainly wasn't right wing. He had very little to do with conservatism.

He had no patience with what he called the bourgeoisie. He called his party was, the National Socialist Party. Now why did he call them socialist. If you listen to the left wing people, they say "Oh, that is just to confuse everybody".

The fact of the matter is that he organized the government (the state) to dominate everything. Now, that should be a clue. The 20th century in my judgment, here's a judgment call, was not a conflict between the left and the right but between democratic and antidemocratic elements (political elements, population elements, whatever and however you want to characterize). Democracy and anti-democracy was characteristic of the activities of the 20th century and I suggest will probably be the principle dispute in the 21st century. Let's take a look at what we have. For many years, the Glo Minh Dong (Sun Yat Sen's followers) and Chong Kai Shiet were considered fascists.

Now, the question is do they qualify as fascists? Now I don't know because you got to give me a definition of these terms. Now notice, if you are going to use any of these terms, give me definitions. They don't have to be definitions accepted by everyone, they just have to be your working definition. Now, what does it mean to be left wing? Basically, I think, in the 20th century, outside of all the folderol, left wing means anti capitalist.

Left Wing means the excision of private property from the factories that govern society. It means rejecting the commodity market, as a source of price determination. Ok? Anti-private property, anti-capitalist, anti-commodity markets. That is typical of what is considered the left wing in the 20th century.

And I think you could make a case for that. What you can't make a case for, is that the left wing in the 20th century (that was so characterized anti-capitalist, anti commodity markets, anti-private properties) were democratic. You can't characterize them as democratic, because you have to say, look a democracy is a system in which you have one party that is dominant and it has a dictator who claims to know all, see all and be all. That defies any definition of democracy I've ever heard.

Now, to focus on the Glo Minh Dong and the Chinese Communist Party, notice, that if you try to make a distinction between the two (the Glo Minh Dong is right wing and the Chinese Communist Party is left wing). [10: 00] Up until 1949, the Chinese Communist party advertised itself as the most emphatic representative of Sun Yat Sen in China. Remember that. So if Sun Yat Sen is the father of fascism in China, then how could the Chinese Communist party be anything but Fascist, if they claim to be following the precepts of Sun yat Sen. There is a great deal of confusion about the history of China that persists till this day.

Now, the question is what do we have in China. We have two political movements. The Glo Minh Dong in one hand and the Chinese Communist party on the other. What were the differences?

Again, the differences were basically relatively indifferent up until Mao Say Dung comes to power, because what he calls the new democracy has all the properties of the political system advocated by Sun Yat Sen. Now remember, Sun Yat Sen initially argued what? He said, China must ultimately (and the emphasis is on ultimately) be democratic. Now, here's the definition of democracy that Sun gave. Sun defines democracy in the following way: a government composed of checks and balances that are reflected in an executive branch, a judicial branch, and a legislative branch. And he acted as checks and balances for each other.

And he gets his model from the united states. Now, more than that, he uses initiative, and referenda and recall as extra powers. That is he wants the people to be able to initiate legislation. He wants the people to have referenda concerning legislation already passed and he wants to have the people enjoy recall capabilities for people already elected. Now that is what we would consider to be a democratic government because it reflects the principles of our government, and we can define our government as democratic. You don't have to get into all of this "what about the poor, the hungry and the disabled?" All that kind of crap is irrelevant.

It is a question of how you define a system. You are not recommending it. You are simply defining it. And so Sun defined his system as democratic, a democracy that we recognize. And you may say "Oh our democracy is incomplete". That is fine and dandy, but save that for discussion elsewhere.

What is considered democracy in the contemporary world is reflected in the institutions at the United States. Now you may say that it is incomplete, needs reform and all that sort of stuff. [Dr. Gregor lost his place because of a student comment]. Now the definition of democracy you have to provide. You don't have to recommend it, you have to provide it. Now, what do you get when you get to the Chinese Communist party.

They say that they are followers of Sun Yat Sen. But, when Mao Say Dung comes to power, he says we have to introduce something, initially called a new democracy, but then the full development of socialism. Now what the Hell does that mean? It means, a single party dominance. It means a charismatic leadership.

It means the suppression of all opposition. Now, did the Glo Minh Dong do that, yes. Because what? Sun said exactly, "we have to start out with military dictatorship, because you have to bring the country together".

They are oppressed by foreigners, so we have to have a military control. It is a dictatorship. No question about it. Sun was not trying to conceal the fact that the initial phases of control by the Glo Minh Dong would be anything other than a military dictatorship.

Secondly, we are going into a period of political tutelage. Now that was a period where you had single party dominance, charismatic leadership, and the suppression of opposition. That is essentially the period of the dictatorial or authoritarian control. Sun Yat Sen and the Glo Minh Dong never denied that [15: 00].

But they said, these are two anticipatory phases. And then finally, you are going to have the constitutional phase and that's the advent of democracy. Now, what's the difference between the Glo Minh Dong's position and that of the Communist party? The Chinese communist party comes into position of authority and then imposes a tutelary government (tutelary government the way Sun called). What does tutelary mean? It means that the party controls everything in order to instruct the backward peasants what they ought to be doing, or how they ought to behave.

Now, does it say that this is just an intermediary phase? It doesn't say that at all. It says, this is socialism. All right? Now what I'm trying to convey to you is this, if there is anything that distinguishes the Glo Minh Dong from the Chinese Communist party, it is, in terms of Sun yat Sen's followers, they aspire ultimately to be democratic. Now whether that happens is unclear.

And we have misgivings. When they say, just wait there will be democracy. We say "Pie in the Sky", we want it right away. And whenever we get involved in anything, we try to introduce it immediately. Just think about our experience in Iraq. We go there and suddenly, "Ok everybody is going to be democratic".

Now you know that is not going to work. It's going to be a very demanding exercise. But we always want to do everything overnight. You know, we live by sort of television time. You know the story starts, by the end of the hour everything has to be resolved.

Crooks have to be put in jail, males and females fall in love, or if it is one of those programs, males and males fall in love or whatever the case might be. But everything has to be resolved in 56 minutes. The world isn't like that. But see the Glo Minh Dong, Chung Kai Shiet, Sun yat Sen, they advocate democracy as an aspiration, as a model. That never was the case with the Chinese Communist party. They called themselves a democracy.

But look, people, every revolutionary movement sin the 20th century called itself a democracy. The fascists called themselves an authoritarian centralized democracy, it was incorporated in the doctrine of fascism. We are an authoritarian centralized democracy. Hitler called his government, a fallfish democracy, a democracy of the people. So everybody called themselves a democracy. You have to be sufficiently intelligent to discriminate between what people say and what they do.

That means, that you have to look at the institutions. Now, the ideological components are clear. Where they say democratic, you got to say, what does that mean in practice? Now you " ve got Taiwan as an illustration of the Glo Minh Dong's commitment to democracy. There's no doubt that democracy was the ultimate aspiration. Because look at Taiwan, they have got a functional democracy, and it satisfies every demand that we make on a democratic totality.

Sure it's got its pimples, and carbuncles, and moles, like all other democracies they have their disabilities. We have our disabilities. But basically democracy is distinctive and Taiwan ultimately matured into a democracy. What do you have on the mainland of China? Dung Show Ping said, we must have a dictatorship. Didn't call it anything else.

A proletarian dictatorship. He said the four cardinal principles of our government include the dominance of the Chinese Communist party, it includes the thought of Mao Say Dung, it includes the road to Socialism. The fact of the matter is, Dung Show Ping specifically rejected democracy. He said bourgeois democracy is a snare and a fiction. There is no democracy in capitalist America. So you have to say to yourself, do we have a more democratic system than they do in the mainland or do we not?

Unless your complete besotted, with what you " re smoking, you " ll recognize it's a little more democratic here regardless of how you slice it, than it is in mainland China. Now I don't think I have to go into that. The fact of the matter is, around here you can pretty much do and say what you want. [20: 00] You got a picture of anybody in mainland China opposing the government the way people oppose the government here. I think not. So the structural features are those items here: charismatic leader, unitary party, the control of opposition, the control of information flow, everything that characterizes a non-democratic system characterizes both the Glo Minh Dong and the Chinese Communist Party during the revolutionary period, with the Glo Minh Dong promising to deliver democracy after the conclusion of the tutelary phase.

Now do they deliver? Look at Taiwan, they deliver. What the Hell more do you want? They delivered it. If the Chinese Communist party called itself a democracy (of some sort), well it is clear that they don't deliver anything that we would recognize as democratic. It is a strictly controlled political environment, in terms of both information flow and in terms of the allocation of resources, it is controlled by the Communist party, except in those regions where they allow foreigners to invest, and we " ll talk about that in a minute.

Now, what about economic strategy? Well if you look at the Glo Minh Dong, the principal objection that Americans made to the Glo Minh Dong period, in the mainland was what? They allowed Capitalism to continue. Now this is got to be the strangest thing..