Fat Years - Chan Koonchung [119]
“Just let China maintain the status quo,” he said, “and continue to develop smoothly for twenty more years, then we can see about reform. At the most we can institute a few small reforms and gradually move toward good government.”
“What would a post–Communist Party democratic China be like?” asked Little Xi.
He Dongsheng had no idea.
“Political reform?” he said with a sneer. “Is it that easy? The result of political reform will not be the federalism that you want, or European-style social democracy, or American-style freedom and constitutional democracy. The result of such a political transition will be a Chinese-style fascist dictatorship made up of a combination of collective nationalism, populism, statism, and Chinese traditionalism.”
“Your communist party-state is already fascism,” responded Little Xi, raising her voice. “You don’t need any transition!”
“Even if we are fascist,” He Dongsheng replied calmly, “we are only in the early stages of fascism now. You still haven’t tasted the full flavor of violent fascist despotism. From the way you talk, I can see that you lack the imagination to comprehend genuine evil.”
At that, the faces of a few Communist Party leaders he knew who harbored true fascist ambitions rose before his mind’s eye, and he thought that if any of these men came to power, not only China but the whole world would be in for terrible trouble. He even had a certain sense of mission, a feeling that he must stop such people from coming to power.
He Dongsheng knew for certain that the opponents of the present leadership group came from both the left and the right, but the most dangerous threat was from the ultraright. The “Action Plan for Achieving Prosperity amid Crisis” was a continuation of the market-economy policies of Reform and Openness, and it had offended many powerful people and created many enemies. The Old Left and the New Left both opposed the privatization of agricultural land; many large state-operated enterprises were unhappy with the challenge posed by private businesses, where they had long enjoyed a monopoly; and, finally, abolishing official control and encouraging competition had decreased the scope for collusion between bureaucrats and businesspeople, as well as the officials’ opportunities for graft. For a Party in which deeply rooted corruption was endemic, the current leadership’s attempt to put into effect a “sunshine law”—mandating that officials reveal their overall financial worth in order to uncover the discrepancies between their legal incomes and their actual wealth—so angered many corrupt officials that they resolved to work together to overthrow the current party-state leadership.
Ambitious factions within the Party always looked for the current leadership’s weak spots. The two weak spots of this current one were none other than their alliance with Japan, and their postponement of border disputes. Anti-Japanese sentiment had widespread popular appeal that united several generations. Suddenly signing an oath of brotherhood with the Japanese was quite unacceptable to many, even though it was in accord with China’s core national interests. It was also easy for joint development of border areas to be interpreted as a humiliating forfeiture of Chinese sovereignty. The ambitious faction within the Party knew that all they had to do was fan the flames of nationalist