The 16th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC)
concluded its 6th plenary session in Beijing Wednesday and issued a
communiqué highlighting the issue of social
harmony.
It also set the date and venue for the Party's 17th national
congress in the second half of 2007 in Beijing.
The 4-day plenum, in which General Secretary Hu Jintao made a keynote speech, advocated
putting the construction of a socialist harmonious society at a
"more prominent position" on its work agenda while adhering to
economic development as its central task, the communiqué said.
The plenary meeting, attended by 195 CPC Central Committee
members and 152 alternate members, is the first of its kind that
the Party has ever held focusing on social development matters
other than political and economic affairs.
"There are quite many contradictions and issues that impair
social harmony" even when China is "a harmonious society in
general," the document admitted.
According to the communiqué, the Party will in the next 15 years
commit itself to improving democratic legal system and human rights
protection, narrowing wealth gap, increasing employment, improving
public service of the government, promoting people's moral
standards, securing public order and protecting the
environment.
To achieve these goals, the plenum stressed that more efforts
shall be made to coordinate economic and social development,
promote social equity and justice, form a set of common
aspirations, ideals and moral codes for the whole society,
strengthen social affairs management and services, and create
harmonious social relations for the unity of all the Chinese
people.
While calling for efforts to promote economic growth, the Party
also stressed the importance of erecting a new set of common values
in the market economy-based society in the making.
"(Constructing) a socialist core value system will be essential
to cultural harmony in the country," the communiqué said. It called
on the whole Party to work for cultural harmony and consolidate the
ideological and ethical foundations for social harmony by "erecting
the socialist core value system and the socialist concept of honors
and disgraces."
The plenum also stressed that the role of the CPC itself is
crucial for the construction of a harmonious society. Local Party
committees around the country should "sharpen political
sensitivity, strengthening investigation and research into major
social issues" for the effectiveness of their policies, and
"properly handle prominent contradictions and issues that affect
social harmony in their localities," it said.
The communiqué urged Party members to strengthen ideological and
moral cultivation. It also called for efforts to improve the
anti-corruption mechanism and enhance supervision over leading
officials and organizations.
"Sound ethos within the Party should be cultivated to bring
along healthy ethos among the general public and government
officials, so as to create harmonious relations between the Party
and the masses," it said.
Theoretical development
Building social harmony "is a major strategic
move taken by the Party to build a fair and just society and attain
sustainable social and economic development," Wu Zhongmin, a
professor with the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, told
Xinhua.
The Chinese society is divided by a yawning wealth gap, and
soaring prices of medical services, housing and education, combined
with inadequate social security network and rising unemployment
among new grads, are making people more anxious about their future,
he said. To solve these problems, the CPC first pledged to shape a
"more harmonious society" in its 16th national congress in late
2002, and explicitly made a call to "build a harmonious society" in
2004 in a plenum. General Secretary Hu Jintao defined it as a
democratic society under the rule of law, a society based on equity
and justice, an honest and caring society and stable, vigorous and
orderly society in which humans live in harmony with the
nature.
Political analysts said this CPC meeting's focus on social
harmony would be greatly helpful to resolving the pressing issues
in China, and will provide theoretical guidance for national
development in the long run.
Such views are vindicated by the Party document issued
Wednesday. Building a harmonious society is a major strategic task
under the guidance of Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng
Xiaoping Theory and the Important Thought of "Three Represents,"
reflects the inherent requirement for the modernization drive and
the common aspiration of Chinese people of all ethnic groups, said
the communiqué.
National congress
The plenum also made a decision on the convention of the 17th
national congress of the CPC, which will elect a new CPC Central
Committee to lead the country for a term of five years. The meeting
will be held in the second half of 2007 in Beijing.
The national congress, to be held at a crucial period of China's
economic and social development, "will be of vital importance for
the Party to unite and lead all the Chinese people" in building a
comparatively prosperous society and accelerating the nation's
modernization drive, the plenum said.
(Xinhua News Agency October 11, 2006)
