Wen Yang: The internal and external sides of the issue of "China's political reform"

Wen Yang: The internal and external sides of the issue of "China's political reform" Premier Wen Jiabao's last "Two Sessions" press conference was cited by Singapore's...

> Wen Yang: The internal and external sides of the issue of "China's political reform" At Premier Wen Jiabao's last "Two Sessions" press conference, reporters from Singapore's "Lianhe Zaobao" and the United States' "Washington Post" successively asked about the reform of China's political system. Premier Wen's answer generally includes the following points: 1. Without political structural reform, the "Cultural Revolution" may happen again; 2. With the development of the economy, problems such as unfair distribution, lack of integrity, and corruption have arisen, and political structural reform is also needed; 3. Without the success of political structural reform, economic gains may be lost, and social gains will be lost. New problems that arose at the meeting could not be solved; 4. He paid attention to this matter out of a sense of responsibility. As long as he still had breath, he would fight for one day. At the same time, he called on every responsible party member and leading cadre to also have a sense of urgency; 5. China's democratic system will be developed step by step in accordance with China's national conditions, and the direct village election model can be developed to the county level. Within a day or two, many major media outlets at home and abroad highlighted this question and answer. The Washington Post's headline in the United States is: "China's Wen Jiabao calls for reform, even as the legislature strengthens criminal detention laws." The British "Daily Telegraph" headline is: "China's Wen Jiabao calls for "urgent political reform." And China's domestic media has highlighted the statement that "without political reform, the Cultural Revolution may happen again." Wen Jiabao answered questions from 14 reporters in three hours, and each question could only be answered briefly. It is not difficult to imagine that if these three hours were reserved for Western reporters to ask only one question about China's political reform, it would not be enough, and it would be limited to these questions. Because by its nature, the so-called "China's political reform" is not a clear and consistent question, and the questions and answers can be completely unrelated to each other. If you ask an American reporter, what does he want to ask using the topic of "China's political reform"? It is not difficult to guess that his question is actually: When will the Chinese government implement party rotation, separation of powers, and universal suffrage for one person, one vote? Or to be bolder, when will the "Jasmine Revolution" occur in China, giving pro-Western parties the opportunity to come to power and make China the second Japan and a vassal of the United States? Or even further, when will China fall into political fragmentation, preferably with independent provinces and all-out civil war, as happened when the Ottoman Empire disintegrated into what is now the Middle East? This is the issue of "Chinese political reform" in the minds of the West. Self-destruction of national sovereignty in the name of democracy, and abandonment of national freedom in the name of freedom. The entrance to hell is decorated with extremely gorgeous advertisements for heaven, with classic slogans of liberalism written in the text, and pictures depicting the prosperity of the United States of America. Western strategists, politicians and media are all anxious to death. How they wish to see the Chinese people run all the way towards heaven and then plunge into hell! But China has been slow to take action like a fool. As a result, for decades, the West has been forced to be patient and circumvent on "neutral" issues that are neither salty nor indifferent, and then watched Chinese leaders drag out time in a slow and rambling way, "avoiding" the real core issues. After listening to Wen Jiabao’s press conference, the title of the New York Times article was: “Wen Jiabao calls for political reform but avoids specific issues”! The American media is much more anxious than the Chinese themselves. Wen Jiabao's answer is unlikely to satisfy the West. He limits the connotation of China's political reform issues to China's domestic issues, only as a means to solve economic and social problems, as a way to solve problems left over from history, and as a frontier part of China's reform process. There is no use of the "big words" in liberal theory, no reference to the United States and the West as examples, and no use of any utopian blueprint. It is an issue of "Chinese political reform" that is native-born, pragmatic, and strictly speaking has little to do with foreign countries. By keeping China's political issues in this position, he is much more correct than Sun Yat-sen a century ago and Mao Zedong half a century ago. At the press conference, he said: "I dare to face the people and face history. It is only the Spring and Autumn Period that makes me guilty." Although Wen Jiabao did not establish the major policies of the Chinese government alone, as one of the core decision-makers, this typical conservative stance is worthy of the saying "It is only the Spring and Autumn Period that makes me guilty."