I just finished reading Zhao Ziyang’s memoir, Prisoner of the State, which the former Chinese Premier managed to secretly record onto tapes and have smuggled out of house arrest before his death in 2005. He’s best known as a reformer who fought for economic liberalisation in the 1980s, but was pushed out of power after opposing the use of force against student protesters during the TAM demonstrations in 1989. He was placed in house arrest, and remained in unofficial detention until his death 15 years later.
The book reads partly as his own defence of his political legacy. He affirms his consistent loyalty to Deng Xiaoping, and expresses his deep frustration over his illegal house arrest, carried out against the rules and procedures of the Party. In some ways, it reminded me of Zhisui Li’s memoirs of his time as personal physician to Mao – it’s written as a defence to posterity that he behaved correctly, rather than a critical reflection over the period of Chinese history that he influenced (and unlike Mao’s physician, Zhao makes no mention of the impact his career and his decisions had on his family or those around him). But even keeping in mind that this is own account, it feels honest, and it gives a fascinating view into Chinese politics and the events of the 1980s.
Other than Zhao’s overall reflections on what was happening, and his hope for future reform in China, there were a few other aspects of his account that I found interesting:
Competing factions within the government: That people in power tend to organise themselves into competing factions is perhaps a component of every political system, but given that China is officially ruled by one party, it’s interesting to read about the factions, almost like sub-parties, competing for power and trying to set policy direction behind the scenes. During Zhao’s time, it was reformers vs. conservatives, and although people fell on different points on the political spectrum, ultimately power was a struggle between these forces. When Zhao was forced out of power for his attempts to handle the TAM protests leniently, it was the culmination of a long struggle by conservatives to remove him from office and to stop the economic and political reform program that he was leading. Although Chinese politics continue to be opaque, the same struggle between conservatives and reformers seems to be going on behind the scenes today, and unfortunately, at the moment, like in 1989, the conservatives have gained the upper hand.
Deng Xiaoping never wanted political reform: Perhaps an obvious point, but because he’s often portrayed as the reasonable leader who fixed things after Mao, it’s easy to forget that Deng Xiaoping wanted only economic but not political reform, and had no tolerance for any form of protest to Communist Party rule.
Li Peng as evil: Reading the book reminded me of a computer virus from the 1990s that I once read about:
The virus would pop up on your screen and ask a question about the hard-line prime minister, Li Peng, who had presided over the massacres that ended the 1989 Tiananmen democracy movement. “Do you think,” the virus pop-up asked, “that Li Peng is a good prime minister or a bad prime minister?”
Li Peng is widely despised, and those who said he was a bad prime minister found that the virus disappeared and did no damage. But those who said he was a good prime minister found that the virus attacked their hard drives.
It’s also interesting that in Chinese, the memoir is called 改革历程, Path to Reform, while in English it’s been given the title Prisoner of the State – a reflection of what’s likely to appeal to the respective audiences?
I haven’t gotten around to reading this one yet, but have you ever read ‘The Political Logic of Economic Reform in China’ by Susan Shirk?
It’s basically about the 80s reform decade and goes into a lot of depth teasing out the ‘logic’ of political competition within China – who the political actors were, what power they wielded, what they used the power to do, the political and economic constraints that were placed on them, etc.
It’s largely based on her own interviews and is pretty heavy-going but highly worthwhile.
I haven’t read that, but it sounds very interesting — I’ll put it on my reading list. It’s interesting to read about these topics from different perspective — and even though the 80s seems like a long time ago, it seems like a lot of the systems behind the scenes still work in the same ways, and it’s still a lot of the same people. Thanks for the recommendation!