Chinese New Left

Generally speaking, the New Left can be applied to a person who embraces leftist theories, ideals, and traditions rooted in variations of socialist ideology, and other schools criticizing postmodernism and neoliberalism.

Intellectual Wang Hui explains the origin of, and his skepticism about, the term: The first stirring of a more critical view of official marketization goes back to 1993 ...

[13] The development of the New Left is correlated to increased Chinese nationalism after its period of low-profile presence on the world stage during the Deng Xiaoping era.

It is seen as a response to problems faced by China during its modernization drive since the 1980s, which has led to growing social inequality between the coast and hinterlands, and rich and poor.

Some scholars believe that, based on its unique and drastic 20th-century economic and political changes, China cannot adopt the social-democratic, capitalist model of many Western countries.

[8] Strikes, sit-ins, slow-downs, and peasant uprisings, sporadic due to government suppression, are on the rise and may become more organized with the development of the New Left.

[15] According to Zhang Xudong, "An advocate for New Deal-style economic and social policies in China was considered to be liberal in the 1980s, but as 'New Left' by the century's end."

The capitalist free-market model applied in most social-democratic programs is undesirable because, instead of challenging and reforming the existing market economy and representative democracy, it seeks to moderate the social consequences of structural division and hierarchy.

[19] New Left economist Cui Zhiyuan believes that a labour-capital partnership, based on the ideas of James Meade and John Maynard Keynes, can be used to introduce some flexibility to the labour market.

It is believed that the rising popularity of neo-Maoism is due to the growing economic dislocation and inequality under market reforms and globalisation.

[23] Neo-Maoists first became prominent under Hu Jintao's administration, delivering far-left attacks on CCP policy from websites such as Utopia, or MaoFlag.

[24] Maoism and neo-Maoism have been increasingly popular after the rise of Xi Jinping among millennials and poor Chinese people, and they are more frequently covered by foreign media.

[25][26][27][28] National Public Radio's website posted a story about Nanjie on 13 May 2011, calling it a prime example of recent "re-collectivizations" inspired by Mao's ideas: "The furniture and appliances in each home are identical, including the big red clocks with Chairman Mao's head, radiating psychedelic colours to the tune "The East Is Red."

Cui Zhiyuan and Gan Yang began to establish small, rural industries and collectives to mitigate the increasing socioeconomic gap and provide an alternative to large-scale capitalism.

[31] Of the Chinese Communist Party's current ideology, the idea of privatising China's countryside has not been accepted and it remains in public hands.

The Zhengzhou incident is one of the first manifestations of public nostalgia for the Mao era reported by the international press, although it is unclear whether these feelings are widespread.

[36][37] Politician Bo Xilai was promoted in October 2007 to party chief of Chongqing, a troubled province with high levels of pollution and unemployment and poor public health.

He led an economic reform of the region which was known as the Chongqing model and focused on expanding state influence in the economy, anti-corruption campaigns, and the promotion of "Red Culture".

Radio and television played Maoist propaganda and students were organized to "return to the countryside" and promote the singing of "red songs" during this period.

[45] The Xi administration, while imposing political controls on businesses, has also promoted greater economic liberalisation in Shenzhen, which was then held up as a model for the rest of China.

In September 2020, the former mayor and party chief of Shenzhen, Li Youwei, published a sharply-worded commentary in Wen Wei Po, warning that due to the resurgence of leftists discussing class struggle, China was at a crossroads for economic reform.

[49][50] On the 52nd anniversary of the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, dozens of neo-Maoists from all over China gathered in Hong Kong for commemorations, saying that their activities had been banned in the mainland.

After Xi's emphasis on a more equal society and promotion of the term "common prosperity", Li Guangman, a retired newspaper editor affiliated with the Chinese New Left, published an article[56][57] that claims a "profound revolution" was close that would take the party closer to masculinity[relevant?]