FURTHER CONSOLIDATE SHANGHAI’S STABILITY1
JUNE 13, 1989
Since June 9, the situation in Shanghai has changed markedly.
The First Phase
Beginning on June 9, the situation in Shanghai improved rapidly, and great changes took place, not only here but also in Beijing, which gradually stabilized.
Mobilization of the People. A significant factor in the city’s turnaround was that the vast majority of our people united under the slogan, “Keep Shanghai stable, keep the overall situation stable, continue with production and ensure livelihoods.” We can say that we had the support of over 90% of the people. Our working class, in particular, had already organized, and what’s more, its spirit was unprecedentedly high. We have received many letters these past few days, some from entire families, some from a workshop, a store, or a research institute; there was even one signed “An old silver-haired warrior.” Many colleagues said they shed tears as they read these letters, and I, too, cried as I read them. Because the people were organized and united as one, we were able to send 100,000 in worker patrols onto the streets in a timely way. They removed the roadblocks, and traffic resumed in short order. By yesterday, all of the 1,000 damaged buses had been repaired.
The main reasons we were able to obtain such results during this serious rioting in Shanghai were the clear instructions and appropriate policies of the Party Central Committee and the State Council. Jiang Zemin spoke with me by phone every day and relayed instructions from central leaders in timely fashion, so our general direction was very clear. In a conversation at the most dangerous moment, he said, “Don’t place your hopes in using troops—you must mobilize the people.” That’s why I made it very clear in my televised address that we wouldn’t be using troops. If I hadn’t said so at the time, we wouldn’t have been able to mobilize the workers so quickly because everyone would think, “If you’re going to use the army, what do you want our worker patrols for?” If we had used troops and then mobilized workers, I’m afraid the workers wouldn’t have come.
At the time, several leaders of tertiary institutions felt their work was very difficult and urged the Municipal Party Committee to impose martial law. Had we not clearly stated our determination to avoid using troops, it would have been very hard to mobilize the people. That decision has now proved to be very popular. Many people have written to say that it was indeed correct not to use the army and to rely on the working class. Everyone felt at ease and stepped forward enthusiastically. With worker patrols at the front line and with public security police and armed police backing them up, the problem was solved. At the same time, there was a significant change in the climate in Beijing during those two days. Many people’s thinking changed and everyone’s understanding of the situation made a quantum leap over those two days.
Collective Decisionmaking. In dealing with the entire incident, every decision of ours was made after collective discussion. The Municipal Party Committee, [Vice Mayor] and Chairperson Ye Gongqi of the Standing Committee of the Municipal People’s Congress, other vice mayors of the municipal government, and many retired colleagues—everyone carefully looked into matters together, discussed them repeatedly with open minds, and put forth different views. Not one of the members of the Municipal Party Committee’s Standing Committee worried whether his opinions were “left” or “right,” were radical or conservative. Everyone raised different opinions out of a spirit of being responsible to the Party, to the people, and to Shanghai’s stability—of being responsible to history.
We then engaged in democratic decisionmaking, after which we all individually focused on implementation. Each person was responsible for one area of work and went about organizing it concretely, seeing it through to the end. It isn’t at all easy to organize worker patrol teams—meetings were held every night during the three days of mobilizing people ideologically, with subsequent meetings led by Huang Ju, [Wu] Bangguo, and [Gu] Chuanxun for those in charge at the relevant bureau-level departments and districts as well as factory directors. Implementation occurred step by step, and that is how we mobilized the people.
Retired colleagues like [Chen] Guodong and those at the Advisory Group on Urban Administration stood firm with us through it all, offering ideas and advice. At critical moments when we were uncertain, we always invited them to discuss things with us and act as our gatekeepers. Looking back now, we can see that during this struggle to keep Shanghai stable, there were no major errors in any of our decisions.
Broad Unity. In the course of stabilizing Shanghai and the overall situation, we created a political scenario of broad unity by mobilizing all sides—all front lines, all classes, and all walks of life—and especially by relying on the working class. The Shanghai Federation of Trade Unions played a very important part in organizing worker patrols; the Youth League and Women’s Federation also did a lot of work. Likewise, our government agency cadres performed well and made singular contributions.
During the most difficult time, cadre attendance at the Municipal Party Committee and the agencies of the municipal government still reached 99%. When traffic was cut off for three days, our workers and cadres all walked or bicycled to work. Many felt that even if they had to walk three or four hours, they wanted to get to work to show that they were not fleeing from the front. Government cadres were the first to sign up to help maintain traffic during the first three days. Most cadres of district and municipal agencies performed very well—over 90% of those at agencies of the Municipal Party Committee and government signed up, and it was 100% at many agencies.
Our public security police and armed police played a seminal role throughout the entire course of events. During the early phase, they were beaten and cursed at and felt very aggravated. The Municipal Party Committee told them to avoid direct clashes, so they were willing to put up with some unfair treatment because the time had not yet come for such action, and they were afraid of accidentally injuring people, which would have led to even greater clashes. In the end, the worker patrols arrived and did their work beautifully. The public security police and the armed police played a vital role, aided by the security departments, which also did a great deal of work—we send salutations to them all. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA)—our strong backstop, the foundation of our political power, our Great Wall of steel, our pillar—contributed to stabilizing Shanghai as well.
On behalf of the Municipal Party Committee and government, I also want to thank the Party committees and governments of all the districts. The policy we proposed of “assignments by district, unified command, and fighting jointly” was the right one. I’ve always advocated devolving power to districts and counties; we have to rely on them especially for social security and order. The neighborhoods know the lawbreakers and lowlifes best—if we don’t rely on them, how can we understand things clearly? So we have to integrate the vertical and the horizontal jurisdictions, relying primarily on the horizontal.
In fact, for several days in a row, leading members of district Party committees and governments have already been organizing teams to dismantle roadblocks. They haven’t slept well for several days and nights. On the night of June 8, the mother of Gu Deng, Party secretary of Yangpu District, died of a heart attack, yet he remained steadfast at his post. I offer my condolences to Gu Deng. For the sake of the public, you did not think of yourself and were not able to see your dying mother one last time—I am very sorry about this. I want to commend those from the district Party committees and governments for staying calm in a crisis and for keeping up the fight.
I also want to express my thanks to all the county Party secretaries and county heads. Although you weren’t on the front lines, you kept the rural areas stable, which was the greatest form of support for the urban area. All counties rushed shipments of vegetables in the night, giving the urban area a constant stream of support. CCTV yesterday reported panic buying in some cities but not in Shanghai, which reflects people’s confidence in the government. The staff of our finance and trade departments also did very well—they used the stretch of time when roadblocks were being cleared at night to organize rush shipments, and they made excellent arrangements in the markets. Some old ladies living in the backstreets told me they felt a bit panicky during the first two days, so when the price of vegetables sold by individual vendors began rising sharply, they bought a lot at the higher prices. As it turned out, state-owned vegetable markets had ample supplies, so a lot of the vegetables they had bought rotted and had to be thrown out. They later had harsh words for the individual vendors, who they thought were trying to profit from the country’s troubles.
As the foregoing remarks make clear, at the critical moment, our Party, our Party members and cadres, and our working class were all up to the test. Throughout the entire course of events, the publicity departments also did a great deal of work. Every night, [Chen] Zhili2 and the heads of the “three papers and two stations,”3 Gong Xinhan,4 Gong Xueping,5 and their colleagues at the Municipal Party Committee’s publicity department carefully planned the next day’s newspaper layouts and broadcasts. The Municipal Party Committee and government are pleased with your publicity work during this phase—you have played a large part in winning over people’s hearts. Of course this was primarily due to the correct policies of the Party Central Committee, but the way our work was done in Shanghai was also quite good.
The Main Tasks for the Next Phase
The most important step now is to carefully study Deng Xiaoping’s speech,6 align our thinking, and further consolidate stability in Shanghai. As we move ahead, we mustn’t overstate our achievements or overestimate the positive turn of events—we must recognize that the situation is still very grim. I had not expected such a strong reaction from the people after my televised address on June 8, and I was very moved. Particularly on the morning of June 9, the traffic problems were solved all at once and the forces of right were on the rise—the people were clapping for joy.
Deng Xiaoping’s speech was a historic one and provides an outline of our work in the coming period. That’s why the Municipal Party Committee has decided to hold a study session for all its members, first within the Party, then outside—to align the thinking of the leading cadres within the Party, then align the thinking of the people, some of whom still have some problem understanding the situation. As Jiang Zemin urged, we should turn things to our advantage in working on people’s thinking, which should begin to ease up now that the truth has come to light and various favorable developments have occurred. We shouldn’t be too impatient about this process. We should use Deng Xiaoping’s important speech to align everyone’s understanding and should focus tightly on this work, but we shouldn’t rush people to state their positions. What we want now is still stability, it is unity and calm. Don’t make everyone jittery, or else it will be hard to sustain the stable situation. I believe that it will be relatively easy to align the thinking of the vast majority of people, especially the ones who are our core supporters.
Our second task is to further rely on the people and organize teams to consolidate the stable situation in Shanghai and maintain traffic and security. We must reinforce the worker patrol teams and should take three steps in this regard: (1) be confident that we will surely win, (2) have tight organization, and (3) have strong discipline. Although the teams are led by the factory Party secretary or the factory director, thus ensuring strong discipline among the ranks, we’ve now discovered some cases in which individual patrol teams have been rather lax when executing tasks, which is very bad for their image. They should learn from the PLA, firmly remembering the “three main disciplines and eight points to note”7 and doing a good job of reinforcing the worker patrol teams. They mustn’t become lax, they mustn’t be lulled, and they mustn’t disband as soon as the situation improves—that won’t do!
Some have asked whether the duties of the patrols can be expanded somewhat, whether they can also crack down on pornography and on the black market. We feel it isn’t appropriate to do that now. These problems can’t be solved in one stroke: they have accompanied reform and opening up and have social origins. It isn’t realistic to ask the patrol teams to solve them. The worker patrols were sent out during an emergency. They restored traffic throughout the city, and their morale is high. If we were to now ask them to do other things, I’m afraid it would be hard to mobilize them, so we should take no action before we reach a consensus on what they should be doing. The main duties of patrols at this point is to maintain traffic order, protect the free flow of traffic, and assist the public security police in some security work.
At the same time, we must let the neighborhoods and backstreets play a role. Everyone should keep their eyes open and report bad elements. Now even the old ladies in the backstreets have been mobilized, and they play an important role.
Our third task is to further develop the “Two Increases and Two Decreases”8 campaign to win back lost time. The goals are still the original ones, except we have to emphasize ideological work, in particular; agencies and enterprises at all levels must focus on studying Deng Xiaoping’s speech. We believe that the workers will have this kind of zeal and will increase production.
We must also work on the foreign-invested enterprises and commend the good ones. I’ve received many letters over the past few days such as a touching one from Hans-Joachim Paul, technical implementation manager at Shanghai Volkswagen. When his headquarters told him to go back home, he refused after hearing my televised address, and continued to ride his bicycle to work. That’s why I’ll go to Shanghai Volkswagen tomorrow to have a look. Then the British 48 Group9 sent me a telegram saying, “We were your friends in the past and are still your friends now; we will continue to urge British businessmen to do business with you.” That’s a fine thing! The president of the Marubeni Corporation of Japan said he was deeply moved when every one of his Chinese employees continued coming to work. He, too, decided not to leave, and would even urge those who had already left to return as soon as possible. In yet another example, Mr. Tang, a Hong Kong manager, wrote that he couldn’t understand why people would denounce Deng Xiaoping and want to overthrow him after he had spearheaded reforms for 10 years and had done so much, and after the Communist Party had achieved so much. Tang attributes it to the lack of good ideological publicity. He’s helping us sum up our experiences and sees the situation in Shanghai as very promising, and so has decided that his investments here should remain unchanged.
Yesterday, CCTV reported a series of stories on work being done to keep foreign investment steady. We haven’t done enough in this area; we must do more and persuade the foreign businessmen who have left to return as soon as possible. In the earlier phase, we put our energies into organizing the worker patrol teams; now we must hurry up and focus on production.
1. This is the main part of Zhu Rongji’s speech to a meeting of leading cadres from Shanghai’s Municipal Party Committee and government.
2. Chen Zhili was then a member of the Standing Committee of the Municipal Party Committee and director of its publicity department.
3. The “three papers and two stations” were Liberation Daily, Wenhuibao, Xinmin Evening News, Shanghai People’s Radio, and Shanghai TV.
4. Gong Xinhan was then deputy director of the Municipal Party Committee’s publicity department.
5. Gong Xueping was then director of the Shanghai Bureau of Radio and Television and also director of Shanghai TV.
6. This refers to the speech made by Deng Xiaoping on June 9, 1989, when he met with cadres of army level and above from the troops enforcing martial law in Beijing.
7. These rules of behavior are part of the tradition of the People’s Liberation Army and embody the military’s nature and mission.
8. The “two increases and two decreases” were increasing production and decreasing waste, and increasing revenues and decreasing expenditures.
9. The British 48 Group was founded in 1954. In 1991 its name was changed to the 48 Group Club and it merged with the Sino-British Trade Council to form the China-Britain Trade Group. In 1998 the China-Britain Trade Group changed its name to the China-Britain Business Council.