"Electoral Campaign" at Peking University

"Electoral Campaign" at Peking University

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The primary elections at Peking University (e.g. to chose three official student candidates) were at first scheduled for the end of November 1980. The students had their own constituency, the other Peking University constituency was formed by teachers and gereral staff.

During several weeks before the elections the campus saw a lively and diverse campaigning, with speeches by candidates, public debates, election platforms and big-character posters and journals that promoted the views of those running for seats.

Eventually there were 29 candidates to run for the two student seats in the Haidian (海淀) People's Congress (at least the official results of the primaries list that many names, there had been several additions and withdrawals beforehand).

Among the candidates there were some well-known civil rights activists who had already been known as authors of dazibao at the Democracy Wall or in one of the independent magazines a year before. One female student (there were at least four female candidates) focussed on the situation of women in Chinese society. As a whole there were candidates both critical to the government and close to the official party line. ABC correspondent Jim Laurie has produced a TV Report on the Peking University electoral campaign in 1980.

Most candidates invited to public debates either outside on the campus grounds, in the dining hall or in one of the university auditoriums. Often several hundred students attended, and at a few instances (like the big presentation of ten main candidates on November 28) there were even more than a thousand. Election platforms were usually posted at the central "Triangle Square" (三角地), where they were eagerly read and copied.

The platforms and debates rarely touched upon local or academic issues, usually they related to the big national topics such as political freedoms and rights, the appraisal of Mao and the Cultural Revolution, the economic situation, theory and practice of "socialism" and issues of the role of women.

On posters and chalkboards candidates presented their CVs, electoral promises and sometimes also lengthy treatises that reminded more of the traditional political speak than of the rhetorics of the new civil rights movement.

Hu Ping (胡平), a research student of philosophy, focusses in his "electoral program" on the freedoms of expression and of the press. He says these are "the most basic rights of citizens", and "enjoying them has not yet won everything, but without them everything else would be lost." The level of democracy also depends on the development of productive forces, therefore it needs to be unfolded cautiously. But China's low economic level must not prevent the society creating a solid base for Democracy. The most important instrument that already gives a lot of power to the people even under such limited circumstances, he adds, is the freedom of expression. Hu Ping presents himself as a prudent theorist and critic of the system.

The literature student, author and female candidate Zhang Manling (张蔓菱) is one that everbody talks about. She is focussing on women's issues, but her (both male and female) audience is deeply divided. Her assertion that Chinese women should primarily emphasize their feminine features and their "Oriental Beauty" (东方美) just as men should stress their masculinity, receives broad approval as well as strong contradiction. And she says, women should "at the same time be elegant, active, intelligent and gentle", and society should not just treat them as "pure labor force".

When some of her fellow students attack her personally during a late-night debate, she posts a passionate dazibao the following day titled "Women are also Humans" (女子也是人) that draws again - sometimes a bit confused - counter-polemics.

Wang Juntao (王军涛) from the Technology and Physics Department, was already a key figure in the 1976 Tiananmen Movement. He is closely linked to the Communist Youth League (and later becomes an alternate member of its Central Committee), and reformist Party Secretary General Hu Yaobang will at some point receive him for a personal discussion. 

In his political treatises Wang delivers a very critical judgement on the Cultural Revolution and other deviations in party history. He wants to fight corrupt cadres, and democratize the political system. Mao, he says in one of the electoral debates, was not a Marxist but a dictator, because he never implemented the kind of democracy practiced by the "Paris Commune" (of 1871) although Marx had repeatedly praised it.

Fang Zhiyuan (房志远) is a student of international relations. One of his manifestos carries the headline: „socialism = public property + democracy“. Fang is also (like Wang Juntao and Hu Ping) linked to the independent journals of the Democracy Movement, he represents the Guangzhou Magazine "Voice of the People" in Beijing. Fang is critical of Mao, questions the leading role of the Communist Party, advocates a multi-party system, and strongly defends the freedoms of expression and the press. To underline this, he drafts an outline of a new media and publication law.

Xia Shen (夏申) is a particularly active candidate who writes numerous treatises, publishes his own campaign Magazine "The Citizens" (Gongmin 公民) and organizes several rallies and meetings. He makes known his opinions on many diverse topics, though his arguments often sound a bit complicated. He claims in a pre-election interview that "Marxism is only part of the outstanding cultural heritage of mankind", Marx has died more than a hundred years ago, the world has greatly changed since, one cannot find all the answers with Karl Marx any more, but people could ask how Marx would have dealt with a specific problem.

Although himself a Communist Party member, Xia says in response to a question, that party interests do not stand above people's interests – if he were elected, he would in the first place follow the interests of the people. He also says: "We have to diversify power, give it back to the people, democratize political and economic power, and liberate thought."

Yang Baikui (杨百揆), again a student from the Department of International Relations, speaks of the ten years of the Cultural Revolution as a "big step backwards into feudalism". Asked whether political or economic reforms were more important, Yang says that China first of all needed a renewal of its economy and "personal freedom", only on that basis it could implement additional freedoms like those of expression and the press. The educated elites in his opinion play an important role in that, "intellectuals are the most progressive force in society," says Yang.

Yang Lichuan (杨利川), a student of philosophy and Party Secretary of his graduate class, stands out by his unconventional style of campaigning. He gives speeches from a rostrum outside (while most of the others invite to one of the auditoriums), he repeatedly appears at rallies of his competitors to give his own opinions (and he sometimes brings along a megaphone to make himself heard), and he also warns of "political seducers" among the other candidates. For socialism he sees a "crisis of confidence", but he would still like to develop and democratize it.

Liu Juan (刘娟) does not write lengthy treatises herself, but she publishes a number of surveys and research studies on the situation of female students at Peking University, on health issues and some practical problems of campus life. Her motto for the elections: "Everything for the free development of human beeings".

Other candidates who caught some public attention are Tian Zhili (田志立), Yu Dahai (于大海), Yao Liming (姚礼明), Yi Zhigang (易志刚), Lu Jingli (卢敬利), Yuan Hongbing (袁红兵), Xue Qiliang (薛启亮) and Yao Liming (姚礼明) as well as the two female contestants Liu Wei (刘卫) und Xu Xinxin (许欣欣).