New awarenesson mass mobilization in the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress
Truong Thi Mai
Member of the Politburo and Secretary of the Party Central Committee, Head of the Party Central Committee’s Mass Mobilization Commission
Viewpoints and the core content on mass mobilization in the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress inherit and consistently develop from the thought on mass mobilization of President Ho Chi Minh and the Party Congresses’ Resolutions, especially the Resolution of the 7th Plenum of 11th Party Central Committee on “Strengthening and renewing the Party's leadership over mass mobilization in the new situation.”
Thoughts, and viewpoints on mass mobilization and mass mobilization work of President Ho Chi Minh and the Communist Party of Viet Nam have been consistent through all revolutionary stages. However, progress has been made in content, form, and methodology development. There have been new contents, new and increased awareness on contents in line with revolutionary requirements of the new period.
1. Inheriting the thoughts on mass mobilization of President Ho Chi Minh and the Party's viewpoints, especially the Resolution of the 8th Plenum of the 6th Party Congress Central Committee on “Renewing the Party’s mass mobilization work, strengthening the relations between the Party and people,” the Resolution of the 7th Plenum of 11thCentral Committee on “Strengthening and renewing the leadership of the Party over mass mobilization in the new situation,” developing the system of viewpoints, tasks and solutions for Party mass mobilization, the work of mass mobilization has been more effective and appropriate, meeting requirements of the new period of modernization and deep international integration. The system of viewpoints, tasks and solutions have been enhanced as set out in the documents of the 12th Party Congress.
The system of the Party's viewpoints on mass mobilization has been fully and comprehensively established. First, the revolution is the cause of the people, by the people and for the people; The people are masters, the people exercise their mastership. Second, the motivation to drive the people's movement is to promote the people’s ownership, meet practical interests of the people, harmonize interests; rights must go hand in hand with civic obligations; attention must be given to direct benefit of the people; mobilization of people’s contribution must go hand in hand with fostering people’s strength; do what is beneficial to the people, and avoid what is harmful to people. Third, renovate Party leadership in mass mobilization in association with building the clean and strong Party and State. All Party viewpoints and lines and State's laws must be for the interests of the people, by the people and for the people. Each cadre, Party member, civil servants and public employees must be exemplary for people to follow. Fourth, mass mobilization work is the responsibility of the political system, cadres, Party members, civil servants, public employees, members of mass organizations, officers and soldiers of the armed forces. In which, the Party exercises its leadership, the government organizes implementation, the Fatherland Front, the socio-political organizations play the core and consultative role. Fifth, the State continues to institutionalize the mechanism “Party leads and the State manages, the people are maters,” for the organization in the political system, cadres and party members, public employees, civil servants and officers and soldiers of the armed forces to carry out mass mobilization, promote people's mastery and institutionalize the motto “People know, people discuss, people do and people supervise”; and methods to rally people must be diversified, scientific and effective.
Our Party’s viewpoints on mass mobilization have demonstrated fully, clearly and deeply the nature of the socialist democracy, establish the country’s position, the historic role of Vietnamese people in all revolutionary periods. The viewpoints stated that promotion of democracy and meeting people’s interests, especially direct interest is the great motivation to drive the people's movement; mobilization must go hand in hand with fostering people's strength; renewing the Party's leadership methods must be tied to taking care of people's lives. The viewpoints also identifies responsibilities of the political system in mass mobilization. The Government must institutionalize the Party lines and Resolutions of the Party on mass mobilization. Thus, given President Ho Chi Minh Though and the Party viewpoints, the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress continues to supplement and develop mass mobilization in both theory and practices.
2. As far as notion is concerned, the Communist Party of Viet Nam unanimously uses the term “mass mobilization” instead of the term “mass agitation” or “the mass work” in the documents of the Party.
The concept “mass mobilization” was used by President Ho Chi Minh since he led revolutionary in the Viet Bac resistance area in the early years of the war against the French colonialists. In the article “Mass Mobilization” published in Truth newspaper on 15 October 1949, President Ho Chi Minh used the words “mass mobilization” and “smart mass mobilization” to talk about a field of work of the Party. In addition to the concept of “mass mobilization,” in a number of other works, such as “Rectifying the way of working” published in 1947, President Ho Chi Minh also used other concepts like “mass,” and “people” but to imply a the large force who followed the Party’s revolutionary and not as a field of work. Thus, President Ho Chi Minh pointed out the target to be mobilized were people. People in Ho Chi Minh ideology had very wide connotation, a rally of the mass, and each individual Vietnamese. According to Him, the people are “all sons and daughters of Viet Nam,” “Every Dragon and Fairy”, irrespective of ethnicity, belief, “the elderly, young, girls, boys, rich, poor, higher class or lower class,” if they are Vietnamese, they are the targets of mobilization and also the mobilizers.
Later, due to the characteristics of each stage of the revolution, the notions “mass agitation” or “the mass work” were used quite commonly. In essence, these concepts are not much different to the concept “mass organization,” but the connotation is “mass organization” broader, true to the nature of a field of Party work. The fact that both the 7th Plenum of the 11th Party Central Committee, and the Documents of the 12th Party Congress use these words shows that “it is a task of strategic significance for the entire Vietnamese revolutionary cause, an important condition for ensuring the leadership of the Party and strengthening ties between the Party, State and people,” as stipulated by the “Regulations on mass mobilization of the political system” issued in 2010 by the Politburo of the 10th Party Congress.
3. For the first time, in the documents of the 12th Party Congress, mass mobilization is elaborated in an exclusive section “Continue to renovate and improve the effectiveness of mass mobilization, and strengthen close ties between the Party and people” in Part XV- Building a clean and strong Party, enhance leading capacity and combativeness of the Party. Accordingly, the requirements for mass mobilization is to continue to renovate and improve efficiency. Renovation here is to renovate content, method, the way to do mass mobilization, renew the Party's leadership over this work; Renovation is a necessary condition to improve the effectiveness of mass mobilization; An important goal to be achieved is strengthening ties between the Party and the people.
In the documents of the Party from the 11th Tenure upwards, the work of mass mobilization was integrated in the work of Party building. In the 11th Congress documents, mass mobilization was included in the section “Training revolutionary virtues, and anti-individualism” of Part XII – “Build a clean and strong Party, improve leading and fighting capacity of the Party,” in “Implementing well the Regulation on mass mobilizationin the political system, renovate and improve the quality of mass mobilization work.”
It should be stressed that, some fields of work, and important political tasks of the Party relating to the work of mass mobilization have always been mentioned in the documents of the Party congresses so far, they are “Promoting socialist democracy, ensure the people's mastery” and “Promoting the great national unity bloc.” These are big contents, and tasks, of decisive significance to the success of the revolution in all periods.
By spending an exclusive section of the documents of the 12th Party Congress on mass mobilization, the Party has set great store by its significance, role and importance as “it is of strategic significance for the entire revolutionary cause of our country,” and is an important work of Party building. During the period of industrialization, modernization and international integration, in face of requirements of economic development, security and defense, efforts should be made to address issues related to the interests of the people, create a social consensus, support and active participation of citizens in order to ensure effective implementation the tasks that the Party set out. The 30-year-renovation has brought about many valuable lessons, including: “Renovation must always follow the principle, “the people are the root,” work for the sake of the people, rely on the people, promote people’s mastery, sense of responsibility, creativity and resources and bring into play the strength of the great national unity.”
4. Consistent with Resolution No. 25-NQ/TW of the 11th Party Central Committee, the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress defined the objectives of mass mobilization in the new period: strengthen people's confidence in the Party and the great unity bloc and the close relationship between the Party and the people, gather and mobilize the people to implement the Party lines and State’s laws and policies, promote the immense power of the people to form a broad revolutionary movement to build and protect the country.
Among the above objectives, “strengthen people's confidence in the Party, the great unity bloc and the close relationship between the Party and the people,” is the specially important overarching objective considered as the highest target of mass mobilization in all periods. Resolution No. 25-NQ/TW of the 11th Party Central Committee, and the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress have continued setting out tasks of this objective in all fields of mass mobilization .
Mass mobilization only can not achieve this objective. It is necessary to simultaneously perform multiple tasks and work in various fields such as socio-economic, and cultural fields, security and defense, and building the political system. Given people's trust in the Party, the socialist regime as well as the strength of the great national unity bloc, the close ties between the people and Party must be built and created by many factors and conditions to achieve substantial results. In the current period, it can be said, people’s trust depends much on the correctness of the Party and the State’s decisions, purity, leading and ruling capacity of the Party, the exemplary righteousness of cadres and Party members, especially leading cadres of the Party and governments at all levels, and the settlement of issues regarding livelihood, knowledge, democracy and practical benefits to the people. These issues, after all, are the depth of mass mobilization that each party committee, party organization, government agency as well as each cadre, Party member, civil servant and public employee must be fully and deeply aware of and strictly implement.
When people trust the Party, State and regime, it is very favorable for strengthening and promoting the national great unity bloc, implementation of the Party lines, the State’s laws and policies as well as successful mass mobilization.
5. Tasks and solutions for mass mobilization in the Resolution of the 12th Party are elaborated in a comprehensive and synchronous manner , including:
First, renew the Party’s methods of directing mass mobilization work in the context of developing socialist-oriented market economy and international integration.
The renewal of leading methods over mass mobilization is identified as to associate mass mobilization with building a clean and strong Party and State. All Party viewpoints and lines, the State laws must be consistent with the interests of the people, by the people and for the people. It is necessary to build a strong Party in politics, ideology, organization and ethics, focus efforts on timely and effectively people’s resentment, making people believe in the Party’s leadership and boosting the close relationship between the people and the Party and State. The Resolution defines more clearly the responsibility of the Party to serve the people under the supervision of the people, and be responsible for its decisions before the people, the power and responsibilities of the heads and the relationship between Party committees, Party organizations with the heads, the exercise of democratic centralism, collective leadership, individual responsibility in association with upholding the role, responsibility and proactiveness of the heads and mechanisms to deal with violations by the heads. It stipulates that each cadre and Party member, civil servant and public employee must set example for people to follow.
At the same time, continue to implement the Resolution of the 4th Plenum of the 11th Party Central Committee, on Party building, stop and repulse the degradation of political ideology, morality and lifestyle. Strictly implement the principle of democratic centralism, self-criticism and criticism in Party activities. Implement the Regulation on Mass Mobilization in the political system, the Regulation on monitoring and criticism of the Vietnam Fatherland Front and other political and social organizations, the Regulation on the Vietnam Fatherland Front, political and social organizations and citizen’s contribution to Party and administration building. Further institutionalize the Party lines and resolutions. Strictly address cases of corruption and negative phenomena and complicated, prolonged petitions.
Second, institutionalize timely the Party lines into policies and laws in line with reality, meeting people’s interests, and legitimate aspirations.
This is one of very important tasks to ensure the effectiveness of the Party leadership in practice. In recent years, the Communist Party of Viet Nam has set great store by directing and leading the institutionalization of its lines and resolutions into policies and laws of the State, thus many major Party lines and decisions have been effectively put into life. However, the documents of the 12th Party Congress also frankly access the institutionalization, development of action plans and implementing of the Party resolutions, directives, regulations, and conclusion, including the institutionalization of Party lines and viewpoints on mass mobilization, especially “the Party leadership, State management, the people’s mastery.” Therefore, in the coming period, attention should be given on leading the institutionalization of the Party lines, resolutions, directives and decisions. In the development of institution and policies, strictly implement the principle that all Party lines and State laws and policies must conform to people’s will, deriving from the interests and legitimate aspirations of people. It can be seen that these issues were addressed in a number of previous documents of the Party, but this time shows new way of thinking, awareness of new and requires higher seriousness.
The mechanism “the Party leadership and the State management, the people’s mastery” is the mode of operation of Viet Nam’s political system, demonstrating superiority in the Vietnamese Party-State-People relation. To effectively operate the mechanism, the 12th Party Congress clearly points to some fundamental issues: First, accelerate institutionalization into law and soon put the into life all Party lines, especially the 12th Party Congress document. Second, create favorable conditions for people to directly exercise their right as the owner in the activities of the Party, the State and society. Third, continue to build and perfect the rule of law socialist state of the people, by the people, for the people under the leadership of the Party. In that spirit, in the coming time, it is necessary to institutionalize and concretize the Party lines and viewpoints on mass mobilization into legal documents for authorities, cadres and Party members, civil servants, public employees and people of all strata to implement. Amend, supplement and finalize specific policies on the working class, the peasantry, the intelligentsia, businessmen, young people, women, veterans, and the elderly. Promulgate mechanisms and policies to support and assist the people residing overseas to settle down, preserve and promote national cultural identity, turn their thoughts to the country, and make contribution to national construction.
Third, enhance and renovate, improve quality and efficiency of mass mobilization of the state agencies.
President Ho Chi Minh attached great importance to the role and responsibility of administration in mass mobilization. He stressed: All cadres of the administration, all members of unions and all members of the people's organizations (Lien Viet Front, the League for the Independence of Vietnam, Viet Minh for short,...) must be in charge mass mobilization. The Resolution of the 7th Plenum of the 11th Central Committee identified that mass mobilization is the responsibility of the political system, cadres and Party members, public employees, civil servants, officials, mass organizations, officers and soldiers of the armed forces. In particular, the Party leads, the government executes, the Fatherland Front and mass organizations are advisors and core force. Thus, mass mobilization is the task and responsibility of state agencies, governments at all levels, not “additional” work. It is possible to say that the identification of responsibility of state agencies, governments at all levels toward mass organization is not a new issue. However, it has been better aware of.
Accordingly, in order to fulfil their responsibilities, state agencies, and governments at all levels should regularly and thoroughly study the Party line, the State policies and laws on mass mobilization, proactively build the programs, plans and organize mass mobilization in association with the implementation of professional duties and enhance the role and responsibilities of head of organizations. Step up communication and education to raise awareness on mass mobilization. Continue to review, modify and supplement the legal system related to human rights, the rights and obligations of citizens in accordance with the 2013 Constitution. Promote democracy, openness and transparency in management and operation. Focus on solving urgent petitions and resentment of the people. Implement effectively the Program on Administrative Reform in the period of 2011-2020, focusing on building and finalizing the provisions of the law on the relationship between the State and the people, ensuring people's mastery, collecting people’s opinions before making decisions on important lines and policies and people’s supervision of state administrative agencies.
Improve work ethics, sense of responsibility in service of the people for cadres, public employees and civil servants, build a contingent of cadres and public employees who work in people’s interest, listen to people’s opinions to change the working style of cadres, public employees and civil servants. Strengthen inspection and control, strictly punish cadres, public employees and civil servants who show authoritarianism, corruption, wastefulness, harassment infringement on people’s legitimate interest and rights.
The documents of the 12th Party Congress also raise a number of tasks and solutions mentioned in a number of documents of recent Central Committee plenums, but this is the first time the Party Congress documents request cadres, Party members to truly believe, respect, understand, learn from, rely on, and be responsible before the people, promptly resolve urgent petitions and denunciations of citizens; pay attention to training and retraining of cadres working on mass mobilization. In the current period as well as in the future, Party committees and administrations at all levels must set store by and continue to lead, direct and implement, contributing to the effective implementation of the Resolution of the 4th Plenum of the 11th Party Central Committee, “On some urgent issues in Party building at present.”
Inheriting the essence of President Ho Chi Minh Though on mass mobilization, the Communist Party of Viet Nam has always defined: mass mobilization is one of the important areas of Party building, a task of strategic significance for the country's revolutionary cause, conditions to ensure the Party's leadership, strengthen and enhance the relationship between the Party, State and people. The documents of the 12th Party Congress elaborates on the tasks of mass mobilization, reflecting new thinking, new awareness on mass mobilization amid the comprehensive renovation, industrialization, modernization and international integration. The Central Committee’s Mass Mobilization Commission and its system at all levels must develop and realize programs of action to implement the Resolution of the 12th Party Congress on mass mobilization, focusing on improving the quality of research, and advice to the Central Committee, Politburo, Secretariat and committees at all levels to implement synchronously tasks and responsibilities mentioned in the documents of the 12th Party Congress in order to bring about new, practical and more effective changes in this important work, contributing to building a clean and strong Party, and confidence of the people in the Party.
