Communist Party Schools Enroll Private Businessmen

Schools run by the Communist Party of China (CPC), which previously enrolled only the Party elite, have recently been eyed by private businessmen as excellent training centers.

Created by the Party's committees at different levels, Party schools are characterized by a special educational system designed to spread Marxism among cadres. Doctoral programs are available for the most distinguished students.

Now, courses targeting private businessmen have been launched in Party schools at both central and local levels. Sources say that the enthusiasm for applying a seat in a Party school is soaring, particularly in the coastal regions where the market economy is on a fast track.

Xu Guanju, president of the private-owned Chuanhua Corporation in the coastal province of Zhejiang, and a Party school student, said that the courses have helped him "thoroughly understand Deng Xiaoping's theory and the Party's lines in the preliminary stage of socialism."

Xu was enrolled in a master's degree-level business refresher course in the provincial Party School. Xu said he supported the Party members to establish a Party committee in his company.

Jiang Zemin, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, last month visited Xu's company and learned how a grass-roots Party organization carries out its activities in a private company.

Jiang was pleased with Xu's success.

Xiaoluxia Party school is the first village-level Party school in Zhejiang province. Every Saturday, the parking lot outside the school is filled with the luxury cars owned by heads of private companies.

"We want to know the Party's new policies, as we all remember that it was the Party's policy that has made us rich," said Xie Senmiao, a village entrepreneur who operates a successful electrical fitting company.

Xie, like most private businessmen, is not a Party member. There are more than 30 private companies in Xiaoluxia village, pop. 2,000, which exported 25 million-U.S. dollars-worth of goods last year.

Yu Zhangqian, deputy president of Xiaoluxia Party school, said that Party school courses are very helpful because they always provide useful guidance to the bosses, who are willing to re- charge them with some knowledge after their businesses were expanded.

In April this year, the Party School of the CPC Central Committee opened a course on the market economy for some 70 private businessmen from Wenzhou, Zhejiang province. It is the first time the ruling Party of a socialist country has opened a special class for private business people, who were previously condemned as the "exploiting class."

The Party's doctrines are incorporated into the curriculum, as well as China's economic development strategy, world economic trends, high-technologies, regulations of the WTO, modern enterprise systems and economic laws.

"The courses are very useful. I have become aware that China's entry into the WTO means a great opportunity for my textile company. I am ready to rake it in," Zhou Yanming, a private business owner from Wenzhou said.

A teacher with the Party school's advanced studies department said that the remarks by Jiang Zemin that the CPC represents the development requirements of the advanced productive forces are widely accepted among private businessmen, who know how they themselves got rich under the leadership of the Party.

The teacher said that Party schools at various levels will further satisfy the private businessmen's demands.

There are 80 million people engaged in private business in China. At the suggestion of the CPC Central Committee, Chinese lawmakers revised the constitution last year at the National People's Congress, including a statement about the protection of private business into the new version.

The CPC was set up on July 1, 1921, and now has more than 63 million members. Some 90 percent of the private companies in some prosperous coastal provinces have set up CPC committees.



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