Vendors at a curio market in Beijing on Monday unfurl a 1969 banner depicting former Chinese leader Mao Zedong “inspecting the great army of the Cultural Revolution.” China embarked on the revolution – a decade of tumult Mao launched to enforce radical egalitarianism – exactly 50 years ago. Photo: AP

 
Discussions over China's Cultural Revolution have been emerging on the Internet. The decade-long internal chaos was a huge disaster. It is thus normal to hear people talking about it on the 50th anniversary of this movement. On the other hand, however, such discussions cannot be treated as a cleavage in people's ideological understanding. Chinese society shares much more consensus than divergences in terms of the way we see this part of history.

Resolution on certain questions in the history of our party since the founding of the People's Republic of China, adopted in 1981 by the Communist Party of China (CPC), made the authoritative conclusion of the utter denial of Cultural Revolution.

Since then, generations of Chinese leaders have all firmly stuck to the conclusion of the resolution. Completely denying the values of the Cultural Revolution is not only an understanding throughout the party, but also a stable consensus of the whole of Chinese society.

Since the 18th National congress of the CPC, as well as the development of the "Four Comprehensives" strategy, China is getting increasingly closer to the goal of realizing the modernization of country despite ups and downs.

It is not possible for such a revolution to be repeated. The decade of calamity caused severe damage, leaving permanent pain for many Chinese. Entirely denying the values of the Cultural Revolution will help Chinese society remain vigilant against the danger of all kinds of disorder.

Over the past few years, many developing countries have experienced civil strife, but not China. A significant reason is that the lessons the Cultural Revolution taught us has given the nation a certain immunity. Nobody fears turmoil, and desires stability more than us.

China's development in recent decades started from complete denial of the Cultural Revolution in theory and shifting the focus of the country to economic construction in practice. In the over 30 years, we strived to recover from the losses. The shared goal has provided strong momentum for the country's progress. It also helped strengthen social solidarity. The principle of not straying onto the wrong path has been widely endorsed by the public.

The Cultural Revolution era is long over. Reform has brought China to the fore of globalization. No matter whether it is the anti-corruption campaign and advancing rule of law, or developing the public's livelihood and reducing social gap, we must stick to the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

We have bid farewell to the Cultural Revolution. We can say it once again today that the Cultural Revolution cannot and will not come back. There is no place for it in today's China.