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The Sixth National Congress of the CPC

The Academy of Contemporary China and World StudiesUpdated:  July 13, 2022

The Sixth National Congress of the CPC

After the Great Revolution had failed, the CPC was forced to embark on a new course of taking leadership of the revolution on its own. It urgently needed to hold a national meeting to discuss the status of Chinese society and its impact on vital issues such as the nature, targets, motives and future of the Chinese revolution. 

From June 18 to July 11, 1928, the CPC held its Sixth National Congress secretly in Moscow. Participating in the congress were 142 delegates, including 84 formal delegates with voting rights. On behalf of the Fifth Central Committee, Qu Qiubai delivered a political report entitled "The Chinese Revolution and the Communist Party." Zhou Enlai reported on the organization and military affairs, Li Lisan reported on the issue of the peasants, Xiang Zhongfa (1880-1931), on the workers' movement. Comintern representative Nikolai Bukharin (1888-1938) talked about the Chinese revolution and the CPC's tasks.

The Sixth CPC National Congress adopted a number of resolutions on politics, the military, organization, the Soviet regime, the peasants, land, the workers, publicity, ethnicity, women, and the Youth League, and reviewed and adopted a revised Party Constitution. The participants elected a new Central Committee and a Central Review Committee.

The Sixth Central Committee elected a new Political Bureau at its first plenary session after the congress, and elected Su Zhaozheng (1885-1929), Xiang Zhongfa, Xiang Ying (1898-1941), Zhou Enlai and Cai Hesen as members of the Standing Committee, and Li Lisan, Yang Yin (1892-1929) and Xu Xigen (1903-?) as alternate members. Xiang Zhongfa was elected to be chairman of the Political Bureau and of its Standing Committee, while Zhou Enlai was elected secretary-general of the Standing Committee.

The Sixth CPC National Congress was a meeting of historic significance that was held at a particular moment under special conditions. It reviewed the Party's experience since the failure of the Great Revolution and provided basically correct answers to a series of essential questions concerning the Chinese revolution. These included two questions over which there had been heated controversy in the Party. (1) Regarding the nature of Chinese society and Chinese revolution, it concluded that since China was still a semi-colonial, semi-feudal country and since none of the basic problems that had given rise to the revolution had been resolved, it was still a bourgeois-democratic revolution. (2) Regarding the situation of the Chinese revolution and the tasks ahead, the congress concluded that since the revolution was on the low ebb, the Party needed to gain the support of the people, and shift its efforts from organizing uprisings by every possible means to undertaking patient, long-term work among the people.

Due to the historical conditions, the Sixth National Congress of the Party did not provide a full understanding of the characteristics, central tasks and adversaries of the Chinese revolution. But its resolutions did help unify the thinking of the whole Party and play a positive role in the revolution.

中国共产党第六次全国代表大会

大革命失败后,中国共产党开始走上了独立领导中国革命的道路。在关于中国社会性质以及革命性质、对象、动力、前途等关系革命成败的重大问题上,迫切需要召开一次党的全国代表大会认真加以解决。

1928年6月18日至7月11日,中国共产党第六次全国代表大会在莫斯科秘密召开。出席大会的代表共142人,其中有表决权的正式代表为84人。瞿秋白代表第五届中央委员会作《中国革命与共产党》的政治报告,周恩来作组织报告和军事报告,李立三作农民问题报告,向忠发作职工运动报告,共产国际代表布哈林作《中国革命与中国共产党的任务》的报告。

中共六大通过了关于政治、军事、组织、苏维埃政权、农民、土地、职工、宣传、民族、妇女、青年团等问题的决议,审议通过经修改的《中国共产党章程》。大会选举产生了新一届中央委员会和中央审查委员会。随后召开的中共六届一中全会选出中央政治局,并选举苏兆征、向忠发、项英、周恩来、蔡和森为中央政治局常委会委员,李立三、杨殷、徐锡根为中央政治局常委会候补委员,选举向忠发为中央政治局主席兼中央政治局常委会主席,周恩来为中央政治局常委会秘书长。

中共六大是在特定历史时期和历史条件下召开的具有重大历史意义的会议。大会认真总结了大革命失败以来的经验教训,在一系列有关中国革命的根本问题上作出了基本正确的回答。它集中解决了当时困扰中国共产党的两大问题:一是在中国社会性质和革命性质问题上,指出现阶段的中国仍然是半殖民地半封建社会的国家,引起中国革命的基本矛盾一个也没有解决,现阶段的中国革命是资产阶级性质的民主主义革命。二是在革命形势和党的任务问题上,明确了革命处于低潮,党的总路线是争取群众,党的中心工作不是千方百计地组织暴动,而是做艰苦的群众工作,积蓄力量。由于历史发展的局限性,中共六大对中国革命的特点、中国革命的中心问题、中国革命的敌人、中国共产党的工作重心等问题认识不足,但大会决议传达贯彻后,基本上统一了全党思想,对革命运动的发展产生了积极的作用。

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