For eight years, China waged an “arduous battle against poverty,” lifting 98.99 million rural residents out of extreme poverty by the end of 2020. Some 255,000 work teams were dispatched to impoverished villages nationwide. More than 1,800 people died fighting poverty on the front lines, sometimes getting caught in severe weather or geological events while staying in their assigned villages. Many deaths occurred during travel to and from impoverished areas, often located in mountainous terrain with poor road conditions. How should we understand the idea of “dedication” in this context? For Western readers, words such as “sacrifice,” “dedication” or “giving one’s life” may evoke associations different from those they carry in China’s cultural and political framework. To approach their meaning, we must look beyond this campaign and return to an experience that profoundly shaped modern Chinese history: the Long March (1934-36).
The Long March began as a strategic retreat under extraordinarily adverse circumstances, but its historical significance became much greater. Surviving, regrouping and continuing the struggle transformed it into a foundational narrative of the Communist Party of China and a key reference in the political memory of the People’s Republic of China.
The March ended, but its meaning did not
From this experience emerged what China calls the Long March spirit. The concept encompasses values that go beyond enduring hardship: firm convictions and goals, readiness to make great sacrifices, seeking truth from facts, acting according to concrete conditions, discipline, unity, and close ties with the people.
The Long March thus ceased to be merely the name of an event that took place between 1934 and 1936, and became a metaphor for major collective undertakings that unfold over long periods and involve immense difficulties—tasks requiring both conviction and adaptability.
When people in China today speak of a “new Long March,” they are not proposing to reproduce the circumstances of the 1930s. The metaphor conveys a different notion: Every era faces its own challenges and must follow its own path. In 2016, on the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Long March, Chinese President Xi Jinping said, “Every generation has its own Long March.”
This explains why an event that concluded more than 90 years ago remains present in the language through which China understands its contemporary development.
In pursuit of the greater good
One component of the Long March spirit is particularly important: “seeking truth from facts,” which is closely related to proceeding based on actual conditions.
From this perspective, perseverance does not mean stubbornly repeating the same method over and over again. One lesson of the Long March is the need to distinguish between firmness of purpose and the flexibility required to achieve it. Circumstances, strategic decisions, routes and approaches changed throughout the grueling trek. Continuing to advance often meant taking a different path—literally.
This combination of steadfast goals and adaptability has appeared repeatedly in China’s development. Although later challenges differed greatly from those of the Long March, the underlying logic remained: setting long-term goals, proceeding from reality, adjusting methods when necessary and mobilizing collective efforts toward a common objective.
A ‘Long March’ against poverty
China’s campaign to eradicate extreme poverty offers a clear contemporary example. Its decisive phase took place between 2012 and 2020. One of its central principles was targeted poverty alleviation: identifying who was living in extreme poverty, determining its specific causes and selecting interventions suited to each household and locality.
Rather than treating absolute poverty as a general problem requiring a uniform response, the campaign distinguished among different situations, including inadequate infrastructure, limited access to education or healthcare, lack of employment opportunities, unfavorable geography and the need for relocation.
One of the campaign’s most striking features was its human dimension.
Hundreds of thousands of officials were sent to impoverished villages as first secretaries and work team members.
(First secretaries are outside officials, drawn from government departments, state-owned enterprises and public institutions, assigned to live and work in a village for a set period, typically one to three years, to lead extreme poverty alleviation efforts and strengthen local governance—Ed.)
Their role went beyond visiting villages, assessing conditions and writing reports from distant offices. Many lived in the villages, shared the daily lives of residents and became deeply involved in the community. This enabled them to understand local problems and participate directly in finding and implementing solutions.
This mobilization reflected several elements of the Long March spirit: a priority goal, collective organization, work under difficult conditions, measures adapted to specific circumstances and, at times, the subordination of individual interests to a common undertaking.
The meaning of words
When Chinese concepts are translated as “dedication,” “sacrifice” or “martyr,” the words may be linguistically accurate without fully conveying their cultural meaning. Readers inevitably interpret them through the history and values of their own language and culture.
Within the Long March spirit, “sacrifice” may be better understood as “assumed responsibility.” Taking on a task considered important to the collective means recognizing that fulfilling it may entail real personal costs and serious difficulties. Such demands are not viewed as separate from the commitment, but as part of the responsibility from the moment it is accepted.
The concept of “dedication” or “devotion” is especially important. It does not mean seeking suffering or indiscriminately renouncing personal interests. Rather, it means “refusing to make self-interest the absolute limit of what one is prepared to do for a collective cause.” Those who accept such responsibilities understand that they may need to make concrete personal sacrifices.
These may include working far from one’s family, living in regions with difficult conditions, leaving one’s usual post temporarily, devoting years to a demanding assignment or postponing personal needs. In exceptional circumstances, the risks may be far greater.
There is a recognizable continuity with the Long March. Those who crossed mountains, rivers and marshlands did not do so because suffering was considered valuable in itself. They did so because they had committed themselves to a cause they were prepared to uphold despite the hardships encountered along the way.
Lessons for Latin America
Proceeding from reality means recognizing that development paths cannot be separated from a society’s historical, social, institutional and cultural conditions.
China and Latin America have deeply different histories, political structures, institutions and economic trajectories. Nor is Latin America a uniform whole: the problems and capacities of Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Bolivia and Central American countries are not interchangeable. China’s experience therefore cannot simply be transplanted to the region.
Precisely for this reason, however, it can help frame important questions. Latin America faces structural problems including low growth and productivity, persistent inequality and difficulties in maintaining the institutional capacity needed for long-term transformation. These challenges can hardly be overcome within a single economic cycle or political term.
The Long March spirit may therefore be most useful not as a set of ready-made answers, but as a way of thinking about development. How can societies build goals that endure for decades? How can they maintain a strategic direction while adjusting policies when reality changes?
Above all, how can a society find its own path? This may be where the Long March enters into its most meaningful dialogue with Latin America, not because the region should follow China’s path, but because China’s experience shows that no profound transformation can be achieved by mechanically following a route charted by others.
The historical Long March ended nine decades ago. Since then, China’s goals, methods and circumstances have changed drastically. Yet one idea has endured: When a task is important enough, the road may be long; difficulties may require changes of direction; and methods may need adjustment without losing sight of the goal.
This is the spirit of the Long March.
The author is an Argentine professor at the School of Liberal Arts of Changchun Normal University, specializing in Chinese language and culture. –The Daily Mail-Beijing Review news exchange item
