Strengthening the Party’s leadership role in ideological work in the new period

Being well aware of the importance of building, consolidating and developing the social ideological foundation, in the process of leading the revolution, our Party always attaches great importance to the field of ideology – culture, which is one of the three important components of Party building work and is identified in the leading position.

In today’s era, when the scientific-technological revolution develops strongly, the global trend affects all countries in the world, the cultural-ideological issues such as cultural identity, ideological foundation becomes a big problem of every country. Being well aware of the importance of building, consolidating and developing the social ideological foundation, in the process of revolutionary leadership, the Communist Party of Vietnam always attaches importance to the ideological and cultural fields, considering that is one of three fronts (economic, ideological – political and cultural).

Leaders of the Provincial Party Committee’s Propaganda Commission awarded certificates of merit from the Chairman of the Provincial People’s Committee to the staff of the Provincial Party Committee’s Propaganda Commission for successfully completing their tasks for two consecutive years. Photo: THANH MAI

During the doi moi period, the ideological work of the Party took place in a complicated context, in which emerged the opposition of hostile forces to sabotage the revolutionary achievements of the Party and our nation. In order to protect the achievements of the revolution and carry out the work of national construction and development, the ideological work of the Party is given top priority. Applying Ho Chi Minh’s thought “Ideological education and ideological leadership are the most important tasks of the Party, we must resolutely oppose the habit of disregarding the ideology”**. Our Party has formed a system of viewpoints to guide ideological work which is a constituent part of the entire Party’s activities – a key field for building and fostering the political foundation of the regime; demonstrated the role of forerunner, paving the way in the cause of national construction and defense, this view is affirmed in all activities of the Party.

The ideological work of protecting, developing, and making Marxism-Leninism, Ho Chi Minh’s thought, the Party’s guideline and the values in the national cultural tradition occupy a leading position in the spiritual life of society. Doing ideological work is the task of the whole Party, of all party members, of the whole political system with the participation and contribution of the People; it is an activity of the Party, aimed at building the Party in terms of intellectual and political ideology, contributing to the Party always being the vanguard of the working class, capable of political leadership for the whole society. Therefore, all Party members must consider “The work of guiding the thought is the most important. Only within the Party and outside the Party can they clearly recognize the new situation and understand the new tasks, only then will the ideology be unified” (Party Charter).

The Party’s ideological work is a work for people, a difficult and complex task that requires mastering the specific laws of thought in order to have a scientific attitude and method. Closely combine the requirement of thought orientation, with voluntariness; between reason and emotion; between words and deeds; between “build” and “fight against”, take “build” as the main. According to Marx, “The human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual. In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations.”* According to Ho Chi Minh, “Every human being has good and evil in their hearts. We must know how to make the good part in each person bloom like a spring flower and the bad part fade away, that is the attitude of a revolutionary.”**

Ideological work takes the press as the voice of the Party, the State, of socio-political organizations, a forum of the People, placed under the direct leadership of the Party, management of the State and activities within the framework of the law. It must ensure the ideological, truthfulness, people’s, combativeness and diversity of activities of the press. This view affirms the role of the press as President Ho Chi Minh affirmed: “The Party newspaper is like a simple, practical and widespread training class. It teaches us what to do about propaganda, organization, leadership, and work. Every day it helps to improve our political level and work productivity. If you just close your eyes and work without looking at the Party newspaper, you will be like closing your eyes and walking at night, you will definitely be embarrassed and fail at work”**.

The 13th National Congress of the Party supplemented and emphasized a number of guiding viewpoints on ideological work: “The guiding thought throughout the entire Party, people and army is to be consistent, apply and creatively develop Marxism-Leninism and Ho Chi Minh’s thought; steadfast in the goal of national independence and socialism; steadfastly on the Party’s renewal line; steadfastly adhere to the principles of Party building; ensure the highest interests of the nation – nation on the basis of basic principles of international law, equality, cooperation and mutual benefit to firmly build and protect the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. This is a matter of principle, of vital significance for our regime, a solid foundation of our Party which allows no deviation and wavering” (Resolution of the 13th Congress). At the same time, ideological work is “The driving force and important development source of the country is to strongly arouse patriotism, the will to strengthen the nation, the strength of the nation’s unity and the aspiration to develop a prosperous and happy country” (Resolution of the 13th Congress).

Celebrating the 92nd anniversary of the traditional day of propaganda work, it is necessary to make the whole Party, people and army understand clearly, properly perform political tasks in the new period, so that “the Party is a large collective, united in thought, unanimous in action”** in the process of building the country according to the ideal of socialism, accelerating industrialization and modernization to achieve the goal of a prosperous people and a strong, democratic, equitable and civilized country.

 

*C. Marx and F.Engels (1995), Complete work, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 1995.

** Ho Chi Minh: Complete Works, Truth National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2011.