Communist Review - The major relationships are identified by the Communist Party of Viet Nam (CPV) in the Platform on National Construction in the transitional period to socialism (amended in 2011) and documents of the 12th National Party Congress that mentions normative issues of the cause of national construction and protection, reflecting the inventiveness of socialism theory and the path to socialism in Viet Nam, laying foundation for the identification of contradictions and challenges that must be resolved in planning revolutionary guidelines and methods. Our “Doi moi” in the coming years requires thorough grasp and good handling of such identified major relationships; along with good summarization of practice and further theoretical research to figure out new relationships, including the one between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation, towards strong social discipline.

Cognitive perception in major relationships

On the basis of both practical and theoretical review of the 25-year period of “Doi moi” (1986 - 2011) and 20 years implementing the Platform on National Construction in the transitional period to socialism (1991 - 2011), the Platform on National Construction in the transitional period to socialism (amended in 2011) is the crystallization of wisdom, revolutionary courage, and vision of the CPV, being the theoretical guideline leading the Vietnamese people to the 21st century. In order to realize the major directions of the transitional period to socialism in Viet Nam, the Document, for the first time, had laid a special emphasis on thoroughly grasping and properly handling major relations, including the relationship between renewal - stability and development; between economic reform and political reform; between market economy and socialist orientation; between the development of productive forces and the step-by-step improvement of the socialist production relations; between economic growth and cultural development, particularly the realization of social progress and equity; between socialism building and Fatherland protection; between independence - autonomy and international integration; and between Party leadership - State governance and People’s mastery.

The eight major relationships are of critical significance that reflect and contain normative issues of socialism and the path to socialism in Viet Nam. Clearly identifying the eight major relationships that exist objectively in a volatile world, other relationships, and multidimensional impacts between constituent elements and inherent opposites during the transitional period to socialism without passing through a capitalist stage – a practice that had never been uttered in the human history, is a new and important step making contributions to the theory of socialism and the path to socialism in Viet Nam. Given that cognitive perception, the CPV is well aware of the nature and ways to successfully handle such major relationships, applying them to the leadership and renewal practice of our country in different periods, abreast of the development trends of the era and the contemporary world.

K. Marx, F. Engels, and V.I. Lenin had resolutely rejected the notion that socialism is absolutely invariant. "Continuous innovation is the essence of socialism, the rule of existence and development, and the principle of self-defense of socialism" (1). In a general rule, major relationships are also constantly shifting, changing, and becoming something different. In each historical period or stage of development, the major relationships are all making changes within themselves and manifest the changes out in a relationship with others, by substituting, removing, or adding different properties, states, and elements.

Clearly identifying and handling those major relationships is a continual process; and it is the reality of the various “Doi moi” process in Viet Nam that is the measurement of the work effectiveness, also a decisive factor for the great relationships’ transformation, providing vivid materials for further theoretical research of the CPV. Considering all of the above views, the 12th National Party Congress made an adjustment, changing the relationship "between the market economy and the socialist orientation" into the relationship "between compliance with market rules and realization of socialist orientation". Meanwhile, the eight major relationships have been developed into nine major ones, with the  "State and market" relationship added to the list. The ninth relationship was then defined more fully in the Party Central Committee’s Resolution (PCC) in its fifth plenary plenary meeting of the 12th tenure that is the relationship "between the State, market and the society".

Upholding the consistency in reviewing and resolving major relationships based on the viewpoints of dialectical materialism and historical materialism, as well as the demands of practice, the relationship between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation – maintenance of social discipline, is expected to be the tenth one constituting the overall system of major relationships, to be supplemented in the 13th National Party Congress’s documents for the first time. Not until now has the CPV realized and attempted to resolve this relationship, but since March 1989, when Viet Nam was negatively affected by the complicated situations in the Eastern European socialist countries and the Soviet Union, the PCC’s sixth plenary meeting of the sixth tenure introduced one of the five principles leading the “Doi moi” process, which was “Democracy must go hand in hand with concentration, discipline, legal obedience, and sense of civic responsibility. Democracy must be exercised under sound leadership; and leadership must be there to promote democracy in the right direction. Moreover, leadership must be carried out by democratic methods on the basis of promoting democracy. Democratic principle is equal for everyone, but anyone who subverts or attempts to subvert the revolutionary achievements, the national security, social order and safety must be punished.” (2). This principle plays a pivotal role in both promoting democracy, maintaining discipline, ensuring legal obedience, and combating the acts of “excessive democracy”, especially in times of difficulties and challenges when the socialist regimes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union collapsed.

In the message in early 2020, on the threshold of the Party Congresses at all levels, towards the 13th National Party Congress, Party General Secretary, State President Nguyen Phu Trong noted that the political reports of the Party Congresses at all levels and the 13th National Party Congress should pay special attention to solving the major relationships, including the relationship between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation - maintenance of social discipline (3). The draft political report of the 13th National Party Congress has also, for the first time, mentioned the practice of democracy and the consolidation of legislation - maintenance of social discipline as a major relationship that needs to be firmly grasped and well handled in the 2021 - 2030 period and the following years.

The significance of adding the relationship between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation  - maintenance of social discipline to the list of major relationships, serving the leadership over revolution in the new period

Adding the relations between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation -maintenance of social discipline relationship in the whole system of major relationships is an urgent task for today, both in theorical and practical aspects.

Firstly, developing socialist democracy into a new height, in abreast of the development of the socialist-oriented market economy and the progressive trend of the times, is an inevitable requirement.

Socialist democracy is the essence of the Communist Party-led political regime, with the most important implication that all State power belongs to the people; and the people are the executors of the public power. Socialist democracy is the highest level of democracy, or democracy in the fullest sense. However, building an absolute socialist democracy in Viet Nam remains a long process; and on that journey to "ultimate democracy", it is necessary to "seek" appropriate forms of democracy, under the help of relevant mechanisms and institutions, to step by step realize the roadmap in practice. V. I. Lenin once interpreted "To develop democracy to the utmost, to find out the forms of that development, and to test them by practice" (4). This is one of the important quests posed on the socialist revolution.

Like other elements of the society's superstructure, democracy has an economic base and is determined by social existence. Different levels of production methods inevitably lead to discrepancies in the level of democracy. On that account, socialist democracy also has different levels of development. In order to promote democracy in the right direction and with high efficiency, that process should not be separated from reality. Rather, steady steps must be taken, suitable with the socio-economic development level of each historical period of the country. It would be impossible to arbitrarily apply a democratic form of one country into another with differences in terms of political practice, cultural identity, and economic level.

Prior to the “Doi moi” process, the CPV considered collective ownership as the essence of the socialist democracy, associated with the abolition of all forms of private ownership, establishing a unique regime of collective ownership of means of production. Although this was considered a high-level form of democracy, it was not appropriate given the unsatisfactory production forces in Viet Nam at that time. The central planning public administration and the subsidized economy inevitably produced worthless democracy. That worthless democracy upset the collective ownership regime, even deformed it into an "ownerless" economy, leading to heavy bureaucracy and eliminating all driving forces for development, driving the economy to the verge of stagnation and crisis. That is a profound and expensive lesson about the choice of a form of democracy that does not suit the level of economic development and other real conditions. Vice versa, when the level of production has made new changes in terms of quality but the level of socio-political and economic democracy remains lower, that form of democracy will become a hindrance to the development.

After the “Doi moi” started, the CPV has become more and more aware of the importance and role of democracy promotion. Socialist democracy is seen as the nature of a Communist Party-led political regime; and democracy is both the goal and the driving force for development. Democracy is a form of social organization with comparable production level. On that account, the more we push our economy onward, the more democracy is urged. After nearly 35 years of “Doi moi”, the socialist-oriented market economy that Viet Nam pursues in the transitional period to socialism has made great progresses in both terms of quantity and quality. Compatible with it is an increasingly complete socialist democracy with the enhancement of representative democracy and the gradual expansion of forms of direct democracy. In Viet Nam, democracy development reflects a strong shift from administrative obedience - based institutions to responsible cooperation - based institutions on the principle of consensus, ensuring the mastery of the people and the rule of law in all State affairs. For each stage of the 35-year “Doi moi” period, Viet Nam has done all it could to “figure out” the most appropriate form of democracy.

However, in fact, the development of the socialist democracy still lags behind the active development of the socialist-oriented market economy (The scale of Viet Nam’s economy in 2020 is estimated to increase by 9 times compared to 1986, when our “Doi moi” was initiated). Although this is completely true to the facts that social consciousness often follows social existence and political innovation follows economic movements, it cannot be denied that the bigger the gap is, the more hinderances to the development would be. That definitely violates the law of objectivity, the goals and good nature of socialism. Socio-political democracy has its important basis stemming from economic democracy. People’s fundamental freedoms, including political freedom, only stay true to their values when they are derived and developed from the inevitable outcome of economic liberalization. Given the current development level of the Viet Nam’s socialist-oriented market economy associated with the increasingly open economic liberalization process, the socio-politial democratization process must be lifted to a higher level. The task becomes exceptionally urgent when the common intellectual level is getting increasingly improved. As soon as the basic needs are fulfilled, high-level ones will arise, including the thirst for freedom and democracy.

In a broader sense, democratization is a trend of the contemporary times. The simultaneous convergence of multiple major development trends, including the fourth industrial revolution that creates a leap of production forces; the digital age and new media of hyperconnectivity that offer new modes of interaction between political institutions and individuals in society; and the open society that promotes the interference of ideals and cultural values, inclusive of the democratic culture as a universal value of humanity, has made democracy a trend of the contemporary era. Beyond any transient extreme phenomena, tendencies, or non-democratic trends, democracy reflects the upward progression of human history. The development of socialist democracy in Viet Nam is not out of that mainstream of the times. The continuous process of democratic expansion is closely attached to the selective absorption of the progressive values ​​of humanity on democracy, so that another form of democracy can be developed better than the bourgeois democracy.

Secondly, there is a gap and an incompatible relationship between democratic theory and democratic practice.

CPV’s ideology on democracy as well as socialist democracy has been gradually developed with a deeper, richer, and fuller understanding of its nature, forms, characteristics, position, role, and effects. Democracy is taken into account in both terms of a political regime associated with a specific social class and State and a universal value of humanity... That democratic theory and democratic regime are getting clearly defined serves as a premise for the widespread and substantive practice of democracy in Viet Nam, through both forms of representative and direct democracy.

However, reality shows that the transitional process from democratic awareness to democratic practice in Viet Nam has been taking place slowly. There’s even a lack of compatibility between democratic consciousness and practice of democracy, making the principles of power belonging to the people hard to realize in practice with various shortcomings, typically the situation of “underestimating the practice of democracy” (5). Sometimes, in some places, the phenomenon of undemocratic practice or worthless democracy is still recorded. On the other hand, there remains excessive, extreme, and anarchic democracy; inadequate attention to practice of direct democracy; and lack of a monitoring mechanism by the people and social organizations to supervise State agancies in exercising powers delegated by the people.

The gap between democratic theory and democratic practice is deeply blamed on the fact that during the transitional process to socialism in Viet Nam, there have still been “traces of the old society that gave birth to the new one” (6). This is an objective outcome of a backward country's transition to socialism. It was the society that was born at the heart of feudalism, where historical remnants confined people to strict rituals and tyrannical hierarchies. That society was of course alien to democracy and freedom of the mass. Throughout the historical process after that, the Vietnamese people had little chance to experience the democratic life when they were subject to the colonial rules of absolute dictatorship, economic monopoly, and cultural stupefication. Experiencing the prolonged wars as well as the dogmatic application of central planning public administration, the people had almost no chance to practice democracy to the fullest. That deeply affected the people’s way of thinking and lifestyle, leading to the lack of democratic traditions and longlasting historical remnants in the Vietnamese society. As a result, a part of officials and civil servants nowadays underestimate the role of democracy. State management is carried out mainly by administrative orders, autocratic leadership, “ask – give” mechanism, and unnecessary bureaucracy while many people have yet to be aware or capable of practicing democracy. When social disputes or conflicts occur, they are easy to go from one extreme to the other. “The practice of democracy has yet to become a common social value” (7). Democratic culture has yet to be clearly shaped in the social life of Vietnamese people.

The discrepancy between the theory and practice of democracy is somewhat a mirror reflecting the level of development of a society. As a society develops, the gap between the law and the realization of human rights and civil rights will shrink, and vice versa. However, in addition to objective factors that come from the history, tradition, and culture, subjective factors and requisites that ensure the practice of democracy also have a decisive role in either narrowing or separating the democratic theory and its practice. Especially, when it comes to the advancement of social leadership, a legal corridor for democracy will be properly guaranteed to facilitate the democratic implementation in practice.

Economic and market forces nurture the material premise for the birth of democracy, but on the other hand, contribute to corruption of the State power, due to negative influences of the "interest groups" that cause market manipulation, "bend" the policies, restrain freedom of competition, and threaten the practice of democracy. In other sense, democratic rights will only be workable on papers if there are no institutions that guarantee democratic practice. Given that many wise policies on democracy have been issued but have yet to be completely institutionalized, democratic practice in the Vietnamese society is still limited while the people's mastery has not been fully respected or promoted. Therefore, institutionalizing citizens’ rights and freedoms in the Constitution and laws together with finalizing effective institutions and mechanisms is considered the most important premise for modern democracy.

Thirdly, the spirit of rule of law has yet to be well aware in social and political life.

Democracy is closely and naturally attached to the law. Legal document is the habitat for the birth of democracy and an indispensable condition to protect and nurture the development of democracy. It would be mistaken to say that democracy is the opposion to the law. There is no such kind of democracy that is absolutely non-political or above the law. Of course, the law must be a fair, progressive, and humanitarian legal system; rather than the one that merely obeys the will and protects the interests of the ruling class as minority, who see the law as a tool to govern and suppress the masses.

A socialist rule - of - law state is built on the foundation of democracy and a sense of respect for the law. The socialist legal system in Viet Nam belongs to the people, is decided by the people, and acts for the interests of the people. The law provisions come from the will and aspirations of the people and protect their legitimate interests. The people are not only the executors of the law, but also the ones responsible for law construction and protection. The Vietnamese legal system carries the nature of progressiveness, socialism, and profound humaneness (in addition to the class nature like other law practices), as it shows the will and protect the interests of the working class. It is something that the capitalist legal system cannot obtain due to the irreconcilable antagonism of interests between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

Respect for the law is a prerequisite for democracy to be practiced widely and substantially. After nearly 35 years of “Doi moi”, the Vietnamese legal system demonstrates a legislative mindset based on the rule of law, fully bearing the nature of democracy, progressiveness, and increasingly perfection in terms of content, form, and legislative techniques, towards unification, consistency, feasibility, comprehensiveness, and transparency; thus, fulfilling the role of both a tool for State and social management and a tool to promote the people’s mastery and supervision over State power. The socialist legal system guarantees the ruling Party’s leadership by the law while testing the Party's leadership capacity through the quality of the law and the effectiveness of law enforcement. The fairly complete legal system is the foundation and prerequisite for the socialist legislation to be increasingly consolidated, requiring all organizations and individuals in society, from State agencies, social organizations, to citizens, to respect and fulfill all legal obligations and bear mandatory responsibilities when violating the law ...

However, besides its achievements and advantages, the socialist legislation in Viet Nam also has many limitations, typically the cumbersome apparatus with many layers, lack of stability, and high compliance costs. A number of laws and sub-law documents have yet to meet the requirements, with overlapping, contradictory, and inconsistent contents; while discipline in formulating and promulgating legal documents are not strict enough. Ambiguous laws that require guidance documents before coming into effect remains a common practice. The situation of "lacking" guidance documents has only been removed partially, not completely. In addition, law enforcement remains a huge problem when the building of effective law enforcement mechanisms has yet to receive proper attention to. In some cases, the execution of public services and social life still witnesses loose discipline, causing disdain for the rule of law. Respecting the rule of law and ensuring the supremacy of the Constitution fail to be a common practice of cadres, civil servants, organizations, and individuals in society, nor deeply embedded in the political and social life of the Vietnamese people. The incident in Dong Tam commune, My Duc district, Hanoi (January 2020) is a typical example of disregard and violation of the law, causing tragic consequences. It also shows limitations of law enforcement as well as of execution of law violations. Especially, taking advantage of the incident, the political opportunists and hostile forces at home and abroad have incited the so-called "civil disobedience" to turn civil frustrations, contradictions, and conflicts into acts of subversion and confrontation with the Government. This malicious conspiracy aims to promote wilful acts, thus invalidating the socialist legislation and attempting to overthrow the People's government in our country.

An important cause of the above situation lies in the fact that the Vietnamese traditional society was not governed by a rule-of-law State and a culture of following the rule of the law. Rather, it promoted the rule of humanity, the rule of morality, and the rule of ceremoniousness; using such feudal morality of the "Three Fundamental Bonds and Five Constant Virtues" to bind the people. That social lifestyle valued emotions above the law, and did not have the habit of using legal tools to regulate social relations, even being averse to procedural activities that try to resolve conflicts,  protect justice and human rights, perceiving that "only idiots take to court". On the other hand, the "village convention" tends to absoluteize the role of customary practices in regulating social relations, making the State law the secondary. Just like “imperial power bends to suit rural customs”, the law is localized or deformed according to the subjective will of the local community and the clans. Those remnants cause many obstacles to the building of a socialist rule-of-law state, the application of the rule of law in organizing and administering a modern society, harming the effectiveness and efficiency of the law.

In a centrally planned subsidized economy, administrative orders usually dominated the law. For that reason, the nearly-35-year renewal process would not be long enough to completely erase that fixed mindset and gain full experience in building socialist legislation in the conditions of market economy and international integration. In addition, as the legal system has been built and perfected in the transitional process, when searching for new ways of doing and learning from experiences occur at the same time, it is difficult to avoid limitations and shortcomings. Given that it’s hard to fully foresee the impacts and efficiency of the newly activated mechanisms, a number of legal provisions fail to bring into full play their effects in practice. Regularly reviewing, amending, and perfecting the law are necessary; but this also makes the legal system unstable and asynchronous...

Viet Nam is currently exercising a legal system of a comprehensive renewal period, with many development steps and many forms of socio-economic organizations. The law regulates social relations that arise in the struggle between the old and the new in order to create qualitative changes in all aslects of social life. That requires the Vietnamese legal system to be constantly improved, which is a prerequisite for the full implementation of a socialist legislation; and vice versa, the socialist legislation becomes a solid foundation for the ever-expanding socialist democracy. Expanding the practice of democracy must always go hand in hand with tightening social discipline. That is the close relationship between democratic practice and socialist legislation.

In addition to the three main reasons mentioned above, the need to supplement the relationship between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation – maintenance of social discipline into a great relationship is also resulted from the positive impact of the development of theoretical awareness on new topics directly related to the above pair of categories, such as building a socialist rule-of-law State, building and promoting the cultural values ​​and potential of Vietnamese people, developing a sustainable society, ensuring social progress and equity, and expanding democracy within the Party as the decisive factor to build socialist democracy...

In general, the duration of nearly 35 years of “Doi moi” have offered the CPV enough space, time, and experience to define socialist democracy and socialist legislation as not only an inevitable issue of socialism, a development direction of the country in the transitional period, or a matter of the leadership of the Party, but also becomes a core issue that reflects the development of the Vietnamese revolution in the transitional period to socialism. The repositioning and elevation are not a coincidence, but have undergone a long-term process of searching for and developing new theories, with profound lessons from the realities of life, including shortcomings and mistakes at high costs. Therefore, adding the relationship between practice of democracy and consolidation of legislation - maintenance of social discipline relations to the whole system of major relationships at present time is a certain outcome of both theory and practice.

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(1) Nguyen Duc Binh, Theory of revolution and development of Viet Nam, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2012, p.198

(2) Complete works of the CPV, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2007, vol.49, p.592

(3) Nguyen Su, Has our country ever earned such great fortune,  https://www.vietnamplus.vn/dat-nuoc-ta-chua-bao-gio-co-duoc-co-do-to-lon-nhu-ngay-nay/616466.vnp

(4) V.I. Lenin, Complete works, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2006, vol.33, p.97

(5) Report of reviewing theoretical and practical issues after 30 years of renewal (1986 – 2016), National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2015, p.144

(6) Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Complete works, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 1995, vol.19, p.33

(7) Report of ten-year review of Platform 2011, National Political Publishing House, Hanoi, 2020, p.106

This article was published in the Communist Review, No. 945 (July 2020)