-- All-China Federation of Trade Unions
The All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) is a mass organization of the Chinese working class led by the Communist Party of China and formed by the workers and staff members on a voluntary basis. It is a bridge and bond linking the Party and the masses of the workers and staff members, an important social pillar of the state power of the country, and the representative of the interests of the trade union members and workers and staff members.
The Chinese trade unions were founded on the basis of the development of the workers' movements. Soon after the establishment of the Communist Party of China on July 1921, a liaison office of workers was set up. All-China Federation was formally set up in Guangzhou on May 1, 1925. Under the guidance of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought and under the leadership the CPC, the Chinese workers forged the closest alliance with the broad masses of peasants and, together with other patriotic and democratic forces, carried out unrelenting struggles for national independence and the liberation of the people, and won the thorough victory of the new democratic revolution. After the founding of the PRC in 1949, the working class has become the masters of the country, built up a contingent of well-educated and self-disciplined workers with lofty ideals and moral integrity, earnestly strengthened professional ethics, and vigorously launched activities to build spiritual civilization among workers and as a result they performed great historical feats for the establishment of the socialist system and scored tremendous achievements in the socialist construction. Since the Third Plenum of the 11th CPC Central Committee, the Chinese working class, has emancipated its minds, pressed ahead with reform and opening-up and modernization drive. The working class, keeping the overall situation in mind and with a high sense of responsibility of the masters of their own affairs, has promoted a sustained, rapid and sound growth of the national economy and social progress in an all-round manner.
The Chinese trade unions extensively develop friendly relations with trade union organizations of various countries on the basis of the principles of independence, equality, mutual respect and non-interference in each other's internal affairs. Now the Chinese trade unions have established relations with more than 400 national trade union centers of over 140 countries.
The Eleventh National Congress of the Chinese trade unions convened in October 1988, put forward that the Chinese trade unions should center on economic construction, and better express and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of workers as well as keep the overall interests of the Chinese people in mind on the primary stage of socialism, and therefore, the Chinese trade unions should exercise the following social functions:
(1) to protect the legitimate interests and democratic rights of the workers and staff members, (2) to mobilize and organize the workers and staff members to take part in the construction and reform and accomplish the tasks in the economic and social development, (3) to represent and organize the workers and staff members to take part in the administration of the State and social affairs and to participate in the democratic management of enterprises, (4) to educate the workers and staff members to constantly improve their ideological and moral qualities and raise their scientific and cultural levels.
The principle of reform adopted by the Chinese trade unions is to take economic construction as their central task, carry out the various social functions of the trade unions in line with the guiding principle of reflecting and safeguarding concrete interests of the workers and staff members in a better way while safeguarding the overall interests of the people throughout the whole country, and, united with the broad masses of workers and staff members, strive for the realization of China's socialist modernization.
The grand objective of reform adopted by the Chinese trade unions is to build the Chinese trade unions into independent, democratic and dependable mass organizations of the working class led by the CPC, and get them to play an important role in social life.