An aerial drone photo taken on June 27, 2023 shows the Yan'an Revolutionary Memorial Hall in Yan'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province. (Photo: Xinhua)
For the first six years of my life in China, I lived in the ancient city of Xi'an, the capital of thirteen dynasties and one of the central urban hubs of northwest China. As the capital of Shaanxi Province, Xi'an is a bustling and dynamic city that has become a key node of the Belt and Road Initiative and is rapidly emerging as a global city in its own right.
Because I was based in Xi'an, I had the opportunity to travel three times to a unique and special place just two hours north by high-speed rail: the city of Yan'an, the cradle of the Chinese Revolution and the place where the New China was born.
Photo shows a beautiful view of Baota Mountain in Yan'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province. (Photo: People's Daily Online)
Nestled on the Loess Plateau, it is a city of a little over 2 million people with a rich and illustrious revolutionary history. The Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and revolutionaries of the older generation, including Chairman Mao Zedong, lived and struggled in Yan'an for 13 years from 1935 to 1948. It is where the CPC, after enduring the arduous and tortuous Long March, settled and created a revolutionary base area from which they bravely directed the Chinese masses of workers and peasants to resist Japanese aggression. It is also where the Party's ideological innovations were developed and synthesized, particularly through works by Chairman Mao such as On Practice, On Contradiction, and Talks at the Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art.
Each time I visited Yan'an, I marveled at revolutionary sites such as Zaoyuan and Yangjialing, as well as the Yan'an Revolutionary Memorial Hall. I became fascinated with how the revolutionary process at Yan'an maintains an indelible place within the hearts of the Chinese people and still acts as a guiding principle for the CPC. The Chinese people call this the Yan'an Spirit.
What makes up the Yan'an Spirit?
The Yan'an Spirit entails sticking to the correct political orientation, emancipating the mind and seeking truth from facts, serving the people wholeheartedly, and working hard in a spirit of self-reliance.
The last time I visited Yan'an, in June of this year, I stood at the site where Mao Zedong gave his landmark speech "Serve the People," at a memorial ceremony for Zhang Side, a revolutionary soldier who laid down his life. Hearing the story of Zhang Side's sacrifice for his comrades' lives reminded me that the Yan'an Spirit is also the spirit of everyday heroism.
We see how the Yan'an Spirit flows through the veins of the CPC in its policies and everyday actions. In every neighborhood, village, workplace, and school, grassroots Party cadres work tirelessly and selflessly to ensure that the people's needs are fulfilled to the highest level. On a national scale, this spirit has driven the historic eradication of absolute poverty, a victory profoundly felt in Yan'an itself.
The author at Mao Zedong's former residence in Yan'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province.
This domestic commitment to shared prosperity naturally extends outward. The CPC brings China to the world stage in a manner that allows the nation to maintain independence and self-reliance while building a more equitable and just world order. The Belt and Road Initiative is a perfect example of this, with China leading the way toward a multipolar system based on common prosperity and mutual benefit.
The Yan'an Spirit is the guiding principle that inspires the Chinese people to continue building a modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious and beautiful. As an American living in China, I can only wonder: what would this world be like if every country embraced the Yan'an Spirit?