ABSTRACT
The 'adherence to the socialist road' provided the overall theoretical context for all other changes in Chinese Communist Party (C.C.P.) ideology. The Third Plenum had vindicated the Eighth Congress decisions in a general sense. The Third Plenum was seen as a continuation and promotion of the spirit of the Eighth Congress; moreover, the 'false charges' brought against it had already been 'exposed for what they were'. It was anticipated that 'the glory of the Eighth Congress' would shine with increasing brilliance. This chapter argues that the positive assessment of the line of the Eighth Party Congress was qualified right from the time of its rehabilitation. The reformulation involved its marriage with a functionalist reading of Mao Zedong's speech 'On the Correct Handling of Contradictions'. The line of the Eighth Congress had such an important symbolic importance that the post-1978 C.C.P. leadership were bound to come to terms with it.
