Australian hails 'human story' of CPC

When 31-year-old Australian Christian Goopy looks back on his decision to join the Communist Party of Australia (CPA), he said it is a decision he has fully committed himself to and one he would never change.

"It's allowed me to be more truly who I am, and also to make more of a contribution as a communist," Goopy told China Daily.

Goopy, a member of the CPA Central Committee and president of its New South Wales State Committee, joined the party in 2018 after being drawn to socialist and communist ideas for some time.

He said he had looked at different approaches before that, but came to believe they did not offer a way forward for the fundamental social transformation needed to meet people's needs better and unlock society's potential.

Founded in 1920 in the aftermath of Russia's October Revolution, the CPA has gone through changes over its more than 100-year history, but Goopy said it is now seeing "renewed interest in socialism amongst young people".

"I believe that resurgence has its origins in the global financial crisis and the crisis of confidence in the capitalist world that has begun since then," he said.

Now, more than half of the party's members are under 40.

Goopy sees communism as a future society built on advanced technology and a strong capacity to create wealth.

"But the precondition is the social ownership of the wealth and of the means of production, and we have to undergo a process of constructing a society," he said.

"It's not just enough to have the tools and the wealth, but the right ownership structure and the right incentives, to ensure that the wealth that society creates can be used for the benefit of people, that can improve people's lives, and elevate our society's potential toward the future realization of a communist system," he added.

In that system, scarcity and poverty would be abolished, said Goopy, who also serves on the editorial board of the Australian Marxist Review, the CPA's journal covering theoretical studies, party building, and international developments.   

Regarding today's global turbulence and uncertainty, Goopy said the unequal accumulation of wealth and resources under capitalism is an underlying cause of much of the current instability.

He said China's development experience is contributing to fundamental changes in the international system.

Goopy said that in terms of the international redistribution of power, China has demonstrated "that there are other credible development pathways that can provide solutions to the problems that people across the world face".

Other countries, he said, can draw upon these experiences to develop policies and approaches suited to their own conditions, rather than following a narrow prescription.

Goopy first visited China last year after the nation introduced visa-free entry for Australian passport holders.

During the trip, he visited Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou, and Nanjing, saying the experience gave him a deeper understanding of the Communist Party of China.

"The entire story of the CPC is an enormous human story of perseverance through enormous difficulties, of enormous bravery and courage by the members of the Party and the people that they organized into struggle to overcome enormous and profound challenges," he said.

Goopy said that the stories and experiences of members of the CPC show what can be realized if you set your mind toward changing things.

He added, "If you are willing to arm yourself with the analysis of what is creating the situation, and the tools of organization and discipline to use that analysis to translate that into practical actions, you can achieve enormous things."

xinxin@chinadaily.com.cn