Conditions of the Working Classes in China
Despite this legacy, any simplistic return to the past is neither possible nor desirable. Too much has been changed, and too many genies have been let out of the bottle to simply put them back again. The failures and mistakes of the past, as well as the successes and victories, will have to be reexamined, and new ways will have to be found to overcome the limitations of the first era of socialism, in China, as elsewhere. No easy prediction is possible as to what direction the struggle will take in the coming period. But as they move forward, the Chinese working classes may also look backward as they find their own path again to a new socialist society, one that combines their historical and current struggles with the global movements of today, and that brings about a revolutionary transformation once more.