Deng Xiaoping embraced Marxism as a teenager whilst a student in France from 1920-25. He was 16 when he arrived.
During a stopover in Shanghai on his voyage to France, Deng "saw white people treating Chinese, in their own country, as if they were slaves".

To get by as a student, like foreign students today, Deng worked as a kitchen hand, a fireman on a locomotive, and a factory worker (Renault, steel and rubber factories). If that’s your daily life experience, you’re not out fine dining in gay Paree - you’re encountering racism and social injustice on the factory floor. A lot of other people around you, your friends, are in the same boat.

Deng joined the communist party as a result. He met the charismatic Chou Enlai, who fostered Deng’s evident abilities. (This bond would later save Deng's life.) For this he was hounded by French authorities. He fled France the day before his house was raided.

When his daughter, Deng Rong (邓榕), was later asked why he’d closed himself off to the French philosophies of equality and democracy, she said it wasn’t him doing the closing off: "What he came in contact with was not democratic."

It’s a different perspective. One where you’re disrespected and exploited - partly because of your skin color. That’s the kind of stuff that sticks in your craw - hardens your beliefs.

To understand the nature of The Party Vision, we need to acknowledge this bitterness. It’s a real thing - borne of real injustice.