 After he retired, Ren Zhongyi remained active in public affairs and was bold and outspoken.He was amongst a few influential people in China who still publicly advocated political reform.One example is his iconoclastic article in the May 5, 2000 issue of the Guangdong-based national newspaper "Southern Weekly", which sought to re-interpret Deng Xiaoping's theory of the Four Cardinal Principles (upholding the socialist path; upholding the people's democratic dictatorship; upholding the leadership of the Communist Party and upholding Marxist Leninsm Mao Zedong Thought) in order to create more room for democratic reforms.