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○many landlords wiped out in Yanan area or could remain on same level as

peasants
○many faced public trial or faced denunciation from the peasants

(p. 42 hndout)
○‘Speak Bitterness’ sessions – confronted and humiliated landlords

○Gentry class – big landlords – eliminated

•
results (hndout)
– Political front
•
it became clear that China will be 1-party state
•
1949 – 10 political parties, 1952 – Law which won’t allow any parties
•
Political purges + campaigns to extend influence over people, against
counterrevolutionaries and imperialists
•
Methods: local party workers encouraged their people to spy on neighbors,
workers to inform on coworkers and children to report on their parents
•
if not involved -> class enemy
•
labeling was a means of enforcing obedience
•
1954 New constitution
○People’s National Congress established (parliament with little power)

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•
in Shanghai and Guangzhou – gangs and triads -> used them to consolidate the
cities, now need to eliminate them
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130,000 “bandits” and criminals arrested in Guangzhou, ½ executed, 20,000 more
killed in Shanghai
–Youth organizations closed down or taken over by the party
–Religion was attacked, Christian ch. closed, property seized, priests and nuns expelled
•
Religion condemned by constant use of wall posters and loud speakers
•
Buddhism, Confucianism – all denounced as being “worthless superstitions”, no
place for them in China
–Slogans praising value of Maoist China; means of enforcing conformity
–Education opportunities expanded
•
1949 80% illiterate, 25% of primary age children were at school
•
1956 bit below 80% illiterate, primary school attendance 56% (p. 43)
–Marriage Reform Law (1950) – to end oppression of women in China


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Economy
First Five Year Plan (1952 – ’56)
– “lean to one side” – favour USSR more
– 1949 USA banned trade with PRC -> Mao looked to USSR for aid -> treaty that
provided
 China with mil. of dollars in loans + Russian technicians and econ. advisors

– in return USSR was giving economic concessions

– PRC economic policies followed closely the USSR’s econ. planning

– emphasis on heavy industry directed by the state

– GMD’s national resource committee est. before -> controlled ind. policy – managers and
work force already in place
– + rural-urban migration
– success – controlled inflation
•
reducing public spending
•
incr. of tax for urban population
•
introduced new currency (Yuan)
– Areas targeted: coal, steel, petrochemicals, automobile ind, transport
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– Major civil engineering projects – road and rail bridges over Yangzi

– overall output went up by 15.5% per year

– heavy output incr, light industry great incr. -> faster than the target

– statistics not reliable -> managers would falsify the records

– China also has to finance Korean War

– Mao saw USSR’s price for the aid as exploitation -> weakened the relationship
Effects of Five Year Plan on Industry
– private ownerships of factories banned
•

has been allowed ’49-’52 = yrs. of capitalism

– all factories on state ownership – many owners remained as managers

– the economic planning and management of factories became more centralized

– factories managed by 1 person – took orders from central planning ministers

– 90% of investment was put into heavy industry (p. 45)

Effects of FYP on agriculture

– agr. under huge pressure from heavy ind.

– prices of grain fixed – sold in low price to the state

– production incr. only by 2% per year (14% ‘49-’52)

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– 1959 – 65% belong to mutual aid teams (p. 45-46)
The Hundred Flowers Campaign (1957)

– mid-1950’s – greater freedom of expression for ‘constructive criticism’

– allowing the intellectuals to have a say

– 1956 Mao’s slogan: “Let a hundred flowers bloom. Let a hundred schools of thought

contend” -> allowing criticism of CCP

– need for ‘democracy’

– right of workers to strike and demonstrate

– few intellectuals responded at first

– individuals and policies attacked for corruption, inefficiency and unrealistic

– leading figures in gov, education, arts criticized for their failure

– campaign stopped since Mao thought it went too far, everything reversed -> time of
severe repression

– Campaign replaced by ‘Anti-rightist Movement’

– those who responded had to retract their statements

– university/school teachers, writers, economists, artists…

– had to make confessions and submit to ‘re-education’

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– who was too critical was submerged


2 views:

I.

– campaign was deliberate plan to expose the critics and then remove them

– cleanse CCP of those who weren’t fully committed

– control society where all expressions had to be politically correct

– anti-rightist movement was ruthless

II.

– Campaign was seen by Mao as a safety measure to keep control -> release pressure

– got out of control

The Great Leap Forward / The Second 5-Year Plan (’58 – ’62)
Collectivization of the peasantry
– industrialization -> lack of workers -> from rural areas
– lack of food – ‘peasants eating too much’, have too many children -> need to be under
control

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– ’56-’58 the gov. ordered that 750,000 cooperatives would be joined into a number of

large communes

– 1958 – major part of the 2nd 5-Y Plan

– land divided into 70,000 communes, each communes made of brigades, those made of
 households

– who thing under PRC’s central government

– methods of farming, sales and prices under control – no private farming

The Famine
– collectivization -> huge social transformation
– disruption when private farming ended -> peasants discouraged to produce beyond
their

own needs -> famine

– all rural households organized into communes

– 1958 – good weather – good harvest (200 mil ton of crop)

– central committee published inflated figures of 260 mil. tons -> set unrealistic target for
’59 but poor harvest (170 mil tons)
– unscientific agricultural methods – based on soviet Lysenko
– Lysenkoism – official policy of ‘58

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– 8 point agricultural “constitution” – based on Lysenko’s theories, Chinese farmers had
to

follow it (deep plaughing, close planting, incr. fertilization, more pest control) – methods applied

without consideration of different conditions (weather, soil…) – tragic results

– sparrows killed by the seeds -> death sparrows eaten by other animals who eat the
plants,
larger birds decrease (p. 48, end)

– many peasants could not adapt to the famine

– if returned to old ways of production, then punished

– no uprising because of the tight control

– CCP did not admit mistake

– Harvest of 1960 26 % below that of 1957

– 1960 death rate: 2.54% of pop. up from 1.08% 1959

– 1959 - 1961 -> “Three Bitter years”

– 20 years in famine
Industry
– Mao’s aims for GLF:
•
both agriculture industries must be developed

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•
revive the Yanan spirit
•
mobilize masses to build a modern socialist economy
– establishment of communes -> would result in surplus of labour -> employed in
projects

eg. irrigation, industry, crèches, mess halls

– Mao wanted to use GLF to create a communal ethos (spirit of culture) -> ‘Socialist man’

– industry developed in countryside and towns

– 1958 policy: “backyard furnace” -> every family should have one -> double steel

production to 10.7 mil. tons by 1959

– 600,000 furnaces built (p. 47)

– grate achievements in manual labour

– Tiananmen square in Beijing built, damns, canals, bridges

Results:

– GLF did not reach its objectives

– mass labour doesn’t mean mass production

– people used instead of modern technology

– availability of coal, iron and transport system not taken into account
– home produced iron was useless and low quality

– background uranium mines

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– success in science in developing nuclear power -> atomic bomb by 1964, hydrogen
bomb
by 1967 (p. 48, statistics!)
– 1960 – abandonment of GLF -> new measures introduced
– 1959 Mao stood down as the chairman
1961-1966
– GLF failed, Mao’s reputation damaged
– Mao asked Liu Shaoqi PRC chairman and Deng Xiaoping CCP General Secretary to
restore the economy -> restores incentives
– Measures introduced (p. 49)
•
peasants returned to the fields
•
communes split into 3 smaller units
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production team income dependent on the performance
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peasants’ private plots restored, private profits
•
harvest recovered to 1952-1954 level (160 mil. tons)
– Mao concerned with the popularity of Liu and Deng -> political threat

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– divisions between Maoists and pragmatists’ (modernisers) within CCP
– Mao turned to Lin Biao, the minister of defense (dedicated Maoist)
Propaganda:
– together with Chen Boda (editor of CCP journal) they published “The Little Red Book” –

a collection of thoughts and sayings of Mao

– everyone had to carry copy around, free for soldiers – basic test in military training

– compulsory in schools and universities

– public communal readings

– further propaganda: Lei Feng – lorry driver devoted to revolution, his diary (1963) – all

made up, held up as a story of martyrdom

– joined The Little Red Book as an essential part of school curricula

– literally and cultural work became important tools in the power struggle

– “The Dismissal of Hai Rei from Office” – a play -> intensified division within the Party
-> move against the anti-communists elements within the party
– Jian Qing, wife of Mao (film actress) – criticism and attack on revolutionaries and the
revisionists in the Party
•
had strong influence since she was wife of chairman

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•

undermined the “Group of Five” – professional party bureaucrats who try to

prevents splits within the Party, they were condemned by Jian for being to

moderate
•
demanded that the Chinese culture be cleansed of writers/artists whose work
showed lack of commitment to Mao’s revolution
•
worked towards the establishment of the new Chinese culture – reject the past and
conform to the socialist ideas of Mao
•
leader of Shanghai forum – left radical group, identified counter-revolutionaries
who must be destroyed
•
her idea: the PLA would lead in the fight of anti-socialist weeds and get rid of all
traces of artistic corruption
The Cultural Revolution (1966 – 1969/70)

– aim: to create new type of Chinese society

– began with 1 mil on Tiananmen square waving with The Little Red Book (p.50)

– primarilyyouth – Mao used them to manipulate

– “4 Olds” – targets for the young to attack

•
old culture, thoughts, customs and habits

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•
undermined the “Group of Five” – professional party bureaucrats who try to

prevents splits within the Party, they were condemned by Jian for being to

moderate
•
demanded that the Chinese culture be cleansed of writers/artists whose work
showed lack of commitment to Mao’s revolution
•
worked towards the establishment of the new Chinese culture – reject the past and
conform to the socialist ideas of Mao
•
leader of Shanghai forum – left radical group, identified counter-revolutionaries
who must be destroyed
•
her idea: the PLA would lead in the fight of anti-socialist weeds and get rid of all
traces of artistic corruption
The Cultural Revolution (1966 – 1969/70)

– aim: to create new type of Chinese society

– began with 1 mil on Tiananmen square waving with The Little Red Book (p.50)

– primarilyyouth – Mao used them to manipulate

– “4 Olds” – targets for the young to attack

•
old culture, thoughts, customs and habits

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– every area and family affected
– millions died
Reasons:

– Mao hoped to re-establish his authority

– make sure revolution would continue once he’s gone

– Mao believed that revolution is being betrayed from within the Party and that the Upper
rankings in CCP are infected with ‘neo capitalists’
– the ‘Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution’ was to ensure that revolution continued ->
called on the people to save the Revolution
– deliberate policy to disrupt and destroy anything that could threaten the Revolution –
“a
great disorder across the land leading to a great order”
– Mao concerned about the vents in the USSR – an attack on Stalin’s cult of personality
– Mao believed that Khrushchev had betrayed the Revolution with ‘détente’ with the W
and
revisionism
– believed that the older Revolutionaries have lost the spirit -> to save the Revol. he
needs

to attack the CCP hierarchy

– new generation needs to replace the old

– she rejected all non-proletarian

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Problems:

– Young members of the Party don’t have the experience (White terror, Long march)

– strict social and political control

– Mao wanted to keep the Chinese Revolution a peasant movement, not run by intellectuals

– Intellectuals have criticized the GLF -> tensions -> Mao attacked them during the Revol.
Phase 1

– poster campaign in the Summer of ’66 -> Cult. Rev. (CR) becomes a public movement

– encouragement of youth and radical teachers to put up posters attacking the edu. system

– Deng and Liu uneasy about the enthusiasm of students -> causes unrests

–Zhou Enlai tried to keep peace between Party fractions (Maoists and those who want

order)

– violence increased between the sides

– students moved into streets wearing red arm bands -> ‘Red Guards’ – reign of terror

– July ’66 – Mao’s reappearance -> swam in a river, TV, pictures went into every village
– Mao exploited this atmosphere to tighten the grip on Party
– Aug ’66 Special meeting of the Central Committee
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– only works with contemporary Chinese themes (no Chinese classics or opera, only long and boring

contemporary works –e.g. ‘triumph of workers’) -> culture was to serve the people
Red Guard Terror

– The Red Guard movement had strong foundation

– since the 50s pupils encouraged to se themselves as pioneers under Mao

– mass rallies used in the Hundred Flowers campaign, anti-rightist campaign

– Mao deliberately picked the youth to be the instrument of cultural revolution

– made to feel that they have a role to play and Mao had strong hold of them

– Mao = hero who freed China from the humiliation of foreign powers

– young were brutalised -> give them no moral line to follow -> respect broken down

– Mao favoured chaos

– obedience to parents and teachers is strong -> reversed behaviour became violent

– anything that represented the corrupt past = ‘Confucius & Co.’ -> destroyed

– many priceless treasures of Chinese civilisations destroyed in organised vandalism

– Red Guards took over radio, TV, public transport

– if decadent tendencies showed (e.g western clothes) -> publicly humiliated

– intellectuals common targets

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– some forced to undergo struggle sessions

– Red Guard actions were officially directed

– Xie Fuzhi – Minister for Public Security – police should stand on the side of Red Guard
•
 5 categories: Landlords, rich peasants, reactionaries, bad elements, rightists

– the victimisers often became victims if seen as weak

– Red Guard movement eventually turned on itself -> regional group clashes
•
e.g. factory workers started to make their own groups
•
each group desperate to prove their loyalty to Mao

– Role of PLA
•
supported students and workers n hinting down class enemies
•
didn’t see themselves as creators of the Revol, the students did
•
army loyal to Mao
•

Red Guard went wild became Mao knew he can use PLA to restore order Chinese
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– the arts had to show the revolutionary spirit

– undermined any sense of tradition

– common slogan: “the more brutal, the more revolutionary”

– children made to trample grass

– beginning of the purge in the Party

– Group of Five denounce, the play writer Vu also, Liu and Deng undermined

– China entered the period of cultural revolution

– 1937 – Mao’s wife – artistic wasteland -> artists had to conform or sent to re-educational

labour camps

– her hold on the arts lasted 10 years (’66 to Mao’s death)

– new cultures hasn’t been created

Final Phase
– by late 1960s China was near Civil War
•
Red Guard factions fighting each other
•
conflict with PLA
•
conflict widespread
•
industries/schools/Unis closed

– the culture had to be the expression of political and social situation of the time