Mao 2 Essay, Research Paper

History

+ October 1, 1949 The People s Republic of China was formed with its nationalist capital at Beijing.

+ 4 social classes: Workers, Peasants, the petite bourgeoisie, and the National-Capitalist, which were led by CCP.

+ In February 1950, after months of hard bargaining, China and the Soviet Union signed the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance, valid until 1980. The pact also was intended to counter Japan or any power’s joining Japan for the purpose of aggression.

+ By 1950 international recognition of the Communist government had increased considerably, but it was slowed by China’s involvement in the Korean War.

+ June, 28 1950 Agrarian Land Reform, Redistribution of the land, class struggle landlords and wealthy peasants, An ideological reform campaign requiring self-criticisms and public confessions by university faculty members, scientists, and other professional workers was given wide publicity. Artists and writers were soon the objects of similar treatment for failing to heed Mao’s dictum that culture and literature must reflect the class interest of the working people, led by the CCP.

+ 1951-1952, San Fan ( or “three anti”) and Wu Fan ( or “five anti”) movements. The San Fan was directed against the evils of “corruption, waste, and bureaucratism”; its real aim was to eliminate incompetent and politically unreliable public officials and to bring about an efficient, disciplined, and responsive bureaucratic system. The Wu fan movement aimed at eliminating recalcitrant and corrupt businessmen and industrialists, who were in effect the targets of the CCP’s condemnation of “tax evasion, bribery, cheating in government contracts, thefts of economic intelligence, and stealing of state assets.” In the course of this campaign the party claimed to have uncovered a well-organized attempt by businessmen and industrialists to corrupt party and government officials. This charge was enlarged into an assault on the bourgeoisie as a whole. The number of people affected by the various punitive or reform campaigns was estimated in the millions.

+ The period of officially designated “transition to socialism” corresponded to China’s First Five-Year Plan (1953-57). The period was characterized by efforts to achieve industrialization, collectivization of agriculture, and political centralization.

+ Major political developments included the centralization of party and government administration. Elections were held in 1953 for delegates to the First National People’s Congress, China’s national legislature, which met in 1954. The congress promulgated the state constitution of 1954 and formally elected Mao chairman (or president) of the People’s Republic; it elected Liu Shaoqi ( 1898-1969) chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress; and named Zhou Enlai premier of the new State Council.

+ In the midst of these major governmental changes, and helping to precipitate them, was a power struggle within the CCP leading to the 1954 purge of Political Bureau member Gao Gang ( ) and Party Organization Department head Rao Shushi ( ), who were accused of illicitly trying to seize control of the party.

+ As part of the effort to encourage the participation of intellectuals in the new regime, in mid-1956 there began an official effort to liberalize the political climate

+ By mid-1957, however, the movement unexpectedly mounted, bringing denunciation and criticism against the party in general and the excesses of its cadres in particular. Startled and embarrassed, leaders turned on the critics as “bourgeois rightists” ( ) and launched the Anti-Rightist Campaign. The Hundred Flowers Campaign , sometimes called the Double Hundred Campaign ( ), apparently had a sobering effect on the CCP leadership.

Childhood

+ @1911-12 He served in the Nationalist army in the revolution against the Manchu government and was a library assistant at Beijing University when the anti-Japanese May Fourth Movement began.

+ 1920 Mao returned to Changsha as head of a primary school. When his attempts to organize mass education were suppressed, he turned to politics, helping to found the Chinese Communist party in Shanghai in 1921

+ In 1923, when the Communist party allied with the Nationalist party (Kuomintang) against feuding local warlords, Mao became a full-time party worker.

+ 1927 Mao wrote Report of . . . the Peasant Movement in Hunan, arguing that peasant discontent was the major force in China and deserved Communist support.

+ 1920s He organized Kuomintang-sponsored peasant and industrial unions.

+ 1926 Mao directed the Kuomintang’s Peasant Movement Training Institute.

War Years

+ Elected first chairman of the new Chinese Soviet Republic in 1931, Mao defied the urban-oriented Communist Central Committee to initiate moderate land reform, a policy attractive to the peasants.

+ Meanwhile, the Japanese, anxious to expand commercial and territorial interests in China, had invaded Manchuria (1931) and northeastern China (1932).

+ 1937, Mao’s first wife was shot by the Nationalists, and he divorced his second. In 1939 he married the film actor Lan P’ing, who became known as Jiang Qing (Chiang Ch’ing) and after 1964 played an increasingly important role in the party.

+ By 1946 the Communist party was identified with the interests of the peasant majority. Mao, head of the Communist party since the Long March, had become a national leader. Unwilling to cooperate after World War II, Mao and Chiang resumed the civil war. By 1949 corruption and inflation had destroyed the remaining credit of the Nationalists, and the Communists had captured most of China. The People’s Republic of China was proclaimed and Mao was elected chairman.

Chairman Mao

+ In 1956, reacting to Soviet condemnation of Stalin, Mao began to air his own policies. The advice to “let a hundred flowers bloom” was intended to conciliate intellectuals by allowing them to criticize the bureaucracy. His speech “On the Ten Great Relationships” rejected Soviet emphasis on heavy industry, arguing that increasing peasant purchasing power was the key to rapid-and socialist-economic development. His 1957 speech “On Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People” repudiated the Soviet denial of contradictions in socialist society, insisting that conflict was both inevitable and healthy. In 1958 he applied his policies in the Great Leap Forward, an attempt to substitute for the bureaucratic state a cellular system of autonomous local communes (referring to the Paris Commune of 1871) and projects, united by common ideology.

+ The Great Leap failed. Mao retired (1959) as head of state, and disillusioned Communist leaders returned to the East European socialist practice of giving autonomy to large undertakings, suppressing small ones, and tolerating leadership by an educated elite. Convinced that maximum popular participation was the fastest route to full socialism, Mao fought back. In the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-69) he mobilized youth into the Red Guard to attack the party establishment. After much rioting and the near destruction of the party, he allowed the army to restore order and the party to be rebuilt.

+ In of the country at a vastly faster pace and with greater results.1958 the CCP launched the Great Leap Forward ( ) campaign under the new “General Line for Socialist Construction.” The Great Leap Forward was aimed at accomplishing the economic and technical development

+ In April 1959 Mao, who bore the chief responsibility for the Great Leap Forward fiasco, stepped down from his position as chairman of the People’s Republic. The National People’s Congress elected Liu Shaoqi as Mao’s successor, though Mao remained chairman of the CCP. Moreover, Mao’s Great Leap Forward policy came under open criticism at a party conference at Lushan ( ), Jiangxi Province

+ From 1928 until 1931 Mao, with Zhu De and others, established rural soviets in the Hinterlands, and built the Red Army. In 1931 he was elected chairman of the newly established Soviet Republic of China, based in Jiangxi province

+ Mao led (1934 35) the Red Army on the long march (6,000 mi/9,656 km) from Jiangxi north to Yan’an in Shaanxi province, emerging as the most important Communist leader.

+ During the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937 45) the Communists and the Kuomintang continued their civil war while both were battling the Japanese invaders.

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