V. The Cultural Revolution in China

A. Background to the Cultural Revolution

B. Start of the Cultural Revolution

C. End of the Cultural Revolution

D. Lin Biao's Bid For Power

E. Death of Zhou Enlai

F. Death of Mao Zedong and the Fall of the Radicals

                                             

"A 'barefoot' doctor is a peasant who does part-time medical work... With their medical kits slung over their

shoulders, they called on patients in their homes, and when not occupied with medical tasks, they worked

barefoot in the paddy fields. The peasants recognized this type of doctor as their own and fondly gave them the name. Hsingkuang Production Brigade has some 290

households with a total population of 1298 organized into seven teams. The brigade provides a house for the co-

operative medical station and assigns two 'barefoot' doctors and one midwife there... These two 'barefoot'

doctors are very close to the people and serve them devotedly. There are many moving stories about Shen

Pennan, a young man, and the young woman Hsing Yichen... Shen's formal education was only five years of

primary school. After two months' training in the commune hospital, he began serving as 'barefoot' doctor in

the brigade..."

Barefoot Doctors in China

This year, in many areas and in every province, productivity has been extraordinarily high. These are the results of the commune-based system, of the coordination of efforts under the lead o the Party... and of the intelligent application to local conditions of the eight points of the Agricultural Charter..."

Factions During the Cultural Revolution– Maoist Faction

• Closely associated with Mao

• Believed in continual revolution, mass campaigns

• Believed in virtues of “red over expert”

• Members included Mao, Jiang Qing (wife) Ken Shang

– Party Bureaucrats• Leaders of the party apparatus in Secretariat

• Believe in pragmatic economic development using incentives to increae production

• Respected Mao but disliked his romantic views of change

• Great Leap policies were misplaced and damaging

• Members included Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping

– Government Faction• Composed of governmental officials in administration

• Ideologically closer to party bureaucrats but members has close personal relations with Mao

• Knew their skills would be necessary to administer China

• High managerial ability

• Zhou Enlai identified with this faction

– Military Faction• Internally divided between followers of Lin Biao who

supported Mao and Lo Juijin who favored a strong, conventional PLA

• People’s militay vs. regular military

• Improvement in relations with Russia favored by PLA

Gang of Four

During China’s Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), Zhang Chunqiao, Jiang Qing, Yao Wenyuan, and Wang Hongwen, clockwise from top right, developed a series of radical political campaigns with the support of Communist Party leader Mao Zedong.

The campaigns caused ten years of chaos and violence. After Mao’s death in 1976, the group was dubbed the Gang of Four, and each was tried and convicted of crimes associated with the Cultural Revolution.

Hua Guofeng

In 1976 Hua Guofeng became premier of China and chairman of the Chinese Communist Party. He resigned from both posts in the early 1980s.

After Chinese Communist Party chairman Mao Zedong died in 1976, Deng Xiaoping became the most influential political official in China. Deng was the force behind the Communist government’s easing of cultural and political policies and push for economic modernization that occurred during the 1980s. He also ordered the military crackdown in June 1989 on the students demonstrating for democratic reforms at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.

Deng Xiaoping

Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing, wife of Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong, became well-known in Chinese cultural circles for promoting Maoist themes in the arts. After Mao’s death in 1976, she and three radical associates, dubbed the Gang of Four, were arrested for planning a coup. Jiang was convicted and sentenced to death, which was later commuted to life imprisonment.

Lin Biao

Lin Biao was a Chinese Communist military leader who won fame as the commander of the Fourth Field Army, which helped defeat Chinese Nationalist forces in 1949, then fought on the side of the North Koreans the following year. Lin was designated to succeed Communist Chairman Mao Zedong in the late 1960s, and during that period he helped lead the Cultural Revolution in China. He allegedly died in a plane crash in 1971 after a failed coup against Mao, in which he was said to have taken part.

Hu Yaobang

Two days after Hu Yaobang’s death in April 1989, thousands of students from Beijing universities marched to Tianamen Square and laid wreaths at the Monument to the People’s Heroes in honor of the former CCP Secretary-General who had been forced to resign his post in January 1987.

Zhao Ziyang

Communist Party Secretary Zhao Ziyang urging students in Tianamen Square to end their hunger strick. Later he would tearfully admit,” I came too late, I came too late,” but he assured them that “The problems that you have raised will eventually be resolved.”

They weren’t resolved. Zhao Ziyang would be purged by the hardliners in the Politburo