The Cultural Revolution

35.1.5: The Cultural Revolution

The Cultural Revolution (1966-76) was a sociopolitical movement, set into motion by Mao Zedong, whose stated goal was to preserve ‘true’ Communist ideology in China by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society. In practice, it led to the persecution and abuse of millions.

Learning Objective

List the key events of the Cultural Revolution

Key Points

  • In 1958, Mao Zedong launched the Great Leap Forward, an economic and social campaign to transform the country’s largely agrarian structure into a socialist society through rapid industrialization and collectivization. Restrictions on rural populations were enforced through forced labor, public struggle sessions, and social pressure.The Great Leap was a social and economic disaster that removed Mao from the position of power in the Communist Party of China.
  • During the early 1960s, a group of moderate pragmatists in the Party favored the idea that Mao be removed from actual power but maintain his symbolic role. Most historians agree that launching the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in 1966 was Mao’s response to the group’s increasing political and economic influence. The Revolution marked the return of Mao to a position of power after the Great Leap Forward.
  • The Cultural Revolution was a sociopolitical movement, set into motion by Mao, that started in 1966 and ended in 1976. Its stated goal was to preserve “true” Communist ideology in China by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from society and reimposing Maoism as the dominant ideology within the Party.
  • During the Revolution, millions of people were persecuted in the violent struggles that ensued across the country and suffered abuses including public humiliation, arbitrary imprisonment, torture, sustained harassment, and seizure of property. A large segment of the population was forcibly displaced. The Cultural Revolution also wreaked havoc on minority cultures in China.
  • The Cultural Revolution led to the destruction of much of China’s traditional cultural heritage and the imprisonment of a huge number of Chinese citizens as well economic and social chaos. Nearly all of the schools and universities in China were closed. The Revolution also brought to the forefront numerous internal power struggles within the Party, many of which had little to do with the larger battles between Party leaders.
  • Although the effects of the Cultural Revolution were disastrous for millions of people in China, there were some positive outcomes, particularly in the rural areas, including access to basic education and health care.

Key Terms

struggle sessions
A form of public humiliation and torture used by the Communist Party of China in the Mao Zedong era, particularly during the Cultural Revolution, to shape public opinion and humiliate, persecute, or execute political rivals and class enemies. In general, victims were forced to admit to various crimes before a crowd of people who would verbally and physically abuse the victim until he or she confessed.
Cultural Revolution
A sociopolitical movement in China from 1966 until 1976. Set into motion by Mao Zedong, then Chairman of the Communist Party of China, its stated goal was to preserve “true” Communist ideology in the country by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society and reimposing Maoist thought as the dominant ideology within the Party. The movement paralyzed China politically and had significant negative effects on its economy and society.
Red Guards
A fanatic student mass paramilitary social movement mobilized by Mao Zedong in 1966 and 1967 during the Cultural Revolution.
Great Chinese Famine
A period in the People’s Republic of China between the years 1959 and 1961 characterized by widespread famine. Drought, poor weather, and the policies of the Communist Party of China (Great Leap Forward) contributed, although the relative weights of these contributions are disputed. Scholars have estimated the number of famine victims to be between 20 and 43 million.
Gang of Four
A political faction composed of four Chinese Communist Party officials that came to prominence during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) and was later charged with a series of treasonous crimes. The group’s leading figure was Mao Zedong’s last wife, Jiang Qing. It remains unclear which major decisions were made by Mao Zedong and carried out by the group and which were the result of its own planning.
Down to the Countryside Movement
A policy instituted in the People’s Republic of China in the late 1960s and early 1970s. As a result of what Mao Zedong perceived as anti-bourgeois thinking prevalent during the Cultural Revolution, he declared certain privileged urban youth would be sent to mountainous areas or farming villages to learn from the workers and farmers there. Approximately 17 million youth were sent to rural areas as a result of the movement.
Great Leap Forward
An economic and social campaign by the Communist Party of China (CPC) that took place from 1958 to 1961 and was led by Mao Zedong. It aimed to rapidly transform the country from an agrarian economy into a socialist society through rapid industrialization and collectivization. It is widely considered to have caused the Great Chinese Famine.

 

Background: The Great Leap Forward

In 1958, Mao Zedong, the Chairman of the Communist Party of China, called for “grassroots socialism” with the aim of accelerating his plans to turn China into a modern industrialized state. In this spirit, he launched the Great Leap Forward, an economic and social campaign to transform the country’s largely agrarian structure into a socialist society through rapid industrialization and collectivization. Main changes in the lives of rural Chinese included the incremental introduction of mandatory agricultural collectivization. Private farming was prohibited and those engaged in it were persecuted and labeled counter-revolutionaries. Restrictions on rural populations were enforced through forced labor, public struggle sessions (a form of public humiliation and torture),  and social pressure. Many communities were assigned the production of a single commodity—steel.

The Great Leap was a social and economic disaster. Farmers attempted to produce steel on a massive scale, partially relying on backyard furnaces to achieve the production targets set by local cadres. The steel produced was of low quality and largely useless. The Great Leap reduced harvest sizes and led to a decline in the production of most goods, except substandard pig iron and steel. Further, local authorities frequently exaggerated production numbers, hiding and intensifying the problem for several years. Simultaneously, chaos in the collectives, bad weather, and exports of food necessary to secure hard currency resulted in the Great Chinese Famine. Historians agree that the Great Leap resulted in tens of millions of deaths, with estimates ranging from 18 to 55 million. Historian Frank Dikötter notes, “coercion, terror, and systematic violence were the foundation of the Great Leap Forward,” which “motivated one of the most deadly mass killings of human history.”

The Party forced Mao to take major responsibility for the Great Leap’s failureIn 1959, Mao resigned as the President of the People’s Republic of China, China’s de jure head of state, and was succeeded by Liu Shaoqi. By the early 1960s, many of the Great Leap’s economic policies were reversed by initiatives spearheaded by Liu and other moderate pragmatists, who were unenthusiastic about Mao’s utopian visions. By 1962, Mao had effectively withdrawn from economic decision-making and focused much of his time on further developing his contributions to Marxist-Leninist social theory, including the idea of “continuous revolution.” This theory’s ultimate aim was to set the stage for Mao to restore his brand of communism and his personal prestige within the Party.

Development of the Revolution

During the early 1960s, State Chairman Liu Shaoqi and General Secretary Deng Xiaoping favored the idea that Mao be removed from actual power but maintain his ceremonial and symbolic role, with the Party upholding all of his positive contributions to the revolution. Most historians agree that launching the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in 1966 was Mao’s response to Liu and Deng’s increasing political and economic influence (some scholars, however, note that the case for this is overstated). Dikötter argues that Mao launched the Cultural Revolution to wreak revenge on those who had dared to challenge him over the Great Leap Forward.

The Cultural Revolution was a sociopolitical movement, set into motion by Mao, that started in 1966 and ended in 1976 and whose stated goal was to preserve ‘true’ Communist ideology in China by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society and reimposing Maoism as the dominant ideology within the Party. The Revolution marked the return of Mao to a position of power after the Great Leap Forward.

The Revolution was launched after Mao alleged that bourgeois elements had infiltrated the government and society at large, aiming to restore capitalism. He insisted that these “revisionists” be removed through violent class struggle. China’s youth responded to Mao’s appeal by forming Red Guard groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist Party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials, most notably Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping. During the same period, Mao’s personality cult grew to immense proportions. Millions of people were persecuted in the violent struggles that ensued across the country and suffered a wide range of abuses, including public humiliation, arbitrary imprisonment, torture, sustained harassment, and seizure of property. A large segment of the population was forcibly displaced, most notably the transfer of urban youth to rural regions during the Down to the Countryside Movement.

A poster from the Cultural Revolution, featuring an image of Chairman Mao and published by the government of the People's Republic of China.

A poster from the Cultural Revolution, featuring an image of Chairman Mao and published by the government of the People’s Republic of China.: Mao set the scene for the Cultural Revolution by “cleansing” Beijing of powerful officials of questionable loyalty. His approach was less than transparent. He achieved this purge through newspaper articles, internal meetings, and skillfully employing his network of political allies. 

The start of the Cultural Revolution brought huge numbers of Red Guards to Beijing, with all expenses paid by the government. The revolution aimed to destroy the “Four Olds” (old customs, old culture, old habits, and old ideas) and establish the corresponding “Four News,” which ranged from the changing of names and hair cuts to ransacking homes, vandalizing cultural treasures, and desecrating temples. In a few years, countless ancient buildings, artifacts, antiques, books, and paintings were destroyed by the members of the Red Guards.Believing that certain liberal bourgeois elements of society continued to threaten the socialist framework, the Red Guards struggled against authorities at all levels of society and even set up their own tribunals. Chaos reigned in much of the nation.

During the Cultural Revolution, nearly all of the schools and universities in China were closed and the young intellectuals living in cities were ordered to the countryside to be “re-educated” by the peasants, where they performed hard manual labor and other work.

Mao officially declared the Cultural Revolution to have ended in 1969, but its active phase lasted until the death of the military leader Lin Biao in 1971. After Mao’s death and the arrest of the Gang of Four in 1976, reformers led by Deng Xiaoping gradually began to dismantle the Maoist policies associated with the Cultural Revolution.

Consequences

The Cultural Revolution led to the destruction of much of China’s traditional cultural heritage and the imprisonment of a huge number of citizens as well as general economic and social chaos. Millions of lives were ruined during this period as the Cultural Revolution pierced every part of Chinese life. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, perished in the violence of the Cultural Revolution.

The Revolution aimed to get rid of those who allegedly promoted bourgeois ideas as well as those who were seen as coming from an exploitative family background or belonged to one of the Five Black Categories (landlords, rich farmers, counter-revolutionaries, bad-influencers  or “bad elements,” and rightists). Many people perceived to belong to any of these categories, regardless of guilt or innocence, were publicly denounced, humiliated, and beaten. In their revolutionary fervor, students denounced their teachers and children denounced their parents.

The remains of Ming Dynasty Wanli Emperor at the Ming tombs. Red Guards dragged the remains of the Wanli Emperor and Empresses to the front of the tomb, where they were posthumously "denounced" and burned.

The remains of Ming Dynasty Wanli Emperor at the Ming tombs. Red Guards dragged the remains of the Wanli Emperor and Empresses to the front of the tomb, where they were posthumously “denounced” and burned. During the Cultural Revolution, libraries full of historical and foreign texts were destroyed and books were burned. Temples, churches, mosques, monasteries, and cemeteries were closed down and sometimes converted to other uses, looted, and destroyed. Among the countless acts of destruction, Red Guards from Beijing Normal University desecrated and badly damaged the burial place of Confucius.

Although the effects of the Cultural Revolution were disastrous for millions of people in China, there were some positive outcomes, particularly in the rural areas. For example, the upheavals of the Cultural Revolution and the hostility towards the intellectual elite are widely accepted to have damaged the quality of education in China, especially the higher education system. However, some policies also provided many in the rural communities with middle school education for the first time, which facilitated rural economic development in the 1970s and 80s. Similarly, a large number of health personnel was deployed to the countryside. Some farmers were given informal medical training and healthcare centers were established in rural communities. This led to a marked improvement in the health and the life expectancy of the general population.

The Cultural Revolution also brought to the forefront numerous internal power struggles within the Party, many of which had little to do with the larger battles between Party leaders but resulted instead from local factionalism and petty rivalries that were usually unrelated to the Revolution itself. Because of the chaotic political environment, local governments lacked organization and stability, if they existed at all. Members of different factions often fought on the streets and political assassinations, particularly in predominantly rural provinces, were common. The masses spontaneously involved themselves in factions and took part in open warfare against other factions. The ideology that drove these factions was vague and sometimes non-existent, with the struggle for local authority being the only motivation for mass involvement.

The Cultural Revolution wreaked havoc on minority cultures in China. In Inner Mongolia, some 790,000 people were persecuted. In Xinjiang, copies of the Qur’an and other books of the Uyghur people were burned. Muslim imams were reportedly paraded around with paint splashed on their bodies. In the ethnic Korean areas of northeast China, language schools were destroyed. In Yunnan Province, the palace of the Dai people’s king was torched and a massacre of Muslim Hui people at the hands of the People’s Liberation Army in Yunnan, known as the Shadian Incident, reportedly claimed over 1,600 lives in 1975.

Attributions