The great leap foward, and the cultural revolution

[BIG BROTHER]

I've always had a somewhat negative view of the great leap foward and the cultural revolution. I've seen them as good ideas, but that were carried out in a disastrous form.

And although I'm concious that the capitalist love to slander this events to attack communism, I think they were still failures.

Later I read some material from the Bob avakian were he argues in favor of the great leap foward, and the cultural revolution.

here are the links:http://revcom.us/a/033/socialism-communism-better-capitalism-pt9.htm http://revcom.us/a/035/communism-socialism-better-than-capitalism-pt10.htm http://revcom.us/a/1251/communism_socialism_mao_china_facts.htm

Although this has made me re-think about this events my views about them haven't changed much.

But I want to know, what do you guys know and think about this two events? Is there any information out there that I should know?

Feel free to discuss.

[BobKKKindle$]

In the case of the Great Leap Forward, the figures that are often published to show how many people died are of dubious scientific validity, as, in addition to the crude death rate, they also include the people who might have been born but were not, due to the lower birth rate during this period, which is obviously not an effective way of calculating how many people have died as a result of a famine, because these "people" did not exist. Therefore, the famine during this period was not as serious as has been suggested, and was not solely due to the economic mismanagement of local officials - the economic embargo imposed by the United States and the lack of rainfall during the growing season were also important factors.

A common criticism of the GPCR is that there was excessive destruction of China's cultural heritage, and yet the cultural artifacts which were discovered and excavated during the revolution are still in good condition today - for example, the Terracotta Army located in Xi'an.

I have recently ordered two books to improve my understanding of China:

The Battle for China’s Past : Mao and the Cultural Revolution - Mobo Gao
(reviewed here (http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/))

Some of Us: Chinese Women Growing Up in the Mao Era - Zueping Zhong, Wang Zheng, and Bai Di
(reviewed here (http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2008/02/14/book-review-part-1-some-of-us-chinese-women-growing-up-in-the-mao-era/) apparently by Prairie Fire posting on a Third-Worldist blog)

[Illus]

Complete over-reliance on the revolutionary peasantry at the expense of rapid heavy industrialization and the urban working class.

[thejambo1]

i would say positive in ideas, but carried out badly. as has been said too much reliance on the peasantry.

[Panda Tse Tung]

i voted positive because of the cultural revolution. The great leap forward was a metaphysical disaster.

[Dros]

The great leap forward was a metaphysical disaster.

What are you talking about?! :lol::lol::lol:

Metaphysical?

[Kami]

The great leap forward was a metaphysical disaster.
Yes, a tragedy. We're still not sure if China exists or not :(

[Sam_b]

Complete over-reliance on the revolutionary peasantry at the expense of rapid heavy industrialization and the urban working class.



I agree.

On the point that there were 'good ideas', I happen to disagree. The attacks against the organised bureaucracy were carried out poorly, which destroyed large amounts of the state structure and were still needeed at the time. The peasantry, deemed the revolutionary class, were overworked and ended up giving all their productional output into the centralised grain reserve, which ultimately caused starvation. The years from 1958 until Mao's death saw him taking an ultra-leftist turn, as can be seen by the Cultural Revolution, arguably a backlash after the Hundred Flowers campaign. Seeing as the CR ended up almost destroying the state between the summers of 1967 and 1968 due to gang warfare on the street and purging from the party/imprisoning/murdering anyone seen as 'bourgeois' says it all really.

[Dominicana_1965]

I've always had a somewhat negative view of the great leap foward and the cultural revolution. I've seen them as good ideas, but that were carried out in a disastrous form.

And although I'm concious that the capitalist love to slander this events to attack communism, I think they were still failures.

Later I read some material from the Bob avakian were he argues in favor of the great leap foward, and the cultural revolution.

here are the links:http://revcom.us/a/033/socialism-communism-better-capitalism-pt9.htm http://revcom.us/a/035/communism-socialism-better-than-capitalism-pt10.htm http://revcom.us/a/1251/communism_socialism_mao_china_facts.htm

Although this has made me re-think about this events my views about them haven't changed much.

But I want to know, what do you guys know and think about this two events? Is there any information out there that I should know?

Feel free to discuss.

In regards to the Cultural Revolution I know very little so I won't speak on it but the Great Leap Forward (GLF) was widely slandered by the reactionaries in the West and around the World to completely distort the reality of China during the period of 1959-61 (in the similar way they did with the "Ukrainian Famine Genocide" during the early 30s). As claimed by critical authors of China, "anti-communists in the 1950s and 1960s made allegations of massive famines in China virtually every year". Such extremely exaggerated "figures" of 38 million and onwards really don't have any credible sources. Most of the sources come from worthless and baseless "evidence" such as "smuggled out official documents" by "dissidents" without explaining how they actually got these secret documents and people that weren't even interviewed by the anti-communist authors like Jung Chang and Halliday. Halliday and Chang claimed they interviewed Mao's English teacher, Zhang Hanzi who later told a reviewer she gave them no information and declined the interview. The biggest source would probably have to be "official" Chinese figures released by the Deng regime in the 80s. (One who opposed Maoist supporters)

In the 1960s a magazine called The China Quarterly was being funded by the CIA. This magazine published allegations of famine deaths that have been utilized as authenticate sources by even the most referenced anti-Maoists books.

The Great Leap Forward had made some errors, and as many peasants in the time would tell you...it was widely due to natural disasters. Despite the errors, the GLF developed a massive oil field, agriculture, rural workshops helped to modernize local communes and their agricultural methods. Heavy industry also developed and rural industry was constructed to meet the needs of the local population, the GLF also helped the countryside to deal with drought and flood defences were built.

[Killer Enigma]

What are you talking about?! :lol::lol::lol:

Metaphysical?
He tried to use a Marxist buzz-word. FAIL.

[BIG BROTHER]

well, I can see that they are definetly bias in the accounts published by capitalist media. Is there any neutral information about both events out there? or at least some first person resources?

[Dean]

I'm surprised a substantial portion of the voters voted in favor of the "cultural revolution." It was an extremely negative and unrealistic attempt to harness the creative and intellectual power of the people for the benefit of the state.

[BobKKKindle$]

Is there any neutral information about both events out there? or at least some first person resources?

The second book linked to in my post above is a collection of first-hand accounts from women who were alive during the the GPCR, and places emphasis on how the GPCR changed gender relations. There is an interview with one of the authors here: "We had a dream that the world can be better than today (http://www.revcom.us/a/059/some-of-us-en.html)"

The MSH article also contains several extracts from the book.

[redSHARP]

i had to read some books about the cultural revolution. everything was going ok, until the youth brigades started to get to radical and started to rip the country apart.

[Asoka89]

Yeah, I voted negative. it wasnt as bad as the western slander would have you believe, but both should have been handled much better.

[chegitz guevara]

It should have been multiple choice. Both were negative and positive events.

[RedHal]

In the case of the Great Leap Forward, the figures that are often published to show how many people died are of dubious scientific validity, as, in addition to the crude death rate, they also include the people who might have been born but were not, due to the lower birth rate during this period, which is obviously not an effective way of calculating how many people have died as a result of a famine, because these "people" did not exist. Therefore, the famine during this period was not as serious as has been suggested, and was not solely due to the economic mismanagement of local officials - the economic embargo imposed by the United States and the lack of rainfall during the growing season were also important factors.

A common criticism of the GPCR is that there was excessive destruction of China's cultural heritage, and yet the cultural artifacts which were discovered and excavated during the revolution are still in good condition today - for example, the Terracotta Army located in Xi'an.

I have recently ordered two books to improve my understanding of China:

The Battle for China’s Past : Mao and the Cultural Revolution - Mobo Gao
(reviewed here (http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/))

Some of Us: Chinese Women Growing Up in the Mao Era - Zueping Zhong, Wang Zheng, and Bai Di
(reviewed here (http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2008/02/14/book-review-part-1-some-of-us-chinese-women-growing-up-in-the-mao-era/) apparently by Prairie Fire posting on a Third-Worldist blog)

I would strongly suggest people atleast read those reviews of those two books (if you don't intend to read the books) Judging by most comments here, the only veiw of these two events have been throught the bourgeois media propaganda machine.

[Guerrilla22]

China saw the greatest amount of economic growth in the history of the country during the cultural revolution in terms of GDP growth. Of course the western media keeps telling us how much growth china has seen with the introduction of privately owned businesses, completely ignoring the fact the country saw greater growth during the cultural revolution.

[redSHARP]

but does the end justify the means?

[Dros]

No study, no right to speak.

It saddens me that so many comrades are willing to except the bourgeois writ of history as objective fact without any deeper exploration of events.

[Panda Tse Tung]

What are you talking about?!

Ok, farmers having little ovens in their 'backyard' with which they would melt metal?
Thats a metaphysical approach of industrialization, and that is from a historical materialist point of view before the anti-dialectics clique starts bashing me, which I'm not into.
Ok, industry as has been shown in history needs to be well like factory's for the sake of efficiency. I cant really explain this well in English, I've got a lot of words springing up which aren't English. But lets phrase it in a different way: what would be better for industrialization? little garden-ovens used by individuals here, there and everywhere, or factories with advanced machinery?
Mao himself realized well before the GLP ended, though he didn't want to 'break the enthusiasm of the masses'.

[Wanted Man]

No study, no right to speak.

It saddens me that so many comrades are willing to except the bourgeois writ of history as objective fact without any deeper exploration of events.
Well, maybe you would be inclined to provide some information, instead of just reciting the "no study" mantra. I'm sorry, but everyone has a right to speak, even if they know jack diddly squat about the subject. If you've got the information to utterly refute the common story of the GLF and GPCR, just post it.

What Dominicana posted makes a lot of sense. Obviously, the screamy texts from Jung Chang and her ilk aren't worth the paper they're printed on. But when Dominicana gets to Deng's figures, we're left with: oh, yeah, but he opposed Mao in the end. It's dogmatic history: oh, he opposed the guy I like, so he's probably biased, wrong or lying.

[Panda Tse Tung]

Well, maybe you would be inclined to provide some information, instead of just reciting the "no study" mantra. I'm sorry, but everyone has a right to speak, even if they know jack diddly squat about the subject. If you've got the information to utterly refute the common story of the GLF and GPCR, just post it.

Not true, this would merely hold back the discussion which is not what we want. We want the discussion to be fruitful to such an extend that you learn and develop through and from it. Someone who knows shit about the subject can of course ask questions, or provide information he possesses, but factually discussing it on the basis of half information would not be a good and would actually be an un-productive and time-wasting manner.

I'm not saying it is applicable to this given situation of course, but just defending the quote in itself.

[Colonello Buendia]

in all fairness I think The GLP was important but like Lenin had done, Mao tried to industrialise to quickly. this meant that though the country could then support itself, alot of people would've suffered. This is my understanding of limited knowledge I have of the subject so feel free to correct and explain

[Dimentio]

I've always had a somewhat negative view of the great leap foward and the cultural revolution. I've seen them as good ideas, but that were carried out in a disastrous form.

And although I'm concious that the capitalist love to slander this events to attack communism, I think they were still failures.

Later I read some material from the Bob avakian were he argues in favor of the great leap foward, and the cultural revolution.

here are the links:http://revcom.us/a/033/socialism-communism-better-capitalism-pt9.htm http://revcom.us/a/035/communism-socialism-better-than-capitalism-pt10.htm http://revcom.us/a/1251/communism_socialism_mao_china_facts.htm

Although this has made me re-think about this events my views about them haven't changed much.

But I want to know, what do you guys know and think about this two events? Is there any information out there that I should know?

Feel free to discuss.

I think the Great Leap Forward was an idiotic idea. Industrial development should not be left in the hand of people who think that reading the Little Red is equivalent to pain relaxation during a brain tumour operation.

[Dominicana_1965]

What Dominicana posted makes a lot of sense. Obviously, the screamy texts from Jung Chang and her ilk aren't worth the paper they're printed on. But when Dominicana gets to Deng's figures, we're left with: oh, yeah, but he opposed Mao in the end. It's dogmatic history: oh, he opposed the guy I like, so he's probably biased, wrong or lying.

Sorry comrades if it appears as if I'm merely claiming "well he opposed Mao, so he must have lied" that was not my intentions. My mistake for thinking that most leftists recognized that Deng's claims were refuted and were widely noticed.

Like I said in the past post most of the prominent modern and recent "figures" come from the early 1980s & late 1970s when Deng criticized Mao's supporters, the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. Claims were made that the "disasters" of the GLF were caused by 70% human errors and 30% natural disasters (this is despite claims of peasants and previous figures presented by the Maoist state that said the exact opposite). Its important to also mention that the "tragic" history of the Great Leap Forward was only taken seriously in the 1980s after the new Chinese leadership set itself in power.

During the power struggle "official" Chinese figures released after Mao died suggest that 16.5 million died in the Great Leap Forward. The problem with this specific figure is that there is no way of authenticating these figures highly due to the mystery on how they were preserved and gathered for 20 years before being finally released. This figure has been utilized by various anti-communists to combine the Chinese figure with their own from the Chinese census in 1954 and 1964. Another problem arises with the actual Chinese census, as I'll explain in a few.

Many U.S. demographers that jump on the bandwagon of a "massive death toll" hypothesis use widely unreliable death rate figures released in the 1980s during Deng's reforms. Although what is interesting is that some of the very same demographers that support this massive death toll have questioned the actual death rate figures themselves.

Most death rate figures from 1940-82 were like most Chinese demographic information, a state secret until the early 1980s. In 1982 the death rate figures of the 1950s and 1960s were released although there is uncertainty on how they were gathered. The figures show a increased death rate of about 10% per 1000 in 1957 to 25.4 per 1000 in 1960, dropping to 14% per 1000 in 1961 to 10% per 1000 in 1962. The figures claim 15 million excess deaths due to famine during the Great Leap Forward. This date as I claimed before was and still is utilized by anti-communists all around the World but mostly by U.S. demographers that push the "massive death toll" hypothesis. John Aird was one of the main three to heavily promote such figures. I would question whether somebody that received funds from the Rockefeller Foundation in the 1980s and writes a book promoting neo-liberalism is reliable for a objective look at the GLF...

Much of the information released during Deng was heavily "filtered" and limited. In 1982 John Aird himself said that "the main reason so few national population data appear in Chinese sources, however, is central censorship. No National population figures can be made public without prior authorization by the state council. Even officials of the State Statistical Bureau cannot use such figures until they have been cleared." 2 of the main demographers of the massive death toll hypothesis also admit that they believe that the Chinese death rate figures released in the 1980s were estimates and not based on actual counts of reported deaths.

The most important, in my opinion at least, is that the Deng figures are more than likely, estimates. Chinese registration and reporting since the 1950s was very unreliable due to the fact that they were incomplete. The national or provincial statistical personnel had to estimate all or part of their totals. The registration was started in the 1950s and as Judith Banister, one of the main U.S. demographers, says "incomplete local reports supplemented by estimates."

[hekmatista]

To the extent that ordinary people were drawn into revolutionary struggle to build new relations of production, insofar as a glimpse of the world beyond wage labor and commodity production was seen, both events were positive. To the extent that many of the correct slogans and purported goals of both were cynically used for factional advantage by the ruling Party, there was a strong negative aspect, often resulting in greater net suffering. In the long run capitalism triumphed in China.
While I agree that bourgeois and Dengist statistics are suspect, is anyone disputing that there were many deaths attributable to economic dislocations following upon the nationwide "line-struggles" of the GLF and the GPCR? Say there were "only" 1.6 million rather than the Dengist 16 million estimate; is that not still a disaster on a scale of the Irish 1847?

[BIG BROTHER]

If most peasants hadn't left their farming duties unattended I'm sure there would have been a smaller famine, since only the weather would have been the only factor that affected the crops.

I wonder though, what would have happened if when Mao discovered that the ovens were going to be useless he would have called the people off.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Mao should have stuck with Stalin's bureaucratic industrialization scheme, established closer ties with the Soviet "revisionists," but also enacted the sovkhozization scheme of said "revisionists."

I voted negative.

[chegitz guevara]

If most peasants hadn't left their farming duties unattended I'm sure there would have been a smaller famine, since only the weather would have been the only factor that affected the crops.

I wonder though, what would have happened if when Mao discovered that the ovens were going to be useless he would have called the people off.

The famine resulting from the GLF wasn't a result of peasants not farming. It was a result of applying politics to farming, bureaucratic cowardice, national pride, and bad weather.

The CPC made two major mistakes: the four pests campaign and attempting to put Lysenkoism into practice. One of the four declared pests was the sparrow, which does eat a little seed. Peasants were encouraged to chase the sparrows until they dropped dead from exhaustion. The problem is, what sparrows like more than grain is bugs, including locust larva. The mass destruction of sparrows led to massive swarms of locusts.

As well, the CPC tried to practice on a wide scale, without testing, Lysenkoist ideas, like the same class of plants won't compete with each other and deep furrowing to grow stronger, deeper roots. As it turns out, crops of the same class do compete with each other, which means smaller plants with less seed. And deep furrows (up to two feet) means that the plants never get out of the ground.

China had two great years of weather, which actually masked the problems in agriculture. Then they had two years of terrible weather, droughts and floods. Because bureaucrats were afraid to admit that they weren't able to meet their quotas, they said nothing, and allowed the state to take too much grain away from the peasants (just as in the Holodomor). When the scale of the disaster finally became apparent, China was too proud to ask for aid (as in the 1976 earthquake), and even continued exporting grain.

The flip side, however, is that the GLF laid the groundwork for a massive expansion of Chinese industry. We will never know how many millions perished from the GLF, but we do know that it was what led to China becoming an industrial giant.

[Bastable]

You should have had done the voting differently so we could vote for either as good or bad.

I personally believe that the Great Leap forward was rash. Mao tried to accomplish too much in too short a space, also i don't feel that the methods employed were to flash hot either.

The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution on the other hand was the second greatest thing to happen in China's history (behind the initial revolution of course). Using the revolutionary youth to weaken the power of his own officials and to change a largely chauvinistic and backward culture to a progressive one was genius on Mao's part.

[PigmerikanMao]

I think they were both entirely necessary, revolutionary, and progressive beyond any other social programs to be implemented before or after them. As for the death toll, most were calculated by class enemies who seek to disparage the advancement of communism, where the broad socio-economic and political advances are completely ignored in the west. Don't get me wrong, there was suffering- as Chairman Mao said, "A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery. It cannot be so refined and leisurely. A revolution is an insurrection in which one class overthrows another."
For an actual unbiased look at the GLF and GPCR, I'd recommend The Battle for China's Past. by Mobo Gao, not the classic Pigmerikkkan textbook definitions of communist "crimes."
;)

[PigmerikanMao]

Say there were "only" 1.6 million rather than the Dengist 16 million estimate; is that not still a disaster on a scale of the Irish 1847?
Yes, but even then, these numbers can be seen as the effect of more than three consecutive years of natural disasters. That considering, I think Mao actually did pretty well. Furthermore, when we look at the nearby capitalist India, about 5 million people died every year there over the course of 20 years due to lack of food, shelter, or supplies- a total death toll of about 100 million, matching the bourgeois announced death toll of the entirety of the "communist experiment."
:rolleyes:

[Dros]

If you've got the information to utterly refute the common story of the GLF and GPCR, just post it.

Read books. Do an investigation of original sources. I'm not going to force feed the fish here about something that a basic materialist understanding of history could correct.

[BobKKKindle$]

read books. Do an investigation of original sources. I'm not going to force feed the fish here about something that a basic materialist understanding of history could correct.I agree that mainstream history presents a biased view of these events, but instead of simply telling people to go and read books when they want to find out what really happened, maybe you should give some suggestions as to which books they should read, or a summary of the achievements of these events, based on your own knowledge?

In addition to the inclusion of the people who were not born (see my previous post) the death toll for the GLF is also flawed because it does not account for the role of migration - many people who had previously worked as farmers chose to migrate to urban areas due to food shortages and low rural incomes, and if they left without obtaining the permission of the local government, they were deducted from rural population records, but were not added to the records showing the number of urban residents. This means that the population data for the years in which the famine was most acute show a fall in the population, and it has been assumed that this fall was a result of deaths from famine - even though part of the decline was actually the result of internal migration.

[Dros]

I agree that mainstream history presents a biased view of these events, but instead of simply telling people to go and read books when they want to find out what really happened, maybe you should give some suggestions as to which books they should read, or a summary of the achievements of these events, based on your own knowledge?

I would start with Daubier's "A History of the Chinese Cultural Revolution". "Fanshen" and "Shenfan" are also quite good.

[BobKKKindle$]

I would start with Daubier's "A History of the Chinese Cultural Revolution". "Fanshen" and "Shenfan" are also quite good.

I was actually making the suggestion for the benefit of other users - I have made the effort to research the objective view of these events (see the second part of my previous post)

[Dros]

I was actually making the suggestion for the benefit of other users - I have made the effort to research the objective view of these events (see the second part of my previous post)

I know. I was suggesting these for other users. You are obviously quite knowledgeable on the subject and consequentially you don't take the bourgeois propagandistic line on the issue.

[DancingLarry]

One thing history allows us to do is to judge policies by their results, both intended and otherwise. The political consequences of the GPCR endure to this day in China, and are catastrophic for the cause of socialism. The excesses of the GPCR were so deep and so grievous that the Chinese masses themselves have hewed unswervingly to a capitalist road line ever since. No serious leftist can consider this a positive result.

It's more difficult to judge the GLF, simply because the breadth of primary information necessary to make a well-reasoned assessment simply isn't available. That the CPC pulled the plug on the program, and they at least should have had that primary information, suggests that the party leadership at least considered it a failure. It was an interesting experiment, one of the few occasions of a state socialist regime attempting a program of decentralized development. Part of the enduring strength of capitalism has been its ability to stimulate decentralized development, which becomes ever more rather than less relevant in an era in which behemoth industrialization is becoming passe. Anyone who seriously is committed to a living socialism in the 21st century will have to recognize the need to find a workable socialist model of decentralized development, for that will be the characteristic model of development of the era, just as industrial gigantism characterized the 19th and early 20th centuries.

[BobKKKindle$]

the excesses of the GPCR were so deep and so grievous that the Chinese masses themselves have hewed unswervingly to a capitalist road line ever since.Incorrect. The mainstream view of the GPCR shows the event as having terrible consequences for all of the people who were alive when this event took place - but this is not an objective view. When Deng Xiaoping took power, the Chinese government encouraged the emergence of a new type of historical narrative which has been described as "wounded/scar literature" (shanghen wenxue) to promote the view that all of the people who were engaged in the GPCR were unfairly victimized, or were guilty of persecuting others (a victim/victimizer dichotomy). This view was promoted to support the government's position that the GPCR was a mistake ("thoroughly negate the Cultural Revolution") motivated in part by the fact that Deng Xiaoping's son was tortured and paralyzed when he was pushed out of a window during the GPCR, and Deng Xiaoping himself was denounced and removed from his position as a "capitalist-roader".

This version of narrative, however, does not account for the positive impacts of the GPCR, and those who are able to remember having positive experiences are unable to make their views heard. Existing memoirs (especially those which are most popular with western audiences) are written mainly by intellectuals who are not representative of the experiences of most Chinese, especially the inhabitants of rural areas. Jung Chang, for example (author of Wild Swans) was the daughter of high-ranking party officials, which meant that she lived in a private compound, had access to servants as a child, and did not have to suffer the hardship of working on the land.

For a selection of positive narratives, I recommend Some of Us, which is based on the experiences of several zhishi qingnian (youths who were sent to work in the countryside and experience the hardship of rural life) and places emphasis on the impact of the GPCR on gender relations. This book also includes an analysis of the legitimacy of different historical narratives in the introductory section.

[aussiestalinist]

i would say positive in ideas, but carried out badly. as has been said too much reliance on the peasantry.


Agreed. China was hundreds of years behind the west and the Soviet Union. China needed to catch up or be crushed by western imperialism. The problem was that it was great idea but it was carried out in the wrong way. To much labour was taken away form agriculture to be used in industrial works. But yet the industrial works produced second-rate produce creating a total economic disaster.

[DancingLarry]

This version of narrative, however, does not account for the positive impacts of the GPCR


Please detail how the GPCR has a positive impact today. If you're going to throw around denunciations about "bourgeois views" you are obligated to be able to define how the GPCR has contributed to a positve progressive proletarian impact for socialism as a continuing dialectical force. I see no positive historic impact on the social and political development of today's China, that in fact today's China remains, 40 years later, continuing to march on a rightist path fueled by the backlash of the GPCR. Simply denouncing something as a "bourgeois view" in itself answers nothing.

[Rawthentic]

China remains, 40 years later, continuing to march on a rightist path fueled by the backlash of the GPCR. Simply denouncing something as a "bourgeois view" in itself answers nothing.

Actually, the GPCR ultimately did fail in its attempt to rid the Party of rightist and other bourgeois elements. It is because the counterrevolution happened (led by Deng Xiaoping) that China is in the condition it is today - horrendous. One can only compare revolutionary China with now and see the stark contradictions.

But, I find it a bit ridiculous to say that the GPCR has no positive impact today. It was, up to today, the highest model of socialism in history. No other leader of a socialist state had understood the contradictions under socialist society (the possibility of emerging bourgeois forces within the party itself due to there still being capitalist remnants or "birthmarks" within developing socialism) and called on the masses to rebel against all reactionary forms of authority, and to carry forward on the socialist path.

[The Intransigent Faction]

No study, no right to speak.

It saddens me that so many comrades are willing to except the bourgeois writ of history as objective fact without any deeper exploration of events.

Indeed, Comrade.

I'd like to post a brief defense which I came across recently.

"There are four main atrocities people tie Mao Tse-Tung in with, The Invasion of Tibet, The Hundred Flowers Campaign, The Great Leap Forward, and The Cultural Revolution; which happened in that order. I wish to present a case in Mao's defense for each.

1) The Invasion of Tibet: In 1950, the Red Army invaded Tibet, a British colonial possession, Mao Tse-Tung was widely blamed for the destruction of Buddhist temples and crack down of religious practices as well as the thousands of deaths during the invasion.
On the contrary, the Red Army was democratic at this point, as was Mao’s wish, so Mao himself had no authority over when the Chinese army invaded the colony. He merely pretended to as to not appear weak to the western imperialists, which would have taken such opportunity to fund a counter revolutionary operation to remove the new communist government.
As for the invasion itself and atrocities which occurred, since Mao had little control over the red army at the time, he obviously didn’t control when soldiers went out of line and torched a Buddhist temple, which were actually rare occurrences. Besides the deaths, which were mostly those of enemy combatants anyways, the Invasion actually liberated Tibet from harsh British rule, healed the poverty of the region, and promoted further rebellion against the British on the continent.

2) The Hundred Flowers Campaign: Once Mao had a firm grip on party policy, he launched the Hundred flowers campaign 50 years ago in 1956. It was started by Mao as an attempt to liberalize party policy and allow multi ideal practices in China. The hardliners of the party, which also held some influence, saw Mao as trying to restore capitalism, failing that a loose socialism, and aimed to stop him.
Mao was forced to step back from full power because of bombardment by his enemies, and during this time, those who expressed their ideals to the party were attacked because of their "reactionary" thinking, and as a matter of fact, the failure to liberalize party policy and the deaths of those attacks in truth, greatly grieved Mao.

3) The Great Leap Forward: In the late 50's and early 60's Mao noticed that the Nationalists failure to commercialize the Agricultural network in China and the booming population would soon lead to a disaster. Noticing the coming problems, Mao launched a series of Industrial and Agricultural reforms to combat the coming starvation.
In any other scenario, Mao would have prevented many deaths except for one problem; drought. During the middle of his agricultural reform, drought struck China and many died from Famine, a famine which Mao is widely blamed for. It can be noted and seriously debated however, that without the Great Leap forward, many more, as much as three times as recorded, could have died from starvation. Despite US propaganda at the time, the Great Leap Forward was actually a big success and saved many lives.

4) The Cultural Revolution: The Cultural Revolution, affectionately called "The Time China went mad" by anti-communists, is the major folly Mao is remembered for, that being that the atrocities of the failures in this campaign were actually Mao's fault... at least partly that is.
Before Mao died in 1976, he launched his final campaign which he called the Cultural Revolution. Mao saw reactionary capitalists gaining ground in the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) as well as external forces demonizing the party’s actions (Including attempts to overthrow the Congolese government, end Pol-Pot’s primitive reign over Cambodia, and send economical aid to Albania during the Sino-Soviet Split).
Mao called upon the masses for a second revolution and for the proletariat and farmers alike to besiege party headquarters and end the reactionary threat. The people applied and formed the Red Guard which went beyond Mao's plans and attacked religious sites of worship, immigrants that were thought to be working for reactionaries, and even each other. Mao, foreseeing the coming anarchy, quickly moved to restore order in China and called the Cultural Revolution a "success" and asked the Red Guard to dismantle.
Shortly after, Mao died of illness and China was left in a power struggle. In truth, had the Red Guard not gone out of hand and the Cultural Revolution been truly successful, China could have been on its way to a true communist utopia. Arguably, it was the Cultural Revolution that was the closest period in time in which a nation was the closest to reaching true communism."

So..all the alleged atrocities are overplayed by bourgeois historians who are willing to blame him for everything from trying to prevent a bourgeois resurgence (bourgeoisie sympathizers don't permanently disappear post-revolution) to bad weather.
There was legitimate concern about what would happen if Mao was removed and other elements of the party took power. After his death, we see the results in modern China. A departure from "Mao Zedong thought" has turned China into anything but a "worker's state"..In modern China, the workers are little more than pawns of the international bourgeoisie and the government is hardly a government of the average workers.
EDIT: Although, "Live For The People" is correct that it would be inaccurate to claim that there are no positive aspects to the current Chinese government.

[Rawthentic]

Brad, I never implied that.

I meant that it is ridiculous to think that there are no positive aspects to the GPCR, when it was a movement that truly shook the world.

The current Chinese government is a reactionary, capitalist regime.

[The Intransigent Faction]

Brad, I never implied that.

I meant that it is ridiculous to think that there are no positive aspects to the GPCR, when it was a movement that truly shook the world.

The current Chinese government is a reactionary, capitalist regime.

Ah, my mistake. Misinterpretation there of what you meant by

But, I find it a bit ridiculous to say that the GPCR has no positive impact today.

Still, that's quite true.
The idea of a Communist revolution in China in itself is great for that nation.
As I said above, China has strayed far from Marxism-Leninism-Maoism since.

[aussiestalinist]

Actually, the GPCR ultimately did fail in its attempt to rid the Party of rightist and other bourgeois elements. It is because the counterrevolution happened (led by Deng Xiaoping) that China is in the condition it is today - horrendous. One can only compare revolutionary China with now and see the stark contradictions


That is why the great proletarian cultural revolution didn't do enough. First it should have killed or purged every any of the proletarian movement. Second it should have made it impossible for any opposition to have any power. Then and only the the revolution would be safe from capitalist roaders. I denounce all anarchists, trotskyists, revisionists and fabians as enemies of the revolution and enemies of the people.

[Lost In Translation]

For me, I think that Mao meant well in terms of the Great Leap Forward. However, it might have had a different outcome if Khrushchev supported this idea. Unfortunately, Mao didn't handle the situation well when it started to not work, and completely ignored it. The result: a China thrown back into the dark ages, and Capitalists once again triumphing at the sight of socialism falling apart.

Still, it was probably a positive event to start.

[Rawthentic]

globalcommie, Khrushchev did not support the GPCR because it represented a struggle against revisionism, it was built upon the lessons of capitalist restoration in the Soviet Union, which Nikita exemplified.

I'm not sure how Mao was supposed to handle the situation or not. I mean, this was a mass movement of millions of students, workers, peasants, and intellectuals, amongst others.

[BobKKKindle$]

The result: a China thrown back into the dark ages, and Capitalists once again triumphing at the sight of socialism falling apart.You have made an assertion but you have not provided any citations or evidence to support this allegation, and so why should people accept what you have to say? The Chinese economy continued to grow during the GPCR at a rate higher than most other developing countries, despite the lack of development aid, and the expansion of healthcare in the countryside through the "barefoot doctors" movement (students who were sent to the countryside with basic medical supplies to treat diseases and issue information to encourage prevention) enabled a rapid increase in life expectancy (Source: Mobo Gao, The Battle for China's Past) Therefore, the assertion that China was returned to the "dark ages" is false.

[kotahitanga whenua]

we won the great patriotic war dident we>?. china is a superpower isint it?>.:glare:

[Qwerty489]

Actually, the GPCR ultimately did fail in its attempt to rid the Party of rightist and other bourgeois elements. It is because the counterrevolution happened (led by Deng Xiaoping) that China is in the condition it is today - horrendous. One can only compare revolutionary China with now and see the stark contradictions.

But, I find it a bit ridiculous to say that the GPCR has no positive impact today. It was, up to today, the highest model of socialism in history. No other leader of a socialist state had understood the contradictions under socialist society (the possibility of emerging bourgeois forces within the party itself due to there still being capitalist remnants or "birthmarks" within developing socialism) and called on the masses to rebel against all reactionary forms of authority, and to carry forward on the socialist path.
The counter-revolution happened because of the gross theoretical and practical revisionism of Mao's theory itself, that includes letting the 'national bourgeois' into positions of power within society simply because they engaged in fake self-criticism, and in more general terms of the non-confrontational stance of Mao towards the 'patriotic bourgeois' in class struggle.

Mao failed because he did not recognize in theory or practise, comrade Stalin's theory of the development of socialism alongside the aggravation of class struggle.

[PigmerikanMao]

I would suggest reading the Battle for China's Past by Mobo Gao, he delves deeply into the issue and reveals the great progress brought fourth by the two programs as opposed to fixating on the negatives that western capitalists and revisionists are always enthralled to pour over.

[PigmerikanMao]

Indeed, Comrade.

I'd like to post a brief defense which I came across recently.

"There are four main atrocities people tie Mao Tse-Tung in with, The Invasion of Tibet, The Hundred Flowers Campaign, The Great Leap Forward, and The Cultural Revolution; which happened in that order. I wish to present a case in Mao's defense for each.

1) The Invasion of Tibet: In 1950, the Red Army invaded Tibet, a British colonial possession, Mao Tse-Tung was widely blamed for the destruction of Buddhist temples and crack down of religious practices as well as the thousands of deaths during the invasion.
On the contrary, the Red Army was democratic at this point, as was Mao’s wish, so Mao himself had no authority over when the Chinese army invaded the colony. He merely pretended to as to not appear weak to the western imperialists, which would have taken such opportunity to fund a counter revolutionary operation to remove the new communist government.
As for the invasion itself and atrocities which occurred, since Mao had little control over the red army at the time, he obviously didn’t control when soldiers went out of line and torched a Buddhist temple, which were actually rare occurrences. Besides the deaths, which were mostly those of enemy combatants anyways, the Invasion actually liberated Tibet from harsh British rule, healed the poverty of the region, and promoted further rebellion against the British on the continent.

2) The Hundred Flowers Campaign: Once Mao had a firm grip on party policy, he launched the Hundred flowers campaign 50 years ago in 1956. It was started by Mao as an attempt to liberalize party policy and allow multi ideal practices in China. The hardliners of the party, which also held some influence, saw Mao as trying to restore capitalism, failing that a loose socialism, and aimed to stop him.
Mao was forced to step back from full power because of bombardment by his enemies, and during this time, those who expressed their ideals to the party were attacked because of their "reactionary" thinking, and as a matter of fact, the failure to liberalize party policy and the deaths of those attacks in truth, greatly grieved Mao.

3) The Great Leap Forward: In the late 50's and early 60's Mao noticed that the Nationalists failure to commercialize the Agricultural network in China and the booming population would soon lead to a disaster. Noticing the coming problems, Mao launched a series of Industrial and Agricultural reforms to combat the coming starvation.
In any other scenario, Mao would have prevented many deaths except for one problem; drought. During the middle of his agricultural reform, drought struck China and many died from Famine, a famine which Mao is widely blamed for. It can be noted and seriously debated however, that without the Great Leap forward, many more, as much as three times as recorded, could have died from starvation. Despite US propaganda at the time, the Great Leap Forward was actually a big success and saved many lives.

4) The Cultural Revolution: The Cultural Revolution, affectionately called "The Time China went mad" by anti-communists, is the major folly Mao is remembered for, that being that the atrocities of the failures in this campaign were actually Mao's fault... at least partly that is.
Before Mao died in 1976, he launched his final campaign which he called the Cultural Revolution. Mao saw reactionary capitalists gaining ground in the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) as well as external forces demonizing the party’s actions (Including attempts to overthrow the Congolese government, end Pol-Pot’s primitive reign over Cambodia, and send economical aid to Albania during the Sino-Soviet Split).
Mao called upon the masses for a second revolution and for the proletariat and farmers alike to besiege party headquarters and end the reactionary threat. The people applied and formed the Red Guard which went beyond Mao's plans and attacked religious sites of worship, immigrants that were thought to be working for reactionaries, and even each other. Mao, foreseeing the coming anarchy, quickly moved to restore order in China and called the Cultural Revolution a "success" and asked the Red Guard to dismantle.
Shortly after, Mao died of illness and China was left in a power struggle. In truth, had the Red Guard not gone out of hand and the Cultural Revolution been truly successful, China could have been on its way to a true communist utopia. Arguably, it was the Cultural Revolution that was the closest period in time in which a nation was the closest to reaching true communism."

So..all the alleged atrocities are overplayed by bourgeois historians who are willing to blame him for everything from trying to prevent a bourgeois resurgence (bourgeoisie sympathizers don't permanently disappear post-revolution) to bad weather.
There was legitimate concern about what would happen if Mao was removed and other elements of the party took power. After his death, we see the results in modern China. A departure from "Mao Zedong thought" has turned China into anything but a "worker's state"..In modern China, the workers are little more than pawns of the international bourgeoisie and the government is hardly a government of the average workers.
EDIT: Although, "Live For The People" is correct that it would be inaccurate to claim that there are no positive aspects to the current Chinese government.

Where did you come across this? I'm trying to remember if I wrote it or not. :laugh:

[Labor Shall Rule]

I recommend that everyone read Mao and Lincoln: Great Leap Forward not all bad to get a more intellectually honest view of Chinese history during that mid-20th century.

Here are some excerpts:


The Great Leap Forward (GLF) was not a senseless fantasy as many in the neo-liberal West and some in China have since suggested in hindsight. It called for the new system of "Two Decentralizations, Three Centralizations and One Responsibility". By this was meant the decentralized use of labor and local investment; central control over political decisions, planning and administration of natural investment capital; one responsibility meant every basic unit to account for itself to its supervising unit.

The GLF was successful in many areas. The one area that failed attracted the most attention. It was the area of back-yard steel-furnace production. The technological requirement of steelmaking, unlike hydro-electricity, did not lend itself to labor-intensive mass movements. Yet steel was the symbol of industrialization and a heroic attempt had to be made to overcome the lack of capital for imported modern mechanization. The attempt failed conspicuously, but its damage to the economy was overrated. The program did not operate year-around, and did not disrupt farm harvests.


In 1963, the Chinese press called the famine of 1961-62 the most severe since 1879. In 1961, a food-storage program obliged China to import 6.2 million tons of grain from Canada and Australia. In 1962, import decreased to 5.32 million tons. Between 1961 and 1965, China imported a total of 30 million tons of grain at a cost of US$2 billion (Robert Price, International Trade of Communist China Vol II, pp 600-601). More would have been imported except that US pressure on Canada and Australia to limit sales to China and US interference with shipping prevented China from importing more. Canada and Australia were both anxious to provide unlimited credit to China for grain purchase, but alas, US policy prevailed and millions starved in China.

The University of Wisconsin's Maurice Meisner, whom many consider to be the dean of post-World War II Chinese scholarship, presents three related ways of looking at the alleged 20 million to 30 million deaths caused by the Great Famine begun in the late 1950s under Mao's tenure in The Deng Xiaoping Era and Inquiry into the Fate of Chinese Socialism 1978-1994 (New York, Hill and Wang, 1996). One, it was a horrible miscalculation. Two, it was the end of famines on this scale (famines had been occurring for the previous few centuries off and on in China about every generation or so). In other words, it brought this horrible historical pattern to an end. Or, three, it was a horrible miscalculation, while also afterward bringing this pattern of famine every generation of so to an end, thus saving millions from a similar fate.

It is now the common perception in the West that 30 millions starved to death as a result of Mao's launching of the Great Leap Forward. Is it true or is it again a result of manufactured history? An article from the Australia-China Review contains a noteworthy refutation of the widely accepted figures of tens of millions of deaths caused by the GLF. The following is excerpted from this article, "Wild Swans and Mao's Agrarian Strategy" by Wim F Werthheim, emeritus professor from the University of Amsterdam, one of the best-noted European China scholars:


But the figure amounting to tens of millions ... [lacks] any historical basis. Often it is argued that at the censuses of the 1960s "between 17 and 29 millions of Chinese" appeared to be missing, in comparison with the official census figures from the 1950s. But these calculations are lacking any semblance of reliability. At my first visit to China, in August 1957, I had asked to get the opportunity to meet two outstanding Chinese social scientists: Fei Xiao-tung, the sociologist, and Chen Ta, the demographer. I could not meet either of them, because they were both seriously criticized at that time as rightists; but I was allowed a visit by Pang Zenian, a Marxist philosopher who knew about the problems of both scholars. Chen Ta was criticized because he had attacked the pretended 1953 census. In the past he had organized censuses, and he could not believe that suddenly, within a rather short period, the total population of China had risen from 450 [million] to 600 million, as had been officially claimed by the Chinese authorities after the 1953 census. He would have [liked] to organize a scientifically well-founded census himself, instead of an assessment largely based on regional random samples as had happened in 1953. According to him, the method followed in that year was unscientific.

For that matter, a Chinese expert of demography, Dr Ping-ti Ho, professor of history at the University of Chicago, in a book titled Studies on the Population of China, 1368-1953, Harvard East Asian Studies No 4, 1959, also mentioned numerous "flaws" in the 1953 census: "All in all, therefore, the nationwide enumeration of 1953 was not a census in the technical definition of the term"; the separate provincial figures show indeed an unbelievable increase of some 30 percent in the period 1947-1953, a period of heavy revolutionary struggle. (p 93-94) My conclusion is that the claim that in the 1960s a number between 17 [million] and 29 million people was "missing" is worthless if there was never any certainty about the 600 millions of Chinese. Most probably these "missing people" did not starve in the calamity years 1960-61, but in fact have never existed.

[The Intransigent Faction]

Where did you come across this? I'm trying to remember if I wrote it or not. :laugh:

I came across this on GaiaOnline quite a while ago, actually. Doubt it's been published so you could polish it a bit and take the credit. :lol:

[BIG BROTHER]

Mao an lincoln that seems like an interesting book.

[PigmerikanMao]

I came across this on GaiaOnline quite a while ago, actually. Doubt it's been published so you could polish it a bit and take the credit. :lol:
yeah, that was me- I used to go to gaia under the name of comrade xan I believe xD lmao

[Winter]

I would suggest reading the Battle for China's Past by Mobo Gao, he delves deeply into the issue and reveals the great progress brought fourth by the two programs as opposed to fixating on the negatives that western capitalists and revisionists are always enthralled to pour over.

Excellent. Thanks for the suggestion comrade, I need to get my hands on that book :thumbup:

[redwinter]

This week Revolution newspaper published an article from the Set the Record Straight project specifically dealing with the revolutionary legacy of Mao Tsetung and the Cultural Revolution in China...going right up in the face of all the reactionary flag waving in the lead up to the Olympic games (and only getting worse as the days go by).

I offer a link to the article as a contribution to clearing up some misconceptions and some incorrect approaches I've read interlaced through this thread (though some people aren't as far off compared to others I've seen, thank God!)

Setting the Record Straight: The Truth About the Cultural Revolution (http://www.revcom.us/a/139/STRS-en.html)

I thought this excerpt would contribute to some of the debate here:



Can you point to real accomplishments of the Cultural Revolution?
First and foremost, the Cultural Revolution succeeded in maintaining proletarian rule and preventing capitalist takeover in China for 10 years (1966-76). It also led to profound social and institutional changes and deepened the orientation of organizing society around the principle of “serve the people.” Here are some examples.

Education. China’s universities—which in the early 1960s were still the province of the sons and daughters of intellectuals, cadres, and the former privileged classes—were transformed. The old curriculum was overhauled as part of meeting the needs of building an egalitarian society. Autocratic teaching methods were criticized. At all levels, education was taken as much more than just classroom schooling—it was understood to be a broad social and lifelong process. Study and research were combined with productive labor. Revolutionary politics and political study were integral to the educational process. The Cultural Revolution attacked the notion that education is a ladder to “getting ahead” and that skills and knowledge are a ticket for gaining advantage and privilege over others. It promoted new values and the outlook that knowledge must be acquired and used to serve the collective good.

The universities instituted open enrollment: by the early 1970s, worker and peasant students made up the great majority of the university population. Educational resources were vastly expanded in the rural areas: for instance, middle-school enrollment rose from 15 to 58 million!6 (http://www.revcom.us/a/139/STRS-en.html#footnote6)The charge that the Cultural Revolution was a “wasted decade” in education is a gross distortion, and another example of class prejudice.
Culture. “Model revolutionary works” in opera and ballet put new emphasis on workers and peasants and their resistance to oppression (in place of old imperial court dramas). Western techniques were integrated with traditional Chinese forms, and many new performance works brought forth powerful depictions of revolutionary women that challenged patriarchal relations. There was an explosion of creativity among the masses: short stories, poetry, paintings and sculpture, music and dance. Cultural troupes and film units multiplied in the countryside. Between 1972 and 1975, Beijing held four national fine arts exhibitions (with 65% of exhibited works created by amateurs) that attracted an audience of 7.8 million, a scale never reached before the Cultural Revolution.7 (http://www.revcom.us/a/139/STRS-en.html#footnote7)
Economic management. In factories and other workplaces, traditional forms of “one-man management” were dissolved. New “three-in-one” combinations of rank-and-file workers, technicians, and Communist Party members took responsibility for day-to-day management of factories and other types of work. Workers spent time in management and managers spent time working on the shop floor.8 (http://www.revcom.us/a/139/STRS-en.html#footnote8)
Science conducted in new ways. “Open-door research” was introduced: research institutes were spread to the countryside and involved peasants; technical laboratories literally opened their doors to workers; and universities set up extension labs in factories and neighborhoods. Popular primers made scientific knowledge available to the masses.9 (http://www.revcom.us/a/139/STRS-en.html#footnote9)

[Sendo]

Monthly Review has a great article debunking the GLF lies. It shows a life expectancy rose as a result of the GLF.

http://www.monthlyreview.org/0906ball.htm