Mao Outline

Bader Al Majed
IB History
China and Mao

Origins and nature of the authoritarian and single-party states * Conditions that produced authoritarian and single-party states * Mao Zedong came to power and created the People’s Republic of
China after decades of civil and international war. * The Communist party assumed power and utilized propaganda strategies to alter people’s opinions and outlooks. * Emergence of leaders: aims, ideology, support * Communist ideology helped him convince his country that the PRC was superior to others. * He is officially held in high regard in China as a great revolutionary political strategist, military mastermind, and savior of the nation. Additionally, Mao was viewed as an intellectual poet philosopher and visionary. * Aims: to spread communism and also to copy what Stalin did but in a larger scale. * Support: During Mao's era China had the support of the USSR but that did not last for long. * Totalitarianism: the aim and the extent to which it was achieved * Eliminating Opposition a) Mao started a series of land reform
i) " ““Shortly after the founding of the PRC, land reform, he "lurched violently to the left" with Mao laying down new guidelines for "not correcting excesses prematurely.” Mao insisted that the people themselves, not the security organs should become involved in the killing of landlords who had oppressed them. This was quite different from Soviet practice, in which the NKVD would arrest counterrevolutions and then have them secretly executed and often buried before sunrise. Mao felt that peasants who killed landlords with their bare hands would become permanently linked to the revolutionary process in a way that passive spectators could not be actual numbers killed in land reform are believed to have been lower, but did rank in the millions as there was a policy to select "at least one landlord, and usually several, in virtually every village for public execution." (Lynch) b) Three- Anti Movement and the Five-anti Movement c) Following the consolidation of power, Mao launched the First Five-Year Plan (1953–58). The plan aimed to end Chinese dependence upon agriculture in order to become a world power.

Establishment of authoritarian and single-party states * Methods: force, legal * Legally gained support because of resistance to KMT (Nationalist party)

i. KMT inefficient and corrupt, did not improve factory conditions or peasant poverty, and put up little resistance against the Japanese ii. Communists gained strength and following while the war with Japan (1936) weakened the Nationalists * Civil War (Red Army i. Communists (CCP) triumphed, largely due to determination/organization, also more popular ii. Communists (led by Mao) used Guerrilla warfare, and finally won in 1949 iii. The revolution was “peasant-based”, and had the commitment for future help from the Soviets through the Sino-Soviet alliance * Abuse of power i. Mao used insane propaganda to keep support, through youth programs, his “Little Red Book” of Mao quotes, and full-size billboards with his face. ii. “Cult of Personality” to keep Mao the leader of the Communist party * Form of government. (left – and – right wing) ideology * Ideology: i. Mao claimed to be the truest interpreter of the Marxist ideology, and wanted to keep his revolution as strictly Marxist-Leninist as possible. ii. Mao believed in a Marxism with Chinese characteristics iii. Cultural Revolution: Mao cut ties with Russia, and wanted to renew support and revolution for his Chinese Marxism.

* Government: i. Constitution of 1950: National’s People Congress took authority for legislation and was elected by the people (however, had to be Communist to run), the Chairman and the State Council were elected by Congress, and the Politburo was chosen by the State Council and made main decisions for the government. ii. All officials were Communist iii. Mao was truly a Chairman, and took a back seat to his administrators (as long as they stayed true to Communism) * Nature, extent and treatment of opposition 1) Nature of Opposition: a) Right wing, and believed that people needed incentive to work b) Also believed that the country needed experts to help run everything, but Mao believed that experts would turn into a high class. c) External opposition: America, eventually Russia, enemies of China 2) Treatment of Opposition: * During the first four years of Communist rule, Mao had roughly 750,000 enemies killed * Mao kept the country in a constant state of revolution, with faith in the power of the masses all following Mao’s lead. * Mao often ruled through terror, and “rid” himself of his opposition and enemies
Domestic policies and impact * Structure and organization of government and administration * Mao was the dictator (highest in the chain) * Everything in China was controlled by the state (State –Controlled) from health care to religion * State Owned Enterprises * Political, economic, social and religious policies * Political Policy
a. Goals: On October 1, 1949, the People’s Republic of China is declared with Mao Zedong as its leader. “Our state system of the People's Democratic Dictatorship is a powerful weapon for safeguarding the fruits of victory of the people's revolution and for opposing plots of foreign and domestic enemies to stage a comeback. We must firmly grasp this weapon.” He vows to protect the people’s revolution and claims Communism will help end China’s status as a lesser-developed state. Pledges to be-friend the Soviet Union and other ‘new democratic countries.’
b. Organization: Single party state of Communism with Mao as the Chief of State. Though he is forced to resign in 1959 after the Great Leap Forward, he remained chair of the party and in control of the country.
c. Opposition:
i. Mao’s seizure of power coincided with the ousting of the major political opposition, led by Chiang Kai-shek, who had been too tied to traditional social structures with power in the hands of the landowners and sympathies with Japan. He failed to garner support for not coming up with a good program for alleviating poverty. He was driven to Taiwan. ii. In the beginning, he was not a ‘dynamic’ leader; he feared competition from among his own party. By the late 1950s he condemned the educated, liberal class that had appeared, calling it a threat to Communism, and encouraged purges against them and anyone even slightly aligned with his perceived biggest rival within the party, Liu Shao-chi.
d. Personality Cult: Even though personality cults went against Marxism and were discouraged, Mao could not help one from developing: Mao and the Communist party were heroes who had liberated the people from the oppressive past party. He came around to the cult as “useful” and exploited it until it took off and began enforced nationwide. * II. Economic Policy
a. Maoism: Marxism, or goods produced and wealth accumulated being shared relatively equally by all, interpreted for colonial and peasant-based economies.
b. Great Leap Forward: 1957: Economic movement initiated by Mao to break the Russian model of Communism. Decentralization of economy by establishing independent communes and reinvigorating revolutionary spirit. Impact:
i. 20 million people die, mostly from starvation, due to the inefficiency of the system ii. Made to rival Soviet Union cuts off ties/aid and rift divides over true interpreter of Communism iii. Mao forced to step down from Chief of State, but remains head of Communist Party
III. Social Policy
a. Cultural Revolution: Mao’s reassertion of his beliefs over society. Mao’s initiative to reinstate social control after the failure of the Great Leap Forward. Begins 1965 with closure of schools. Students given “Quotations of Chairman Mao” and mobilized into Red Guards.
i. Results: Many die in ensuing purges, including that had once been Mao’s colleagues. Mao’s personality cult really takes shape.
b. Red Guards: Battalions of students organized to incite local rebellions. Travelled around to make speeches, to universities and schools to promote Maoism and discourage the “four olds”: society, ideas, culture and manners. Became violent/oppressive against any who opposed Mao. In one incident, in 1966, march through a town destroying all signs of capitalist or traditional symbols like temples. Some clashes with peasants. Many members are brainwashed weapons for Mao.
c. Personality Cult: As mentioned in the political section.
i. Little Red Book: Aka Mao Zedong on the People’s War. Mao’s book of quotes was widely dispersed, studied and followed. ii. Giant portraits/billboards of Mao. He is made a social hero. iii. Mao wants to keep the Communist party revolutionary, feeling many socialist leaders get too comfortable.
d. Death: Mao falls ill in early 1970s and dies in 1976. The Cultural Revolution, the feverish purging of neighbors suspected of being less than completely devoted to Mao, ended with his death. Mao’s wife was arrested for trying to succeed him and arrested for aiding the Cultural Revolution. Many of his policies were reversed in efforts to catch up to Westernized nations in the “Four Modernizations” – industry, agriculture, science and armed forces. * Role of education, the arts, the media, propaganda * Raising the education standards due to the high illiteracy in 1949 * Set up primary education by 1950 * Reformation of the Mandarin Language to unite it into one written dialect due to the large amount of different dialects. * The large amount of universities started within Mao's era * Art was to help the Communist's aims * Mao wanted the Artists to serve the people * Mao's wife started the political correction test for the art * No more self-expression * Mao demanded to eliminate all the old traditions to be abolished * Propaganda aimed at removing the old and in with the new * Mao used insane propaganda to keep support, through youth programs, his “Little Red Book” of Mao quotes, and full-size billboards with his face. * “Cult of Personality” to keep Mao the leader of the Communist party * * Status of women, treatment of religious groups and minorities * Mao believed in the equality between men and women * Male dominated system * the system contradicts Mao's beliefs * New Marriage laws * Religion is poison * Closed down churches * During the first four years of Communist rule, Mao had roughly 750,000 enemies killed * Mao kept the country in a constant state of revolution, with faith in the power of the masses all following Mao’s lead. * Mao often ruled through terror, and “rid” himself of his opposition and enemies