China Notes

Emergence of an Authoritarian Regime China: 1900-1949

1. China: Turn of the 20th Century
   1. Foreign Imperial domination a threat
   2. Sino-Japanese War 1894-95
      1. humiliating loss for China
      2. Concessions given to Imperialist powers (Britain, France, Germany, Russia, Japan)

Open Door Policy 1800s

• late 19th century, Europeans powers had trade monopoly (without china’s consent)
• USA intervened & declared open door policy
  (all nations = equal access to China)

Boxer Rebellion - 1900

• Under weak Manchu governmnet, foreign nations took control of trading rights
• angered Chinese
• Righteous & Harmonious Fists (anti-foreigner) led the Boxer rebellion against Western Nations
• Boxer Rebellion supported by Chinese government but was put down in 55 days by foreign forces.

Sun Yat-Sen’s revolution - 1911

• Nationalism, Democracy, Socialism
• Revolution = 2 goals
  • overthrow Manchu government
  • drive Westerners out
• October 10, 1911 overthrew Manchu government
• 1912, People’s Nationalist Party or Kuomintang (Republic of China)
• Sun Yat-Sen as the President

China Under Sun Yat-Sen

• China faced a period of intense warlord struggles
• Kuomintang
  • wanted a socialist democracy
  • difficulty getting foreign aid from the Western nations
  • only USSR offered aid to fight the warlords
• 1919 May 4th movement
• Hypo-colony 1920s

KMT and Chinese Communist Party

• Founded 1921 by Mao Zedong

• Inspired by Russian Revolution 1917

• KMT & Communist Party joined 1924 to fight warlords

• Mao Zedong put in charge of propaganda

• 1925 Sun Yat-Sen passed away & Kuomintang came under control of Chiang Kai-Shek

• 1927 KMT gained control of all of China south of Yangtse River

• Chiang decided to get rid of the Communists. He hunted them down and killed them. Mao escaped.

Mao and the Communists

• Mao escaped to a remote area in southern China and settled in Kiangsi-Hunan
  • Thousands of Communists murdered
• Re-organized the Red Army
• Re-built the communist Party on peasantry
• Set-up PLA (People’s Liberation Army)
  • used Guerrilla warfare
  • treated peasants well & gained their support

China under Chiang Kai-Shek

• By 1930, Chiang claimed to be undisputed ruler (Mao disagreed)
• Chaing’s #1 enemy = Mao & Communists
• 1930’s 3gps fight for power
  • Chiang & KMT
  • Mao & Communists
  • Japan
• 1931 Japan Invades Manchuria
  • China appeals to league of nations = Lytton Report 1933
  • Japan leaves league of nations & takes Manchuria
  • Chiang does little as pre-occupied with Mao.

The Long March

• Communist surrounded & supplies cut off … Mao had to act
• Oct 1934, PLA set-off on 9000 km or 6000 mile trek to northern province of Shensi
• Communists = 100,000
• Trek = starvation, fighting the KMT
• Oct. 1935 = reached Yenan but lost 3/4 of men

Chiang unable to defeat Mao

Foreign Altercations: Japan & WWII 1937-1945

• July 1937 - Japan invades rest of China
• United Front = KMT & Communists alliance (civil war on hold)
• Summer 1938, Japan pushed KMT to interior
• Mao’s PLA was more successful in combating Japan
• Mao:
  • popular b/c Red Army resisted Japanese invaders
  • success = mobility, flexibility, hit & run, people’s support, & use enemies limitations
• Chiang lost mass support because failed to react effectively to threat & tainted by corruption & aid from USA
• USSR declared war on Japan in WWII, invaded Manchuria & left with $2 billion in industrial machinery.

Mao

”Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun”

Civil War 1945-1949

Summer 1945 Mao liberated most of Northern China from Japaneses & won public support

Chiang & KMT continued to advance after WWII & captured Yenan but KMT supported by Americans & were tainted

Mao launched conventional war against KMT

• by 1948 PLA = 3 million

• supported & supplied by peasants

• better trained

• really 20 years

• simultaneously nationalist war against foreign occupation & struggle to establish communism

• not classic Marxist because peasants not workers leading revolution

• open struggle, not conspiracy like Lenin’s

1949 Chiang & 1.5 million KMT fled to Taiwan & set up Nationalist China

USA recognized Taiwan/Chiang as official government of China & USA wouldn’t let Communist China into UN

Oct.1 1949 Mao proclaimed
People’s Republic of China

Mao Tse-Tung Consolidation of Power: 1949-1954

Mao’s China: 1949-1976

1. Mao’s communist Rule in China:
   People’s Republic of China Oct.1, 1949
   • Mandate from Heaven: old tradition where new rulers gained right to rule simply because they had seized power
   • Democratic Centralism: obedience to leaders, central control

Conference Sept. 1949

• non-communist parties & others who opposed KMT/GMD brought under communist leadership
• temporary constitution in a multi-party “people’s democratic dictatorship” (communist dominance)
• non-reactionaries granted a vote in the elected National People’s Congress but choice of candidates limited

Non-people with NO political rights

5 Black categeries:

• reactionary elements
• feudal elements
• lackeys of imperialism
• bureaucratic capitalists
• enemies of the people

Included: landlords, business owners & prominent ex-KMT

Exception: National Bourgeoisie & Petit Bourgeoisie given civil rights because skill & expertise needed in early years.

1954 formal Constitution

• China = single-party state
• Mao = Chairman of National People’s Congress (head of government)
• 2 Vice-chairmen & council of ministers led by a PM (Chou Enlai PM 1949-1976)

Population Organization

• Everyone organized into groups each led by a local party cadres

shared groups comments by reporting up chain of command to central committees - politburo in Peking/Beijing → “educate” group on policies → Cadres

Maoist ideology = peasants, soldiers, workers could influence official decisions

Mass Mobilization Campaigns

1. Suppression of counter-revolutionaries began March 1950-1951: People with links to the KMT/GMD, criminal gangs or religious groups
2. Suspicion of foreigners: west (USA b/c Korea)
3. Three antis campaign 1951
   Against corruption, waste & obstruction (struggle session, humiliation, group pressure)
4. Five Antis Campaign 1952
   • Against theft, bribery, cheating government contracts, economic espionage, tax evasion (employers = self-criticisms & “thought reform”, fines, labour camps, property confiscation)
   • Confession = pay dues & return to work (unlike landlord executed in Agrarian Reform)
   • ~ 2-3 million suicides due to humiliation

June 1950 Agrarian Land Reform Passed

Land was taken from landowners & supposedly redistributed peacefully Chinese peasants “denounced ” landowners who went before the Peoples’ Tribunal this man was probably executed (about 5 million were killed)

The first Five Year Plan; 1953

Communist 1st economic plan to increase standard of living

Similar to USSR NEP
- State controlling major industries
- peasants could sell surplus after taxes
Plan included aid from USSR & emphasis on heavy industry (coal, steel, oil, electric power)

Plan successful but paid for at expense of peasantry & small industry

Collectives
- collectivized land - APC’s (Agricultural Producers Co-operatives)
- collectivization was unpopular but Mao could not purge (like Stalin) because his revolution came from peasants so he “encouraged”
- family co-operatives (30-40 families)
- collective farms (80-100 families)

Hundred Flowers Campaign: 1957

Mao encouraged intellects view of communism in an attempt to win them over in Marxist debate

Quote

”let a hundred flowers bloom & a hundred schools of thought compete”

Criticism of communism = fast & furious

”fragrant flower = poisonous weeds”

Mao ended campaign = some intellects joined Mao & others were punished

Mao as Chairman 1958

”considering the future of communism”

• Liu Shao Chi = President

Great Leap Forward: 1958-62

• 2nd Five Year Plan = “Walking on Two Legs”
• Central planning aside for local organization
  • industrialization & agricultural output
  • lack mechanization = hard manual labour
• Focus on backyard steel mills or “backyard furnaces”, irrigation canals, hydro dams
• Cooperatives & collectives into 28000 communes (25000 people to commune)
  • by 1958, 99% farms part of a commune
  • commune responsible for local government (hsiang) roads, hospitals & schools
• Communes too large & family life no longer central
• Drought, floods & Mao’s impractical ideas for agriculture (planting grain & killing birds) = problems
• 1960 USSR pulled out advisors
• 1961 communes cut to 1/3 of size & decisions returned to villages sized collective farms

Great Leap Forward

• successes ( 1970’s dramatic increase in industrial production)
• failures (famine, extreme hard labour, low standard of living)

Consolidation 1949-54

Great Famine

• people ded

Maintaining Power

The Cultural Revolution: 1966-69

Mao did not like “revisionism” so to counter it he launched “Cultural Revolution”

• Supporter

  • Jiang Qing (Mao’s wife)
  • Lin Biao (Minister of Defence)

• Closed universities & schools

  • Reviewed curriculum

• Red guard (organized youths) 1967

  • revisionsts
  • specialists = “going down” (manual labour)

• Red Guard too violent = PLA restored order

• 1969 cultural revolution officially over

  • school & universities re-opened but education more “red”
  • many government officials dismissed
  • ”going down” & “barefoot doctors” common

• Lin Piao

  • Declared Culture Revolution over 1969
  • 1971 died in plane crash (Theory: escape to USSR after attempting to overthrow Mao)

• Chou En Lai attempts to unit orthedox and revisionist

What changed, and what remained the same in China between 1949 and 1954

Page 161 questions 1-3

China and the World

1. Aggressive foreign & hostile towards the West
   Especially during the Cold War

Invasion of Tibet: 1950

• Tibet = Chinese Province
• 1911 Tibet Independent
• 1950 China invaded Tibet
• Tibetans rebelled
• Dalai Lama = refuge of India
• 1965 Tibet = self-governing region of China

China backs North Korea

• USA as UN in Korea - Gen. MacArthur too ambitious & advanced too close to Chinese border
• China involved & supported N. Korea
• Chinese campaign against foreigners

Sino-Soviet Split

• 1920s-50s USSR Aid
• Problems arose:
  • lack USSR help in Korean War
  • Slow return Soviet seized industries WW2
  • China as a satellite
  • USSR’s foreign policy in Asia
  • Khrushchev’s peaceful co-existence = 2 superpowers
• Split Complete: 1959
  • 1959 = USSR criticized Great Leap Forward
  • 1960 = USSR pulled technicians
  • 1967 = China had her own nuclear bomb

Sino-Indian War 1962

• Chinese resented India offering refuge to Dalai Lama
• Chinese built road from Tibet to Sinkiang (Indian claim land)
• India failed to drive Chinese out of area (China did finally return territory)

Vietnam War

• Mao supported Ho Chi Minh of N. Vietnam in the Vietnam War

Ping-Pong Diplomacy

• 1949 to 1970s USA refused to recognize Red China.
  • USA = Taiwan as Permanent Member on UN Security Council
• Early 1970s = USA Ping-Pong team visited China
• 1971 Red China allowed seat on UN’s Security Council
  • USA sponsored China but supported Taiwan’s indepent
• 1972 Nixon visited & lifted bans on US trade with China
  • with in 2 years China’s trade increased 100 times
  • Contention between West & China with human rights

Contemporary China

1. ”One China, two systems” 1997
   • Hong kong unde British control since 1893
   • 1983 negotiations on fate of Hong Kong
     • 1997 British lease was up
     • decision = China regain Hong Kong but the port would keep its capitalist economy for 50 years
2. Hong Kong’s return to China 1997

Humang Rights
Disregard for human rights remains a significant issue today.