Authoritarian China NOTES

Exam Tip: You should actually have decided on an

overarching perspective about these Authoritarian leaders
before you actually revise or study the notes for the exam. Here
is a timeline on Mao and the CCP that can be filled in:

Timeline with Significance

Paper 2: Authoritarian States - Mao’s China
Directions: Make a copy of this timeline and fill out the significance of each event for
this topic. Highlighting events in different colors to show different themes is
encouraged. The syllabus points for this topic are included below for your convenience:

Legend:
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Date Event Description/Significance

Oct 1911 Xinhai Revolution

Mar Yuan Shikai elected President

1912
Aug Guomindang founded
1912

May Yuan takes dictatorial control

1914

Jan 1915 Japan’s 21 Demands

June Yuan Shikai dies, Warlord Period begins

1916

1918 Mao begins studying Marxism

Jan 1919 Paris Peace Conference

May May 4th Movement

1919

July Chinese Communist Party founded in

1921 Shanghai

Jan First United Front formed

1924

Mar Sun Yat-sen dies, Jiang Jieshi takes control

1925 of GMD

July Northern Expedition begins

1926

April Shanghai Massacre

1927

April Red Army formed with 3 Rules and 8 Points

1928

June Republic of China founded

1928

Dec Futian Incident

1930

Sept Manchurian Incident

1931

Nov Jiangxi Soviet formed

1931
Sept Fifth Extermination Campaign against
1933 Jiangxi Soviet

Oct Long March begins

1934

Jan Zunyi Conference

1935

May Battle of Luding Bridge

1935

Oct Yan’an Soviet established

1935

Dec Xi’an Incident

1936

July Marco Polo Bridge Incident

1937

June Yellow River Flood

1938

Oct Battle of Wuhan

1938

Aug Hundred Regiments Offensive

1940

Feb Yan’an Rectification Campaign

1942

Aug Imperial Japan surrenders

1945

July Second Chinese Civil War begins

1946

Nov Shenyang falls to CCP

1948

April Nanjing falls to CCP

1948

Oct People’s Republic of China is declared by

1948 Mao in Beijing
Oct PLA troops occupy Xinjiang
1948

Feb Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship

1950

Mar Campaign to Suppress

1950 Counterrevolutionaries

May New Marriage Law

1950

Oct PLA Invades Tibet

1950

Oct Chinese attack UN Forces in Korea, prolong

1950 Korean War

Nov Three Antis Campaign

1951

Jan Five Antis Campaign

1952

Jan First Five-Year Plan

1953

July Korean War Armistice

1953

Sept New 1954 Constitution

1954

Sept First Taiwan Strait Crisis

1954

April Bandung Conference

1955

Nov Pinyin and Simplified Characters introduced

1955

Feb Hundred Flowers Campaign

1957

July Anti-Rightist Movement

1957
Jan Great Leap Forward begins
1958

Aug Second Taiwan Strait Crisis

1958

Mar Tibetan Uprising

1959

April Mao replaced by Liu Shaoqi as president

1959

July Lushan Conference

1959

Aug Soviets withdraw advisors, Sino-Soviet Split

1960 official

Oct Sino-Indian War

1962

Jan Little Red Book published

1964

Oct Chinese nuclear bomb detonated

1964

May Cultural Revolution begins

1966

Dec Mao sends Red Guards to countryside for

1968 reeducation

Mar Sino-Soviet Border Clashes

1969

April Ping Pong Diplomacy

1971

Sept Lin Biao dies

1971

Oct 1971 PRC replaces Taiwan in UN

Feb Nixon visits China

1972

Jan Zhou Enlai Dies

1976
 April Qingming Festival / Tiananmen Incident
1976 (not 1989)

Sept Mao Dies

1976

Background to the Rise to Power by 1949 by the CCP and Mao

• Boxer Rebellion of 1905, etc. led to the conditions that were ripe for change in CHina
leading to the end of the Qing Dynasty in 191. This ushered in the age of Republican
China, led mostly by Sun Yat-sen who kept things relatively stable until he died in 1925

Conditions/facts that aided Mao’s Communist Movement in post-Qing

Dynasty China
a. Feudal warlords began to dominate areas regionally. They only wanted their own power and
money. That’s old politics that was not going to help the poor.

b. Due to the death of Yuan Shikai there was no central effective government in China

c. The Chinese empire was weak due to the loss of Tibet, Xinjiang, and Outer Mongolia

d. His ideology separated him from the CCP and to make sure that he would remain the symbol
with which the people of China are associated with CCP with.

e.The CCP had similar ideologies with the GMD, and created the United Front. This increased their size
and ability, as when they were separate entities they weren’t strong enough to achieve power in China.

f. The memberships rose from 57 members in 1921 to 58 000 in 1927.

g. This United Front was also supported by the establishment of the Whampoa military
academy in 1924, further supported by Chiang Kai-shek to enable the GDM.

h. Mao saw more of an orthodox communism side of view that he thought would fit the
situation in China back then, when the others just focused on orthodox.

i. Mao used the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to be able to rise in power. PLA was
important in order to help Mao ensure that the young generation was aware of the
ideas of communist ideologies.

First UNited Front; DEFEATING WARLORDS (1924-1927)

• First united front began in 1924, By the GMD and the CCP
• The CCP was encouraged to join alliance with the GMD-- although they had different ideologies
between them, their determination to defeat the warlords united them.
 • It has been proven that the communist revolution could not be achieved unless the warlords
were defeated and the foreign interference would be crushed.

• BUT, BY 1927, the GMD/KMT began to turn their attention to eliminating the
Communist Threat so (1927-1937= First Chinese CIVIL WAR)

The Long March (1934-1936

Background:

• 6,000 mile trek of Chinese Communists trying to elude the then dominant KMT’s forces
• Managed to relocate the centre of the CCP from the Southeastern to Northwestern
China
Importance:
i.Mao Zedong managed to impose his idea of a peasant-based revolution.
ii.Several other communists emerged as talented leaders: Deng Xiaoping (Teng Hsiao-
p’ing), Lin Biao (Lin Piao), Zhou Enlai (Chou Enlai), Zhu De.
iii.This odyssey was an amazing event in military history, however, it was a disaster in
terms of human life.
iv.It was a propaganda success as the Red Army was able to spread communist ideology to
the peasant population during the journey.

Yan'an Period (1936-1947

• This period where the CCP set up their government a the end of the Longs MARCH was
important as they were able to impose and teach the peasants and local citizens about their
Sinofied MArxist ideology such as abandoning arranged marriages, foot binding, land reform
etc.

Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)

BIG Takeaway!: The CCP were seen as a much more efficient fighting force against the
Japanese. They also used to spread their communist ideology throughout CHina
small point: By the end of WW2 the CCP had about one million

Chinese CIVIL WAR (1927-1937) and (1946-1949)

Strengths of the CCP and GMD

• Their tactics for propaganda was very useful and effective

• The GMD resulted in a larger army, and it also made them more powerful
• There was the help of a foreign power, Russia
• The GMD was able to control the majority of the land and territories
• One of the former presidents, Jiang Jieshi, was viewed as a studious, skilled, and
efficient leader (GMD)
• CCP had a popular support on the peasants
 • Mao’s leadership was confident and inspiring
• Controlled most of the railroads
• GMD were regarded as the legitimate ruler of China
• GMD had support from landowners and wealthier peoples.
• GMD had American and British support

Weaknesses of CCP and GMD

• treated the peasants poorly

• poorly trained and poorly fed
• Lack of spirit/ motivation
• The territory depended on the warlords
• Lots of corruption, inflation, and rationing
o inflation: 785,400,000 times greater than in 1937.
• Untrustworthy leadership
• inflexible leadership
• Chiang Kai-shek did not listen to foreign help
• CCP had fewer troops
• CCP had no airplanes and fewer equipment
• CCP only controlled a few cities

• GMD’s military was poor as it lost Manchuria

• GMD lost a lot of territory to the Japanese during the invasion
• GMD controlled cities and infrastructure were in ruins

• GMD relied on corrupt advisers

The Methods to Get Peasant Support

The 6 Principles the soldiers had to follow:

• paying for everything they took
• treating women with respect
• returning everything they borrowed
• put all doors back when leaving house
• Do not invade privacy of peasants
• Rice mattresses must be bundled up and returned.

Mao’s Rise to power by possible themes/Concepts

EXAM TIP: AlwaysConsider the Ideological, Cultural, Political and Economic
arguments
Thematic argument 1:
 Mao rose to power by being completed committed to bringing “Sinified
Marxism to China”
Thematic argument #2
Mao rose to power because China could never transform the old economic
model left over from dynastic rule that allowed large landowners/factory
owners to control the flow of money. The promise of land reform,
education for all etc. led many people to join the movement to defeat the
Nationalists and ChiangKai Shek
Thematic Argument #3
China was poltically unstable due to corruption and arguments left over
from the Qing Dynasty. Warlords and others consistently disrupted any
reforms and alone with corruption, made Mao’s Marxist program seem a
better direction
Theme #4

Ideological Beginnings in post WW1 China

There were about 150,000 Chinese volunteers who went to the front in Europe
for WW1 . Many believed that their behaviour would be rewarded and that
China would regain the sovereignty of Shandong which had been under
German control. To the Chinese’s dismay, when the war was over, Shandong
was transferred to the sovereignty of Japan. This sparked deep feelings of
resentment against both Japan and the Western powers and generated a
youth, anti-imperialist movement known as the May Fourth Movement. Over
3,000 students marched on the streets of Beijing to protest against the outcome
of the Treaty of Versailles. Many Chinese intellectuals and thinkers started
losing faith in the democratic system and developing some more radical ideas.
The ‘May Fourth Movement’ therefore played a critical role in the creation of
the Chinese Communist Party. Mao Zedong, a fervent nationalist, began to see
Marxism as a way to fulfill his dream of unifying China which democracy had
failed to do.

Maintenance and Consolidation of Power (1949-1976)

The Establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949
 • On 1 October 1949 Mao Zhedong, chariman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
stood in the balcony of the old imperial palace in Beijing (formely known as Peking) to
proclaim the formal palace in Beijing. (to proclaim the formal establishment of the
People’s Republic of China. (PRC) { this moment marked the victory of the Chinese
Communists over their enemies after nearly two decades of civil war}
• Mao was the leader of the people’s Republic of China (until his death in 1976)
• He established a single-party state by authoritarian means. The policies convert the:
political, economic, and overall social structure of China.
• Millions of lives were lost due to the result of this upheaval, as well as the victims of the
purge during the climax of the CR (Cultural Revolution) from 1966-1976.
• In the early decades of his rule, he was known in China and neighbouring countries as a
talented guerrilla leader and visionary.
• They view Mao as the liberator of China who restored national pride. In the west, Mao is
often regarded as a despot who used his own brand of communism.

Mao’s Cult of Personality and USE of Propaganda- (ideology)

i. can be traced back to the periods of Jiangxi Soviet, the Long March and the Yanan
period
ii.it reached its height during the Cultural Revolution beginning in 1966, the Red Guard
from all over the country went to Beijing to meet Mao Zedong in person
iii.Chinese population, who had been experiencing wars and corruption for many decades
since the fall of the Qing dynasty, were attracted to Mao’s promise of peace and
prosperity, as shown in the enthusiastic crowds
iv.Mao Zedong also appealed to the Chinese rural society which represented at that time
over 90 per cent of the population, and he made sure to maintain this image of being
connected to the land and the peasants.
v. The cult focused on his thoughts and ideas more than on his person through the
reading of the Little Red Book. This book was covered in red plastic, pocket size and
was to be carried all the time. It was a collection of Mao Zedong’s thoughts, put
together by Lin Biao (Mao’s propaganda minister) and published during the Cultural
Revolution – it was seen as the source of all truth. The book had an unprecedented
impact on the population.
vi.A symbolic swim in the Yangtze River in July 1966
This showed to his people that at 72 years of age, he was still fit to rule the country
and lead the Cultural Revolution. Mao was accompanied by bodyguards and giant
floating posters of himself. His party propagandists claimed he swam nearly 15km in
just over an hour (shattering world records) without getting tired.

Economics

Land Reform Act of 1950

Confiscation of property- show trial of landlords. Agrarian land Reform Act of
1950, etc.

Designed to begin an assault on feudal capitalism be collectvisig and redistributing

land to peasants

Political reforms/Treatment of Opposition

• established a Politburo styled after USSR
• All parties except CCP banned 1952
• established Cominterns in local communities with party leaders locally in charge
• local party officials put wealthy capitalist/landlords on show trials (usually
executed or put into reeducation camps
• in 1956 they instituted the “Hundred Flowers” campaign
Economics
• Great Leap Forward-This was an economic and social campaign that was led by
the communist party from 1958-1962

USE OF FORCE
• Secret Police- are intelligence,security or police agencies that engage in covert
operations against the government's political opponents. The secret police
organizations are characteristics of authoritarian regimes and Totalitarian
regimes.
• household registration system- (hukou) is a system in China, classifying each
person as a rural or an urban resident is a major means of controlling population
mobility and determining the eligibility for state-provided services and welfare.
• Party Purges- Purges of the position removal or execution of people who are
considered undesirable by those in power. Mao claimed that CCP leaders, Gao
Gang and Rao Shushi, abused their positions and the Central Council
dismissed both from their positions.
• Re-education camps- for those likely to revert to their capitalistic or anti-
Marxist ideals the CCP was promoting

• Red Guards- utilized in Cultural Revolution of 1966-1969 primarily

• Little Red Book- book of sayings by used in Cultural Revolution (1966-
1969) to persecute any that did not know Maoism by heart
• invasion of Tibet - was the process by which the People's Republic of China
(PRC) gained control of tibet because many Chinese had always regarded the
province as being part of China.
• reunification campaigns- Targeted Tibet, Muslims, etc.
 Role of Women
Key words:

Patriarchal:
domination of men

Footbinding:
men regarded small feet as something erotic. Therefore they would tie and break their feet even
at a young age so that their feet would resemble a lotus flower. This practice was encouraged
till the 1930’s to make girls more attractive for marriage

Concubine:
The act of keeping women as mistresses

Policies that affected women and their families

• Historically, women in china were the most repressed in the world as imperial china has
been dominated by men (patriarchal) and were controlled by them.
• Women were expected and forced to obey their husbands.
• In fact it was very rare for women to be superior and have high positions.
• Arranged marriages caused women in some parts of rural China and China to
experience a medieval practice called footbinding.
• Moreover, many women were sold into marriage. Her “price” would be determined after
figuring out how many children she could possibly have.
• Before the establishment of the PCR, it was normal and legal for men to have
concubines. Which meant a married woman was subordinate

The Marriage Reform Law of of 1950

• abolished concubinage
• foot binding and arranged marriages were declared illegal, which
improved women’s rights
• Imperial China had been a male-centered society where women had
little to no voice. Few were educated, they did not have any say in
who they were to marry, sons were preferred to daughters and female
infanticide was common. Han Chinese women were expected to
bound their feet, a painful process which involved the bandaging of
the feet to make them stay small.
• All marriages must be registered now with the government
• Arranged marriages came to an end
• The paying of dowries was forbidden
• Women (and men) that were forced into unwanted marriages were permitted to divorce
 Social Policies (Education, HEalth Care, religion )

On Religion:

The CCP believe that religion is a:

• Capitalist invention
• Cultivated by classes in power
• Creation to suppress the exploited masses
• Poison (although only specifically Mao believes in this)
The CCP tackles this “problem” by replacing it with loyalty to the party. They do it through these
methods:
• Christian churches were forced to close
• Churches’ properties were confiscated
• Ministers were attacked, and nuns and foreign priests were expelled from China
• Propaganda means (such as slogans) spoke up against religion
• Religious clothes being worn are banned, along with religious practices, such as
Buddhism and Confucianism
• Songs, dances and festivals are replaced by agitprop performances

But the party cannot completely destroy religion, otherwise they’ll be known as a mad dog.

• one of the biggest challenges in 1949 was the lack of access to healthcare. the
new government aimed to improve medical care
• ‘patriotic health movements’ - government funded
• Barefoot doctors scheme - designed to make it seem they were helping rural
poor

Cultural Policies
• Mao established that China’s culture had to reflect the values of a
proletarian society in the 1930’s
• When the People’s Republic of China became a thing, censorship
and propaganda became important in achieving the above point.
• Politically incorrect books were burned, and foreign media was
persecuted and banned
• Mao’s wife became the “purifier of the nation” Jiang Qing
• Only art forms allowed were those that promoted Chinese themes,
such as plays that promoted Chinese victory over their enemies, etc.
 • The war against artistic expression became fanatical, to the point
where Qing urged kids to knock the heads off of flowers to show their
denial of bourgeois beauty concepts
• Any artists who resisted were sent to re-education.
• Only a guy called Deng Xiaoping dared to try to speak out against it,
but he was ignored by the abundance of artists afraid to act for their
own safety

Literacy, Language and Education

• Majority of peasants were illiterate in 1949
• Mao made education a high priority after he came to power and made
a national system in the mid 1950’s
• By 1976, national literacy levels had risen by from 20% to 70%
• Success can be partially attributed to the reform of Mandarin as a
language in 1955
• Instead of ideograms, he created a uniform system of characters
called Pinyin to allow people to write in a standardized way based on
phonetic sounds
• Reforms were largely successful, but the whole education system
didn’t advance much/
• During the Cultural Revolution, 130 million young people stopped
attending school/uni and 12 million of them were sent to work in the
countryside
• Creativity and critical thinking were undermined greatly because they
prioritized the conformity of students to party ideals
• Mao’s successor, Xiaoping, questioned later if Chinese students
could even read.

Economic Policies

First Five-Year Plan (1952-1957)

a. This was an attempt to create a command economy in China

b. One positive was the construction of roads and dams to improve infrastructure in the Yangtse
River area
c. Many people were unprepared for the industrialization

THE Land Reform Act and the Confiscation of property- Show trial of landlords
•

Collectivism- the collection of produce produced by farming communities by the

government to be distributed across the countries. prevented mini capitalism. put in
place in 1959-1960

Backyard Steel Campaign: Chinese government encouraged communities and

communities to forge steel in order to supply the infrastructure endeavors of the
Great Leap forward. this resulted in basically free steel for the Government,
However, it was of such poor quality that it was virtually useless

The Great Famine 1958 - 1962

• Many peasants were dead due to starvation

• Mao put the blame for all the failures on the peasants
• The agricultural expertise of the peasants was replaced by Lysenkoism ( absurd result )
• Ma(o realized the bad situations but he did not take his responsibility
• Mao`s reputation was tarnished and was confronted by Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping
causing Mao to step down as State Chairman in 1959 leaving policy to Liu Shaoqui
• Liu and Deng revoked Mao`s reform to allow private farming to operate again
• Historian Frank Dikotter estimates around 45 million lives lost due to the famines and
poor agricultural policies

SOCIAL POLICIES AND USE of PROPAGANDA

Centralised Entertainment: The entertainment industry was centralised by the

Chinese Government. Film production increased heavily, but with a fall of quality.
the government didn’t just act as censors, but also as the distributors of films. This
led to over 50% of proceeds going to the government.

Plays were also seized by the government, but where much more difficult to control
due to the popularity of Chinese Operas, especially ones based of western films such
as “Gone with the Wind” and most famously “Waterloo Bridge”. this was controlled
by controlling the theaters themselves, and made it difficult for “Degenerate”
material to be shown.
 Historiography and Arguments
What are the arguments about Mao’s Consolidation and Maintenance of Power:
Historiography?
1. orthodox- Philip Short thought of Mao as a new emperor who didn’t mean
to kill people but was necessary. An attempt at introducing checks and
balances to his totalitarian system. My strongest agrees more along
this argument is this: intentionalist and Marxist
2. Orthodox : Yang Jisheng, Chinese Historian and survivor of the cultural
revolution and the great famine of 1959-1961. Chastises Mao for the poor
management, grave cruelty, and the loss of at least 500,000 lives through the use of
over 400 excerpts, letters, and interviews of survivors of the event.

3. revisionist- Jonathan Fenby, Mao’s great power by pointing out the many
mistakes he made as a leader and how he still remained in power after them.
Innocent people confessed to whatever crime they were accused of, tyrant.
Censorship was posed on scientists, “better red than expert”.
4. In the early 1960s, Mao Zedong and the Communist Party of China revived
the term revisionism to attack Nikita Khrushchev and the Soviet Union over
various ideological and political issue, as part of the Sino-Soviet split. The chinese
routinely described the Soviets as “modern revisio\\\\Reformation- the Chinese
Land reform movement, also known by the Chines abbreviation Tugai, was a
campaign by the communist party leader Mao Zedong during the late phase of the
Chinese civil war and the early People’s Republic of China
5. intentionalist- These historians argue Mao’s life was about intending to
carry out his revolution and major change in the social, economic, political and
economic arenas to make it communist. They might argue based on facts of his
life (joined communist party in 20’s, believed in the “two-stage” communist
theory” , believed in “Sinofied Marxist” (Chinese style by using peasants rather
than industrial workers, etc.)
6. structuralist- could be applied to “Long March”
7. Marxist (Maoism)- Marxist historians argue he set out to do the basic things
that a Marxist state would- i.e. nationalization of industry, land seizure from
landlords, creating equality between men and women, remove capitalistic
displays,

Historian’s Arguments about Mao’s Rise and Maintenance of Power by Theme

1. Political- Martin Jacques, a revisionist historian, has argued that CHina is
not a nation-state in modern Western sense but rather a civilization state
that has existed for thousands of years based on that premise (The
civilization rather than modern Nation-state argument
2. Political- Jonathan Fenby, a revisionist historian, has argued that Mao’s
mass line pretended that policy was determined by the wishes and
interests of the masses as interpreted by the leadership. The Mass LINE
Argument
3. Ideological: Yang Jisheng, a Orthodox Historian, Argues that the rise
of Mao was directed primarily due to a matter of principles, and the
Communist Ideology making promises of equality that seemed
impossible at the time.