Cultural Revolution

1
Cultural Revolution

• Viewpoints from the historians Dr. Caldwell and
  William Jenner

2
What is the Cultural Revolution?
Perspective of Dr. Caldwell

• Hard to answer
• Very complex
• Historian perspective varies due to lack of
  documents
• To understand the Cultural Revolution there are 2
  fields to look at
• Economics
• Political

3
Economical

• Within this field are 2 distinct paths China
  could have chosen
• One based on a rational road
• Using the experience of the West and Soviet
  Union, planning, guidance, central government
• Disaster for China during the Great Leap Forward
• Other was to rely upon the people to guide the
  paten of what evolved economically (peasants)
• Cultural Revolution can be seen as trying to give
  the people back their control in a Maoist view
• To decentralize and to allow the people to plot
  their own course

4
Political

• Very easy for leadership to slip back into
  pre-revolutionary thinking
• Felt some of the leadership abandon Maoist
  principles to allowing the people to rule
• To go back into the old way (top-down) was what
  Cultural Revolution really about and what Mao was
  trying to get rid of
• Cultural Revolution was about spontaneous upsurge
  of popularism (popular Maoism)
• Happened in response of the people who were fed
  up
• To attack a privilege group of politicians

5
Comparison of Russia and China

• China
• spontaneous mass base
• Cultural Revolution seen as a domestic response
  to foreign policy between people who were trying
  to connect to the Soviet Union at this level
• Mao afraid of this
• felt Soviet Union abandon principles of Maoism
  and never had a revolutionary perspective
• Mao believed you cant stop the peasants from
  uprising

• Russia
• Led top down led by a small group of politicians
• Soviet Union under Stalin was about socialism in
  one country and had a lot to lose to try and
  spread the revolution
• Tried to prevent revolution happening elsewhere
• Example is in Korea
• Tried to not help poor countries in their defense
  against imperialism
• Vietnam War for example

6
Response from Jenner

• Agrees with Dr. Caldwell that it was complicated
• Cultural Revolution not a well coordinated
  movement that was effectively controlled in the
  center
• Chaotic and no one really knew what was going to
  happen next
• Very hard to say what it achieved
• In a cultural sphere everything was rejected from
  the past
• Very little has been replaced culturally
• Cultural Revolution not really about culture
• Was about the whole question of peoples
  attitudes and value systems
• Cultural Revolution was a lot about permission to
  question the authority of China
• Once you say people can question things you bring
  together the most volatizing aspects of society
  like students and the youth
• Everything came into question
• 1967-1968 was a movement of extreme radicalism

7
Jenners View of the Cultural Revolution

• Problem of the Cultural Revolution in terms of
  meaning is that China decides what its going to
  tell the rest of the world about it
• During the Cultural Revolution things were a lot
  more open
• Cultural Revolution was a great purge of the
  leadership
• To reeducate the leadership
• In some senses the Cultural Revolution was about
  purges
• Mao established himself as the undisputed leader
  of China by 1967, but it was clear that he had
  lost control of the situation himself
• Restoration of Orthodoxy takes place after the
  Cultural Revolution

8
Dr. Caldwells Viewpoint

• Achievement of Cultural Revolution and Mao was to
  harness the human resources of the country and
  mobilize them
• Address the problem that faced them.
• Although Great Leap Forward was disaster and
  Cultural Revolution was horrible to the economy,
  technical competence isnt the most important
  thing to move an economy forward
• What Mao achieved during Cultural Revolution was
  to show that if you gave people a certain amount
  of human dignity, then you could inspire them
• Question of moral in an economy is more important
  than any single factor

• Moral is the best factor in a poor country
• If you can recruit people to the task of radical
  social transformation then the economy will
  flourish
• At the time the big difference between China and
  India in the 70s was that India was not able to
  mobilize its population
• Not able to inspire its peasantry
• India didnt tap into the energies of its people
  so they left instead

9
Jenners View on Maos Economy

• Question of Maoist economist is an important one
• Maoist economist has always been intensely
  practical
• Ex. Agriculture emaciation
• Maos approach was different then this, he was
  pro-modernization but he wanted the farmers to
  decide in the countryside
• To give power to the ordinary man and let them
  decide how/what was going to happen to change
  their life
• Let them decide and trusted the peasants

10
Paradoxes of the Cultural Revolution

• One of the greatest paradoxes in Chinese history
  is that Mao said to its people we need to
  multiply and populate and use human resources
• Encouraged procreation
• Problem with this is that it happen in China and
  now in this modern period we have massive
  population growth
• Still not enough work for all the people that are
  there
• Economic growth in China has a paradox associated
  and that is they have to move at this pace in
  order to keep people in their job
• Population per capita income is still very low
• Still one of the poorest even though its one of
  the fastest growing countries
• Internal problem with China is that if it doesnt
  keep growing at this rate, the communist party
  lively hood is its ability to tap into
  nationalism and its ability to keep growing
• If it stops growing the communist party is going
  to be under deep threat

• Got to say the Cultural Revolution was
  essentially an urban movement
• Democratization of the countryside had already
  taken place
• In the towns Mao had opposition in the thinking
• There was a much more stronger Soviet ideological
  in the towns
• Mao wanted to overthrow the authoritarian
  structures in the towns
• Given workers the say just like the peasants
  would have had them
• This was why the chaos occurred
• Turned the factory system and the government
  system on its head and attacked the system
• Created a more equal, egagtatirn society
• Makes the C.R movement directly relevant

11
Dr. Caldwells Suggestion

• Suggest that Maoism really was an attempt to
  bring Marxist theory/ideology to the Chinese
  context
• Proof in a sense that Marxism was dead in China
• Class war a failure
• In reality China has very little to do in
  communist
• Class war over
• Cultural Revolution could be seen as a failed
  attempt to instate Marxist ideas in China
• Very little chance of that happening again

12
Legacy of Mao

• Jenner
• Mao will always be with China for hundreds to
  years
• He will be seen as the founder of Modern China as
  it is today
• Like it or not Mao brought China together
• In a nationalism point of view not in a communist
  view that he united the country and pushed it
  forward

• Dr. Caldwell
• Achievements of Mao limited
• Economically brought disaster
• Legacy of Mao is that he actually held China back
  for 20-30 years
• Whole idea to encourage people to populate have
  caused tons of suffering for people
• Mao degraded Chinese society
• Great irony is that his people continue to
  worship him in a god-like sense
• Ultimately when China does pull itself together
  it will challenge the rest of the world either
  politically or economically or both

13
Let China sleep for when she wakes, she will
wake the world.-Napoleon Bonaparte