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Mao Zedong

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  • Mao Zedong was born to a peasant family in Shaoshan, a village in Hunan, on the 26th of December 1893, near the end of the Qing dynasty. His father beat him. The boy refused the wife his father chose. He read forbidden novels instead of the Confucian classics he was meant to study. From that rural household came a man who would found the People's Republic of China and rule it from October 1949 until his death in September 1976. By the time he died at the age of 82, his policies had been credited with near-doubling China's life expectancy and near-doubling its population. They had also caused the deaths of tens of millions, mainly through starvation. How does a librarian's assistant become the Chairman of a nation? How does one leader earn both the label of liberator and the label of tyrant? And what does a country do with a man who, in the words of one CCP comrade, was 'both monster and a genius'? The answers run from a coal-mine strike to a mountain retreat, from a famine to a square packed with a million mourners.

  • At age 8, Mao was sent to Shaoshan Primary School, where he learned the value systems of Confucianism and quietly resented them. He preferred classic novels like Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin. At 13 his father arranged his marriage to the 17-year-old Luo Yixiu, uniting two land-owning families. Mao refused to recognise her as his wife and temporarily moved away. Luo was locally disgraced and died of dysentery in 1910 at the age of 20. Zheng Guanying's booklet, which lamented the deterioration of Chinese power and argued for representative democracy, gave the young farmhand what he called a 'political consciousness'. He devoured translations of Adam Smith, Montesquieu, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Charles Darwin, and Thomas Huxley. He admired the military prowess of George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1911, middle school in Changsha placed Mao at the centre of revolutionary feeling, where animosity toward Emperor Puyi's monarchy ran hot. The republican figurehead was Sun Yat-sen, a Hawaiian-educated Christian who led the Tongmenghui society. As a symbol of rebellion, Mao and a friend cut off their queue pigtails, the sign of subservience to the emperor. When the Xinhai Revolution broke out, Mao joined the rebel army as a private soldier, though he never saw combat. He resigned in 1912 after six months in uniform, just as a newspaper article first introduced him to the word socialism.

  • Yang Changji, a professor at the Fourth Normal School of Changsha, thought Mao exceptionally intelligent and handsome, and it was through him that the path to Marxism opened. After Mao graduated in June 1919, ranked third in his year, he followed Yang to Peking University. There he took a job as assistant to the university librarian Li Dazhao, who would become an early Chinese Communist. Li wrote a series of New Youth articles on the October Revolution in Russia, where Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks had seized power, and those articles added Marxism to China's revolutionary doctrines. Paid a low wage, Mao shared a cramped room with seven other Hunanese students, snubbed by classmates for his rural accent and lowly position. He still believed Beijing's beauty offered vivid and living compensation. Peter Kropotkin's anarchism gripped him before Marxism did, and his early ideas leaned on Kropotkin's concept of mutual aid rather than orthodox class struggle. His mother died in October 1919 and his father in January 1920. Mao met Chen Duxiu in Shanghai during this period and later said Chen's adoption of Marxism deeply impressed him at what was probably a critical period in his life.

  • On the 4th of May 1919, students gathered at Tiananmen to protest the Chinese government's weak resistance to Japanese expansion, igniting the nationwide May Fourth Movement. In Changsha, Mao taught at the Xiuye Primary School and organised protests against the provincial governor Zhang Jingyao, known as 'Zhang the Venomous'. He began producing a weekly radical magazine, the Xiang River Review, written in vernacular language so ordinary people could read it. Several of his articles argued for the liberation of women, a cause shaped by his own forced arranged marriage. The first National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party began in Shanghai on the 23rd of July 1921, attended by 13 delegates, Mao among them. When a police spy appeared, the delegates fled to a boat on South Lake near Jiaxing to escape detection. In August 1921, Mao founded the Self-Study University in Changsha, housed in the premises of the Society for the Study of Wang Fuzhi, a Qing-era philosopher who had resisted the Manchus. The famous Anyuan coal-mine strikes drew on both proletarian and bourgeois strategies, organised alongside Liu Shaoqi and Li Lisan. His wife Yang Kaihui, whom he married in the winter of 1920, worked for women's literacy in the nearby peasant communities. That organising success earned Mao an invitation from Chen Duxiu to join the Party's Central Committee.

  • On the 14th of October 1934, the Red Army broke through the Kuomintang line at the south-west corner of the Jiangxi Soviet and embarked on the Long March. To make the escape, the wounded, the ill, the women and the children were left behind, defended by guerrilla fighters whom the KMT massacred. The survivors crossed the Xiang River after heavy fighting, then the Wu River in Guizhou, taking Zunyi in January 1935. At the conference held in that city, Mao was elected Chairman of the Politburo and became the de facto leader of both Party and Red Army, supported in part by Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin. From Zunyi, Mao set a destination: the Shenshi Soviet in Shaanxi, from where the Communists could focus on fighting the Japanese. The hardest crossing came at the Tatu River, won in a battle over the Luding Bridge in May. In Western Sichuan they met the Fourth Front Army of Zhang Guotao, who wanted to retreat west toward Tibet or Sikkim while Mao insisted on Shaanxi. They parted ways, Zhu De joining Zhang. Mao's forces pushed north through hundreds of kilometres of grassland quagmire, attacked by Manchu tribesmen, losing many to famine and disease. Of those who began, only 7,000 to 8,000 survived to reach the Shenshi Soviet. In November 1935 Mao was named chairman of the Military Commission, though he would not become party chairman until 1943.

  • Edgar Snow arrived in the Border Region and turned his time among the Communists into Red Star Over China, while Agnes Smedley's accounts brought international attention to Mao's cause. From a cave-house in Yan'an, Mao read, tended his garden, and theorised. He divorced He Zizhen, who had taken a shrapnel wound to the head on the Long March and travelled to Moscow for treatment, and married an actress, Jiang Qing. Despising Chiang Kai-shek as a 'traitor to the nation', Mao still telegrammed the Nanjing National Government on the 5th of May proposing a military alliance against Japan, a course Stalin advocated. Chiang meant to ignore the message, but his own general Zhang Xueliang arrested him at Xi'an and forced him to negotiate, producing a United Front on the 25th of December 1937. When the Japanese took Shanghai and Nanjing, the resulting Nanjing Massacre became an atrocity Mao never spoke of in his life. In August 1940 the Red Army launched the Hundred Regiments Offensive, attacking the Japanese in five provinces at once and disrupting railways. In 1944 the United States sent the Dixie Mission, whose soldiers found the party less corrupt, more unified, and more vigorous against Japan than the Kuomintang. After the war, the U.S. continued to back Chiang against the People's Liberation Army Mao led.

  • Mao proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China from Tiananmen on the 1st of October 1949, after Chiang Kai-shek fled the mainland to Taiwan. In October 1950 the People's Volunteer Army entered the Korean War to reinforce North Korea, and at least 180,000 Chinese troops died in the fighting. At home, the land reform campaigns saw people accused of being landlords beaten to death at mass meetings, with deaths estimated between 2 million and 5 million. The Three-anti and Five-anti Campaigns of 1951 turned workers against bosses and children against parents in struggle sessions, and in Shanghai suicide by jumping from tall buildings became so common that residents avoided the pavement near skyscrapers. In January 1958 Mao launched the Great Leap Forward to turn an agrarian China into an industrial one, merging collectives into vast people's communes. Labour was diverted to steel and infrastructure, and grain production dropped roughly 15% in 1959. Cadres exaggerated harvests to avoid being purged, then requisitioned a share of those fictitious yields, leaving farmers with little. The Great Chinese Famine that followed caused the deaths of some 30 million peasants between 1959 and 1962. At the Lushan Conference in 1959, Defence Minister Peng Dehuai voiced the most direct criticism, and Mao purged him. Mao stepped down as Chairman of China on the 27th of April 1959, handing the presidency to Liu Shaoqi, but kept the Party and Central Military Commission chairmanships. Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping later rescued the economy by disbanding the communes and importing grain from Canada and Australia.

  • By the early 1960s Mao feared that a new ruling elite had replaced the old, estranged from the people it was meant to serve. In 1966 he launched the Cultural Revolution, believing a revolution of culture would keep China in a state of continuous revolution. It destroyed much of China's traditional cultural heritage and imprisoned many citizens, among them Liu Shaoqi, with deaths estimated from hundreds of thousands into the millions. Mao chose Lin Biao as his successor, but by 1971 a divide had opened, and Lin died on the 13th of September 1971 in a plane crash over Mongolia, presumably fleeing arrest. Mao's health declined in his final years, aggravated by his chain-smoking, and his lung and heart ailments became a state secret. He suffered heart attacks in May and June, then a third on the 2nd of September that left him an invalid. He died shortly after midnight on the 9th of September 1976, at the age of 82, though the Party delayed the announcement until 16:00. His embalmed body lay in state at the Great Hall of the People for a week, and one million Chinese filed past to pay respects. Despite his request to be cremated, his body was put on permanent display in the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong. In China a common summary holds that Mao was 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong, a verdict that began with the CCP resolution adopted on the 27th of June 1981.

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Common questions

Who was Mao Zedong and what did he do?

Mao Zedong was a Chinese revolutionary, politician, writer, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China. He led China from the PRC's establishment in October 1949 until his death in September 1976, primarily as Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party.

When was Mao Zedong born and when did he die?

Mao Zedong was born on the 26th of December 1893 near Shaoshan village in Hunan during the Qing dynasty. He died shortly after midnight on the 9th of September 1976, at the age of 82.

What was the Great Leap Forward under Mao Zedong?

The Great Leap Forward was a campaign Mao launched in January 1958 to transform China from an agrarian to an industrialised nation by merging collectives into large people's communes. It led to the Great Chinese Famine, which caused the deaths of some 30 million Chinese peasants between 1959 and 1962.

What was the Long March led by Mao Zedong?

The Long March was a military retreat that began on the 14th of October 1934, when the Red Army broke through the Kuomintang line at the Jiangxi Soviet. Of those who set out, only 7,000 to 8,000 survived to reach the Shenshi Soviet in Shaanxi, and the march established Mao as the dominant figure in the party.

Why did Mao Zedong launch the Cultural Revolution?

Mao launched the Cultural Revolution in 1966 because he feared a new ruling elite had replaced the old one and become estranged from the people. He believed a revolution of culture would unseat the ruling class and keep China in a state of continuous revolution.

How is Mao Zedong's legacy assessed in China?

In China a common expression holds that Mao was 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong. The CCP resolution adopted on the 27th of June 1981 stated that Mao's contributions to the Chinese Communist Revolution far outweighed his mistakes.

See all questions about Mao Zedong →

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242 references cited across the entry

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  217. 217Cult of Maolibrary.thinkquest.org
  218. 218Stefan Landsberger, Paint it Red. Fifty years of Chinese Propaganda Posters
  219. 219https://www.britishmuseum.org/pdf/2%20-%20Part%202%20-%20Mao%20badges%20with%20low%20res%20image%20of%20poster.pdf
  220. 220BookRhetoric of the Chinese Cultural Revolution: the impact on Chinese thought, Culture, and CommunicationXing Lu — University of South Carolina Press — 2004
  221. 221Granddaughter Keeps Mao's Memory Alive in Bookshop by Maxim Duncan, Reuters, 28 September 2009
  222. 222Sháoshān shēng qǐ yǒngyuǎn bù luò de hóng tàiyángShaoshan.gov.cn
  223. 223NewsPoll: Millennials desperately need to bone up on the history of communism21 October 2016
  224. 224NewsPoll Finds Young Americans More Open to Socialist Ideas23 October 2016
  225. 225NewsOpinion: Why Millennials are embracing socialismTom Switzer — 23 February 2019
  226. 226News'Who Are Our Enemies?' China's Bitter Youths Embrace Mao.Li Yuan — 8 July 2021
  227. 227NewsZhang Hanzhi, Mao's English Tutor, Dies at 72David Barboza — 29 January 2008
  228. 228Jiēmì máozédōng wèishéme xué yīngyǔ:"Zhè shì dòuzhēng de xūyào"9 July 2015
  229. 229JournalThe Misunderstood Husband: Mao Zedong and He ZizhenNarayan Chandra Sen — 1992
  230. 230JournalJiang Qing, between Fact and Fiction: The Many Lives of a Revolutionary IconSilvia Salino
  231. 231Mao Zedong Thought – Part 1
  232. 232100 years
  233. 233BookCalligraphy and Power in Contemporary Chinese SocietyYuehping Yen — Routledge — 2005
  234. 234Shǒujiè máo tǐ shūfǎ yāoqǐngsài jīngpǐn fēnchéng11 September 2006
  235. 235Barnstone, Willis (1972; rpr. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008). The Poems of Mao Zedong. pp. 3–4. .
  236. 236Being Mao Zedong4 July 2011
  237. 237Famous actor playing Mao Zedong dies5 July 2005
  238. 238Actor famous for playing Mao Zedong dies of miocardial infarction5 July 2005
  239. 239The reel MaoWei Liu — 3 June 2011
  240. 240Actors expect prosperity of Chinese cultureQu Xiong — CCTV News — 26 November 2011
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