Have the Chinese People Been Better Off In Each of These Area’S Since the Death of Mao?
Have The Chinese People Been Better Off In Each Of These Area's Since The Death Of Mao?
In 1967 the Cultural Revolution was at its height and although there were occasional eruptions in 1968, the Chinese communist party slowly began to rebuild the administration of the state and the Red Guard were sent to work in the countryside. Lin Biao was appointed chosen successor in place of Liu Shaoqi at the ninth party congress in 1969. His Peoples Liberation Army soldiers took control of local revolutionary committees, which ran schools, factories and other similar institutions. Right wing party cadres were re-educated through manual labour and thought reform. Government policies were now more socialist than they had been previously. Colleges and universities re-opened in the 1970's and preference was given to people with a farming, worker or peasant background. Economically, output figures were considered less important than the style and attitudes of the workplace and workforce. All institutions (factories and schools for example) were expected to mix theory and practise, so students were spending time in productive work and workers were spending time in the classroom. This aimed to break down barriers between manual labour and education. Sending millions of city dwellers to the countryside was another of Mao's socialist policies, with the intention of equalising society.
In the early 1970's the 'socialist spirit' in new China was strikingly apparent. The United States had become more open to China and China was beginning to make connections with the West. In 1971 the People's Republic government replaced the Guomindang in Taiwan as the representatives of China in the United States of America (USA) and in 1972 the president of the USA, President Nixon visited China and opened up trade connections between the USA and China. However, the whole picture was not shown to the outside world. Many people with high positions were sneaking their children into universities along side worker and peasant students. Lots of homesick students in the countryside were sneaking back into the city. Factory managers wanted new, more up-to-date machinery and scientists wanted contact with the rest of the world these issues were not so forthcoming. None of these problems were addressed because no-body heard about them this was mainly due to the 'Gang of Four' who were extreme Left Wing and controlled the media. Led by Mao's wife Jiang Qing, the gang were described as "more Maoist than Mao" in their perseverance to keep the Cultural Revolution going. They kept China on the socialist road for the time being.
Mao became ill and unable to take part in the politics of China like he once had. He was now more of a figurehead than anything else. The 'gang of four', were maybe more extreme than Mao, so they pushed for slightly different things. They were after the extreme politics, like those of the Cultural Revolution. It is believed that Mao's appointed successor of 1969, Lin Biao tried to seize power in 1971. As a result he died in an air crash while attempting to escape to the Soviet Union. In 1973 the Right Wing, Deng Xiaoping was reinstated as deputy to Zhou En Lai and together they worked to try and increase progress, they talked about the 'four modernizations'. However in January 1976 Zhou En Lai died of cancer and Deng Xiaoping was ousted from power by 'the gang of four' and dismissed yet again. Mao, just before he died on 9th September 1976, placed the not very well known Hua Guofeng in charge of China. He headed the new government but to set the country on its feet, wider support was needed and so Deng was recalled in 1977. Deng was to become the most influential member of the right wing group of leaders and within a short time play a leading role in the Chinese government.
When Deng Xiaoping came to power in 1979 there was a brief hope that democracy was imminent. At 'Democracy Wall' in Beijing a series of radical wall posters appeared, calling for a full rejection of Maoist policies and the introduction of western style personal freedoms. These posters openly discussed the party's failures and criticized the Cultural Revolution's years of turmoil. Wei Jungheng, a young worker, founded a magazine called 'Explorations' in which he called for democracy. The party imprisoned Wei and moved democracy wall to a remote suburb and shortly afterwards it was dismantled altogether. However, this was ...
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When Deng Xiaoping came to power in 1979 there was a brief hope that democracy was imminent. At 'Democracy Wall' in Beijing a series of radical wall posters appeared, calling for a full rejection of Maoist policies and the introduction of western style personal freedoms. These posters openly discussed the party's failures and criticized the Cultural Revolution's years of turmoil. Wei Jungheng, a young worker, founded a magazine called 'Explorations' in which he called for democracy. The party imprisoned Wei and moved democracy wall to a remote suburb and shortly afterwards it was dismantled altogether. However, this was not an accurate demonstration of the next decade that saw an improving economic situation as a result of adopting western economic practises. There was a lot of optimism about China's future. It was hoped that increasing openness and democracy would mean China could be finally joining the rest of the world.
Deng began by reversing the last ten years of Mao's work during the Cultural Revolution. He didn't blame Mao for these years. In fact he saw the Cultural Revolution as a good thing, despite being ousted in the 'bombarding the headquarters' scheme, which was part of the Cultural Revolution. He believed that the 'gang of four' had corrupted it. Mao's wife Jiang Qing and the rest of the group were arrested within a month of Mao's death. They were eventually tried and executed. They were made scapegoats for the failures in China and an excuse for the criticism of the communist system. An American reporter visiting china in 1979 described what he saw:
"The gang of four is blamed for everything. A factory does not produce? The fault lies with the gang of four. The trains are late? The gang again. The evil influence of the radicals is cited endlessly in every factory, hospital, school and commune. But their names, their histories, their intimate connections with Mao himself are rarely mentioned. They have become a universal scapegoat, an excuse for the criticism of the communist system."
Deng did not wish to ruin the reputation of Mao. Now his aim was a step closer, to commencing his 'four modernizations'. Deng and the new leaders of China saw that China was far behind the western countries and so they set up a campaign to encourage the 'four modernizations'. The four modernizations were agriculture, industry, education/scientific technology and defence, as confirmed in the new party constitution, which says:
"The party must lead the people of all nationalities in making China a powerful socialist country with a modern agriculture, industry, national defence and science and technology by the end of the century."
The great leap forward had convinced Deng that China's modernization could only be achieved by what Mao called 'capitalist' methods. Now Deng presided over an official policy of the 'four modernizations', which would require a complete overhaul of internal policies and of China's relations with the outside world. Dengs view of the four modernizations was very different from Hua's. Hua wanted the modernizations but to still adhere to Maoist principles. Deng wanted to bring great change he wanted to create a better-educated, better skilled workforce with a management chosen for expertise rather than political beliefs. This was an extreme departure from Maoism. Deng labelled the new modernization as the 'New Long March' he decided that material incentives should be introduced to encourage greater productivity and efficiency. Also that market forces should influence price and availability of goods and private ownership could play in socialist economy. The aim of this was to improve people's livelihood and the countries economic performance.
In agriculture China conferred with foreign farming experts on new seed varieties, the use of insecticides and the exchange of specialists. Peasants were encouraged to once more to grow food in their private plots and sell the surplus in free markets in the towns. The 'Responsibility System' replaced the commune system in 1979. Peasants know decided for themselves how hard to work. Their allocations of land or animals were guaranteed for from 15 to 30 years. Any surplus they had once state quotas were met could be sold for their own benefit. Some peasant's worked for themselves, others in families or co-operatives, but it was possible to make a great deal of money and aim to buy the 'Four Big New Things' a TV, a freezer, a cooker and a fridge. A favourite slogan was 'Getting rich is glorious'.
The changes in the countryside really meant going back to the way the peasants had always done things. It was different in the towns. The factories had been developed after 1949 on the model of the USSR. Change would take longer. A 'Managerial Responsibility System' was applied to industry in 1984. The state in the future would step back from responsibility in the factories. It would not set production targets or back up any factory, which was not doing well. Except in the industries such as steel and transportation, managers would be responsible for profit and loss. Factories making a good profit could pay out bonuses to their workers and make their own deals with customers and suppliers, sometimes even with foreign ones. If the factory was not successful then the managers could be sacked. New, young, technically trained managers had now taken over in most factories. Mr Yu Weiling, director of the machine tool factory in shanghai said:
"Before, the party had all the responsibility. Now the directors have the biggest power. We used to just follow party directives. Throughout the factory we had the 'iron rice bowl'. If you showed up, no matter what you did you got the same pay. Now better work means more money, more bonuses, and we managers have three years to get results."
During the Cultural Revolution Gao Yutian was called a 'capitalist tail' by the party when he suggested that skilled workers could make more money working on their own. Now he is called by his neighbours 'Ten Thousand Yuan Gao' because they could make a lot more money doing free-lance work. Gao said
"We owe all this to Deng Xiaoping and premier Zhou. Before them we were really stupid, feudal, all 'eating out of the same pot!' Now really intelligent people can do well"
China was a major oil exporter and is among the world's biggest coal producers. Yet energy was in very short supply in China. For example, at Dadong, on the Mongolian border, it was only possible to pour steel at night. Otherwise there would be no power for the rest of the town. The five-year plan from 1985 to 1990 outlined a major programme to develop energy and improve transport and communications. It was hoped that the export of oil would not only prove sufficient for home needs but would also provide about 20 percent of the foreign exchange China needed to be able to buy oversees goods. Unfortunately China oil reserves had shown a number of serious technical problems. The geological structure caused great difficulty in the extraction process. An international drop in the price of oil had not helped China pay for all she wanted abroad. The foreign oil companies who had exploration contracts in the deep and difficult waters of the south China seas were disappointed with the results of offshore drilling between 1982 and 1986. These foreign oil companies found vast quantities of oil in the remote semi-desolate region of zhinjiang province in the far northwest of china. Crude oil continued to be vital to China's plans for economic development.
Education had been a major problem in the move towards the four modernizations. In a population of one billion people, there were less than 800,000 university students. Now the emphasis on political enthusiasm rather than ability had been dropped. Colleges and universities set strict entrance examinations. Formerly students had to go to the countryside on leaving school to work with their hands for at least two years and only those with a satisfactory report form the peasants revolutionary committee could apply to college. The aim was to double the intake those going into higher education by 1990. Large numbers of students now study in the USA, Japan and Europe and in 1985 there were 30,000 Chinese students in western countries. The rewards for academic excellence were great this acted as an encouragement to others to do well. These intellectuals (students) were dissatisfied with the speed at which the changes and this led to serious demonstrations in Shanghai, Beijing and elsewhere. In 1989 during protests for greater democracy young workers flocked to Tiananmen Square in hundreds of thousands they were motivated above all by hostility to growing social inequality and the privileges and blatant corruption of the government. The vast majority of those killed during the massacre of June 3-4, 1989 were young workers, residents of the neighbourhoods to the west of Tiananmen Square, who erected barricades and opposed the entry of the Peoples Liberation Army into the city. Nearly all those executed in the post-Tiananmen purge were young workers; especially those who sought to establish independent workplace and trade union organizations. Deng faced a serious problem, as the continuation of China freeing its economy would lead to the loosening of the political system and the allowance of more democracy. As student protest continued to grow, Deng took a strong line saying:
"When necessary we must deal severely with those who defy orders."
Hu Yaobang, the man who had seemed in line to succeed Deng, was obliged to resign having failed to take effective action to stop the student protest. Deng said:
"Reform should be carried out in an orderly way. That means we must be both bold and cautious."
The emphasis on education was very evident in the new-style Chinese army. During the Cultural Revolution all military academies were closed. Now there are 12 military academies where computers, advanced communications, logistics, languages, physics and mathematics are part of the course. China concentrated on having a smaller but better trained army with more highly advanced weaponry. At the Shrijiazhuang Academy Deputy Commander Wang stated in 1985:
"Deng Xiaoping has said that if China is in danger we must have a better, smaller army. Right now we are large and weak. In the future no one will rise in the army unless they have had this kind of training."
China could not afford to spend huge sums on military requirements if it wished to encourage rapid economic development at the same time, but it did sell arms and import sophisticated weaponry to keep up its defence capability. Senior military commanders were permitted to say publicly that until the turn of the century, the PLA would be no match for its enemies. The old guerrilla tradition of the red army had been abandoned.
The four modernizations led to massive changes socially in the way people lived, job opportunities, greater personal freedom, an improved standard of living for example televisions, fridge's and cookers. There was also a more western influence in all aspects of life, clothes and music. However, this did lead to problems such as an increase in crime and unemployment. In the cities a similar mixture of progress and problems could be seen. Consumer goods were eagerly bought by those who could afford them but stolen by those who couldn't. Petty crime increased as the rural exiles of the Cultural Revolution came flooding back to join the already large number of unemployed in the cities. And not only petty crime increased; in 1983 there were public executions of drug dealers and other major criminals. In one case in 1985, twenty-three government officials were imprisoned for losses to the state of £280,000. The massive population growth brought about the 'One Child-Policy'. In the 1950's the spread of health care meant a fall in the death rate and birth control advice also helped reduce the birth rate - but not far or fast enough. There were still far more births than deaths this meant the population continued to increase, the government unwisely ignored the warning of its experts that only a much lower birth rate would prevent a population explosion. The 1982 census confirmed that the population had almost doubled since 1949, and had an average age of 26, the youngest in the world. The government's response was the one-child policy introduced n 1978. Provinces brought in birth-control regulations, which varied in detail and in severity of enforcement from area to area. The usual pattern was rewards for obeying the 'norm' (one child in urban areas and two in the countryside) and penalties for exceeding it. The first child brought a pay bonus or extra land, and priority for education and housing; a second or third meant fines, reduced pay and other punishments, and a long queue for all state services. The new policy went against China's tradition of large families, shared by other peasant societies. When there is no state care for the elderly, people see children as their old age insurance. And in China it is sons who count most, since a daughter joins her husband's family on marriage. Until the government achieved its aim of full state care for the elderly, parents without sons still feared poverty in old age. This fear brought about the in-humane action of parents disposing of baby's if the baby was a girl, until family's had a son. Chinese newspapers drew attention to a survey of 1000 urban factory women who were asked if wished to stop work, they published the letter of a women engineer which stated:
"An experienced woman managing the household and raising the family contributes more to society tan when she is employed outside the house."
The results of their survey found that the majority of women wished to stop work, especially those aged 29-35.
In foreign affairs, Deng developed closer ties with Japan and the West. He travelled to the United States and Japan in 1979, opening the way for better diplomatic and economic relations after decades of isolation. In the 1980s Deng's government negotiated the return to Chinese sovereignty of Hong Kong from Britain in 1997, and Macau from Portugal in 1999.
