Mao's Last Revolution
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Years of Upheaval
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This book, by two distinguished scholars of modern Chinese politics, is a comprehensive history of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, an event initiated by the 'Great Helmsman', Chairman Mao Zedong. It ran for about a decade, spanning the years 1966-1976, a period roughly paralleling the major social changes occurring in the West (France, the USA) and Latin America (Guatemala, Cuba, Chile).
The book features an introductory chapter which very succinctly outlines the motive for the upheaval, but the remainder of the book is an exhaustive catalogue of the defining events. Each and every political figure of even the most tangential importance to the Cultural Revolution is given abundant ink. While this is of great importance to serious students of modern China, the wealth of detail is daunting for the general reader searching for an explanatory but non-superficial history. The arcana of Chinese Communist Party internecine warfare are catalogued in excruciating detail, replete with all the bloated slogans and cant typical of that era in modern Marxism. The vast damage to the Chinese economy, the armed forces, the educational system and the Chinese social structure is highlighted. The dubious role played by Zho Enlai (portrayed in many sources as a moderating force) is also discussed in detail, as is the tumultuous career in CCP politics of Deng Xiaoping. The unplanned ascendency of the Peoples Liberation Army as a result of GCR policies eventually required the removal of Mao's planned successor, Lin Biao and his supporters in the PLA general's ranks.
The authors note that, along with the tumult engendered by Mao's 'Great Leap Forward', the GCR was equally cataclysmic for China. Widespread famine resulted from the GLF and vast economic disruption from the CGR. Many millions of people died as a combination of these attempts at social engineering, much like the collectivization efforts undertaken in the USSR in Ukraine. Presumably, as a result of these two upheavals, the stage was set for a more pragmatic form of statecraft by Deng and his successors.
The parallels to Stalin's purges of the ranks of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union are evident, but are unstated, as are detailed explanations of Mao's motives (the purging of "revisionism", the backlash against Nikita Krushchov's reforms and the imagined threats to Mao's own rule); these aspects of the history are largely left to the reader's own background knowledge
Finally, the authors note that, along with Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, Mao will be remembered as one of the great tyrants and murderers of the 20th Century. In summary, this is a highly detailed work which is not for the casual reader. |
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