The document discusses Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution in China from 1966-1976. It describes how Mao launched the Cultural Revolution to reassert his power and combat perceived threats of capitalism and revisionism. Radical intellectuals and youth groups like the Red Guards played a major role in purging bourgeois elements and eradicating traditional culture. This led to widespread factionalism and political and social turmoil throughout Chinese society over the next decade until Mao's death.

1. 1966-1976
Amamou Farah
Dreistadt Anaïs

2.  Result of one and only person: Mao Zedong
 More and more inequality
“The CR was to provide a revolutionary commitment of an
older generation of party officials.” (MacFarqhar, p. 234)
 Political crisis
“The greatest danger to a successful socialist revolution is not
the threat of attacks from abroad, but rather the restoration of
capitalism at home” (MacFarqhar, p. 154)

3.  Necessity to intervene to restore the social order
 First phase: 3 steps in 3,5 years
 Mao‟s power base:
 PLA
 Radical intellectuals
 Mass base

4.  Red Guards
 Eradicate „the Four Olds‟
“The RG took the streets looking for evidence of bourgeois
culture” (MacFarqhar, p. 182)
Chairman Mao teaches us that revolution is not like going to
dinner […]. We can‟t be so tasteful and rafined. Revolution is
when one class overthrow another. Let‟s overhrow this
reactionary superstition!” (Gao,Yuan p. 91-92)
 Consequence: factionalism

5.  16/05/1966 circular: a major escalation of Mao‟s
drive against revisionism
“the movement began with utopian rhetoric about
“overthrowing” bureaucracy and establishing direct democracy
along the lines of the paris commune” (MacFarqhar, p. 221)
 January revolution 1967: the overthrow of the
party committees
 3 in 1 combination: 3 networks establishing new
revolutionary committees

6.  Reconstruction of political system: much more
important role played by military officers
“purification of the ranks” of party members, expelling those
who had been shown to be revisionist, and absorbing “fresh
blood” from the activists of the CR. (MacFarqhar, p. 224)
“education serving proletarian politics and education being
combined with productive labour, so as to enable those
receiving an education to develop morraly, intellectually and
physically and to become labourers with social consciousness
and culture.” (Cheng & Letz, p. 429)

7.  Limited impact on agricultural and industrial
production
 Factionalism until the eighties
 Crisis amoung the young people

8.  Why did Mao launch the Cultural Revolution ?
 What are the goals of the radicals intellectuals
in the Cultural Revolution ?
 What are the consequences of the worker-
peasant system on the rural population ?
 Why the bourgeoisie‟s youth had been the
most active during the Red Guards „s
movement ?
 How Mao did mobilize the mass base ?
 What was the role of the mass in the Centrale
Case Examination Group ?
 What was the international reaction?