Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
Read SNT, Chapter 25 Imperialism and Nationalism in Asia, Africa and Latin America, 1914-1945,
Chapter 29, “Nationalism and Communism in China, 691-696 [stop at British Colonialism…], the following
texts and respond to these questions.
1. Who has Sun Zhongshan [Sun Yat-sen], and what role did he play in the development of Chinese
nationalism and the Guomindang? How was Sun influenced by the Russian Revolution? How did Sun‟s
successor, Jiang Jieshi [Chiang Kai-Shek], initiate a civil war with the Chinese Communists?
2. The eventual leader of the Chinese Communists, Mao Zedong, had created a „red base‟ and „red
army‟ in rural southeastern China, where the remaining Communist leaders fled after the Jiang‟s „white terror‟
in 1927. What was the Long March, and how did it regroup the surviving remnants of Chinese Communism,
following its initial defeats in the civil war? Why did Jiang and the Guomindang eventually lose the civil war,
despite its initial military superiority?
3. How was Mao‟s reliance upon the peasantry as the main force of the Chinese Revolution a break with
classical Marxian doctrine? To what extent did Chinese conditions dictate Mao‟s reliance upon the peasantry?
How was Mao‟s conception of revolution shaped by his experience with Chinese peasants?
4. Compare the ideas of revolution of Mao and Frantz Fanon. To what extent do they share similar
themes? What do you think of Mao‟s idea that it was necessary to create a “red terror” in rural areas to
overthrow the landlord class? Do you think that thinkers who saw the peasantry as the main agent of revolution,
such as Mao and Fanon, are more likely to be enthusiastic about the use of violence?
5. Mao talks about the Chinese Communist state as both a dictatorship and a democracy. According to
Mao, how is it a dictatorship? How is it a democracy? In your view, is it possible for a state to be both a
dictatorship and a democracy? Do you think a state can be dictatorial for some, but democratic for others?
Would you agree with Mao that the Chinese state was both a dictatorship and a democracy, or do you think it
was clearly one or the other?
6. Is a revolution necessarily violent and repressive, or is it the goals of the Chinese Revolution – the
elimination of the capitalist and landlord class – that made it violent and repressive?
7. Both the Guomindang and the Chinese Communist Party were organized along Leninist lines, with
tight discipline and the subordination of the lower levels to the leadership [“democratic centralism”]. Why do
you think both parties organized themselves in this fashion? Was an authoritarian state an inevitable outcome of
the Chinese civil war?
Until his death in 1976, Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung] was the supreme figure, reminiscent of the old
Chinese emperor, in the People's Republic of China (PRC). He was one of the dozen who gave birth to the
Communist Party of China in Shanghai in 1921. He emerged as the sole "survivor" among the original
members of the party. The rest left the party for one reason or another, including purges, defections,
resignations, or deaths. His rise to the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party, which was dominated in its
early years by the Moscow-trained and urban-oriented Chinese Communists, was through rather unorthodox
means. He carefully built his power base in the countryside, believing that the peasants, rather than the urban
proletariat, were the mainstay of the Communist revolution. He spent more than twenty years in rural China
organizing and leading peasants and the peasant army, the forerunner of the People's Liberation Army. He
presided over the Communist insurgent government (known as the Chinese Soviet Republic) in a mountainous
region of south-central China from 1931 to 1934. After the collapse of this "Red Republic" in 1935, during the
six thousand mile Long March, harassed by Jiang Jieshi’s1 [Chiang Kai-shek's] pursuing Nationalist troops,
1
Jiang Jieshi [Chiang Kai-shek] (October 31, 1887 – April 5, 1975) served as Generalissimo of the national government of the
Republic of China (ROC) from 1928 until his death in 1975, taking control of the Guomindang (GMD) after the death of Sun
Zhongshan in 1925. Jiang led nationalist troops in the Northern Expedition to unify China and end the Warlord era. He emerged
victorious in 1928 as the overall leader of the ROC. Jiang led China in the Second Sino-Japanese War, during which Jiang's stature
within China weakened because of his constant attempts to eliminate the communist party, but his international prominence grew.
He attempted to eradicate the Chinese Communists during the civil war (1927-1949), but ultimately failed, forcing his GMD
government to escape to Taiwan, where he continued serving as the President of the Republic of China and Director-General of the
Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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Mao emerged as the undisputed leader in the Communist Party by eclipsing the Moscow-oriented party
leadership, which had lost its urban base to Jiang Jieshi. His leadership of the party was formalized in 1943
when he was elected chairman of the Central Committee and the Politburo of the Communist Party of China. In
Yenan [Yan'an], the new hinterland base of operations of the Communists from 1936 to 1947, Mao enjoyed not
only unchallenged leadership in the Chinese Communist movement, but he also emerged as a Communist
theoretician by adapting Marxism-Leninism to the unique socio-economic and political conditions within
China. He produced a number of theoretical works, including On Practice, On Contradiction, and Problems of
Strategy in China's Revolutionary War.
Following Japan's defeat in World War II in August 1945 and the subsequent Communist victory over
Jiang Jieshi’s Nationalist forces in the bitterly fought four-year civil war, on October 1, 1949, twenty-eight
years after the formation of the Communist Party of China, Mao Zedong stood on the Gate of Heavenly Peace
(Tiananmen) in Beijing (Peking) to proclaim the birth of the People's Republic of China. Mao now was the
leader of the world's most populous Communist state.
Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung], Analysis of the Classes in Chinese Society [1926]
Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is a question of the first importance for the revolution.
The basic reason why all previous revolutionary struggles in China achieved so little was their failure to unite
with real friends in order to attack real enemies. A revolutionary party is the guide of the masses, and no
revolution ever succeeds when the revolutionary party leads them astray. To ensure that we will definitely
achieve success in our revolution and will not lead the masses astray, we must pay attention to uniting with our
real friends in order to attack our real enemies. To distinguish real friends from real enemies, we must make a
general analysis of the economic status of the various classes in Chinese society and of their respective attitudes
towards the revolution.
What is the condition of each of the classes in Chinese society?
The landlord class and the comprador class. In economically backward and semi-colonial China the
landlord class and the comprador class are wholly appendages of the international bourgeoisie, depending upon
imperialism for their survival ant growth. These classes represent the most backward and most reactionary
relations of production in China and hinder the development of her productive forces. Their existence is utterly
incompatible with the aims of the Chinese revolution...
The middle bourgeoisie. This class represents the capitalist relations of production in China in town and
country. The middle bourgeoisie, by which is meant chiefly the national bourgeoisie, is inconsistent in its
attitude towards the Chinese revolution: they feel the need for revolution and favour the revolutionary
movement against imperialism and the warlords when they are smarting under the blows of foreign capital and
the oppression of the warlords, but they become suspicious of the revolution when they sense that, with the
militant participation of the proletariat at home and the active support of the international proletariat abroad, the
revolution is threatening the hope of their class to attain the status of a big bourgeoisie...
The semi-proletariat. What is here called the semi-proletariat consists of five categories: (1) the
overwhelming majority of the semi-owner peasants, (2) the poor peasants, (3) the small handicraftsmen, (4) the
shop assistants and (5) the pedlars. The overwhelming majority of the semi-owner peasants together with the
poor peasants constitute a very large part of the rural masses. The peasant problem is essentially their problem...
The proletariat. The modern industrial proletariat numbers about two million. It is not large because
China is economically backward...
To sum up, it can be seen that our enemies are all those in league with imperialism – the warlords, the
bureaucrats, the comprador class, the big landlord class and the reactionary section of the intelligentsia attached
to them. The leading force in our revolution is the industrial proletariat. Our closest friends are the entire
semi-proletariat and petty bourgeoisie. As for the vacillating middle bourgeoisie, their right-wing may become
our enemy and their left-wing may become our friend but we must be constantly on our guard and not let them
create confusion within our ranks.
GMD for the remainder of his life.
Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung], Report of An Investigation of the Peasants’ Movement in Human
[1927]
[A] revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it
cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A
revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another. A rural revolution is a
revolution by which the peasantry overthrows the power of the feudal landlord class. Without using the greatest
force, the peasants cannot possibly overthrow the deep-rooted authority of the landlords which has lasted for
thousands of years. The rural areas need a mighty revolutionary upsurge, for it alone can rouse the people in
their millions to become a powerful force. All the actions mentioned here which have been labeled as "going
too far" flow from the power of the peasants, which has been called forth by the mighty revolutionary upsurge
in the countryside. It was highly necessary for such things to be done in the second period of the peasant
movement, the period of revolutionary action. In this period it was necessary to establish the absolute authority
of the peasants. It was necessary to forbid malicious criticism of the peasant associations. It was necessary to
overthrow the whole authority of the gentry, to strike them to the ground and keep them there. There is
revolutionary significance in all the actions which were labeled as "going too far" in this period. To put it
bluntly, it is necessary to create terror for a while in every rural area, or otherwise it would be impossible to
suppress the activities of the counter-revolutionaries in the countryside or overthrow the authority of the gentry.
Proper limits have to be exceeded in order to right a wrong, or else the wrong cannot be righted.
Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung], Talk with the American Correspondent Anna Louise Strong [1946]
All reactionaries are paper tigers. In appearance, the reactionaries are terrifying, but in reality, they are
not so powerful. From a long-term point of view, it is not the reactionaries but the people who are powerful.
Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung], The People's Democratic Dictatorship [1949]
Communists the world over are wiser than the bourgeoisie, they understand the laws governing the
existence and development of things, they understand dialectics and they can see farther. The bourgeoisie does
not welcome this truth because it does not want to be overthrown.
As everyone knows, our Party passed through these twenty-eight years not in peace but amid hardships,
for we had to fight enemies, both foreign and domestic, both inside and outside the Party. We thank Marx,
Engels, Lenin and Stalin for giving us a weapon. This weapon is not a machine-gun, but Marxism-Leninism.
The Russians made the October Revolution and created the world's first socialist state. Under the
leadership of Lenin and Stalin, the revolutionary energy of the great proletariat and labouring people of Russia,
hitherto latent and unseen by foreigners, suddenly erupted like a volcano, and the Chinese and all mankind
began to see the Russians in a new light. Then, and only then, did the Chinese enter an entirely new era in their
thinking and their life. They found Marxism-Leninism, the universally applicable truth, and the face of China
began to change.
There are bourgeois republics in foreign lands, but China cannot have a bourgeois republic because she
is a country suffering under imperialist oppression. The only way is through a people's republic led by the
working class...
Twenty-four years have passed since Sun Zhongshan‟s2 [Sun Yat-sen's] death, and the Chinese
revolution, led by the Communist Party of China, has made tremendous advances both in theory and practice
and has radically changed the face of China. Up to now the principal and fundamental experience the Chinese
people have gained is twofold:
1. Internally, arouse the masses of the people. That is, unite the working class, the peasantry, the urban
2
Sun Zhongshan [Sun Yat-sen] (November 12, 1866 – March 12, 1925) was a Chinese revolutionary and political leader often
referred to as the Father of Modern China. Sun played an instrumental role in the eventual collapse of the Qing Dynasty in 1911. He
was the first provisional president when the Republic of China (ROC) was founded in 1912 and later co-founded the Guomindang
(Koumintang) where he served as its first leader. Sun was a uniting figure in post-Imperial China, and remains unique among 20 th
century Chinese politicians for being widely revered in both Mainland China and in Taiwan.
Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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petty bourgeoisie and the national bourgeoisie, form a domestic united front under the leadership of the working
class, and advance from this to the establishment of a state which is a people's democratic dictatorship under the
leadership of the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants.
2. Externally, unite in a common struggle with those nations of the world which treat us as equals and
unite with the peoples of all countries. That is, ally ourselves with the Soviet Union, with the People's
Democracies and with the proletariat and the broad masses of the people in all other countries, and form an
international united front.
[Mao now responds to a number of criticisms and inquiries he sees as directed at the Chinese
Revolution.]
"You are leaning to one side."
Exactly. The forty years' experience of Sun Zhongshan and the twenty-eight years' experience of the
Communist Party have taught us to lean to one side, and we are firmly convinced that in order to win victory
and consolidate it we must lean to one side. In the light of the experiences accumulated in these forty years and
these twenty-eight years, all Chinese without exception must lean either to the side of imperialism or to the side
of socialism. Sitting on the fence will not do, nor is theme a third road. We oppose the Jiang Jieshi reactionaries
who lean to the side of imperialism, and we also oppose the illusions about a third road.
"You are too irritating."
We are talking about how to deal with domestic and foreign reactionaries, the imperialists and their
running clogs, not about how to deal with anyone else. With regard to such reactionaries, the question of
irritating them or not does not arise. Irritated or not irritated, they will remain the same because they are
reactionaries. Only if we draw a clear line between reactionaries and revolutionaries, expose the intrigues and
plots of the reactionaries, arouse the vigilance and attention of the revolutionary ranks, heighten our will to fight
and crush the enemy's arrogance can we isolate the reactionaries, vanquish them or supersede them. We must
not show the slightest timidity before a wild beast.
“Victory is possible even without international help."
This is a mistaken idea. In the epoch in which imperialism exists, it is impossible for a genuine people's
revolution to win victory in any country without various forms of help from the international revolutionary
forces, and even if victory were won, it could not be consolidated. This was the case with the victory and
consolidation of the great October Revolution, as Lenin and Stalin told us long ago.
"We need help from the British and U.S. governments."
This, too, is a naive idea in these times. Would the present rulers of Britain and the United States, who
are imperialists, help a people's state? Why do these countries do business with us and, supposing they might be
willing to lend us money on terms of mutual benefit in the future, why would they do so? Because their
capitalists want to make money and their bankers want to earn interest to extricate themselves from their own
crisis – it is not a matter of helping the Chinese people.
"You are dictatorial."
My dear sins, you are right, that is just what we are. All the experience the Chinese people have
accumulated through several decades teaches us to enforce the people's democratic dictatorship, that is, to
deprive the reactionaries of the right to speak and let the people alone have that right.
"Who are the people?"
At the present stage in China, they are the working class, the peasantry, the urban petty bourgeoisie and
the national bourgeoisie. These classes, led by the working class and the Communist Party, unite to form their
own state amid elect their own government; they enforce their dictatorship over the running dogs of imperialism
– the landlord class and bureaucrat – bourgeoisie, as well as the representatives of those classes, the
Guomindang reactionaries and their accomplices – suppress them, allow them only to behave themselves and
not to be unruly in word or deed. If they speak or act in an unruly way, they will be promptly stopped and
punished. Democracy is practiced within the ranks of the people, who enjoy the rights of freedom of speech,
Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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assembly, association and so on. The right to vote belongs only to the people, not to the reactionaries. The
combination of these two aspects, democracy for the people and dictatorship over the reactionaries, is the
people's democratic dictatorship.
"Why must things be done this way?"
The reason is quite clear to everybody. If things were not done this way, the revolution would fail, the
people would suffer, the country would be conquered.
"Don't you want to abolish state power?"
Yes, we do, but not right now; we can not do it yet. Why? Because imperialism still exists, because
domestic reaction still exists, because classes still exist in our country. Our present task is to strengthen the
people's state apparatus – mainly the people's army, the people's police and the people's courts – in order to
consolidate national defense and protect the people's interests. Given this condition, China can develop steadily,
under the leadership of the working class and the Communist Party, from an agricultural into an industrial
country and from a new democratic into a socialist and communist society, can abolish classes and realize the
Great Harmony. The state apparatus, including the army, the police and the courts, is the instrument by which
one class oppresses another. It is an instrument for the oppression of antagonistic classes; it is violence and not
"benevolence."
"You are not benevolent!"
Quite so. We definitely do not apply a policy of benevolence to the reactionaries and towards the
reactionary activities of the reactionary classes. Our policy of benevolence is applied only within the ranks of
the people, not beyond them to the reactionaries or to the reactionary activities of reactionary classes.
Here, the method we employ is democratic, the method of persuasions, not of compulsion. When anyone
among the people breaks the law, he too should be punished, imprisoned or even sentenced to death; but this is
a matter of a few individual cases, and it differs in principle from the dictatorship exercised over the
reactionaries as a class.
As for the members of the reactionary classes and individual reactionaries, so long as they do not rebel,
sabotage or create trouble after their political power has been overthrown, land and work will be given to them
as well in order to allow them to live amid remould themselves through Labor into new people. If they are not
willing to work, the people's state will compel them to work...
Such remoulding of members of the reactionary classes can be accomplished only by a state of the
people's democratic dictatorship under the leadership of the Communist Party. When it is well done, China's
major exploiting classes, the landlord class and the bureaucrat – bourgeoisie (the monopoly capitalist class),
will be eliminated for good. There remain the national bourgeoisie; at the present stage, we can already do a
good deal of suitable educational work with many of them. When the time comes to realize socialism, that, is, to
nationalize private enterprise, we shall carry the work of educating and remoulding them a step further. The
people have a powerful state apparatus in their hands-there is no need to fear rebellion by the national
bourgeoisie.
The people's democratic dictatorship is based on the alliance of the working class, the peasantry and the
urban petty bourgeoisie, and mainly on the alliance of the workers and the peasants, because these two classes
comprise 80% to 90% of China's population. These two classes are the main force in overthrowing imperial ism
and the Guomindang reactionaries. The transition from New Democracy to socialism also depends mainly upon
their alliance.
The people's democratic dictatorship needs the leadership of the working class. For it is only the
working class that is most farsighted, most selfless and most thoroughly revolutionary. The entire history of
revolution proves that without the leadership of the working class revolution fails. In the epoch of imperialism,
in no country can any other class lead any genuine revolution to victory. This is clearly proved by the fact that
the many revolutions led by China's petty bourgeoisie and national bourgeoisie all failed.
To sum up our experience and concentrate it into one point, it is: the people's democratic dictatorship
Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Revolution
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under the leadership of the working class (through the Communist Party) and based upon the alliance of
workers and peasants. This dictatorship must unite as one with the international revolutionary forces. This is our
formula, our principal experience, our maims programme...
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union is our best teacher and we must learn from it. The situation
both at home and abroad is in our favour, we can rely fully on the weapon of the people's democratic
dictatorship, unite the people throughout the country, the reactionaries excepted, and advance steadily to our
goal.
Mao Zedong [Mao Tse-tung], On The Correct Handling Of Contradictions Among The People
[1959]
Our state is a people's democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant
alliance. What is this dictatorship for? Its first function is internal, namely, to suppress the reactionary classes
and elements and those exploiters who resist the socialist revolution, to suppress those who try to wreck our
socialist construction, or in other words, to resolve the contradictions between ourselves and the internal enemy.
For instance, to arrest, try and sentence certain counter-revolutionaries, and to deprive landlords and
bureaucrat-capitalists of their right to vote and their freedom of speech for a certain period of time -- all this
comes within the scope of our dictatorship. To maintain public order and safeguard the interests of the people, it
is necessary to exercise dictatorship as well over thieves, swindlers, murderers, arsonists, criminal gangs and
other scoundrels who seriously disrupt public order. The second function of this dictatorship is to protect our
country from subversion and possible aggression by external enemies. In such contingencies, it is the task of
this dictatorship to resolve the contradiction between ourselves and the external enemy. The aim of this
dictatorship is to protect all our people so that they can devote themselves to peaceful labour and make China a
socialist country with modern industry, modern agriculture, and modern science and culture. Who is to exercise
this dictatorship? Naturally, the working class and the entire people under its leadership. Dictatorship does not
apply within the ranks of the people. The people cannot exercise dictatorship over themselves, nor must one
section of the people oppress another. Law-breakers among the people will be punished according to law, but
this is different in principle from the exercise of dictatorship to suppress enemies of the people. What applies
among the people is democratic centralism. Our Constitution lays it down that citizens of the People's Republic
of China enjoy freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, procession, demonstration, religious belief,
and so on. Our Constitution also provides that the organs of state must practice democratic centralism, that they
must rely on the masses and that their personnel must serve the people. Our socialist democracy is the broadest
kind of democracy, such as is not to be found in any bourgeois state. Our dictatorship is the people's democratic
dictatorship led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant alliance. That is to say, democracy
operates within the ranks of the people, while the working class, uniting with all others enjoying civil rights,
and in the first place with the peasantry, enforces dictatorship over the reactionary classes and elements and all
those who resist socialist transformation and oppose socialist construction.