10.07 - Chinese Civil War, Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, and Tiananmen Square Protests

Sun Yat-sen

(1866-1925) first leader of the Nationalist Party of China and first president of the Republic of China

Chiang Kai-shek

(1911-1975) leader of the Nationalist Party of China during the Chinese Civil War

Chinese Communist Party

(1921-present) the ruling party in China once led by Mao Zedong and later Deng Xiaoping

Chinese Civil War

(1927-1949) conflict between the Nationalist Party of China led by Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese Communist Party led by Mao Zedong that ended with the Communist party's rule

Mao Zedong

(1893-1976) leader of the Chinese Communist Party (1943-1976) who made China communist and whose leadership led to Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution

Nationalist Party of China

nationalist party in China led by Sun Yat-sen and later Chiang Kai-shek which lost the Chinese Civil War to the Chinese Communist Party

Long March (The)

(1935) the Chinese Communist Party's retreat during the Chinese Civil War during which the party and its army marched 4,000 miles to northwestern China where they regrouped and eventually defeated the Nationalist Party; this was the event that made Mao Zedong the undisputed leader of the Communist Party

Great Leap Forward

(1958-1961) Mao Zedong's economic plan to rapidly transform China from a primarily agrarian (or farming) economy into a modern, industrialized communist society; the plan failed and led to the deaths of a least 14 million and many as 43 million, mostly due to famine

Cultural Revolution

(1966-1976) a massive social upheaval brought on by a struggle for power within the Communist Party of China, during which Mao and his supporters purged the country of those who opposed him, trained Chinese youths to worship Mao and his sayings, and then empowered those young people to rebel against their elders to defend Mao's revolution; at least half a million people died and the People's Republic of China was brought to the brink of civil war

commune

a group of people living and working together on land owned by a government

Deng Xiaoping

(1904-1997) leader of the Chinese Communist Party from 1978 to 1989 who reformed the Chinese economy through his Four Modernizations which included free-market elements that propelled the country to a period of growth and who limited political freedoms in the country

Four Modernizations

Deng Xiaoping's economic goals for China which integrated free-market ideas to strengthen the country's agriculture, industry, defense, and science and technology

Tiananmen Square Protests

(1989) student-led protests for political freedoms that were brutally stopped by the Chinese Communist Party led by Deng Xiaoping resulting in 10,000 deaths and a further crack down on political freedom