Mao's China

Guomindang

This was the nationalist political party founded in China in 1912; it governed China from 1928 to 1949.

Sun Yat Sen

He founded the first anti-imperial organization in 1894 and campaigned for a republic. He became president of the new Chinese Republic, but resigned in March 1912 to avoid civil war.

mass mobilisation

This term refers to everyone working together to decide on and carry out policies.

Comintern

The Comintern was founded in 1919 to fight 'by all available means, including armed forces, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and for the creation of an international Soviet republic as a transition stage to the complete abolition of the state.' It sent advisors to other countries to encourage communist revolution.

Confucianism

This was the complex system of morals, philosophical and political thinking developed by an Eastern philosopher, whereby individuals were encouraged to devote their lives to the achievement of moral perfection.

Han Chinese

The dominant Chinese race compromising 92% of the population of mainland China.

GAO Gang

Joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1926. He owned an independent communist area in Shaanxi, where the Long March ended in 1935. He turned Shaanxi into a war-time power base and joined the Politburo in 1943. He became state governor and party chairman in Manchuria and commander of Manchurian army. In 1952, he was put in charge of the Central Planning Commission. However his ambition led to his purge and suicide.

voluntaryism

This term refers to individual willingness to accept and share the same beliefs as those of the community in which they live. This might involve freely renouncing past evil, re-education and remaking in the communist image.

Struggle Session

A session in which the 'accused' individuals were taken before a panel, usually in public, to listen to a catalogue of their alleged crimes and moral failings.

Group of Five

This term refers to the committee established in January 1965 to initiate a revolution in China's culture.

Gang of Four

a powerful political group, created in 1974. It consisted of CCP officials who oversaw the suppression of a wide variety of traditional cultural activities during the Cultural Revolution.

Peng Dehuai

He joined the CCP in 1927 and participated in the Long March. He served in the civil war and was a member of the Politburo, China's defence minister from 1954 to 1959, and marshall of the PLA from 1955. He was removed from all posts in 1959 and placed under house arrest. He was brutally treated during the Cultural Revolution.

Deng Xioaping

Chinese communist statesman; vice-premier 1973-76 and 1977-80; vice-chairman of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party 1977-80. Discredited during the Cultural Revolution, he was reinstated in 1977 and became the leader of China

Chiang Kai Shek

He became the leader of the Guomindang party (GMD) in 1925 and from 1928 dominated the nationalist government as president and commander-in-chief of the army in China. He fled to Taiwan in 1949, which he ruled until his death.

Rao Shushi

He was a political commissar during the civil war and in 1949 was made chairman of the Military and Political Committee of East China. However, his association with Gao Gang led to his downfall and he spent the last 21 years of his life under arrest—in prison and on a working farm.

Commune

An agricultural unit equipped with nurseries, old people's homes, health clinics, schools, and open air cinemas. Peasants abandoned private possessions, slept in unisex dormitories, and ate in communal canteens. Communal teams dealt with house cleaning, mending, and the preparation of food.

Jiang Qing

She was Mao's third wife. She was appointed deputy director of the Central Cultural Revolution Group, and became a part of the Gang of Four.

Liu Shaoqi

He joined the CCP in 1921, and trained in the Soviet Union as a communist organizer and theorist. He was a close ally of Mao's and became Mao's successor in 1943. He succeeded Mao as chairman of the republic, but was denounced during the Cultural Revolution for opposing communes.

Little Red Book

Book of selected statements from speeches and writings by Mao Zedong. It was widely distributed during the Cultural Revolution.

Laogai

A network of labor camps created under Mao and his Soviet advisers. Much like the Soviet Gulags, prisoners were used as slave labor for back-breaking projects.

Ruthless determination

Willpower and determination would be sufficient to bring about change provided everyone showed total commitment. Violence was a necessary element of revolution.

Zhou Enlai

The first Premier of the People's Republic of China, serving from October 1949 until his death in January 1976. He served under Mao Zedong and was instrumental in consolidating the control of the Communist Party's rise to power, forming foreign policy, and developing the Chinese economy.

Mao Zedong

A Chinese communist revolutionary, political theorist and politician. The architect and founding father of the People's Republic of China.

Lin Biao

A major Chinese Communist military leader who was pivotal in the communist victory in the Chinese Civil War, especially in Northeastern China.

The Long March

A military retreat undertaken by the Red Army of the Communist Party of China, the forerunner of the People's Liberation Army, to evade the pursuit of the Chinese Nationalist Party army.