How Did The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution?

In 1965, Mao Zedong believed that his socialist campaign was being threatened by Liu Shaoqi and his comrades who, in Mao’s eyes, were traitors to the revolution because they shied away from a genuine mass movement. These veteran revolutionaries who had helped Mao create the People’s Republic were now seemingly less committed to Mao’s vision. In Mao’s eyes the Chinese Revolution was losing ground because of party conservatism and large bureaucracy. Mao insisted that many party bureaucrats “were taking the capitalist road.” Mao called for a wave of criticism against “reactionary bourgeois ideology” in 1966. Thus began the decade-long Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution that would have devastating and far-reaching impact on modern China.

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The People’s Republic had suffered brutality but none so widespread as the Cultural Revolution. The student revolts that began in Beijing educational institutions quickly led to violence. Libraries were burned to the ground by Red Guards. Anything that was not in line with Marxist-Leninist Mao Zedong Thought was destroyed. Murder was so widespread that trucks patrolled streets in Beijing looking for dead bodies. The suicide rate increased dramatically as people, who attempted to escape persecution jumped from buildings, drank insecticide and would lie across tracks in front of oncoming trains or throw themselves in front of cars. Not only did people during the Cultural Revolution die from murder and suicide, but also, unnecessarily, from illness due to the refusal to grant medical aid to those considered counter-revolutionaries. Everyone in China was affected; everyone knew someone who had died. Historians have had to ask: Why did so many Chinese attack each other with such violence? Why would groups of young Chinese, often students as Red Guards, attack their fellow Chinese with such violence and
He chose to be thorough in his study rather than provide any new interpretation. He wanted not to overemphasize any particular thesis but rather give a clear view of each stage of the Revolution by using primary source Red Guard newspapers. Lee explained the causes of the revolution through four distinct stages. Although the movement began as an elite conflict, Lee explained how it quickly became a conflict between elites and masses. This case study of the Red Guard Movement illustrated the process through which the mass organizations were formed. Lee found that radical organizations came from socially underprivileged sectors and sought to challenge the status quo. When Mao denied the Party of its legitimacy, these groups fought for power. Lee concentrated on these mass groups and particularly the Red Guards. In conclusion, he attempted to explain the reasons why it was so difficult to suppress the violence of the Revolution. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao attempted to reduce the gap between the elite and the masses by exploiting the existing social contradictions and shifting his support from one group to another. The mass organizations behaved according to their own interests because they had such a stake in the outcome of the Revolution. The mass 3 organizations used coercion