Mao's China, 1949-76: establishing communist rule Flashcards
(20 cards)
The Chinese Civil War
1946-49
Problems in China in 1949
1) Administrative chaos: the nationalists stripped China of their assets and cultural treasures, few experienced officials could run cities or rebuild economy
2) lawlessness: 1 mil bandits roam the countryside, refugees wandered aimlessly or crammed into unsanitary cities
3) economic problems: no stable or unified currency, hyperinflation by KMT made money worthless
4) industry: badly damaged by war and industrial equipment was destroyed
5) agriculture: agricultural tools and livestocks were in short supply, food production was low due to Civil War
6) national infrastructure: not a single unified nation, lack of central government, by lack of unified language
7) transport: transport networks were badly damaged
8) isolated: rural and urban China was largely isolated from each other
9) nationalist threat: US-backed nationalists still sent their saboteurs to cities and sent planes to bomb targeted cities
CPPCC (the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference)
Met in Beijing in September 1949
Common Program for China act as a provisional constitution to prove the legal basis for the new republic from 1949-1954
Created by a body of 662 delegates
Democratic Centralism
The voice of the people would be represented in central government through democratic elections to the legislature
National People’s Congress (NPC)
Legislature of PRC that would represent the wishes of the people and meet once a year to make laws or amend the constitution
Campaign to Suppress Counter Revolutionaries aimed at preventing nationalist sympathies and spies from undermining the regime
March 1950
The 3 Antis Campaign was directed against: corruption, waste, obstructionist bureacracy in government. It targeted anyone in the civil service who the regime did not like.
August 1951-July 1952
The 5 Antis Campaign was dedicated to end: bribery, tax evasion, theft of state property, cheating on government contracts, stealing state economic information. It targeted the middle classes and private business owners.
February-May 1952
The regime feared the anti-communist sentiment in Guangdong so targeted it with great ferocity
28k people were executed
Invasion of Tibet
October 1950
PLA cleared all resistance from the Uighurs in Xinjiang
March 1950
The nationalists set up a rival nation in the ROC
Taiwan; Republic of China
Laogai
Reform through labour
Estimated death rate in the Laogai system
27 million people
Prison population in the Laogai system at its peak
10 million people in any one year during Mao’s dictatorship
100 Flowers Campaign
May 1956-June 1957
Anti-Rightists Campaign
1957; estimated 400k-700k intellectuals were purged and sent to the countryside or laogai
‘On Handling Contradictions’
June 1957
Korean War; Korea had been divided along the 38th parallel
1950-53
