From Deng Xiaoping to the Tiananmen Square Massacre

The Era of Deng Xiaoping

After Mao's death & the fall of the Gang of Four, Deng Xiaoping was restored.
This was to the offices he had held before the Tiananmen incident.
Hua Guofeng, who had previously been his subordinate, remained premier.
Over the next four years, Deng Xiaoping campaigned.
To secure the rehabilitation of the victims of the Cultural Revolution.
By implication it implied the rejection of Mao's legacy.
Hua Guofeng claimed to be the guardian to that legacy.
By 1980 Deng had isolatedHua who was then forced resign as premier.
By the early 1980s Deng Xiaoping delegated routine administration to two men.
They were from the younger generation.
a) Hu Yaobang, who became Party secretary
b) Zhao Ziyana, who succeeded Hua Guofeng as premier.
Deng remained in control until 1987, when he resigned from the Central Committee.
But he retained the chair of the Military Affairs Commission.
He continued to dominate the political scene.
This would be until his retirement from all official positions in 1990.
His influence was obvious until shortly before his death in Feb. 1997.

Deng Xiaoping's Politics

His political style was highly personalized.
He was prepared to go to great length to settle private animosities.
As example, he used his authority to secure a ten year prison sentence for Nine Yuanzi.
He was the philosophy professor at Beijing University.
His big-character poster had launched the Cultural Revolution.
In Deng's view he was responsible for the persecution by the Red Guards of his son.
This was his son Deng Pufang, who fell from a roof at the university in 1978.
He became paralyzed from the waist down as a result of this.
Deng was no advocate of democracy.
But he accepted the case for some modest political changes.
In 1980 the system of congressional elections was revived.
They had not operated since the Cultural Revolution.
Direct elections were held for some 2000 country-level congresses.
Members of the National People's congress were now allowed to
a) cross-examine ministers on their work.
b) table suggestions for government actions.
The 1968 constitution was provided for the Congress
This was to establish standing committees to deal with
a) foreign
b) economic
c) minority-nationalities' affairs.
In September 1985, a special Party conference was convened
This was to force the retirement from the Politburo of some of the oldest members
An attempt to reduce the "old" character of government was desirable.
But Deng's motives may have been the settling of old scores.
These moves were subordinate to Deng's primary objective.
His main goal was to bring about a major shift in economic policy
In agriculture this implied
a) the abandonment of collectivization
b) the adoption of a market economy.
After the Great Leap Forward, modifications had been introduced to the communes
But a few things were retained
a) the principles of public ownership of land
b) reliance on human labour as the main source
c) restrictions on private enterprises.
In the years from 1966 to 1978, the gross value of agricultural output had grown.
It had grown at 3.1% per annum.
This was sufficient to sustain the growing population.
But it was quite inadequate to raise living standards to a significant degree.
In 1979, two reforms were instituted
This was to transform the agricultural sector
The first was to encourage peasants to
a) maximize the use of their private plot
b) to sell their produce on the open market.
By 1982, the private income of peasant families amounted to 38% of family income.
The second was the "productive responsibility system."
This was introduced in 1981.
The collective ownership of land was retained.
But single families could now take out contracts.
This would be to cultivate plots of land with specified crops.
They could also retain or sell any surplus produced in excess of their contract.
These measures injected an entrepreneurial spirit into farming.
The slogan "To get rich is glorious" was coined.
Then "ten thousand yuan" households appeared.
In the years after these reforms started, the growth rate of grain output rose.
It went from3.5% to 5% per annum.
In Dec. 1978 the policy of national economic self-sufficiency was abandoned.
China began to accept loans and foreign investments.
China finally joined the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
In 1949 four "Special Economic Zones" were created.
This was at
a) Zhuhai, north of Aomem (Macao)
b) Shenzhen near Xianggang
c) Shantou
d) Xiamen.
The purpose of establishing these zones were to attract foreign capital to China.
foreign firms were offered advantageous terms for
a) investments
b) suitable sites
c) a supply of cheap labour.
Foreign direct investment quickly became substantial.
Most of it came from Xianggang
It brought with it foreign exchange
It also brought in new technology and management practices.

Issues: Women, Minorities & Regions

A number of social issues became topical in the 1980s.
The most notorious one being the one-child family policy.
It was introduced in 1979.
In 1953 the census had shown how rapidly China's population was growing.
A birth control campaign was introduced.
But this was abandoned during the Great Leap Forward.
It was later revived.
During the Cultural Revolution birth control was denounced as an anti-Marxist heresy.
In the 1970s the fertility rate began to fall rapidly.
This was partly in response to a government campaign of economic sanctions.
This was placed on families with more than three children.
But the population continued to increase.
This led the government in 1979 to adopt the one-child family policy.
Those who accepted this received a generous package of benefits.
Those who refused were liable to lose a percentage of their income.
They would also forfeit their private plot or responsibility plot.
Some exceptions were made in cases of children with congenital defects.
The policy generally did not apply to minority groups.
The need for drastic action was supported by the evidence of the 1982 census.
The census showed that China's population exceeded I million.
Thee policy went against the deep;y held belief that a family needed a son.
a) to preserve the ancestral line.
b) to provide economic support
The enforcement of the policy involved the widespread use of
a) abortion
b) sterilization
c) encouragement of female infanticide.
In 1984 it was recognized that the campaign was too coercive.
A wider range of exemptions were allowed.
Since then the policy has generally been accepted and reinforced in urban areas.
It has been less successful in rural areas.
today the government has rethought the idea.
The policy revived the debate about the status of women in Chinese modern society.
The 1950 marriage law had appeared to confirm the Communists' promise.
This was that women would have a position of economic and legal equality with men.
Rural China remained a patriarchal society.
Educational opportunities for girls and employment opportunities for women improved.
But women still laboured under the double burden of child-bearing & work.
The Great Leap Forward provided communal kitchens & nurseries.
It offered women a brief glimpse of a less tramelled existence.
During the Cultural Revolution, the class struggle was emphasized
So feminist issues were dismissed as bourgeois preoccupations.
In 1980 a new Marriage Law was passed.
It confirmed the legal rights of women.
It also raised the minimum age of marriage for men for 20 to 22.
For women it went from 18 to 20.
Comparing their position prior to 1949 women did get liberated.
Yet few women achieved senior positions in employment
Fewer even occupied important political roles.
The new constitution was made known to the public in 1982
It reaffirmed that the People's Republic was a multinational state.
8% of China's population belonged to one of the 55% minorities.
The largest single group is the Zhuang who live in the south-west.
They number over 15 million.
Other large groups include
a) the Hui, Chinese-speaking Muslim
b) the Uighurs, in the north-west.
c) the Miao & the Tibetans in the south & west.
From time to time thereafter international agreements favoured the Chinese.
An example would be the Anglo-Chinese agreement of 1906.
It acknowledged the region to be Chinese territory.
In 1911Outer Mongolia and Tibet seized the opportunity to break away from China
Two years later the Dalai Lama declared Tibet to be an independent state.
This was recognized by Great Britain but never accepted by China.
In 1950 Tibet was "liberated"
It was commanded by Deng Xiaoping
It was designated the Xizang Autonomous Region.
Assurances were given that the region would continue to administer its internal affairs.
Also its social system would be left intact.
But the Chinese presence in Tibet led to rising tensions.
The Tibetan revolt of 1959 resulted.
a) in Chinese military intervention
b) the flight of the Dalai Lama
During the Cultural Revolution many Buddhist monasteries were destroyed.
In some cases this was done by Tibetan Red Guards
After reassurances were offered about Tibet's economic & cultural autonomy.
Buty Tibetan opposition to the Chinese presence continued.
In 1989 demonstrations in favour of Tibet independence were crushed.
During Deng's reign the relationship between China & Taiwan changed.
It went from military & political confrontation to one of economic co-operation.
Taiwan under President Chiang Kaishek became a bastion of Nationalistic resistance.
It became an important part of the USA's strategy for containing communism.
This arrangement collapsed in 1971.
That was when Nixon visited Beijing.
At that time China took Taiwan's seat at the United Nations.
Chiang Kaishek persevered with there policy of confrontation with the mainland.
This was until his death in April 1975.
He was succeeded by his son Jiang Jingguo
And it was his son who initiated a policy of cautious political liberalization.
He remained suspicious of. the People's Republic.
In 1981Deng assured Taiwan that China no longer planned to recover the island.
That would be a recovery by force.
If reunited peacefully to would retain a high degree of autonomy
No negotiations took place
Trade between Taiwan & China began to increase
In 1987 Taiwan relaxed its foreign exchange controls.
It removed its ban on travel to the mainland.
Deng Xiaoping played a leading role in determining the future of Hong Kong.
It had been ceded to Great Britain in 1842
After 1949 there was the expectation it would return to China
But Mao Zedong gave it low priority.
Twice since it has been threatened.
After the Great Leap Forward Hong Kong's resources were strained.
This was due to an influx of refugees.
The Red Guards threatened - Hong Kong's future remained undecided.
Its economy expanded in the 1970s - much to China's advantage.

Margaret Thatcher

In 1982 Margaret Thatcher, the British Prime Minister visited Beijing.
She negotiated and it resulted with the Anglo-Chinese agreement of 1984.
Under this Hong Kong would revert to China in 1997.
It would become a special Administrative Region.
Its people would be allowed to retain their own social & economic systems.
That would be for 50 years after that.
Deng's record as paramount leader was to be tarnished by one event.
This was by his handling of the democracy movement.
also by his role in the massacre of June 3rd & June 4th.
since its founding the CCP's attitude towards democratic freedoms has been mixed.
In 1919 Chen Duxiu declared that only two gentlemen could cure China.
a) Mr. Science
b) Mr. Democracy
And only these could cure Chinas of its dark malaise.
a) morality
b) learning
c) thought.
In protest against this denial of freedom Wang Shiwei responded.
He was a young communist who wrote an essay, Wild Lily.
for this he was executed.
The term "wild lily" denotes democratic dissent.
Wang Shiwei was later described as the CCP's first dissent
In 1957, Mao Zedong launched the Hundred Flowers campaign.
This meant that intellectuals were given a brief opportunity to express their opinions.
On Beijing University campus a "democracy wall" was started.
It had one student calling for true socialism with democracy.
When dissent grew stronger, Mao abandoned the intellectuals.
He called upon Deng Xiaoping to lead an anti-rightist movement.
During the Cultural Revolution, Mao himself had declared "to rebel is justified."
Some Red Guards had published critiques of the Party in the Red Guard Press.
After the Cultural Revolution millions of Red Guards were sent down to the countryside.
Many of them felt betrayed because
a) they had been deprived of their educational opportunities
b) because the cause to which they had been committed was rejected.
The rejection came after Mao's death.
This was the background of the new democracy movement which appeared in 1978.
At first this was not primarily a movement of intellectuals
Its main participants were state-employed manual workers and technicians.
They were later joined by former Red Guards who had drifted back into the cities.
The first manifestation of the movement was the appearance of posters
This was on the wall along Chang'an Avenue in Beijing.
Among their contributions was a picture headed "Democracy, the 5th Modernization"
This was a poster by Wei Jingsheng.
He was a man in his forties who worked as an electrician at Beijing Zoo.
He did this while at the same time studied at Beijing University.
Wei argued that free enterprise was the only economic system compatible with democracy - other contributors to the movement remained committed to socialism.
They argued that China's problems stemmed from the failings of its bureaucracy.
The democracy movement began soon after Deng Xiaoping had been reinstated
His first response was to regard the activists as useful allies.
These would be allies against the surviving Maoists
He would also give the movement his cautious support
But his priority was economic modernization
In Feb. 1979 he defined his political stance in "four cardinal principles"
a) that China should keep to the socialist road
b) that it should uphold the dictatorship of the proletariat.
c) it should uphold the leadership of the CCP
d) it should maintain the authority of Marxism-Leninism & Mao Zedong Thought.
At the same time the "four great freedoms" were removed from the 1978 constitution
These were freedoms that had been formulated by Mao
a) to speak out freely
b) to air views fully
c) to hold great debates
d) to write wall posters.
When Wei Jingshen and others protested, they were arrested.
Wei was given a 15 year jail sentence.
In the early 1980s China's increasing contact with the outside world had effects.
This alarmed some of the more Conservative Party leaders
In 1983, a campaign was started against "spiritual pollution"
This was a reference to
a) Western hairstyles
b) Beethoven's music
c) other examples of capitalist decadence.
The leadership was not united in their condemnation
Hu Yaobang was general secretary of the Party in 1982.
He became known for making incautious remarks.
These were sometimes critical of Marxism or positive about aspects of the West.
Some intellectuals were bold enough to question the record of the CCP.
The most famous of which was the astrophysicist Fang Lizhi
He had been a victim at the time of the Hundred Flowers.
He was now vice-president of the University of Science & Technology at Hefei.

The Tiananmen Square Massacre

In December 1986 a student movement began at Hefai
This was to protest the alleged rigging of elections to the people's congresses.
Student movements have played a key role in national history in 1919.
Students also protested in 1935.
But this was the first sustained series of student demonstrations.
It was not directly sponsored or explicitly encouraged by party officials.
The movement spread quickly to Shanghai & Beijing.
The students were joined by other social groups.
Banners were displayed calling for democracy.
As the movement gained momentum, Party leaders became concerned.
In January 1987 Fang Lizhi was dismissed
It was later revealed that at the same time Hu Yaobang was forced to self-criticism.
Then he was made to resign for having allowed the demonstrators get out of hand.
Zhao Ziyang took over as Party Secretary
In November 1987 Li Peng became acting premier
Under this new leadership efforts were made to implement the four Modernizations.
But political reform remained excluded from the agenda.
In April 1989 Hu Yaobang, a supported of democracy died of a heart attack.
Beijing students held demonstrations in his memory.
At the same time they protested about corruption and nepotism in government.
They also protested other. issues.
One was the new restrictions on students' choice of employment after graduation.
the 70th anniversary of the May 4th incident of 1919 took place.
It was marked by massive unofficial parades in Beijing & other cities.
The May 4th date was always associated with democratic freedoms.
The Chinese leadership was surprised by the scale of these demonstrations.
Zhao Ziyang & Li Peng disagreed on howbeit to proceed.
Tension began to rise when some students camped out at Tiananmen Square.
They began a hunger strike.
This was to force the government to make political concessions.
This situation was complicated by the arrival of the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
He arrived on May 15th for a state visit.
On May 19th Zhao Ziyang visited some of the hunger strikers.
He gave them the impression that he was sympathetic to their demands.
Li Peng took a harsher line.
On the following day he issued an emergency order banning demonstrations.
He empowered the PLA to take appropriate action.
On the night of May 22 & May 25 & days later Deng Xiaoping took action.
He called together the Party Elders to discuss the crisis.
The leading advocate of decision action was President Yang Shangkun.
He argued that if the Party gave way it would fall from power.
He said the result would be that capitalism would be restored.
The student protesters remained firm.
On May 29th they erected a statue of the Goddess of Democracy in the Square.
The first army units to arrive in Beijing appeared.
They were unwilling to use force against the demonstrators
On the night of June 3rd & June 4th troops broke into the square.
They opened fire.
Later it was estimated that between 400 & 800 people had been killed.
Most of them were not students.
Many did not die in the Square, but in surrounding streets.
Various reasons have been advanced to explain why the massacre occurred.
The official version was that it was the suppression of an attempted coup.
They referred to them as being counter-revolutionaries who had foreign backing.
The Party leadership was blamed.
Zhao Ziyang was dismissed for not having taken a firm line with students.
Deng Xiaoping concluded that Li Peng was also at fault.
He had failed to contain the movement.
Then he had to order its suppression in a blaze of international publicity.
Deng needed to distance himself from this implicated.
Jian Zemin was mayor of Shanghai
Deng ranged him to be promoted above Li Peng.
This would be as Secretary General of the Party
The events have been explained as a failure of China's political system.
The economic reforms, started in 1987, might have eased tensions within the leadership.
It might have been accompanied by the development of institutions.
It would have promoted long term political stability.
Instead the reforms provided further grounds for dispute.
The dispute was between reformers & conservatives.
Due to this rift there was no was no agreement within the leadership on how to deal with
a) the democracy movement
b) the cyclical decisions between concession & suppression.
After the Tiananmen Square Massacre people were rounded up
These were the political activists who had not fled abroad,
They were imprisoned.
For a time international outrage in the West was quite great & loud.
It seemed possible that China would make some concessions.
At the 1992 Party Congress Deng's "four cardinal principles" were reiterated.
These principles were a reference to the 1989 demonstrators
Yet economic reforms by now became irreversible.
To hardline members of the leadership there were the cause of political discontent.
Between 1989 & 1991 they tried to restore centralized control of the economy.
In 1992 Deng Xiaoping was on tour of south China.
This included a visit to Shenzhen.
On tour he proclaimed that China would adopt a "socialist market economy."
This meant
a) theeënd of price controls
b) a massive shakeout of workers in state enterprises
c) the encouragement of private enterprises.

Asia 210 - Modern China

Saturday, November 27, 2021

From Deng Xiaoping to the Tiananmen Square Massacre

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