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Great Leap Forward 1958-62 - Coggle Diagram
Great Leap Forward 1958-62
Key points
The co-operatives in the FFYP were joined up to form super communes. An average super commune would have about 4000 families in it; approx 20,000 people or more.
They were subdivided into brigades - the peasants were just another wing of the PLA and needed to be bound by the same honour and sense of duty.
The party essentially controlled everything; wages, what was produced. This led to workers losing incentives to work. Rewards were also taken away.
4 Noes campaign saw the attempt to eradicate pests like: sparrows, rats, mosquitoes, and flies. There was much manpower wasted on this.
No private gardens, animals or food. The canteen style of eating was intended for every meal, not just lunch. It was known as "eating out of one pot".
In industry, large projects like the Three Gate Gorge Dam over the Yellow River were so badly planned that they led to environmental issues which made farming more difficult.
Trofim Lysenko and his pseudo-science made lunacy the central strand of agricultural policy. E.g. storing grain during the winter in ice, then thawing it in the spring when it was mouldy. E.g. the "sky full of stars" where the seedlings were planted too close together.
Mao still continued to export vast amounts of grain to the USSR in order to pay off their debt while Chinese peasants starved in the countryside.
Zhou Enlai was oblivious as to the backyard furnace campaign and was horrified when his ward showed him the spongey steel. This highlights how out of touch the key leaders were with the reality on the ground.
The famine
20-30 million deaths.
The Chinese authority today have admitted that it was caused by 70% human error (they do not say Mao) and 30% natural disaster. It was not until 1980 that the Chinese government even admitted that it took place, calling it the three bitter years.
The cadres savagely punished the communes for any theft or storing of food. Children were killed by having wire pushed through their ears if caught with contraband items or food.
Mao took the famine personally and even gave up meat as a gesture of sympathy. Only Liu and Deng seemed capable of pulling China back from the abyss by disbanding the communes and allowing market forces to return for example.
Successes and failures of the GLF
Successes:
Tiananmen Square was remodelled and rebuilt to what we see today (a propaganda success).
Some small scale irrigation projects worked.
Ideologically private property was banned so China became more communist, although this was not sustainable.
Failures:
Bad weather conditions in 1959; floods in the south and droughts in the north. These conditions reduced the harvest.
Anti-Rightist campaign in 1957 purged crucial experts and left people like Lysenko.
Cadres were afraid to report low figures to Mao, so they altered them which resulted in a snowballing of lies.
Peasants were distracted by either military training, backyard furnaces or starvation to manage the crops, so much of it rotted and went to waste.
USSR withdrew soviet experts and loans to China after 1960.
Lushan conference: July 1959
Peng Duhuai's letter of criticism was essentially grovelling to Mao and singing his praises while also asking him to reconsider the GLF.
This led to Mao accusing him of colluding with the USSR. This is a good example of how someone this close to Mao, and an excellent military leader, could easily be prosecuted for criticising Mao. His replacement, Lin Biao, made it clear that criticism was not tolerated.
Economy 1962-65:
Mao was forced to take a step back while Liu and Deng introduced new economic reforms. They were pragmatists; as Deng said, "It doesn't matter if a cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice".
Their reforms were successful in bringing stability. They allowed insustries to make a profit, factories were told to make goods to help agriculture (E.g. tools), and experts were released from the Laogais.
Industrial outputin 1965 was double what it had been in 1957 and was growing at a rate of 17%. Mao was not happy to take a step back and this is why we get the C.R.