Mao and the CPC's International Relations

Adhering to the principle of integrating the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the revolutionary practice of China, the first generation of the central collective leadership of the CPC with Comrade Mao Zedong at the core persisted in independence and self-reliance in inter-party relations with Communist Parties of other countries. In order to break through the encirclement and blockade of the hostile forces of the West against New China, the Communist Party of China succeeded in opening the gate to the outside world for the young Republic through friendly exchanges and visits with the socialist countries, the communist Parties of various countries and other progressive forces. Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that “Socialist countries are friends and we should unite with them very well. Besides, we also need to unite with friends in the capitalist countries. It will not do without friends.” During that time, the CPC also had exchanges with other political parties in some western countries. In the 1950’s and 1960’s, the CPC experienced twists and turns in its external exchanges in the great polemics within the international communist movement. However, it went through the test and was tempered in the struggle of safeguarding the independence and sovereignty of the Party and the State as well as in rendering support to the peoples of various countries in their fight against imperialism, colonialism and hegemonism.
Comments and Historical Resolution
Comrade Mao Zedong's Historical Role and Mao Zedong Thought
--Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China (abridged)
(Adopted by the Sixth Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on June 27, 1981)
27. Comrade Mao Zedong was a great Marxist and a great proletarian revolutionary, strategist and theorist. It is true that he made gross mistakes during the "cultural revolution", but, if we judge his activities as a whole, his contributions to the Chinese revolution far outweigh his mistakes. His merits are primary and his errors secondary. He rendered indelible meritorious service in founding and building up our Party and the Chinese People's Liberation Army, in winning victory for the cause of liberation of the Chinese people, in founding the People's Republic of China and in advancing our socialist cause. He made major contributions to the liberation of the oppressed nations of the world and to the progress of mankind.
28. The Chinese Communists, with Comrade Mao Zedong as their chief representative, made a theoretical synthesis of China's unique experience in its protracted revolution in accordance with the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism. This synthesis contributed a scientific system of guidelines befitting China's conditions, and it is this synthesis which is Mao Zedong Thought, the product of the integration of the universal principles of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution. Making revolution in a large Eastern semi-colonial, semi-feudal country is bound to meet with many special, complicated problems which cannot be solved by reciting the general principles of Marxism-Leninism or by copying foreign experience in every detail. The erroneous tendency of making Marxism a dogma and deifying Comintern resolutions and the experience of the Soviet Union prevailed in the international communist movement and in our Party mainly in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and this tendency pushed the Chinese revolution to the brink of total failure. It was in the course of combating this wrong tendency and making a profound summary of our historical experience in this respect that Mao Zedong Thought took shape and developed. It was systematized and extended in a variety of fields and reached maturity in the latter part of the Agrarian Revolutionary War and the War of Resistance Against Japan, and it was further developed during the War of Liberation and after the founding of the People's Republic of China. Mao Zedong Thought is Marxism-Leninism applied and developed in China; it constitutes a correct theory, a body of correct principles and a summary of the experiences that have been confirmed in the practice of the Chinese revolution, a crystallization of the collective wisdom of the Chinese Communist Party. Many outstanding leaders of our Party made important contributions to the formation and development of Mao Zedong Thought, and they are synthesized in the scientific works of Comrade Mao Zedong.
29. Mao Zedong Thought is wide-ranging in content. It is an original theory which has enriched and developed Marxism-Leninism in the following respects:
1) On the new-democratic revolution. Proceeding from China's historical and social conditions, Comrade Mao Zedong made a profound study of the characteristics and laws of the Chinese revolution, applied and developed the Marxist-Leninist thesis of the leadership of the proletariat in the democratic revolution, and established the theory of new-democratic revolution--a revolution against imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism waged by the masses of the people on the basis of the worker-peasant alliance under the leadership of the proletariat. His main works on this subject include: Analysis of the Classes in Chinese Society, Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan, A Single Spark Can Start a Prairie Fire, Introducing "The Communist", On New Democracy, On Coalition Government and The Present Situation and Our Tasks. The basic points of this theory are: i) China's bourgeoisie consisted of two sections, the big bourgeoisie (that is, the comprador bourgeoisie, or the bureaucrat-bourgeoisie) which was dependent on imperialism, and the national bourgeoisie which had revolutionary leanings but wavered. The proletariat should endeavour to get the national bourgeoisie to join in the united front under its leadership and in special circumstances to include even part of the big bourgeoisie in the united front, so as to isolate the main enemy to the greatest possible extent. When forming a united front with the bourgeoisie, the proletariat must preserve its own independence and pursue the policy of "unity, struggle, unity through struggle"; when forced to split with the bourgeoisie, chiefly the big bourgeoisie, it should have the courage and ability to wage a resolute armed struggle against the big bourgeoisie, while continuing to win the sympathy of the national bourgeoisie or keep it neutral. ii) Since there was no bourgeois democracy in China and the reactionary ruling classes enforced their terroristic dictatorship over the people by armed force, the revolution could not but essentially take the form of protracted armed struggle. China's armed struggle was a revolutionary war led by the proletariat with the peasants as the principal force. The peasantry was the most reliable ally of the proletariat. Through its vanguard, it was possible and necessary for the proletariat, with its progressive ideology and its sense of organization and discipline, to raise the political consciousness of the peasant masses, establish rural base areas, wage a protracted revolutionary war and build up and expand the revolutionary forces. Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that "the united front and armed struggle are the two basic weapons for defeating the enemy". Together with Party building, they constituted the "three magic weapons" of the revolution. They were the essential basis which enabled the Chinese Communist Party to become the core of leadership of the whole nation and to chart the course of encircling the cities from the countryside and finally winning countryside victory.
2) On the socialist revolution and socialist construction. On the basis of the economic and political conditions for the transition to socialism ensuing on victory in the new-democratic revolution, Comrade Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party followed the path of effecting socialist industrialization simultaneously with socialist transformation and adopted concrete policies for the gradual transformation of the private ownership of the means of production, thereby providing a theoretical as well as practical solution to the difficult task of building socialism in a large country such as China, a country which was economically and culturally backward, with a population accounting for nearly one-fourth of the world's total. By putting forward the thesis that the combination of democracy for the people and dictatorship over the reactionaries constitutes the people's democratic dictatorship, Comrade Mao Zedong enriched the Marxist-Leninist theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat. After the establishment of the socialist system, Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that, under socialism, the people had the same fundamental interests, but that all kinds of contradictions still existed among them, and that contradictions between the enemy and the people and contradictions among the people should be strictly distinguished from each other and correctly handled. He proposed that among the people we should follow a set of correct policies. We should follow the policy of "unity-criticism-unity" in political matters, the policy of "long-term coexistence and mutual supervision" in the Party's relations with the democratic parties, the policy of "let a hundred flowers blossom, let a hundred schools of thought contend" in science and culture, and, in the economic sphere the policy of over-all arrangement with regard to the different strata in town and country and of consideration for the interests of the state, the collective and the individual, all three. He repeatedly stressed that we should not mechanically transplant the experience of foreign countries, but should find our own way to industrialization, a way suited to China's conditions, by proceeding from the fact that China is a large agricultural country, taking agriculture as the foundation of the economy, correctly handling the relationship between heavy industry on the one hand and agriculture and light industry on the other, and attaching due importance to the development of the latter. He stressed that in socialist construction we should properly handle the relationships between economic construction and building up defence, between large-scale enterprises and small and medium-scale enterprises, between the Han nationality and the minority nationalities, between the coastal regions and the interior, between the central and the local authorities, and between self-reliance and learning from foreign countries, and that we should properly handle the relationship between accumulation and consumption and pay attention to over-all balance. Moreover, he stressed that the workers were the masters of their enterprises and that cadres must take part in physical labor and workers in management, that irrational rules and regulations must be reformed and that the three-in-one combination of technical personnel, workers and cadres must be effected. And he formulated the strategic idea of bringing all positive factors into play and turning negative factors into positive ones so as to unite the whole Chinese people and build a powerful socialist country. The important ideas of Comrade Mao Zedong concerning the socialist revolution and socialist construction are mainly contained in such major works as Report to the Second Plenary Session of the Seventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, On the People's Democratic Dictatorship, On the Ten Major Relationships, On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People and Talk at an Enlarged Work Conference Convened by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.
3) On the building of the revolutionary army and military strategy. Comrade Mao Zedong methodically solved the problem of how to turn a revolutionary army chiefly made up of peasants into a new type of people's army which is proletarian in character, observes strict discipline and forms close ties with the masses. He laid it down that the sole purpose of the people's army is to serve the people whole-heartedly, he put forward the principle that the Party commands the gun and not the other way round, he advanced the Three Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points for Attention and stressed the practice of political, economic and military democracy and the principles of the unity of officers and soldiers, the unity of army and people and the disintegration of the enemy forces, thus formulating by way of summation a set of policies and methods concerning political work in the army. In his military writings such as On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party, Problems of Strategy in China's Revolutionary War, Problems of Strategy in Guerrilla War Against Japan, On Protracted War and Problems of War and Strategy, Comrade Mao Zedong summed up the experience of China's protracted revolutionary wars and advanced the comprehensive concept of building a people's army and of building rural base areas and waging people's war by employing the people's army as the main force and relying on the masses. Raising guerrilla war to the strategic plane, he maintained that guerrilla warfare and mobile warfare of a guerrilla character would for a long time be the main forms of operation in China's revolutionary wars. He explained that it would be necessary to effect an appropriate change in military strategy simultaneously with the changing balance of forces between the enemy and ourselves and with the progress of the war. He worked out a set of strategies and tactics for the revolutionary army to wage people's war in conditions when the enemy was strong and we were weak. These strategies and tactics include fighting a protracted war strategically and campaigns and battles of quick decision, turning strategic inferiority into superiority in campaigns and battles, and concentrating a superior force to destroy the enemy forces one by one. During the War of Liberation, he formulated the celebrated ten major principles of operation. All these ideas constitute Comrade Mao Zedong's outstanding contribution to the military theory of Marxism-Leninism. After the founding of the People's Republic, he put forward the important guideline that we must strengthen our national defence and build modern revolutionary armed forces (including the navy, the air force and technical branches) and develop modern defence technology (including the making of nuclear weapons for self-defence).
4) On policy and tactics. Comrade Mao Zedong penetratingly elucidated the vital importance of policy and tactics in revolutionary struggles. He pointed out that policy and tactics were the life of the Party, that they were both the starting-point and the end-result of all the practical activities of a revolutionary party and that the Party must formulate its policies in the light of the existing political situation, class relations, actual circumstances and the changes in them, combining principle and flexibility. He made many valuable suggestions concerning policy and tactics in the struggle against the enemy, in the united front and other questions. He pointed out among other things: that, under changing subjective and objective conditions, a weak revolutionary force could ultimately defeat a strong reactionary force; that we should despise the enemy strategically and take him seriously tactically; that we should keep our eyes on the main target of struggle and not hit out in all directions; that we should differentiate between and disintegrate our enemies, and adopt the tactic of making use of contradictions, winning over the many, opposing the few and crushing our enemies one by one; that in areas under reactionary rule, we should combine legal and illegal struggle and, organizationally, adopt the policy of assigning picked cadres to work underground; that, as for members of the defeated reactionary classes and reactionary elements, we should give them a chance to earn a living and to become working people living by their own labor, so long as they did not rebel or create trouble; and that the proletariat and its party must fulfil two conditions in order to exercise leadership over their allies: (a) Lead their followers in waging resolute struggles against the common enemy and achieving victories; (b) Bring material benefits to their followers or at least avoid damaging their interests and at the same time give them political education. These ideas of Comrade Mao Zedong's concerning policy and tactics are embodied in many of his writings, particularly in such works as Current Problems of Tactics in the Anti-Japanese United Front, On Policy, Conclusions on the Repulse of the Second Anti-Communist Onslaught, On Some Important Problems of the Party's Present Policy, Don't Hit Out in All Directions and On the Question of Whether Imperialism and All Reactionaries Are Real Tigers.
5) On ideological and political work and cultural work. In his On New Democracy, Comrade Mao Zedong stated: Any given culture ( as an ideological form) is a reflection of the politics and economics of a given society, and the former in turn has a tremendous influence and effect upon the latter; economics is the base and politics the concentrated expression of economics. In accordance with this basic view, he put forward many important ideas of far-reaching and long-term significance. For instance, the theses that ideological and political work is the life-blood of economic and all other work and that it is necessary to unite politics and economics and to unite politics and professional skills, and to be both red and expert; the policy of developing a national, scientific and mass culture and of letting a hundred flowers blossom, weeding through the old to bring forth the new, and making the past serve the present and foreign things serve China; and the thesis that intellectuals have an important role to play in revolution and construction, that intellectuals should identify themselves with the workers and peasants and that they should acquire the proletarian world outlook by studying Marxism-Leninism, by studying society and through practical work. He pointed out that "this question of 'for whom?' is fundamental; it is a question of principle" and stressed that we should serve the people whole-heartedly, be highly responsible in revolutionary work, wage arduous struggle and fear no sacrifice. Many notable works written by Comrade Mao Zedong on ideology, politics and culture, such as The Orientation of the Youth Movement, Recruit Large Numbers of Intellectuals, Talks at the Yan'an Forum of Literature and Art, In Memory of Norman Bethune, Serve the People and The Foolish Old Man Who Removed the Mountains, are of tremendous significance even today.
6) On Party building. It was a most difficult task to build a Marxist, proletarian Party of a mass character in a country where the peasantry and other sections of the petty bourgeoisie constituted the majority of the population, while the proletariat was small in number yet strong in combat effectiveness. Comrade Mao Zedong's theory on Party building provided a successful solution to this question. His main works in this area include Combat Liberalism, The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War, Reform Our Study, Rectify the Party's Style of Work, Oppose Stereotyped Party Writing, Our Study and the Current Situation, On Strengthening the Party Committee System and Methods of Work of Party Committees. He laid particular stress on building the Party ideologically, saying that a Party member should join the Party not only organizationally but also ideologically and should constantly try to reform his non-proletarian ideas and replace them with proletarian ideas. He indicated that the style of work which entailed integrating theory with practice, forging close links with the masses and practicing self-criticism was the hallmark distinguishing the Chinese Communist Party from all other political parties in China. To counter the erroneous "Left" policy of "ruthless struggle and merciless blows" once followed in inner-Party struggle, he proposed the correct policy of "learning from past mistakes to avoid future ones and curing the sickness to save the patient", emphasizing the need to achieve the objective of clarity in ideology and unity among comrades in inner-Party struggle. He initiated the rectification campaign as a form of ideological education in Marxism-Leninism throughout the Party, which applied the method of criticism and self-criticism. In view of the fact that our Party was about to become and then became a party in power leading the whole country, Comrade Mao Zedong urged time and again, first on the eve of the founding of the People's Republic and then later, that we should remain modest and prudent, guard against arrogance and rashness and keep to plain living and hard struggle in our style of work, and that we should be on the lookout against the corrosive influence of bourgeois ideology and should oppose bureaucratism which would alienate us from the masses.
30. The living soul of Mao Zedong Thought is the stand, viewpoint and method embodied in its component parts mentioned above. This stand, viewpoint and method boil down to three basic points: to seek truth from facts, the mass line, and independence. Comrade Mao Zedong applied dialectical and historical materialism to the entire work of the proletarian party, giving shape to this stand, viewpoint and method so characteristic of Chinese Communists in the course of the Chinese revolution and its arduous, protracted struggles and thus enriching Marxism-Leninism. They find expression not only in such important works as Oppose Book Worship, On Practice, On Contradiction, Preface and Postscript to "Rural Survey", Some Questions Concerning Methods of Leadership and Where Do Correct Ideas Come From? but also in all his scientific writings and in the revolutionary activities of the Chinese Communists.
1) Seeking truth from facts. This means proceeding from reality and combining theory with practice, that is, integrating the universal principles of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution. Comrade Mao Zedong was always against studying Marxism in isolation from the realities of Chinese society and the Chinese revolution. As early as 1930, he opposed blind book worship by emphasizing that investigation and study is the first step in all work and that one has no right to speak without investigation. On the eve of the rectification movement in Yan'an, he affirmed that subjectivism is a formidable enemy of the Communist Party, a manifestation of impurity in Party spirit. These brilliant theses helped people break through the shackles of dogmatism and greatly emancipate their minds. While summarizing the experience and lessons of the Chinese revolution in his philosophical works and many other works rich in philosophical content, Comrade Mao Zedong showed great profundity in expounding and enriching the Marxist theory of knowledge and dialectics. He stressed that the dialectical materialist theory of knowledge is the dynamic, revolutionary theory of reflection and that full scope should be given to man's conscious dynamic role, when it is based on and is in conformity with objective reality. Basing himself on social practice, he comprehensively and systematically elaborated the dialectical materialist theory on the sources, the process and the purpose of knowledge and on the criterion of truth. He said that as a rule, correct knowledge can be arrived at and developed only after many repetitions of the process leading from matter to consciousness and then back to matter, that is, leading from practice to knowledge and then back to practice. He pointed out that truth exists by contrast with falsehood and grows in struggle with it, that truth is inexhaustible and that the truth of any piece of knowledge, namely, whether it corresponds to objective reality, can ultimately be decided only through social practice. He further elaborated the law of the unity of opposites, the nucleus of Marxist dialectics. He indicated that we should not only study the universality of contradiction in objective existence, but, what is more important, we should study the particularity of contradiction, and that we should resolve contradictions which are different in nature by different methods. Therefore, dialectics should not be viewed as a formula to be learned by rote and applied mechanically, but should be closely linked with practice and with investigation and study and should be applied flexibly. He forged philosophy into a sharp weapon in the hands of the proletariat and the people for knowing and changing the world. His distinguished works on China's revolutionary war, in particular, provide outstandingly shining examples of applying and developing the Marxist theory of knowledge and dialectics in practice. Our Party must always adhere to the above ideological line formulated by Comrade Mao Zedong.
2) The mass line means everything for the masses, reliance on the masses in everything, and "from the masses, to the masses". The Party's mass line in all its work has come into being through the systematic application in all its activities of the Marxist-Leninist principle that the people are the makers of history. It is a summation of our Party's invaluable historical experience in conducting revolutionary activities over the years under difficult circumstances in which the enemy's strength far outstripped ours. Comrade Mao Zedong stressed time and again that as long as we rely on the people, believe firmly in the inexhaustible creative power of the masses and hence trust and identify ourselves with them, no enemy can crush us while we can eventually crush every enemy and overcome every difficulty. He also pointed out that in leading the masses in all practical work, the leadership can form its correct ideas only by adopting the method of "from the masses, to the masses" and by combining the leadership with the masses and the general call with particular guidance. This means concentrating the ideas of the masses and turning them into systematic ideas, then going to the masses so that the ideas are persevered in and carried through, and testing the correctness of these ideas in the practice of the masses. And this process goes on, over and over again, so that the understanding of the leadership becomes more correct, keener and richer each time. This is how Comrade Mao Zedong united the Marxist theory of knowledge with the Party's mass line. As the vanguard of the proletariat, the Party exists and fights for the interests of the people. But it always constitutes only a small part of the people, so that isolation from the people will render all the Party's struggles and ideals devoid of content as well as impossible of success. To persevere in the revolution and advance the socialist cause, our Party must uphold the mass line.
3) Independence and self-reliance are the inevitable corollary of carrying out the Chinese revolution and construction by proceeding from Chinese reality and relying on the masses. The proletarian revolution is an internationalist cause which calls for the mutual support of the proletariats of different countries. But for the cause to triumph, each proletariat should primarily base itself on its own country's realities, rely on the efforts of its own masses and revolutionary forces, integrate the universal principles of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of its own revolution and thus achieve victory. Comrade Mao Zedong always stressed that our policy should rest on our own strength and that we should find our own road of advance in accordance with our own conditions. In a vast country like China, it is all the more imperative for us to rely mainly on our own efforts to promote the revolution and construction. We must be determined to carry the struggle through to the end and must have faith in the hundreds of millions of Chinese people and rely on their wisdom and strength; otherwise, it will be impossible for our revolution and construction to succeed or to be consolidated even if success is won. Of course, China's revolution and national construction are not and cannot be carried on in isolation from the rest of the world. It is always necessary for us to try to win foreign aid and, in particular, to learn all that is advanced and beneficial from other countries. The closed-door policy, blind opposition to everything foreign and any theory or practice of great-nation chauvinism are all entirely wrong. At the same time, although china is still comparatively backward economically and culturally, we must maintain our own national dignity and confidence, and there must be no slavishness or submissiveness in any form in dealing with big, powerful or rich countries. Under the leadership of the Party and Comrade Mao Zedong, no matter what difficulty we encountered, we never wavered, whether before or after the founding of New China, in our determination to remain independent and self-reliant and, we never submitted to any pressure from outside; we showed the dauntless and heroic spirit of the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese people. We stand for the peaceful co-existence of the people of all countries and their mutual assistance on an equal footing. While upholding our own independence, we respect other people's right to independence. The road of revolution and construction suited to the characteristics of a country has to be explored, decided on and blazed by its own people. No one has the right to impose his views on others. Only under these conditions can there be genuine internationalism. Otherwise, there can only be hegemonism. We will always adhere to this principled stand in our international relations.
31. Mao Zedong Thought is the valuable spiritual asset of our Party. It will be our guide to action for a long time to come. The Party leaders and the large group of cadres nurtured by Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought were the backbone forces in winning great victories for our cause; they are and will remain our treasured mainstay in the cause of socialist modernization. While many of Comrade Mao Zedong's important works were written during the periods of new-democratic revolution and of socialist transformation, we must still constantly study them. This is not only because one cannot cut the past off from the present and failure to understand the past will hamper our understanding of present-day problems, but also because many of the basic theories, principles and scientific approaches set forth in these works are of universal significance and provide us with invaluable guidance now and will continue to do so in the future. Therefore, we must continue to uphold Mao Zedong Thought, study it in earnest and apply its stand, viewpoint and method in studying the new situation and solving the new problems arising in the course of practice. Mao Zedong Thought has added much that is new to the treasure-house of Marxist-Leninist theory. We must combine our study of the scientific works of Comrade Mao Zedong with that of the scientific writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. It is entirely wrong to try to negate the scientific value of Mao Zedong Thought and to deny its guiding role in our revolution and construction just because Comrade Mao Zedong made mistakes in his later years. And it is likewise entirely wrong to adopt a dogmatic attitude towards the sayings of Comrade Mao Zedong, to regard whatever he said as the immutable truth which must be mechanically applied everywhere, and to be unwilling to admit honestly that he made mistakes in his later years, and even try to stick to them in our new activities. Both these attitudes fail to make a distinction between Mao Zedong Thought - a scientific theory formed and tested over a long period of time - and the mistakes Comrade Mao Zedong made in his later years. And it is absolutely necessary that this distinction should be made. We must treasure all the positive experience obtained in the course of integrating the universal principles of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of China's revolution and construction over fifty years or so, apply and carry forward this experience in our new work and enrich and develop Party theory with new principles and new conclusions corresponding to reality, so as to ensure the continued progress of our cause along the scientific course of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought.
Mao's Life
Mao Zedong (1893-1976) was a great Marxist, proletarian revolutionary, strategist and theorist, and the main founder and leader of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) and the People's Republic of China. He was born into a peasant family on December 26, 1893, in Xiangtan, Hunan Province. First, he served in the insurgent Republican Army for half a year following the outbreak of the Revolution of 1911. Then he studied at Hunan First Teachers College from 1914 to 1918 and established the revolutionary Society of the New Masses in collaboration with Cai Hesen and others shortly before his graduation from the college. He first started studying and believing in Marxism around the May 4th Movement in 1919 and founded a communist organization in Hunan Province in 1920.
In July 1921, Mao Zedong attended the First National Congress of the CPC, which marked its inauguration. Later on, he became Secretary of the CPC Hunan Committee and led the workers' movement in Changsha, Anyuan and other cities. In 1923, he attended the Third CPC National Congress at which he was elected into the Central Executive Committee of the CPC, thus becoming involved in the central leadership. Following the establishment of the Kuomintang-Communist cooperation in 1924, he was elected alternate member of the Central Executive Committee of the Kuomintang at both its first and second national congresses. He was the acting head of the Central Propaganda Department of the Kuomintang in Guangzhou and the chief editor of the Political Weekly. He also directed the Sixth Class at the Peasant Movement Institute. In November 1926, he became Secretary of the CPC Central Committee's Peasant Movement Commission.
In his works "Analysis of the Classes in Chinese Society" and "Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan" published between the winter of 1925 and the spring of 1927, he underlined the important role of the peasant issue in the Chinese revolution and the paramount significance of the leadership of the proletariat over the peasant struggle and criticized the Right deviationist thinking of Chen Duxiu.
At an emergency meeting of the CPC Central Committee in August 1927 following the total breakdown of the Kuomintang-Communist cooperation, Mao Zedong presented the idea that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun." By this he meant that political power must be seized by the means of the revolutionary armed forces. He was elected alternate member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee at the meeting. After the meeting, he went to the Hunan-Jiangxi border to lead the Autumn Harvest Uprising . Then he led the insurgent troops to the Jinggang Maintains to launch an agrarian revolution and set up the first rural revolutionary base area of the CPC. In 1928, his troops joined forces with the insurgent troops of Zhu De to form the Fourth Army of the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army (later renamed the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army), with Mao Zedong as Party representative and Secretary of the Front Committee, and Zhu De as Army Commander. Proceeding from the reality of China, the Chinese Communists with Mao Zedong as their chief representative developed armed struggle in rural areas where the forces of the Kuomintang rule were weak, and opened up the road to the final seizure of the country's political power by encircling the cities from the rural areas and then capturing them. Mao Zedong expounded this issue theoretically in his works such as "Why Is It That Red Political Power Can Exist in China?" and "A Single Spark Can Start a Prairie Fire." In his "Oppose Book Worship" written in May 1930, he made the famous assertion "no investigation no right to speak." In August of the same year, the First Front Army of the Red Army was established with Mao Zedong as general political commissar. In 1931, the Provisional Central Government of the Chinese Soviet Republic was established in Ruijin, Jiangxi Province, and Mao Zedong was elected its Chairman. In a by-election in 1933, he was elected into the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. Beginning from the end of 1930, Mao Zedong and Zhu De led the First Front Army of the Red Army in defeating Kuomintang campaigns of encirclement and suppression. Arriving in the Central Revolutionary Base Area, the "Left" deviationist leadership collective represented by Wang Ming deprived Mao Zedong of his leadership in the Party and the Red Army and adopted different strategies and policies, leading to the failure in the fight against the fifth Kuomintang campaign of encirclement and suppression. In October 1934, Mao Zedong joined the First Front Army of the Red Army in the Long March. In January 1935, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held an enlarged meeting (known as the Zunyi Meeting) on the way of the Long March, at which the new central leadership represented by Mao Zedong was established. In October of the same year, the CPC Central Committee and the First Front Army of the Red Army arrived in northern Shaanxi, and the Long March ended. In December 1935, Mao Zedong delivered the report "On Tactics Against Japanese Imperialism" to expound the policy of national united front against Japanese aggression. In October 1936, the Fourth and Second Front Armies of the Red Army completed the Long March and reached Gansu to join forces successively with the First Front Army. Working together with Zhou Enlai and others in December of the same year, Mao Zedong brought about the peaceful settlement of the Xi'an Incident. This was crucial for a shift in the national situation from the civil war to the second period of Kuomintang-Communist cooperation against Japanese aggression. In December 1936, Mao Zedong wrote "Problems of Strategy in China's Revolutionary War." He wrote "On Practice" and "On Contradiction" in the summer of 1937.
After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1937-1945), the CPC Central Committee headed by Mao Zedong upheld the principle of independence and initiative within the united front. They worked to mobilize the masses, carried out guerrilla war behind enemy lines, and established many large anti-Japanese base areas. Most of these base areas were located in the mountainous areas in North China, though some of them were situated on the Hebei Plain and the North Jiangsu Plain. In October 1938, Mao Zedong put forward the guiding principle of adapting Marxism-Leninism to Chinese conditions at the Enlarged Sixth Plenary Session of the Sixth CPC Central Committee. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he published important works such as "On Protracted War," "Introducing The Communist" and "On New Democracy." In 1942, he led the whole Party in the rectification movement aimed at subjectivism and sectarianism. This helped the whole Party better understand the basic direction of integrating the universal truth of Marxism with the concrete practice in the Chinese revolution and laid the ideological foundation for victory in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and in the revolution throughout the country. In 1943, he led the army and the people of the base areas in the production movement, which helped overcome the severe economic difficulties. In March of the same year, he was elected Chairman of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. In 1945,he presided over the Seventh CPC National Congress and delivered the report "On Coalition Government." At the congress the Party formulated the strategy of boldly mobilizing the masses, expanding the people's forces and leading them in defeating Japanese aggressors, liberating all the people of China and establishing a new democratic China. Mao Zedong Thought was established as the guiding ideology of the CPC at the congress. He was Chairman of the CPC Central Committee from the First Plenary Session of the Seventh CPC National Congress till his death in 1976.
In response to Chiang Kai-shek's attempt to destroy the CPC and its armed forces following the victory in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Mao Zedong put forward the policy of giving tit for tat for the struggle against the Kuomintang. In August 1945, he traveled to Chongqing for negotiations with Chiang Kai-shek, which demonstrated the CPC's desire for nationwide peace.
After Chiang Kai-shek started the total civil war in the summer of 1946, Mao Zedong worked with Zhu De and Zhou Enlai in directing the People's Liberation Army to employ active defense and concentrate a superior force to destroy the enemy forces one by one. Fighting the Kuomintang forces in one place after another in northern Shaanxi together with Zhou Enlai and Ren Bishi, Mao Zedong directed the northwest theatre of war and the War of Liberation throughout the country from March 1947 through March 1948. In the summer of 1947, the PLA shifted from the strategic defensive to the strategic offensive. Under the leadership of the Party Central Committee headed by Mao Zedong, the PLA overthrew the Kuomintang government after launching the three campaigns of Liaoxi-Shenyang, Huai-Hai and Beiping-Tianjin and carrying out operations after crossing the Yangtze River in April 1949. In March 1949, Mao Zedong chaired the Second Plenary Session of the Seventh CPC Central Committee and delivered an important report. The Session decided to shift the focus of the Party's work from rural to urban areas, defined the basic policies the Party should adopt after the countrywide victory and called on the whole Party to remain modest, prudent and free from arrogance and rashness in its style of work and to preserve the style of plain living and hard work. On July 1 of the same year, Mao Zedong published "On the People's Democratic Dictatorship," defining the nature of the political system of the People's Republic and its basic domestic and foreign policies.
On October 1, 1949, the People's Republic of China was proclaimed, and Mao Zedong was elected Chairman of the Central People's Government. In June 1950, he presided over the Third Plenary Session of the Seventh CPC Central Committee and set forth the general task of working for a fundamental turn for the better in the nation's financial and economic situation. In October of the same year, in response to the US military invasion of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the US threat to the security of Northeast China, the CPC Central Committee headed by Mao Zedong decided to launch the war to resist US aggression and aid Korea. From 1950 through 1952, China under Mao Zedong's leadership carried out the agrarian reform, the suppression of counterrevolutionaries and other democratic reforms. It also launched the movements against the "three evils" of corruption, waste and bureaucracy and against the "five evils" of bribery, tax evasion, theft of state property, cheating on government contracts and stealing of economic information. At the suggestion of Mao Zedong in 1953, the CPC Central Committee announced the Party's general line for the transition period and started systematic socialist industrialization and the socialist transformation of private ownership of the means of production. In 1954 the Constitution of the People's Republic of China that was drafted under Mao Zedong's leadership was adopted at the First Session of the First National People's Congress, and he was elected the first President of the People's Republic and had a tenure till 1959. In April 1956, he delivered a speech "On the Ten Major Relationships," which was a tentative discussion of the road to building socialism in light of China's particular conditions. Before long he put forward the principle of letting a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend at an enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. In 1956, the socialist transformation of private ownership of the means of production was in the main completed. In September of the same year, the CPC convened its Eighth National Congress and pointed out that the chief task of the whole nation had a changeover to concentrating on developing the productive forces. But this policy was not well implemented afterwards, leading to a series of subsequent mistakes and setbacks in the Party's guidance. In February 1957, Mao Zedong delivered a speech "On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People," formulating the theory of correctly distinguishing and handling the two types of contradictions in socialist society that are different in nature - those between ourselves and the enemy and those among the people.
In July of the same year, Mao Zedong called on the Party "to create a political situation in which there are both centralism and democracy, both discipline and freedom, both unity of will and personal ease of mind and liveliness." In 1958, he launched "the Great Leap Forward" and the movement to establish people's communes in rural areas. In 1959 he presided over the Lushan Meeting. Originally he wanted to correct the mistakes that had been found, but in the later stage of the meeting, he erred in initiating the criticism of Peng Dehuai and in launching a Party-wide struggle "against Right opportunism" after the meeting. From the winter of 1960 through 1965, the CPC Central Committee headed by Mao Zedong followed the national economic principle of "adjustment, consolidation, filling out and raising standards" and preliminarily corrected the mistakes of "the Great Leap Forward" and the movement to establish people's communes. As a result, the national economy recovered and developed rapidly. During the period, he put forward a number of measures and preliminarily corrected the "Left" mistakes in rural work and other mistakes. However, at the Tenth Plenary Session of the Eighth CPC Central Committee in September 1962, he overestimated, in absolute terms, the scope of class struggle that existed only within certain limits in socialist society and further developed the idea he put forward after the anti-Rightist campaign in 1957 that the contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie remained the principal contradiction in Chinese society. Between 1963 and 1965, Mao Zedong carried out the socialist education movement in the rural and urban areas and pointed out that the main target of the movement should be "those Party persons in power taking the capitalist road." From the 1950s, he led the CPC in firmly combating the great-power chauvinism advocated by leaders of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and their attempts to interfere in China's affairs and bring the country under their control.
Going to extremes in his judgment of the class struggle situation in China in 1966, Mao Zedong launched the "cultural revolution." Manipulated by the two counterrevolutionary cliques under Lin Biao and Jiang Qing, the movement became especially rampant and went beyond Mao Zedong's expectation and control so that it lasted for ten years and incurred staggering damage and losses in many aspects of China. During the "cultural revolution," Mao Zedong did stop and correct a number of specific mistakes. He led the struggle to smash the Lin Biao counterrevolutionary clique and foiled the attempt of Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao and others to usurp the supreme power of China. In foreign policy, he set forth the "three worlds" strategy and the important principle that China would never seek hegemony, began to enter a new phase in foreign work and created favorable international conditions for China's modernization drive. Mao Zedong died in Beijing on September 9, 1976.
It is true that Mao Zedong made gross mistakes in his later years, but when his life is judged as a whole, his indisputable contributions to the Chinese revolution far outweigh his mistakes, and his merits are primary and his errors secondary. He is still held in great respect by the Chinese people. The CPC gave an all-round evaluation of all his revolutionary activities and thought in a resolution adopted by its Central Committee five years after his death. Mao Zedong Thought, the development of Marxism in China, is still the guiding ideology of the CPC. Mao Zedong's main works are included in the Selected Works of Mao Zedong (in four volumes) and Collected Works of Mao Zedong (in eight volumes).
Deng's 100th Anniversary

• Deng Xiaoping, architect of China's reform, opening-up
• Deng's life
• Story about Deng Xiaoping's practice of economy

Selected Works of Jiang Zemin

• Selected Works of Jiang Zemin published on August 10, 2006
• Top advisory body studies Selected Works of Jiang Zemin
• Senior Chinese leader urges study of Jiang Zemin's works

President Hu on national development

• Chinese president delivers keynote speech on national development
• Top advisor calls for learning President Hu's keynote speech
• Key lies in enhancing Party's self-construction