China's Road to Disaster: Mao, Central Politicians and Provincial Leaders in the Great Leap Forward, 1955-59

Mao, Central Politicians and Provincial Leaders in the Great Leap Forward, 1955-59

Frederick C Teiwes, Warren Sun

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781315502793
• Subtopic: Political Economy
• Index: History

This text analyzes the dramatic shifts in Chinese Communist Party economic policy during the mid to late 1950s which eventually resulted in 30 to 45 million deaths through starvation as a result of the failed policies of the Great Leap Forward. Teiwes examines both the substance and the process of economic policy-making in that period, explaining how the rational policies of opposing rash advance in 1956-57 gave way to the fanciful policies of the Great Leap, and assessing responsibility for the failure to adjust adequately those policies even as signs of disaster began to reach higher level decision makers. In telling this story, Teiwes focuses on key participants in the process throughout both "rational" and "utopian" phases - Mao, other top leaders, central economic bureaucracies and local party leaders. The analysis rejects both of the existing influential explanations in the field, the long dominant power politics approach focusing on alleged clashes within the top leadership, and David Bachman's recent institutional interpretation of the origins of the Great Leap. Instead, this study presents a detailed picture of an exceptionally Mao-dominated process, where no other actor challenged his position, where the boldest step any actor took was to try and influence his preferences, and where the system in effect became paralyzed while Mao kept changing signals as disaster unfolded.

Chapter 1

OPPOSING RASH ADVANCE, 1956–57¹

The period of opposing rash advance from early 1956 up to the fall 1957 Third Plenum² was indeed an “un-Maoist” interlude in terms of the Chairman’s greatest passions, not to mention the demonology of the Cultural Revolution. How can this be squared with our view of a dominant Mao? If neither the leadership conflict interpretation of Mao’s presumed relative loss of clout vis-à-vis other top leaders nor the bureaucratic explanation of policy being driven by institutions are adequate, why were the policy outcomes as they were and what was the nature of the political process? Long recognized factors such as Mao’s confidence in Chen Yun and other specialist leaders in the economic sphere (and his own lack of expertise concerning these matters) and the relatively robust expression of bureaucratic interests in the mid-1950s provide important clues to the general picture, but until the outpouring of new sources beginning in the early 1980s both detail and fuller understanding remained elusive. The contributions of post-Mao Party history has changed this situation significantly.

Standard Party history accounts, as opposed to the full range of new documentation, are closer to the leadership conflict than the bureaucratic model, but without the implication of a major struggle between Mao and other top leaders. In these accounts two opposing lines of thinking concerning economic construction did exist from early 1956 to the Third Plenum, and they reflected the views of Mao on the one hand and Premier Zhou Enlai, Chen Yun, and others (including both top planning and financial officials) on the other. However, rather than causing major political conflict, the differences were managed by Mao obeying the wishes of the majority.³ Yet when the full range of the new evidence available from the reform era is examined, a more subtle and complex picture emerges that is both at variance with each of the major existing Western interpretations and which goes well beyond the stylized official overview.

The Origins and Development of Opposition to Rash Advance

The problem of rash advance clearly originated in the exaggerated expectations produced by the rapid development of agricultural cooperatives in the summer and fall of 1955, as well as in the atmosphere created by the sharp attacks on rightist conservativism which so influenced the cooperativization drive.⁴ In both aspects Mao was at the forefront of extending the rural transformation experience to the economic sphere. In October 1955 he began to sense conservativism in economic policy when he received a report from Li Fuchun’s SPC which proposed targets for the entire period to 1967, targets which a dissatisfied Chairman considered too low.⁵ About this time Mao also became disenchanted with the execution of the 1955 plan and was not fully mollified even when Zhou Enlai made a self-criticism and the SPC demanded more activism from ministries and provinces in drawing up 1956 economic plans. The key moment came on December 5 when Liu Shaoqi conveyed Mao’s criticism of right conservative thought in the economy to a meeting of 122 Central Committee members and responsible officials of leading Party, government, and military organs. Liu quoted Mao as saying that it was necessary to use the opportunities created by the more relaxed international situation of 1955 to speed the pace of development and that the crucial thing was “to oppose rightist thought, to oppose conservatism.” Liu further amplified the message with some comments of his own, which contrasted sharply with what would become the dominant theme of fanmaojin, when he observed that the development of real things was not balanced, and that attempting to manage affairs in a balanced manner would only lead to problems.⁶

In the same period, believing that, much as the continuing high tide of cooperativization had laid down a standard for socialist transformation generally, an increased pace of agricultural growth could set a precedent for speeding up overall economic construction, in mid-November Mao convened meetings in Hangzhou and Tianjin with Party secretaries from 15 provinces which produced 17 articles on agricultural development. In December the Chairman drafted a notice inviting opinions from provincial-level leaders on the 17 articles, and on the basis of consultations involving these local leaders and concerned central officials, the 17 articles were expanded into the ambitious 40 article 12-year Draft Program for Agricultural Development which was formally adopted by the Supreme State Conference in January 1956.⁷ Thus on this key issue which was so important in setting the tone for the ambitious push for rapid development in early 1956, provincial leaders had a direct input in fueling Mao’s enthusiasm for intensified agricultural growth. Moreover, as Mao toured the provinces at the turn of the year, provincial leaders took the opportunity to complain of overcentralization and inadequate central government funding of the economic development of their areas, as we shall see in somewhat more detail later.⁸

While Mao’s personal role in creating the new atmosphere and pushing specific projects such as the Draft Agricultural Program was crucial, there is little evidence of any contrary voices within the leadership in late 1955. The top bodies of the Party and state adopted without argument the measures and symbols which characterized what became known as the first leap forward. In addition to the 40 articles, the Party Secretariat approved Mao’s late December preface to Socialist Upsurge in the Chinese Countryside which urged criticism of rightist and conservative thinking “without stop” and called for speeding up not only the socialist transformation of handicrafts and capitalist industry and commerce, but also industrialization and the development of science, culture, education, and other fields of work. Also endorsed in this period were anti-rightist guidelines for the projected Eighth Party Congress. And enlarged Politburo meetings further approved the “committee to promote progress” (cujin weiyuanhui) to push forward agricultural development⁹ and the slogan “more, faster, better, and more economical” (duo, kuai, hao, sheng),¹⁰ initiatives which together with the 40 articles were the three things that, in fall 1957 at the Third Plenum, Mao complained had been “blown away” by fanmaojin.¹¹

Although the kind of political pressure Mao had generated during cooperativization was clearly operative here, the evidence suggests that there was a genuine and broad support for more rapid growth. Both oral sources and Bo Yibo’s memoir account claim strong enthusiasm within the leadership and “the whole Party” for boosting construction. In bureaucratic terms, at this stage the Ministry of Finance joined the spending departments and the localities in approving the new thrust. Given his preeminent role subsequently in pushing the fanmaojin program, the attitudes of Zhou Enlai are of particular interest. As Bo Yibo put it over 35 years later, at the end of 1955 the Premier like other leaders was “filled with exaltation” over a high tide of construction, a position seemingly also shared by Chen Yun who helped to formulate the crucial 40 articles. When Zhou addressed the conference of intellectuals in mid-January it was also in the spirit of opposing right conservatism, but by that point events were unfolding which would very soon force an initial reassessment. As Premier, Zhou had to contend with the consequences of significantly increased targets proposed by both central ministries and localities. As early as November–December, driven by the desire to avoid the rightist label, direct orders from both Zhou and the SPC, and the opportunity to expand spending on their organizational functions or local areas, such units began the frenzy of setting unrealistic targets which marked the first leap forward. Pushed also by a new national objective of fulfilling the First Five-Year Plan (FFYP) in four years, this “small leap” would last well into spring 1956.¹²

Zhou was now faced with excessive demands on state resources. Although the joint planning and financial conference (i.e., the third national planning conference) which met in Beijing from January 10 to February 7 was convened under the anti-rightist banner and the SPC presented ambitious targets including a 22 percent overall industrial growth rate for 1956, during this conference spending ministries and the provinces pushed for even higher targets and demanded large investments. While the SPC proposed a hefty increase in total capital construction investment to ¥14.85 billion, the demands put on the table reached ¥18 billion and then ¥20 billion plus, producing considerable concern on the part of Zhou and the CCP’s economic architect, Chen Yun. At the symbolic level, Zhou sought to deal with the situation by balancing the need for opposing conservatism with an equal imperative to avoid blind rash advance. In speeches in late January and early February he emphasized the approach of seeking truth from facts, avoiding unrealistic goals, and guarding against too fast development. In some striking phrases he enjoined that “on no account [should we] raise the slogan, ‘Realize industrialization at an early date,’” and while it was necessary to avoid pouring cold water on the masses, “cold water can be useful for leaders who get carried away, for it may sober them up.”¹³

More concretely Zhou, working with Li Xiannian and Li Fuchun, began to press for a reduction of targets with the result that the capital construction investment target was pushed back down to ¥14.7 billion, a situation which led the Premier to joke that the joint conference, which actually continued to work for the next year, had become a committee for promoting retrogression (cutui weiyuanhui), i.e., the opposite of the committee for promoting progress. Several things stand out from this process. First, there was no division in principle between the SPC and the Ministry of Finance over the necessity of reining in unrealistic plans; moreover, the two organizations worked together in achieving the ¥14.7 billion figure. Some evidence of the influence of organizational missions is available, however, in the sense that the Ministry of Finance reportedly was the most concerned, with Li Xiannian particularly active in dealing with the problem. Yet, according to oral sources, the key figure without question was Zhou Enlai whose work style of minute attention to detail led him to focus on the problem early and to carry out joint research with the Finance Ministry which had itself become aware of the problem almost simultaneously. Zhou’s key contribution was both the vision and political will to deal with the question. Given the atmosphere of the time, the general desire for economic development, and the feeling of many leaders that given the relatively smooth economic performance of the previous three years high targets would not be a problem, Zhou’s willingness to pour cold water was, in the view of one senior Party historian, quite extraordinary. But it must also be pointed out that the actual measures taken at this juncture were pale in comparison to what happened later. This fanmaojin appears to have been limited to the 1956 capital construction target, and the result was simply to pare things back to the already ambitious targets advanced by the SPC. Moreover, when the SPC presented its draft 1956 plan later in February it reflected the anti-rightist spirit and contained ambitious targets, and it was formally approved by Zhou’s State Council on March 25.¹⁴

This leaves the question of Mao’s role, and the relationship between the Chairman and Premier. While Party historians are adamant that the efforts of Zhou and associates were aimed at the lower levels and not at the Chairman, the position adopted was clearly at some variance with Mao’s enthusiasm at the turn of the year. Yet in one sense, the very fact that Zhou’s fairly modest results could be seen in retrospect as “courageously doing a little bit”¹⁵ speaks volumes for Mao’s authority, Zhou, moreover, drew on that authority when arguing for moderation, citing the Chairman’s January injunctions not to attempt things which cannot be realized, that ministries should fix targets on a realistic basis, and to avoid “left” adventurism. Party history analyses today, however, while observing that Mao had considered the question of “leftist” errors and put forward many correct and reasonable opinions which Zhou then developed, conclude accurately (with the benefit of hindsight) that these efforts were not the Chairman’s main emphasis — an emphasis suggested by his late February urging of heavy industry leaders Wang Heshou and Lü Dong to pursue faster growth than the Soviet Union’s and his early March remark that “Our understanding of the real situation has advanced a step, but it has also brought about a rightist tendency.”¹⁶ Nevertheless, one of the most authoritative writers on Zhou Enlai, Shi Zhongquan, concludes that Zhou and the vice premiers responsible f...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Tables and Photographs
• Abbreviations
• Preface
• Chronology of Important Events, 1955–62
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Opposing Rash Advance, 1956–57
• Chapter 2 The Origins of the Great Leap Forward, 1955–58
• Chapter 3 Policy Making While Leaping Forward, 1958
• Chapter 4 The Politics of “Cooling Down,” 1958–59
• Conclusion Politics and Players under Mao, 1955–59
• Epilogue 1 The Lushan Conference, July-August 1959
• Epilogue 2 The Retreat from the Great Leap, 1960–62
• Appendix 1 Participants in Party Conferences, January 1958–April 1959
• Appendix 2 Self-criticisms by the Architects of Opposing Rash Advance, January–May 1958
• Annotated Bibliography of Major Sources
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Authors