Essay on The Chinese Post-Revolution Economical Development

In comparison, capitalism and communism are like night and day--opposite of each other in every way, but the main differences in the two can be seen in the distribution of wealth among a society’s peoples and the appearance

Communism is a system of social organisation which formerly consumed almost a third of countries in the entire world, having originated in Russia. The first official communist state was founded during the Russian revolutions in 1917, due to the inaugural communist political party ‘Bolsheviks’ gaining primal power. Afterwards, the influence of communism spread to other countries with the likes of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and East Germany to name a few. These countries that were governed on communist principles were known as the ‘Eastern Bloc’. Even countries in Asia were persuaded into the theoretically human equality system such as China, Laos and Vietnam. Communism was gathering strength to strength every year in the mid 20th century, but eventually its impact was wiped off in the late 20th century when the Berlin War was knocked down in 1989, ending the barrier between the Eastern and Western blocs. Communism arguably was the most influential social experiment in history, but also the most flawed and its failure to change the world permanently will always remain significant in history.

Mao Zedong, the leader of China during the third quarter of the 20th century, organized two movements in his country in an attempt to develop China 's economy through the establishment of communism. Through The Great Leap Forward, Mao planned to change the layout of the Chinese economy by forcing collectivism on his country and implementing other ways to speed up production. Since this movement failed, he then implemented The Cultural Revolution. It consisted of the same goals but was carried out through violence and was also an utter failure. These two movements failed because of the lack of organization with which they were performed. This lack of organization manifested itself in a number of different ways. The government did not care about their people, the reforms themselves were not planned out in detail, the government did not think about the spontaneity of young people, they did not consider the effect violence would have on their country, they did not realize the decline in education that would result from the participation of students in the revolution, they did not plan well economically, they did not examine the negative effects of communes, and they did not foresee the large number of deaths that would plague their country. Although designed to rapidly increase China 's economic growth through communism, the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution had the opposite effects and significantly diminished China 's economy. The two direct causes of the failure

A line of thousands of Chinese communists hiked up the mountains of Northern China. The years of struggle and harsh life they lived did not deter these fighters. Their goal was to create a better future for the common Chinese citizen by using communism; something which their leader called “a hammer which we use to crush our enemies.” He stayed true to his word. This bold and charismatic leader was at the head of a mass revolution in which China was forever changed. He led a movement which transformed China into the powerful and influential nation which they had never envisioned for themselves. This man’s name was Mao Zedong. Mao’s actions drove forward the process in which he turned both his nation and himself into world leaders.

In the Manifesto of the Communist Party, what communism is is discussed; this writing attempts to enlighten the world about what communism ideals are. The communist party is pro-proletariat and wants what is best, in their eyes, for the working class people. “The essential condition for the existence and rule of the bourgeois class is the accumulation of wealth in private hands, the formation of capital; the essential condition of capital is wage-labour” (Marx, p. 135). According to Marx and Engels, the reason the bourgeois class exists is because of the labor from the proletariat class; without the capital produced from the proletariat the bourgeois class would not be as successful as they are. “The Communists are no separate party

As many other countries around the world China has its long history of a struggle for equality and prosperity against tyrants and dictatorships. The establishment of People’s Republic of China in 1949 seemed to have put an end to that struggle for a better life. “The Chinese people have stood up!” declared Mao Tse-tung, the chairman of China’s Communist Party (CPP) – a leading political force in the country for the time. The people were defined as a coalition of four social classes: the workers, the peasants, the petite bourgeoisie and the national-capitalists. The four classes were to be led buy the CPP, as the leader of the working class.

Mao Zedong was the ideological helmsmen who delivered a oppressed country from the administratively inept Qing dynasty and incessant waves of international invasion by enemies near and far. Although, emerging from a momentous socio-political transformation, China was yet again, pummeled by political maneuvers of the combative dichotomy consisting of Mao Zedong the CCP Party with continual campaigns. Nonetheless, Maoism, in regards to the Cultural Revolution, propelled the dogma that only “raising the political consciousness of the masses, revitalizing the socialist spirit and the ideals of the revolution, and refashioning a state structure guided by “proletarian ideology” could the danger of a regression to capitalism be forestalled,” for Mao...; It was these tenets which governed the hearts and minds of the Chinese people (Meisner, pg. 315). However, the ramifications of this monotheistic ideology, I contend, the heart of the issue, was this induced a permanent and perpetual competition within the populace in proving who was the “truest” in the cause of revolution. Therefore, “trueness” materialized from the tension of not only an individual's “bloodline,” but also the proving one’s “redness,” which I define as an unwavering political loyalty to the ideological figure of Mao and Maoist thought (ibid, pg. 315). Thus,

China has been in a state of revolution and reform since the Sino-Japanese war of 1895. As a result of Japan’s victory over Russia in 1905, China’s constitutional reform movement gathered momentum. This forced the Manchu government by public opinion to make gestures of preparation for a constitutional government, an act to which reformers in exile responded enthusiastically by establishing a Political Participation Society (Cheng-wen-she) (1, pg.84).

BIBLIOGRAPHYBarnett, A. (1965), 'Multiple factors', in Pichon Loh (ed.) 'The Kuomintang Debacle of 1949: Conquest or Collapse?' D.C. Heath & Company, BostonBianco, Lucien. (1971), 'Origins of the Chinese Revolution, 1915-1949' Stanford University Press, StanfordChang, Carsun. (1965), 'Chiang Kai-shek and Kuomintang dictatorship', in PichonLoh (ed.) 'The Kuomintang Debacle of 1949: Conquest or Collapse?' D.C. Heath& Company, BostonChang, Kia-Ngua. (1965) 'War and Inflation' in Pichon Loh (ed.) 'T

In addition to creating a communist society, Mao wished to strengthen and develop China’s economy, although his level of success in this area is debatable. Immediately after victory in 1949, Mao began to nationalise and centralise all private industry. In 1953, the first of the Five Year Plans, based on the soviet economic model began. The emphasis was on growth and heavy industrial development, utilising sensible economic policy. In economic terms, the first Five Year Plan was relatively

In 1949, after a long lasting contest for leadership, the Communists were able to gain power. In 1900, China was ruled by the Manchu dynasty, however less than in half a century a completely new government came into power. The Qing government had already been weak due to European countries because they gained great influence in China’s affair by using forces. They became so unpopular that people plotted to overthrow them. Despite the fact that the revolution of 1911 failed to overthrow them, it made the government collapse. People needed changes. But none of the leadership or the Party government could achieve what they promised in order to make the lives of people better in China. The Communist

Therefore, the reasons of Mao’s victory could be clearly related to the outcome of the war; the Mao and the CCP defeated the KMT and established the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

There can be no doubt over the wide-ranging influence of Karl Marx’s theories on sociology and political thought. His concept of communism overcoming the socioeconomic pitfalls of capitalism has not been a theory that has seen the light of day in the way that he may have hypothesised. There have been many throughout history that have misrepresented Marx’s writing, which begs the question, if pure communism in the original Marxist sense is at all possible given that humanity appears to have an innate ‘need’ for hierarchy and a thirst for power.

The Chinese Communist Revolution succeeded to dispose of capitalism and imperialism. The Communists and the Nationalists started their fight in the 1920s; however, Japanese invasions forced the two sides to formulate a temporary truce to battle off the Japanese at the time of World War Two. During the war, the Nationalist Army started to fade and weaken while the Communists grew and prospered because strong guerilla tactics helped the Communists dominate against the opposition (Schaff, 2009). At the time, China was managed by European countries who took no action against the Japanese occupation, and so, China economically began collapsing. Zedong used the war to his advantage as an opportunity to see how strong his reign over the army was. Ultimately, Chairman Mao Zedong led the Communist Party to victory over the Nationalists to form the People’s Republic of China (Young, 2001). Social and economic ailments and the unfair treatment of peasants gave rise to the communist revolution in China, which resulted in the destruction of the economy and a tilt to the balance of authority between the Western powers and Communists.

To better understand the nature of Sino-Soviet relations in the twentieth century, one must analyze the emergence of communism in the respective nations of Russia and China. Communism was first developed by German philosopher Karl Marx in the 1800s, and is defined as a socioeconomic policy structured around the common ownership of property in the absence of any social distinctions such as class, wealth, or race. Marx saw this arrangement as the zenith of human society, the paragon of interaction where the resources of economic production are fully socialized and everything, from basic nutrition to education, is freely allocated based on necessity. These egalitarian doctrines and policies of social, economic, and political freedom greatly appeased to the working-class populations in politically oppressed regions of the world, especially in the situations of the repressed poor and peasant classes of early twentieth-century Russian and Chinese societies.