To: Provincial (Municipal) Party Committees, Party Committees of Autonomous Regions, Ministries and Commissions at the Central Level, and Party Leadership Groups:

A public discussion is currently being conducted nationwide on the major issue of correctly handling contradictions among the people. This discussion may extend for several months.

The Party’s directive on the rectification movement [1] will be issued within days. It takes the correct handling of contradictions among the people as its theme, promotes correct ideological and work styles, and rectifies erroneous ideological and work styles such as subjectivism, bureaucratism, and sectarianism.

Another Party notice [2] will also be issued within days. This notice advocates that principal Party and government cadres at the county, district, and township levels, provided they are capable of physical labor, should allocate a portion of their time each year to working in the fields and engaging in a small amount of manual labor.

Principal Party, government, and military cadres at and above the county level (not ordinary cadres), provided they are capable of physical labor, should do likewise. Each year, they should allocate a portion of their time to working respectively in the fields, factories, mines, construction sites, or other locations, joining workers and peasants in performing a small amount of manual labor within their capacity (even if it is very little).

In this way, the Party and the masses will become integrated as one, and subjectivism, bureaucratism, and the style of overlords can be greatly reduced, bringing about an entirely new outlook.

Furthermore, please pay attention to the specific contradictions existing between the Party and the following seven sectors: (1) workers, (2) peasants, (3) students, (4) PLA soldiers, (5) intellectuals, (6) democratic parties, and (7) minority nationalities. Convene separate meetings to analyze and study these contradictions, so that you may have a clear understanding and move from blindness to consciousness, thereby enabling you to persuade cadres and the masses with sound reasoning.

A document from the Hubei Provincial Party Committee on contradictions among the people in rural areas [3] is hereby distributed to you for reading and reference.

Both this document and the telegram of April 19 [4] are to be forwarded to Party committees at the county level, military regiments, and urban factories and schools.

Central Committee of the Communist Party of China
April 27, 1957

Printed from the manuscript of Mao Zedong.

Notes

--- Notes

[1] Refers to the Directive of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Rectification Movement, dated April 27, 1957. This directive was published in *Renmin Ribao* on May 1 of the same year.
[2] Refers to the Directive of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Leading Personnel at All Levels Participating in Manual Labor, dated May 10, 1957. This directive was published in *Renmin Ribao* on May 15 of the same year.
[3] Refers to a report by the Xinhua News Agency on April 23, 1957, concerning the issue of contradictions among the people in the rural areas of Hubei Province. The report stated that the main problems of contradictions among the people currently existing in rural areas were: 1. Undemocratic leadership, lack of financial transparency, and unreasonable distribution within agricultural cooperatives, causing dissatisfaction among the masses. 2. Improper handling by some cadres of folk superstitious activities and religious issues, leading to disturbances among peasants. 3. Conflicts of interest between the state and local masses over issues such as the occupation of fishing grounds, livestock farms, forest farms, tea plantations, small mines, and farmland. 4. Poor relations and disputes between local cadres and demobilized soldiers. 5. Weak political atmosphere and improper school ethos and discipline in urban middle schools, causing serious dissatisfaction among teachers, students, and parents toward the government and school leadership. In some schools, serious bureaucratism and sectarianism among the leadership led to student disturbances. 6. Cadres aloof and detached from the masses, deepening the contradictions between the people and the leaders.
[4] Refers to the Directive of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Examining the Discussion and Implementation of the Issue of Correctly Handling Contradictions Among the People, dated April 19, 1957, and the article "Report to the Central Committee on the Discussion and Implementation of Correctly Handling Contradictions Among the People Within a Prescribed Time Limit" on pp. 292–293 of this volume.