On Correctly Handling Contradictions Among the People
(February 27, 1957)

Source: Kau & Leung, The Writings of Mao Zedong 1949-1976, Vol. II
Pages 311-350
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: = . . 7


ments in socialist construction have rapidly changed the face of old China.! A still
more beautiful future for our homeland lies in front of us. The state of national
disintegration and chaos that the people loathed is gone, never to return. Led by
the working class and the Communist Party, the 600 million people of our country,
united as one, are engaged at this very moment in the great [endeavor of] building
socialism. The unity of the country, the unity among the people, as well as the
solidarity among the various nationalities in the country:* these serve as the basic
guarantee of the inevitable victory of our cause. Nevertheless, this does not mean
that our society is free of any contradictions. It would be a naive delusion [to hold]
that there are no contradictions, an idea that does not conform to objective reality.
Confronting us are two types of social contradictions, namely those between the
enemy and ourselves, and those among the people.> They are two types of
contradictions completely different in nature.

To acquire a correct understanding of these two different types of contradictions,
[i.e., the contradictions] between the enemy and ourselves and [the contradictions]
among the people, we ought first make clear what is meant by the people and what
is meant by the enemy. The concept of the people varies with different countries
and with different historical periods of the various countries.4 Take our country’s
situation, for instance: during the period of the War of Resistance Against Japan,
all classes, strata, and social groups opposing Japan fell under the rubric of the
people, while all the Japanese imperialists, Chinese traitors,© and pro-Japan factions
were the people’s enemies. During the period of the War of Liberation,’ U.S.
imperialism and its running dogs, that is, the bureaucratic-capitalist class,® the
landlord class, and those representing these classes, namely, the Kuomintang
reactionaries, were all enemies of the people, while all classes, strata, and social
groups that opposed these enemies came under the rubric of the people. In the
current stage, in the period of constructing socialism, all classes, strata, and social
groups that approve of, support, and participate in the endeavor to construct
socialism fall under the rubric of the people, while all social forces and social
groups that resist the socialist revolution and are hostile to or undermine the
construction of socialism are the people’s enemies.

The contradiction between the enemy and ourselves is an antagonistic contradiction.? As for contradictions among the people, those among the laboring people
are nonantagonistic in nature, while those between the exploited classes and the
exploiting classes have, apart from a nonantagonistic aspect, an antagonistic aspect
as well. Contradictions among the people didn’t just start today, but they are
different in content [now] during the period of the construction of socialism from
[the way] they were during the various periods of revolution [in the past]. Under
the prevailing conditions in our country today, by contradictions among the people
we mean to include contradictions within the working class, contradictions within
the peasant class, contradictions among the intellectuals, contradictions between
the working class and the peasantry, contradictions between the workers and
peasants on the one hand and the intellectuals on the other, contradictions between
the working class and other [sections of the] laboring people on the one hand and
the national bourgeoisie!® on the other, contradictions within the national bourgeot-

312 {/ MAO ZEDONG

sie, and so on. Our People’s Government is a government that truly represents the
people’s interests and dedicates itself to the service of the people. Even so, certain
contradictions exist between it and the masses of the people. These types of
contradictions include contradictions between the interests of the state and the
interests of the collective, on the one hand, and the interests of the individual, on
the other, contradictions between democracy and centralism, between the leadership and the led, and contradictions arising from the bureaucratic work style of
some personnel in state organs in relationship to the masses. These types of
contradictions are also contradictions among the people. Generally speaking,
contradictions among the people are contradictions based on the fundamental
unanimity of the interests of the people.

In our country, contradictions between the working class and the national
bourgeoisie belong to the category of contradictions among the people. Class
struggle between the working class and the national bourgeoisie is in general a class
struggle within [the ranks of] the people. This is because the national bourgeoisie
in our country has a dual character. During the period of the bourgeois democratic
revolution, it had a revolutionary facet and also a conciliatory facet. During the
period of the socialist revolution, it had a facet that exploited the working class to
make profits, and yet at the same time it also had the facet that supported the
Constitution and was willing to accept socialist transformation.!! The national
bourgeoisie is different from the imperialists, the landlord class, or the bureaucratic-capitalist class.!2 Between the working class and the national bourgeoisie
there is a contradiction between the exploited and the exploiter, a contradiction that
was originally antagonistic in nature. Under the specific conditions in our country,
however, the antagonistic contradiction between these two classes can be transformed into a nonantagonistic contradiction if properly handled. This contradiction
can be resolved through peaceful means. If we mishandle [the contradiction], [if
we] fail to adopt the policy of uniting with, criticizing, and educating the national
bourgeoisie, or if the national bourgeoisie refuses to accept this policy of ours,
[then] the contradiction between the working class and the national bourgeoisie
will change into a contradiction between the enemy and ourselves.

The two types of contradictions, those between the enemy and ourselves and
those among the people, are different in nature and [should be] resolved by different
methods. To put it briefly, the former involves an issue of distinguishing between
the enemy and ourselves, and the latter involves an issue of distinguishing between
right and wrong. Of course, the issue between the enemy and ourselves is also an
issue between right and wrong. The question of who is in the right, we or the
reactionaries at home and abroad, namely, the imperialists, the feudalists, and the
bureaucratic-capitalists, for example, is also an issue between night and wrong.
Nevertheless, this is a type of right-or-wrong issue that by its nature stands apart
from the issue among the people. Ours is a country of the people’s democratic
dictatorship!3 led by the working class based on the worker-peasant alliance.!4
What is this dictatorship designed to do? The dictatorship’s first function is to
suppress the reactionary classes, reactionaries, and exploiters who resist the socialist revolution within the country, and to suppress those who sabotage the construc-


tion of socialism; this is for the purpose of resolving the contradictions between
the enemy and ourselves at home. For example, to arrest certain counterrevolutionaries and convict them, to deprive the landlords and bureaucratic-capitalists of their right to vote and deny them freedom of speech! for a certain period
of time—all this falls under the category of dictatorship. To keep social order and
safeguard the interests of the broad masses of people, we must also exercise
dictatorship over thieves, swindlers, murderers, arsonists, hoodlum gangs, and
various kinds of evildoers who seriously disrupt the social order. This dictatorship
has yet a second function, which ts to protect [the country] from the subversive
action and possible aggression of the enemy outside the country. When such
conditions arise, then, the dictatorship is entrusted with the task of resolving the
contradiction between ourselves and the enemy outside. The aim of the dictatorship
is to protect all the people in their peaceful labor so that they can build our country
into a socialist state with modern industry, modern agriculture, and modern science
and culture. Who, then, is to exercise the dictatorship? Naturally, the working class
and the people under its leadership. The dictatorship system does not apply within
[the ranks of] the people. The people cannot exercise dictatorship over themselves,
nor is it possible for one section of the people to suppress another. Lawbreakers
among the people must also be punished according to law, but this is [a case]
different in principle from the dictatorship exercised to suppress the people’s
enemies. Within the ranks of the people we adopt the system of democratic
centralism.!© It is stipulated in our Constitution that citizens of the People’s
Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, press, assembly, association, procession, demonstration, religious belief, and so on.!7 Our Constitution also provides
: that the system of democratic centralism must be practiced in state organs, that they
must rely on the people’s masses, and that their personnel must serve the people.
This socialist democracy of ours is a democracy of the broadest kind that cannot
be found in any bourgeois state. Our dictatorship is called the people’s democratic
dictatorship which is based on the worker-peasant alliance led by the working class.
This demonstrates that a democratic system is being carried out within the ranks
of the people, whereas the working class, uniting with the entire people who enjoy
civil rights—in the first place with the peasantry—exercises a dictatorship over the
reactionary classes, the reactionary factions, and all those elements who resist
socialist transformation and socialist construction. By civil rights we mean, in a
political sense, the rights of freedom and democracy.

But this freedom is freedom under leadership, and this democracy is democracy
under centralized guidance. In no way does it represent a state of anarchy. A state
of anarchy is at variance with the interests and wishes of the people.

After the Hungarian Incident took place,!8 some people in our country felt
happy. They hoped a similar incident would happen in China, with thousands upon
thousands of people taking to the streets in demonstration against the people’s
government. This hope of theirs ran counter to the interests of the people’s masses,
and it was impossible for it to win the support of the people’s masses. Some of the
masses in Hungary, deceived by counterrevolutionary forces both at home and
abroad, mistakenly resorted to violent action against the people’s government. As

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a result, both the state and the people suffered losses. The economy, damaged by
the few weeks of turbulence, will take a long time to recover. There were some
other people in our country who displayed vacillation over the Hungarian issue.!9
This is because they did not understand how things actually stand in the world.
They thought that there is too little freedom under our people’s democratic system
and that it is better to be under a Western parliamentary democracy where there is
more freedom. They demanded that a two-party system, [like that] of the West, be
instituted [in China], with one party on the stage and the other off the stage.70
Nevertheless, this so-called two-party system is nothing more than a device to
sustain the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie; it can in no way safeguard the working
people’s freedom and rights. As a matter of fact, in this world, freedom and
democracy exist only in the concrete; there is no abstract freedom or abstract
democracy. In a society where there is class struggle, the laboring people will have
no freedom from exploitation if the exploiting class has the freedom to exploit the
laboring people. As long as there is democracy for the bourgeoisie, there can be no
democracy for the proletariat and the laboring people. Some capitalist countries
allow the legitimate existence of the Communist Party, but only to the extent that
it does not pose a danger to the fundamental interests of the bourgeoisie. Nothing
is permitted beyond that limit. Those who demand freedom and democracy in the
abstract view democracy as an end but do not recognize that democracy is a means.
This thing we call democracy, sometimes it may appear to be an end, but as a matter
of fact it is only a means. Marxism tells us that democracy is a part of the
superstructure and falls under the category of politics. That is to say, in the final
analysis, it services the economic base. The same holds for freedom. Democracy
and freedom are both relative, not absolute; both come into existence and develop
in the course of history. Within the ranks of the people, democracy Is relative to
centralization and freedom is relative to discipline. All these [democracy and
centralization, freedom and discipline,] are contradictory facets of a unity; they are
contradictory and at the same time united. We should not place one-sided emphasis
on one aspect while negating the other. Within the ranks of the people, freedom is
indispensable, and so is discipline; democracy is indispensable, and so is centralization. Such a unity of democracy and centralization, of freedom and discipline,
constitutes our system of democratic centralism. Under this system the people
enjoy extensive democracy and freedom, while having at the same time to restrain
themselves with socialist discipline. These principles are intelligible to the broad
masses of the people.

We advocate freedom with leadership and democracy under centralized guidance. In no sense is this construed to suggest that problems of ideology and
questions of distinguishing right from wrong among the people can be resolved
through coercive measures. Any attempt to resolve ideological problems or issues
of right and wrong through the method of administrative orders or the method of
coercive measures is not only ineffectual but also harmful. We cannot abolish
religion by administrative orders, nor can we force people not to believe in
religions. We cannot coerce people into relinquishing idealism, nor can we coerce
people into espousing Marxism. All questions of an ideological nature and all issues


of debate among the people can be resolved only through a democratic method, the
method of discussion, of criticism, of persuasion and education, and cannot be
resolved by the method of coer¢ion or repression. In order to carry out production
effectively, and carry on with their studies, or to lead a life in normal order, the
people require their government, their leaders in production, and those in charge
of cultural and educational institutions to issue all sorts of administrative ordinances that are appropriate’and that carry the force of coercion. Without such
administrative ordinances, maintenance of social order would be out of the question, a fact that comes within people’s common sense. This and the method of
resolving contradictions among the people by means of persuasion and education
are two [mutually] complementary aspects.2! Even then, administrative orders that
are issued for the purpose of maintaining social order must also be accompanied
by persuasion and education; in many cases administrative orders alone do not
work.

In 1942, we boiled down this democratic method of resolving contradictions
among the people into a concrete formula, namely, “unity-criticism-unity.”22 To
explain it in greater detail, it means proceeding from a desire for unity, resolving
the contradiction through criticism or struggle, and arriving at anew unity on anew
basis. Our experience shows that this is a correct method of resolving contradictions
among the people. In 1942 we adopted this method in resolving the contradictions
inside the Communist Party, that is, the contradiction between the dogmatists and
the broad masses of Party members, and the contradiction between the ideology of
dogmatism and the ideology of Marxism. Previously the “Left” dogmatists had
resorted to a so-called method of ruthless struggle and merciless blows for intra-
Party struggle. It was a wrong method.23 When criticizing “Left” dogmatism, we
didn’t employ this old method; instead, we adopted a new approach, namely,
proceeding from the desire for unity, distinguishing between right and wrong
through struggle or criticism, and arriving at a new unity on a new basis. We used
this method in the rectification [campaign] of 1942.24 After a few years, by the time
the Chinese Communist Party held its Seventh National Congress in 1945,25 lo and
behold, we actually achieved the purpose of unity throughout the Party, and thus
won the great victory of the people’s revolution. What is needed here is first of all
to proceed from the desire for unity, because if subjectively we do not have such
a desire for unity, things would certainly be thrown into confusion and get out of
hand once the struggle is started. Wouldn’t this be the same as “ruthless struggle
and merciless blows?” And how then could there be any Party unity? From this
experience we arrived at the formula “unity-criticism-unity.” Or, in other words,
[“]learning from past mistakes to avoid future ones and curing the illness to save
the patient.[”’]¢6 We extended the use of this method to outside the Party. In dealing
with the relationships between the leadership and the masses, between the army
and the people, between officers and soldiers, between the different units of the
army, and between the different sections of cadres in the various anti-Japanese base
areas,2/ we applied this same method and achieved great success. The issue, in our
Party’s history, can be traced back to still earlier times. The method had been used
to deal with the relationship between the Party and the masses, between the army


and the people, between the officers and soldiers as well as other relationships
within the ranks of the people ever since we established the revolutionary armed
forces and base areas in the south in 1927.28 Nevertheless, by the time of the War
of Resistance Against Japan, we had established the method on a more conscious
basis. Since the liberation of the entire country we have employed the same method
of “‘unity-criticism-unity” toward the democratic parties2? and the industrial and
commercial circles. Our current task 1s precisely to continue to extend the method
within the entire ranks of the people and make still better use of it, requiring ail the
factories, cooperatives, shops, schools, [government and Party] organs, and
[people’s] organizations, in short, [all] the 600 million people, to employ this
method in resolving their internal contradictions.

Under ordinary circumstances, contradictions among the people are not antagonistic. However, if they are mishandled or if [we] lose our vigilance or are numb
or careless, antagonism may occur. In a socialist country, such circumstances are
generally speaking only a local and temporary phenomenon. This is because in a
socialist country the system of exploitation of human beings by others has been
eliminated, and the interests of the people are fundamentally in unanimity. Antagonistic actions on a considerably extensive scale such as those that took place in
the Hungarian Incident were the result of the effect of counterrevolutionary factors
both within [Hungary] and abroad upon [the situation]. It was a special and also a
transient phenomenon. [In that case] reactionaries inside a socialist country colluded with the imperialists and took advantage of contradictions among the people
to sow discord and stir up trouble in an attempt to achieve [the aims of] their
conspiracy. A lesson such as the Hungarian Incident deserves our attention. Many
people have the feeling that using the democratic method to resolve contradictions
among the people poses a new issue. In fact this is not true. It has been the consistent
belief of Marxists that the cause of the proletariat can only depend upon the masses
of the people, and that the Communists can only employ the democratic method of
persuasion and education when working among the laboring people; under no
circumstances are they allowed to take a commandist?? attitude or resort to coercive
measures. The Communist Party of China has faithfully observed this Marxist-Leninist principle. We have consistently advocated that under the people’s democratic
dictatorship two different methods, one dictatorial and the other democratic, be
used to resolve the two types of contradictions that are different in nature, namely,
contradictions between the enemy and ourselves and contradictions among the
people. This notion has been discussed time and again in many previous documents
of our Party and in speeches by many of the people in positions of responsibility
in the Party. In the article “On the People’s Democratic Dictatorship” written in
1949, I said: “The combination of these two aspects, democracy with regard to
matters among the people and dictatorship over the reactionaries, is the people’s
democratic dictatorship.

In resolving problems among the people, [I added], “the method we employ its
democratic, the method of persuasion, not of compulsion.”3! In a speech delivered
at the Second Session of the National Committee of the Political Consultative
Conference in June 1950, I again said this: “The people’s democratic dictatorship


has two methods. One, which applies to the enemy, is the dictatorial method, which
means that when necessary they can be forbidden to participate in political
activities, forced to obey the laws of the People’s Government, and forced to take
part in labor and to reform themselves through labor in order to become new people.
For the people it is exactly the opposite. It is not the coercive method, which is to
say that they must be permitted to participate in political activities. We will not
force them to do this or that but will use democratic methods to carry out the work
of education and persuasion among them. This type of educational work is the work
of self-education among the people. The method of criticism and self-criticism is
the basic method of self-education.”32 [Thus], in the past, we have already discussed many times the issue of resolving contradictions among the people by a
democr ethod, and we have in the main applied it in our work. Many cadres
and the people are aware of the problem in practical terms. Why then are there
now people who think that it issue? This is because the struggle between
the enemy and ourselves, both at home and abroad, has been intense in the past,
and the contradictions among the people have not commanded as much attention
as they do today.

Many people cannot distinguish between these two types of contradictions that
are different in nature, those between the enemy and ourselves and those among
the people. They are prone to confuse the two. It should be admitted that at times
these two types of contradictions can be easily mixed up. We ourselves mixed them
up in our work in the past. In the work of purging and cleaning out counterrevolutionaries, some good people were mistaken for bad.33 Such instances
happened before, and still happen now. That our mistakes have not expanded [out
of bounds] is due to the fact that we have stipulated in our policy that a distinction
must be drawn between the enemy and ourselves, and that mistakes be corrected
whenever they are discovered.

Marxist philosophy holds that the law of the unity of opposites is the fundamental law of the universe.34 This law exists universally, whether in the natural world,
in human society, or in people’s thought. The opposites which are in contradiction
with each other exist as a unity and at the same time are struggling against one
another; and it is this that impels things to movement and to change. Contradictions
exist everywhere, but their natures differ in accordance with the different natures
of different things. In any given specific thing, the unity of opposites is conditional,
temporary, and transitory, and hence relative, whereas the struggle of opposites is
absolute. Lenin made a clear exposition of this law, and in our country a growing
number of people have come to understand it. Nevertheless, to many people it is
one thing to admit this law and another thing to apply it in observing and handling
problems. Many people dare not openly admit that contradictions remain a fact
among the people in our country, and that it is precisely these contradictions that
propel our society toward forward development. By failing to admit that contradictions still exist in socialist society, quite a few people become overcautious and
hesitant when they are confronted with contradictions in society, and thereby put
themselves in a position of passivity; they do not understand that in the course of
continuing, uninterruptedly, to correctly handle and resolve contradictions, the


unity and the solidarity within a socialist society will be reinforced with each
passing day.35 Therefore, there is the need to make explanations among the people;
first of all among the cadres, to guide people in understanding contradictions in
socialist society and in learning to use correct methods to handle such contradictions. Contradictions in a socialist society are fundamentally different from those
in old societies, for example in a capitalist society. Contradictions in a capitalist
society manifest themselves as acute and violent antagonisms and conflicts, as
intense class struggle. Contradictions of that sort cannot be resolved by the
capitalist system itself; they can only be resolved through socialist revolution.
Contradictions in a socialist society are a different matter. [In a] precisely contrary
[way], they are nonantagonistic contradictions and can be resolved continuously
through the socialist system itself.

In socialist society the basic contradictions remain those between the relations
of production and the forces of production and those between the superstructure
and the economic base. It is just that compared with the contradictions between the
relations of production and the forces of production and between the superstructure
and the economic base in old society, these contradictions in socialist society are
basically different in nature and circumstances. The current social system of our
country is far superior to the social system of the old days. Otherwise, the old system
would not have been overthrown and it would not have been possible for the new
system to be established. In saying that the socialist relations of production can
better accommodate the character of developing forces of production than did the
relations of production in the old days, we mean that [the new relations] allow the
forces of production to develop at a speed that was never found in the old society.
Consequently, production will expand ceaselessly and, with that, a situation will
be produced in which, step by step, the people’s ever-growing need can be met.
Under the rule of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic-capitalism, the development of the forces of production in old China has always moved at a snail’s
pace.*° In the more than fifty years prior to Liberation, steel output in the whole
nation, excluding the northeastern [provinces], had always amounted to no more
than several tens of thousands of tons [a year], and the peak annual output of the
country [even] with the Northeast included, was never more than some 900,000
tons. In 1949, the steel output of the whole nation was only between 100,000 and
200,000 tons. [Now,] merely seven years have elapsed since the Liberation of the
entire country, and [the national] steel output has come up to more than four million
tons [a year].3’ There was hardly any machine-building industry in old China, to
say nothing of automobile- and airplane-manufacturing industries; now they have
all been established. Now that the people have toppled the rule of imperialism,
feudalism, and bureaucratic-capitalism, which way should China turn? To capitalism or to socialism? Many people were unclear in their way of thinking about this
question. Facts have now provided an answer to this problem; only socialism can
save China. The socialist system has promoted a phenomenally rapid development
of our country’s forces of production; this is a fact that even our enemies abroad
cannot deny. However, our country’s socialist system is still in its initial stage of
establishment; it has not been completed nor fully consolidated. In the joint


state-private enterprises8 in industry and commerce, capitalists still receive fixed
interest.°? That means exploitation still remains a fact. As far as the ownership
system is concerned, enterprises under this category are not completely socialist in
nature. Some of the agricultural producers’ cooperatives and the handicraft
industries’ producers’ cooperatives are also still only semisocialist in nature.40
[Even] with the completely socialized cooperatives, there are stil] some specific
problems regarding the system of Ownership that need to be addressed with
continued effort. Relations between production and exchange in the various economic sectors are still in the process of being gradually established in accordance
with socialist principles, and in _a step-by-step process of finding more
appropriate forms for them. Within [the economic séttor under] ownership by the
€ sector of the economy under} ownership by the collective,
o forms of socialist economy, the issue of [the ratio of] distribution
cumulation and consumption is a complex problem, and it is not easy
to find a perfectly rational solution for it all at once.4! In sum, socialist relations of
production have been established, and they correspond to the growth of the forces
of production. However, they are far from perfect, and the imperfections stand in
contradiction to the development of the forces of production. Aside from this
situation wherein there is, simultaneously, a correspondence and yet also a contradiction between the relations of production and the forces of production, a situation
also exists wherein there is also, simultaneously, a correspondence and yet also a
contradiction between the superstructure and the economic base. [Aspects of] the
superstructure, such as the state system and the law of the people’s democratic
dictatorship and the socialist ideology guided by Marxism-Leninism, have played
a positive role in propelling the victory of our country’s socialist transformation
and the establishment of its socialist labor organization. It conforms to the socialist
economic base, that is, to the socialist relations of production.42 Nevertheless, that
there is a bourgeois ideology, a certain bureaucratic work style in our state organs,
and flaws in certain links of the state system is in contradiction with the socialist
economic base. We must, in the future, continue [our efforts] to resolve the
above-mentioned contradictions in light of the specific conditions. Of course, after
the solution of these contradictions, new problems will crop up. Further efforts are
needed for the solution of new contradictions. For example, objectively, the
contradiction between social production and the needs of society will long remain
a fact and will have to be constantly regulated through state planning. Every year
Our country draws up an economic plan to establish a proper ratio between
accumulation and consumption so as to achieve an equilibrium between production
and needs. Equilibrium means a temporary, relative unity of opposites. Taken as a
whole, such an equilibrium will be upset by the struggle of contradicting [oppo-
Sites] after one year’s time; such a unity will undergo change; equilibrium will
become disequilibrium, and unity will become disunity. Hence the need to work
Out an equilibrium and unity for the next year. This is where the Superiority of our
planned economy lies. As a matter of fact, this equilibrium and unity are partially
disrupted each month and each quarter, and partial readjustment needs to be made.
Sometimes, because [our] subjective arrangement does not conform to objective

ae

320 {| MAO ZEDONG

circumstances, contradictions arise that upset the equilibrium; this 1s what we call
committing a mistake. The continuous emergence of contradictions and their
continuous solution ts the law of dialectics in the development of things.

This 1s how things stand right now: The large-scale and rough-winds-and-torrential-rains type of class struggle*3 waged by the masses during the times of
revolution has basically come to a halt, but class struggle is not completely over.
On the one hand, the broad masses welcome the new system, while on the other
hand they do not feel quite accustomed to it yet. Government functionaries are also
still inadequately experienced and should continue their study and exploration of
specific policy issues. In other words, our socialist system still needs to go through
a process of continued construction and consolidation, the masses of the people
need to go through a process of getting themselves accustomed to this new system,
and the government functionaries need [to go through] a process of studying and
gaining experience. At this juncture, therefore, it is imperative for us to raise the
issue of drawing a line of distinction between the two types of contradictions, those
between the enemy and ourselves and those among the people, and the issue of
correctly handling contradictions among the people, so as to rally the people of all
nationalities and throughout the country to fight a new battle—the battle against
nature, to develop our economy and our culture, and to help the people as a whole
to travel more smoothly through the current transitional period, reinforce our new
system, and build up our new state.

2. The Issue of Eliminating Counterrevolutionaries44

The question of eliminating counterrevolutionaries is a question of a struggle
involving the contradiction between the enemy and ourselves. Among the people,
there are some who see the issue of eliminating counterrevolutionaries in a different
light. Two types of people hold views differing from ours. Those with a Right-deviationist [way of] thinking make no distinction between the enemy and ourselves,
and take the enemy to be our own people. They regard as friends those who are
regarded as enemies by the broad masses [of the people]. Those with a “Left’’-deviationist thinking magnify the contradictions between the enemy and ourselves to
the point where they see some contradictions among the people as contradictions
between the enemy and ourselves, and regard as counterrevolutionaries persons
who actually are not counterrevolutionaries. Both views are erroneous. Neither of
them makes it possible to handle correctly the issue of eliminating counterrevolutionaries or correctly assess our work in this regard.

To evaluate correctly what we have done in eliminating counterrevolutionaries
in Our country, we may as well take a look at the impact the Hungarian Incident
has had on our own country. After the incident took place, there was some unrest
among a section of intellectuals in our country, but it did not touch off any
turbulence. What are the reasons for this? One of them, it should be said, is that we
have fairly thoroughly eliminated the counterrevolutionaries.

Of course, the consolidation of our country does not primarily come as a result
of the elimination of counterrevolutionaries. The primary factor for the consolidation of our country is that we have a Communist Party and a Liberation Army


JANUARY ~ MARCH 1957 / 321

tempered through decades of revolutionary struggle, and a laboring people who
have been tempered likewise. Our Party and army have taken root among the
masses, tempered in the flames of a protracted revolution, they are combat-worthy.
This people’s republic of ours was developed step by step out of the revolutionary
base areas; it was not a regime established . Certain democratic
personages* have also been tempered in-Varying degrees and have gone through
thick and thin together with us. Some‘intellectuals were tempered in the struggle
against imperialism and the reactionary forces, and many of them have, since
Liberation, gone through an idedlogical remolding aimed to {help them] draw a
clear line of demarcation between the enemy and ourselves. On top of that, the
consolidation of our country’is also due to the fact that our economic measures are
basically correct; the people’s life is secure and keeps on improving gradually, and
we have pursued a correg¢t policy toward the national bourgeoisie and other classes,
and so on. Nevertheless, our success in eliminating the counterrevolutionaries is
doubtlessly one of the major factors behind the consolidation of our country.
Because of all this, our university students, with a few exceptions, are patriotic and
supportive of socialism, even though there are still many of them who come from
non-working-class families.46 They did not have any unrest during the Hungarian
Incident. It was the same with the national bourgeoisie, to say nothing of the basic
masses of workers and peasants.

After Liberation, we purged and weeded out a batch of counterrevolutionaries.
Some counterrevolutionaries who had committed serious crimes were sentenced
to death. This was absolutely necessary and was the demand of the broad masses.
It was done to liberate the masses who for a long time had been oppressed by the
counterrevolutionaries and all sorts of [local] despots and bullies:47 in other words,
it was done to emancipate the forces for production. Had we not done so, it would
be impossible for the masses to lift up their heads [with dignity]. Since 1956,
however, things have undergone a basic change. Taking the country as a whole,
the main bulk of the counterrevolutionaries’ forces have already been ferreted out
and eliminated. Our basic task has changed from that of emancipating the forces
of production to that of safeguarding and developing the forces of production under
a new [set of] relations of production. Some people do not understand that our
present policy applies to the present situation and our previous policy applied to
the situation in the past. They intend to make use of today’s policy to reverse past
decisions*§ in an attempt to negate the tremendous achievements we have made in
the past in eliminating the counterrevolutionaries. This is completely mistaken, and
the masses of the people will not permit it.

In our work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries, achievements were the
principal aspect, but we also made some mistakes. There were instances both of
excess and of counterrevolutionaries slipping through the net. Our policy is
counterrevolutionaries must be eliminated whenever found, and mistakes must be
corrected whenever discovered. The line that we have followed in the work of
eliminating counterrevolutionaries is one in which the masses [themselves] are
eliminating the counterrevolutionaries. Of course, even with adopting the mass
line, mistakes may still occur.49 But there can be fewer occasions for things to go |

|


322 {/ MAO ZEDONG

wrong, and the mistakes will be easier to rectify. The masses will gain experience
through the struggle. From things done correctly [they will] gain the experience of
how to do things right, and from the mistakes made [they will] gain the experience
of how mistakes are made.

For mistakes already discovered in our work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries, we have taken, or are in the process of taking, steps to correct them. For
mistakes yet to be discovered, we are prepared to rectify them as soon as they come
to light. Reversal of mistaken [decisions} should be announced at a scope as wide
as when the decisions were originally made. I propose a general review be made
of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries either this year or the next year?
in order to sum up the experience, promote justice, and stem evil trends.°! At the
Center, the review [should be] in the charge of the Standing Committee of the
National People’s Congress and the Standing Committee of the Political Consultative Conference; at the local [level] it should be in the charge of the people’s
councils and the committees of the Political Consultative Conferences in the
provinces and municipalities.°>2 When conducting the review, we must help the
broad [masses] of cadres and active elements, not douse them with cold water. To
douse the broad [masses of] cadres and the active elements with cold water would
be a mistake. However, mistakes must be corrected once they are spotted. Whether
it is the public security organs, the procurators’ offices, the judicial departments,
prisons, or organs administering labor reform, all must take such an attitude. It is
our hope that members of the Standing Committee of the National People’s
Congress, members of the [Standing] Committee of the Political Consultative
Conference, and people’s deputies, whoever can do it, will take part in such a
review [project]. This will be helpful in making our legal system5? healthy and
complete, and in dealing correctly with counterrevolutionary elements and other
criminal elements.

As for how things stand with the counterrevolutionaries now, they can be
boiled down to the following line: There are still counterrevolutionaries, but
not many. In the first place, counterrevolutionaries still exist. Some people say
there are no more [counterrevolutionaries]} and all is well, and therefore we can
puff up the pillow and have a good sleep.>4 This is not in tune with the facts.
The fact is, there are still [counterrevolutionaries] (of course, this is not to say
that they can be found in every place and in every unit), and we must continue
to struggle against them. We must understand that the hidden counterrevolutionaries yet to be ferreted out and eliminated will never take things
lying down; they will avail themselves of every opportunity to stir up trouble.
The U.S. imperialists and the Chiang Kai-shek clique are still constantly
sending their secret agents to carry out subversive activities in our territory.>>
Even after we have ferreted out and eliminated all the existing counterrevolutionaries, it is still possible for some new counterrevolutionaries to
emerge. If we lose our vigilance, we shall be taken in [by the enemy] and suffer
badly. Wherever the counterrevolutionaries are found making trouble, they
must be stamped out resolutely. However, as far as the whole nation is concerned, there are indeed not that many counterrevolutionaries any more. It

i ge me MN te

wie tee Se aE abe”



would be a wrong opinion’[to assume] that there still are large numbers of
counterrevolutionaries agfoss the country. Acceptance of such an assessment
would certainly mess thi

3. The Issue of the Cooperativization of Agriculture

Our country has an agricultural population of more than 500 million people.
How things stand with the peasants has an extremely important bearing on the
development of our country’s economy and the consolidation of our political
power. As I see it, the situation is basically good. With the completion of [agricultural] cooperativization, the major contradiction in our country between socialist
industrialization and the individual peasant economy has been resolved. The rapid
accomplishment of the cooperativization [movement] caused apprehensions
among a number of people who were concerned that something might go wrong.°6
Fortunately, [while] there were some mistakes, there was nothing of a major kind,
and [the movement] was basically sound. The peasants are vigorous in production,
and grain output in the whole nation registered an increase last year despite the fact
that disasters caused by floods, drought, and gales were the worst in years. But now
there are people who assert that cooperativization does not work, that it has no
superiority. Thus they whip up a miniature typhoon.>7 Does cooperativization have
superiority or not? Among the documents distributed at today’s meeting is material
about that Wang Guofan Cooperative in Zunhua xian, Hebei Province.58 You may
all give it a reading. The place where this cooperative is located is a hilly area that
had always been very poor and every year had to depend upon relief grain sent by the
people’s government. When the cooperative was first set up in 1953, people called it
the “paupers’ cooperative.”°? After four years of hard and bitter struggle, things have
been getting better year after year. The overwhelming majority of the cooperative’s
members now have become households with surplus grain. What can be achieved by
the Wang Guofan Cooperative should also be possible for other cooperatives to achieve
under normal conditions, or, [if need be,] in a bit longer time.

From this it can be seen that the argument that something has gone wrong with
cooperativization is groundless. From this it can be seen likewise that cooperatives
have to be built through hard and heroic struggle. Any newly born thing has to
experience difficulties and setbacks in its growth. To imagine that the cause of
socialism does not have to experience difficulties and setbacks, does not exact
tremendous efforts, but is always smooth sailing and easy success—such an idea
is nothing but an illusion.

Who are the people in active support of the cooperatives? The overwhelming
majority of the poor peasants and lower-middle peasants,©° who constitute more than
70 per cent of the rural population. Most of the other people also pin their hopes on the
cooperatives. Only an extremely small minority are dissatisfied. Many people have not
analyzed this situation and have failed to make overall investigation into the achievements and shortcomings of the cooperatives as well as the roots that have given rise to
these shortcomings, and they have taken the local [situations] and one-sided [findings]
to be the general picture. This is why a miniature typhoon has been stirred up among
a number of people who insist that the cooperatives are devoid of superiority.


324 {/ MAO ZEDONG

How long will it take before the cooperatives can be consolidated and arguments
such as those that cooperatives do not have superiority cease to be [aired]? Judging
from the experience of how a large number of cooperatives have developed, it will
probably take five years, or a little longer. Now the majority of cooperatives in the
nation have only a history of a bit more than one year. It is unreasonable for us to
ask them to be that good. As I see it, it will be good enough if we set up the
cooperatives during the First Five-Year Plan period, and consolidate them during
the Second Five-Year Plan period.®!

The cooperatives are now undergoing a process of being gradually consolidated.
Some contradictions that need to be resolved still exist in them. For example,
between the state and the cooperatives, and in and between the cooperatives
themselves there are still some contradictions that remain to be resolved.

We must pay constant attention to handling the above-mentioned contradictions
from [the angle] of the problems of production and distribution. On the issue of
production, the cooperatives’ economies must, on the one hand, obey the leadership
of the unified economic plan of the state, and, at the same time, retain a certain
flexibility and independence of their own on the premise that they do not violate
the state’s unified plan, or the state’s policies, laws, and regulations. On the other
hand, every household that joins the cooperative, aside from [dealing with] its
private plot©2 and other individually operated economic undertakings in regard to
which it can make its own appropriate plans, must comply with the general plan of
the cooperative or the production team.® On the issue of distribution, we must take
the interests of the state, the collective, and the individual all into consideration.®
The three-way relationship among the state [agricultural] tax, the cooperatives’
accumulation [funds], and the peasants’ personal income must be properly handled,©5 and we must take care to make constant readjustments [so as to resolve] the
contradictions among them. The state must have accumulation, so must the
cooperatives, but neither accumulation can be excessive. We must do everything
possible to ensure that in normal years the peasants can increase their personal
income year after year through the increased production.

Many people say that the peasants live in hardship.° Is this opinion correct? In
a sense it is. That is to say, due to more than acentury of oppression and exploitation
by the imperialists and their agents, our country has been reduced to destitution.
Not only do our peasants have a low living standard, but that of the workers and
intellectuals is low as well. It will take us several decades, and it must be through
strenuous efforts, before we can gradually raise the living standard of the people
as a whole. In this sense, hardship is an appropriate [description]. In another sense,
however, it is incorrect; that is, [when the phrase is meant] to say that in the seven
years since Liberation there has been no improvement in the peasants’ livelihood;
that we have only improved the livelihood of the workers. As a matter of fact, the
livelihood of both the workers and the peasants, except for an extreme few, has
shown some improvement. Since Liberation, the peasants have been relieved of
the landiords’ exploitation and [their] production has grown year after year. Take
grain, for example. In 1949, the entire country produced only some 210 billion
catties of grain. By 1956, the grain output had risen to more than 360 billion catties,


an increase of nearly 150 billion catties.6? The agricultural tax levied by the state
cannot be deemed heavy, only something over 30 billion catties a year. And the
[state] purchase of grain from the peasants at regular prices only amounts to a little
over 50 billion catties.68 These two items together total 80-some billion catties.
And more than half this grain is sold and marketed back to the rural areas and nearby
towns. From this it can be seen that it is impossible to assert that there is no
improvement in the peasants’ life. We are prepared generally to stabilize the [total
annual] amount of the grain tax and the grain purchased [by the state] at 80-some
billion catties within the next few years so that agriculture can develop and the
cooperatives can be consolidated. In this way, the small number of grain-deficient
households still existing in the countryside will no longer be short of grain, and all
peasant households, except for those specializing in growing cash crops, will
become households with grain to spare or self-sufficient households. There will no
longer be poor peasants in the countryside, and the entire peasantry will have a
living standard of the middle peasant and above. Simply to compare the peasants’
average annual per capita income with that of the workers, alleging that one is too
low and the other too high, is [therefore] inappropriate. A worker has a much higher
labor productivity than a peasant, and the living expenses of a peasant are much
more economical than a city worker’s. Therefore we cannot say that the workers
are given special favorable treatment by the state. The wages of a small number of
workers and some personnel working in state organs are a little too high, and it
stands to reason for the peasants to be dissatisfied with that. It is necessary to make
some appropriate adjustments according to the circumstances.

4. The Issue of the People Engaged in Industry and in Commerce

With regard to the transformation of our country’s social system, in 1956,
besides the cooperativization of agriculture and handicraft industries, the transformation of privately owned industry and commerce into joint state-private enterprises was accomplished as well.©? That this was done so rapidly and smoothly was
closely related to the fact we treated the contradiction between the working class

_and the national bourgeoisie as a contradiction among the people. [But] has this
class contradiction been completely resolved? No, not yet. A complete solution
will require as yet a fairly long period of time. Nevertheless, some people now say
that the capitalists have been so well remolded that they are almost like the workers,
and that no further remolding is necessary. There are even people who allege that
the capitalists are even better than the workers. Still others say that if remolding is
necessary, why is the working class not remolded? Are these arguments correct?
Of course not.

In the process of building a socialist society, everyone needs to go through
remolding. The exploiters have to be remolded, and so do the laborers. Who says
that the working class needs no remolding? Naturally, the remolding of exploiters
and the remolding of laborers are two remoldings that differ in nature from each
other; [the two] cannot be lumped together. The working class must remold the
entire society through class struggle and the struggle against nature, and in the
process remold itself. The working class must continuously learn in the course of

ee


work; it must gradually overcome its own shortcomings and must never stop
{moving forward]. Take people such as ourselves, for example. Many of us make
some progress each year; that is to say, we are remolding ourselves every year.
Personally, I had all kinds of non-Marxist ideas before, and it was only later that I
accepted Marxism. I learned a bit of Marxism from books and made some initial
remolding of my ideology. But in the main, it was only through the long-term
[participation in] class struggle that I was remolded and changed around. Furthermore J must continue to learn from now on in order that I may make still some more
progress, otherwise I shall lag behind. In contrast, can the capitalists be so great
that, in fact, they do not need any more remolding?

Some people say that China’s bourgeoisie today no longer has two sides to
its character, that it has only one side. Is this a fact? No, it is not. On the one
hand, bourgeois elements have already become administrative personnel in the
joint state-private enterprises and are in a process of transformation in which
they are changing from exploiters into laborers who live by their own labor./?
On the other hand, they still receive fixed interest in the joint state-private
enterprises. That is to say, they have not yet cut themselves loose from their
roots of exploitation. Between them and the working class there is still a fairly
wide distance in terms of ideas, sentiments, and habits of life. How can it be
said that they no longer have two sides to their character? Even when they have
stopped receiving the fixed interest and their bourgeois hat’! has been removed,
they still will need a considerable period of time to continue to go through
ideological remolding. If one is to believe that the bourgeoisie no longer has a
dual character, then the capitalists would no longer have the task of remolding
themselves and studying.

It should be said that not only does such an opinion not conform to the actual
situation of the people engaged in industry and commerce; it is also not
consistent with the desire of most of these people themselves. In the previous
few years, the majority of the people engaged in industry and commerce were
willing to study and have made marked progress. Their thorough remolding,
however, can only be [realized] in the course of work. They should labor
alongside the staff and workers in the enterprises and regard the enterprises as
a base where they can conduct self-remolding. But it is also important for them
to change some of their old views through study. Such study for those engaged
in industry and commerce should be [conducted] on a voluntary basis. Many of
the people in industry and commerce, after studying at some lecture and
learning classes for a few weeks, find that they have more of a common
language with the worker masses and representatives of the state’s [portion of
the ownership of the enterprises] upon their return to the factories. They have
thus improved the conditions of [their own] working together with others. From
their personal experience, they have learned that it is to their benefit to keep on
studying and remolding themselves. The opinion that there is no need to study
and remold, as mentioned above, represents the view of only a few of the people
engaged in industry and commerce, and cannot [be taken] to represent the
opinion of the majority among them.

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Rene eRe 2 alle Lee om ol es pales gemini ee rs a re


5. The Issue of the Intellectuals

The contradiction among the people in our country is also manifesting itself
among the intellectuals. The'several million intellectuals who served the old society
in the past now have switched over to the new society. Herein is contained the
question of how they can adapt themselves to the needs of the new society and how
we are to help them to achieve this. This, too, comes as a contradiction among the
people. The great majority of the intellectuals in our country have already made
marked progress in the past seven years. They have expressed their approval of the
socialist system. Among them are many who are studying Marxism diligently, and
some of them have already become Communists. Although this segment is now
still in the minority, it is steadily growing. Of course, among the intellectuals there
are still some who are skeptical, or disapprove, of socialism; nevertheless, they
only account for a small proportion.

Our country’s formidable and arduous undertaking of constructing socialism
needs the service of as many intellectuals as possible. We should confer trust on
all those intellectuals who are truly willing to serve the cause of socialism; we must
improve our relations with them from the ground up and help them resolve all sorts
of problems that need to be resolved in an effort to enable them actively to give
full play to their talents. Many of our comrades are inept at uniting with intellectuals; they treat them with rigidity, show no respect for their labor, and interfere
improperly in some [areas of] scientific and cultural work in matters where
interference is uncalled for./2 All these shortcomings must be overcome.

Although the broad [ranks of] intellectuals have made progress, they should not
therefore feel complacent. To meet fully the needs of the new society and unite as
one with the workers and peasants, the intellectuals must continue to remold
themselves, gradually do away with [their] bourgeois world view, and establish a
proletarian, Communist world view. The transformation of [one’s] world view is
a fundamental change, and currently most of [our] intellectuals cannot be said to
have completed this change. It is our hope that our country’s intellectuals will
continue to move forward, and in the course of their work and study, gradually
establish [for themselves} a Communist world view, learn well [the teachings of]
Marxism-Leninism, and become one with the workers and the peasants. [We hope
that] they would not stop half way, or, what is worse, slide back; there will be no
way out for them if they slide back. Due to the fact that there is already a change
in the nation’s social system, the economic base for the bourgeois ideology has
already been fundamentally eliminated. Thus it becomes not only imperative but
also possible for the intellectuals in vast numbers to transform their world view.
However, a thorough transformation in world view takes a very long time; we
should work patiently [among them] and must not be impetuous. As a matter of
fact, there are bound to be a number of people who ideologically will always be
unwilling to accept Marxism-Leninism or communism. We should not demand too
much of this segment of the people; as long as they comply with the demands of
the state and engage in legitimate labor, we should allow them opportunities to do
Suitable work.

Recently political and ideological work has been weakened among the intellec-


328 {/ MAO ZEDONG

tuals and young students, and some [erroneous] deviations have surfaced. In the
eyes of a number of people, there seems to be no necessity to be concerned about
politics, the future of the homeland, or the ideals of humanity. It 1s as if although
Marxism was all the rage for a while, it has now gone out of fashion. In response
to these circumstances, we must now strengthen ideological and political work.
Regardless of whether they are intellectuals or young students, they must study
hard. Aside from the study of their specialized subjects, they need to study
Marxism, current events, and politics so that they can make progress both ideologically and politically. Not having a correct political viewpoint is tantamount to not
having a soul.’? Ideological remolding previously conducted was necessary and
has produced positive results. However, it was done in a somewhat crude way and
a number of people got hurt. This is not good. This drawback must be avoided in
the future. Ideological and political work ts the responsibility of all departments
[and organizations]. The Communist Party should hold itself responsible [for the
work]; so should the Youth League,’4 the government departments in charge of the
work, and especially the headmasters and teachers of schools. Our educational
policy should enable the educated to develop in all the various areas of moral
education, intellectual education, as well as physical education—\[so that] they can
become laborers with both a socialist consciousness and culture. We must advocate
[the idea of] building our country through diligence and thrift,’> and we must let
all the young people know that ours is still a very poor country and such a state of
affairs cannot be radically changed in a short period of time. It is only through our
younger generation and the entire people joining hands in unity and struggling hard
and heroically for several decades that we can build a rich and powerful country
with our hands. The establishment of the socialist system has opened for us a road
leading to an ideal state, but the realization of such an ideal state depends on our
hard work. Some young people believe that everything should be good once we
arrive at a socialist society, and that they can enjoy aready-made happy life without
putting in any effort. The idea is unrealistic.

6. The Issue of the Minority Nationalities

Minority nationalities in our country total more than thirty million. Even though
they only make up 6 per cent of the nation’s entire population, [the territory} they
inhabit extends over vast regions that account for some 50 to 60 per cent of China’s
total area. Thus it becomes necessary to handle well the relations between the Han
people and the minority nationalities. The key to this problem lies in overcoming
Han chauvinism.’6 At the same time we must overcome regional nationalism where
it exists among the minority nationalities.’7’ Whether we are speaking of Han
chauvinism or regional nationalism, both are detrimental to the unity of [all the]
different nationalities. They are also a type of contradiction among the people that
should be overcome. In this regard we have already done some work, and in most
of the areas inhabited by minority-nationalities there has been great improvement
in the relations among nationalities as compared with before. But there are still
some problems that remain to be resolved. In anumber of areas, there ts still a grave
problem of both Han chauvinism and regional nationalism, and to this we must pay


2 a "= PL ll
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adequate attention. Through the efforts of the people of different nationalities over
the last few years, the overwhelming’majority of minority nationality areas in our
country have basically completed democratic reforms and socialist transformation.
Democratic reforms have not fet been carried out in Tibet due to the fact that
conditions there are not yet rype. According to the Seventeen-Article Agreement
concluded between the Centfal [People’s Government] and the local government
of Tibet, reform of the social system there must be implemented, but the time for
the implementation can only|be decided by the great majority of the Tibetan people
and [local] leaders when they see fit. We cannot be impetuous. Now it has been
decided that reform will not be carried out during the period of the Second
Five-Year Plan. Whether reform should be implemented in the period of the Third
Five-Year Plan will be decided according to the conditions at that time.78

7. Comprehensive Planning While Giving Consideration to All Sectors, and
Proper Arrangement/?

The comprehensive planning while giving consideration to all sectors discussed
here refers to the comprehensive planning and overall consideration for the 600
million people [of the whole country]. In drawing up plans, doing things, and
thinking over problems, we must proceed from the fact that our country has a
population of 600 million; under no circumstances should we forget this. Why
should we raise such a question [at this time]? Can it be possible that there are still
people who do not know that our country has a population of 600 million? [We all]
know it for sure, but when it comes to doing things, some people forget about it;
to them it seems, the fewer the people, the smaller the circle, the better. People who
harbor such a “small circle” mentality resent the idea of mobilizing all positive
factors, uniting with all those with whom unity is possible, and doing everything
one can to turn negative factors into positive factors so that they serve the great
cause of building a socialist society. I hope these people will broaden their field of
vision and truly admit that our country has a population of 600 million people; they
should recognize it as an objective fact and that it is an asset for us.8° The huge
population we have is a good thing and, of course, also involves difficulties. Our
undertakings of construction are vigorously moving forward on all fronts and have
achieved great success. However, in the present transitional period of tremendous
social changes, we still face many difficult problems. At once there is progress and
difficulty—this is contradiction. Not only is it necessary for us to resolve any
contradiction, but it is entirely possible to have it resolved. Our policy is comprehensive planning, giving consideration to all sectors, and making proper arrangements. Whether it is a problem of food, of natural calamities, employment,
education, the intellectuals, the united front of all patriotic forces, the minority
nationalities, or anything else, all must be resolved by proceeding from the
viewpoint of comprehensive planning and overall consideration that embraces the
whole people. Proper arrangements must be made in light of what is actually
possible at a given time and a given place through consultation with people of all
walks of life. Under no circumstances should we complain that there are too many
people, that others are backward, and that things are too troublesome to handle,


thus pushing them outside the door and leaving it at that. In saying this do I mean
that the government should take care of everybody and everything? Of course not.
In many cases we can let the social organizations or the masses directly figure out
ways to handle things. They are capable of coming up with many good solutions.
This, too, comes within the scope of the principle of comprehensive planning,
giving consideration to all sectors, and making proper arrangements. We should
guide social organizatioris and the masses of different localities everywhere in

doing this.

8. On Letting a Hundred Flowers Bloom and a Hundred Schools of Thought
Contend,8! and on Long-term Coexistence and Mutual Supervision®2
“Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend,” and
“long-term coexistence and mutual supervision”—under what conditions are these
slogans advanced? They are advanced in light of the specific situation in China, on
the basis of recognizing that various contradictions continue to exist in socialist
society, and in keeping with the country’s urgent need rapidly to develop its
economy and culture. The principle of letting a hundred flowers bloom and a
hundred schools of thought contend is a principle to promote the development of
the arts and progress in the sciences; it is a policy to enhance the flourishing of the
socialist culture in our land. Different forms and genres of art can develop freely,
and different schools of science can contend and debate freely. Using administrative force to impose one particular genre coercively, or one particular school, while
banning another genre or school, is, we believe, detrimental to the growth of art
and science. Issues of right and wrong in art and science should be resolved through
free discussion in artistic and scientific circles and through the practice of art and
science. We should not try to settle them with a simplistic method. To determine
whether something is right or wrong frequently takes a trial period. In history, new
and correct things often could not win recognition from the majority of people at
the start, and they had to move forward by twists and turns in struggle. People tend
to deny correct things, good things, as fragrant flowers at the outset; instead, they
regard them as poisonous weeds.83 Copernicus’s theory of the solar system and
Darwin’s theory of evolution’4 were both regarded at one time as erroneous, and
both experienced bitter struggle. In our country’s history, there are also many
similar cases. Compared with the old society, a socialist society [provides] basically
different and far better conditions for the growth of new things. However, it is still
a common occurrence for newly emerging forces to be held back and for reasonable
opinions to be suppressed. Even when the suppression is not deliberate, lack of
clarity in discernment alone can hinder the growth of new things. Therefore we
should adopt a cautious attitude toward [questions] of right and wrong in science
and art. [We must] encourage free discussion and avoid making hasty conclusions.
Adopting such an attitude, we believe, will help the sciences and arts progress in
a relatively smooth manner.
Marxism itself develops through struggle. Marxism sustained all kinds of blows
at the beginning and was regarded as a poisonous weed. Even now it continues to
be on the receiving end of attacks and is still seen as a poisonous weed in many


a


parts of the world. In the socialist countriés, however, Marxism has a different
position. But even in the socialist countries, non-Marxist ideologies remain, and
so do anti-Marxist ideologies. In our gountry, although socialist transformation in
regard to the ownership system has’been basically completed and the large-scale
rough-winds-and-torrential-rains type of class struggle of the masses characteristic
of the revolutionary period has also basically come to an end, remnants of the
overthrown landlord and comprador’®s classes still exist, the bourgeoisie still exists,
and the petty bourgeoisie is just in the midst of being remolded. Class struggle has
not come to an end. The class struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie,
the class struggle between the various political forces, and the class struggle
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the ideological sphere will still be
protracted, tortuous, and even violent at times. The proletariat wants to transform
the world according to its own world view, and so does the bourgeoisie. In this
regard, the question of whether socialism or capitalism will win [in the battle
between them] has not yet really been settled.86 Whether among the entire population or among the intellectuals, Marxists remain a minority. Therefore Marxism
still has to develop through struggle. That Marxism can only develop through
struggle holds true not only for the past and present but will also inevitably hold
true in the future. A correct thing always develops in the course of struggle with
the wrong thing. Things that are true, good, and beautiful always exist by contrast
with things that are false, evil, and ugly, and develop in the struggle with such
things.’’ By the time a certain erroneous thing comes to be rejected universally by
humankind, or a certain truth comes to be universally accepted, truths of a still
newer kind will already have begun to struggle with new erroneous ideas. Such
strug gle will never end. It is the law of the development of truth, and naturally, also
the law of the development of Marxism.

[The question of] whether socialism or capitalism will win out in our country
in the ideological struggle between them will take as yet a fairly long period before
it can be resolved. This is because the influence of the bourgeoisie and of the
intellectuals who have come [over] from the old society will long remain in our
country. They will long remain as a class ideology. Failure to understand this
situation adequately or to understand it at all will lead to the gravest mistake, [the
mistake of} neglecting necessary ideological struggle. Ideological struggle is
different from other [forms of ] struggle; it can only use the method of painstaking
reasoning rather than the method of crude coercion. Currently, in the ideological
Struggle, socialism possesses the conditions to win. The basic strength of the state
power rests in the hands of the laboring people led by the proletariat. The
Communist Party has mighty strength and enjoys a high prestige. Even though there
are shortcomings and mistakes in our work, every fair-minded person can see that
we are loyal to the people, that we are determined and have the ability to stand
Shoulder to shoulder with the people to build [our] homeland, and that we have
already achieved tremendous successes and will continue to achieve still greater
ones. The bourgeois elements and intellectuals who have come [over] from the old
society are for the overwhelmingly greater part patriotic; they are willing to serve
the socialist homeland which is becoming more prosperous every day. They are


332 {/ MAO ZEDONG

aware that if they are divorced from the socialist cause and are alienated from the
laboring people led by the Communist Party, they will have nothing to rely on and
it will be impossible for them to have any bright future.88

Some people raise the question: [Since] Marxism has been accepted by the vast
majority of people in our country as the guiding ideology, can criticism be leveied
at it? Of course it can be criticized. Marxism is a scientific truth and fears no
criticism. If Marxism were afraid of criticism and if it could be toppled by criticism,
then it would be worthless. In fact, aren’t idealists making every form of criticism
against Marxism every day? And aren’t those who harbor bourgeois ideas and who
are reluctant to change also criticizing Marxism in every form? Marxists should
not be afraid of being criticized by anyone. On the contrary, it is precisely in the
midst of others’ criticism and in the storm and stress of struggle that Marxists can
temper and develop themselves and expand their [strategic] positions. To struggle
with erroneous ideas is like getting vaccinated; under the effects of being inoculated
with a vaccine, one will develop greater immunity [against disease].8? Things
nurtured in greenhouses cannot have strong vitality. Implementing the policy of
letting a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend will not
weaken the leading position of Marxism in the ideological field; on the contrary,
it will strengthen such a position.

What principle should we adopt toward non-Marxist ideas? Regarding those
who are obviously counterrevolutionaries and saboteurs of the socialist cause, the
matter is easy; [simply] depriving them of their freedom of speech will do. Things
are different with erroneous ideas among the people. W111 it work to ban such ideas
and deprive them of any opportunity for expression? Of course not. To handle
ideological issues among the people, issues involving the mental world, with
simplistic methods is not only ineffective but also extraordinarily harmful. Even if
we deny erroneous opinions their expression, erroneous opinions will continue to
exist. Whereas correct opinions, if they are fostered in greenhouses and have not
been exposed to rough weather, and have not acquired immunity [from disease],
will not be able to win the battle against erroneous opinions when they encounter
them. Therefore, it is only by employing the method of discussion, criticism, and
reasoning that we can truly develop correct opinions and overcome mistaken ones,
and that we can really resolve problems.

The bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie are bound to give expression to their
ideas and mentalities. Invariably they will resort to every possible means to
stubbornly assert themselves over political and ideological issues. It is impossible
for them not to reflect [on things] or give expression of themselves. We should not
use the method of suppression to prevent them from expression; rather we should
allow them expression, and at the same time that [such ideologies] are expressed,
debate with them and make appropriate criticism [of them]. Doubtlessly we should
criticize erroneous ideas of all kinds and all stripes. Of course it wouldn’t work if
we made no criticism and simply looked on as erroneous ideas spread unchecked
and allowed them to take over the market. Criticisms must be made whenever there
are mistakes, and struggle must be waged wherever poisonous weeds crop up.
Nevertheless, such criticism should not be dogmatic. Rather than using the meta-


ee


physical method, we must strive to use the dialectical method, with scientific
analysis and convincing argument. Dogmatic criticism cannot [help to] resolve a

problem. We are against poisonous weeds of any kind, but we must exercise edution
in discerning what is really a poisonous weed, and what is really a fragrant flower.
Together with the masses we must learn to distinguish carefuHy between fragrant
flowers and poisonous weeds, and together we will fight thé poisonous weeds with
correct methods.

At the same time that we criticize dogmatism, w¢ must also pay attention to
criticizing revisionism. Revisionism, or Right opporfunism, is a bourgeois tide of
thought even more dangerous than dogmatism. Reévisionists, as well as Right
opportunists, carry Marxism on their lips too, and they, too, attack “dogmatism”
[with equal ardor]. But what they attack are precisély the things that are most
fundamental to Marxism. They oppose or distort materialism and dialectics; they
oppose or try to weaken the people’s democratic dictatorship and the Communist
Party's leadership; they oppose or try to weaken socialist transformation and
socialist construction. [Even] after the socialist revolution has won the basic victory
in our country, there are still some people in society who dream of restoring the
capitalistic system. They will struggle against the working class in every area,
including in the sphere of ideology. The revisionists will serve as their best aide in
this conflict.

Judging them literally, the two slogans [“Jletting a hundred flowers bloom[”]
and [“jletting a hundred schools of thought contend[”] do not have aclass character.
The proletariat can make use of them, so can the bourgeoisie, and so can other
people. Also, in defining what a fragrant flower is and what a poisonous weed is,
the various classes, strata, and social groups are each able to have their own criteria.
Then, from the perspective of the broad masses of the people, what are our criteria
for distinguishing between fragrant flowers and poisonous weeds today? In the
political life of our people, how should they judge right from wrong in our words
and deeds? Based on the principles of our country’s Constitution and in keeping
with the will of the vast majority of our country’s people as well as the common
political advocation made public by our country’s various [political] parties on
many occasions, we are of the opinion that such criteria can be defined, in broad
terms, as follows:

(1) [Whether something] helps to unite, not split, the people of all different
nationalities across the country;

(2) [Whether something] is beneficial, not harmful, to socialist transformation
and socialist construction;

(3) [Whether something] facilitates the consolidation of, and does not undermine or weaken, the people’s democratic dictatorship;

(4) [Whether something] facilitates the consolidation of, and does not undermine or weaken, the system of democratic centralism:

(5) [Whether something] facilitates the consolidation of, and does not cut loose
from or weaken, the Communist Party’s leadership:

(6) [Whether something] is beneficial, not harmful, to the international unity
Of socialism and the international unity of the peace-loving people in all the world.


Of these six criteria, the most important are the two criteria concerning the
socialist road and the Party’s leadership. These criteria are put forward to help the
people develop free discussion on all kinds of issues; they are not intended to hinder
such discussion. Those who disapprove of these criteria may still set forth their
own views and argue their case. However, with the majority of people having clear
and definite criteria to go by, it will be possible for criticism and self-criticism to
develop on the right track. These criteria can then be applied to determine whether
one’s words and deeds are correct and whether they are fragrant flowers or
poisonous weeds. These are political criteria. Of course, to determine whether
scientific arguments are correct or erroneous and to appraise the artistic standards
of works of art, we need some other criteria respective [of the subject]. These six
political criteria, however, apply also to any scientific and artistic activity. In a
socialist state like ours, can there be any beneficial scientific or artistic activity that
runs counter to these criteria?

The above-mentioned views proceed from the specific historical conditions in
our country. In different socialist countries and in different Communist parties the
situations are not the same. Therefore we do not hold that they must or should adopt
China’s method.

The slogan of “long-term coexistence and mutual supervision” is also a product
of China’s specific historical conditions. This slogan was not proposed abruptly; it
has gone through quite a few years of fermentation. The idea of [“|long-term
coexistence[’’] has [in fact] been in existence for quite a long time. By last year
| when] the socialist system had been basically established, these slogans were set
forth in firm and explicit terms. Why are we going to allow bourgeois and
petty-bourgeois democratic parties” to exist alongside the political party of the
working class for a long time to come? This 1s because we have no reason not to
adopt a policy of long-term coexistence toward all those parties that genuinely
dedicate themselves to uniting the people in the cause of socialism and enjoy the
people’s confidence. Back in June 1950, at the Second Session of the Political!
Consultative Conference, I had already stated: “As long as somebody is truly
willing to work for the people and has indeed helped the people at a trme when they
were still having difficulties, has performed good deeds and has consistently
continued to do so without giving up halfway, then there will be no reason for the
people or the People’s Government not to want such a person, and there will be no
reason not to give such a person a chance to make a living and serve [the people].’”?!
What [I] said there constitutes the political basis for the possibility of the long-term
coexistence of the various parties. It is our desire and also our policy that the
Communist Party will exist alongside the democratic parties for a long period of
time. As to whether the democratic parties can exist for a long time to come, [this
question] will be decided not merely by the desire of the Communist Party alone
but also by how the democratic parties acquit themselves and whether they can win
the people’s confidence. Mutual supervision among the various parties, too, has
long existed as a fact; that 1s, it has long been [a practice for] the various parties to
offer suggestions to each other and make criticism of each other. By mutual
supervision, naturally we do not mean [that supervision comes from] one side


alone; [while] the Communist Party can exercise supervision over the democratic
parties, the democratic parties can also exercise supervision over the Communist
Party. Why should we allow the democratic parties to exercise supervision over
the Communist Party? This is because a party is like a person; one needs to hear
different voices. As we all know, the Communist Party is mainly under the
supervision of the laboring people and the masses who make up its membership.
However, to have [the supervision from] the democratic’parties [also] will redound
to its benefit. Of course, the opinions that the various democratic parties and the
Communist Party offer to each other and the criticisms that they make of each other
can play a positive role of mutual supervision only under the conditions that they
conform to the six political criteria we mentioned above. Therefore it is our hope
that the various democratic parties will pay attention to ideological reform and
strive to coexist with the Communist Party for a long period of time and exercise
supervision over each other in an effort to meet the needs of the new society.

9. On the Question of Disturbances Caused by Small Numbers of People?

In 1956, in a few places, incidents occurred wherein small numbers of workers
and students went on strike.?? The immediate cause for these people creating
disturbances was that some [of their] material demands were not met. Of these
demands some should and could have been met, while others were inappropriate
or excessive and could not be met for the moment. But a more important cause of
the disturbances was the leadership’s bureaucratism.?4 In some cases, the organs
at higher levels should be held responsible for the mistakes of bureaucratism; we
cannot put the blame entirely on the lower levels. Another cause for the disturbances was the lack of ideological and political education among the workers and
students. In 1956 there were also incidents in which small numbers of cooperative
members made trouble in the cooperatives.?° The main causes for this were also
the leadership’s bureaucratism, and lack of education among the masses.

It should be admitted that some of the masses often are prone to pay attention
to immediate, partial, and personal interests, and do not understand, or do not quite
understand, long-term, national, and collective interests. Because they lack experience in politics and the life of society, quite a few young people are not good in
making comparisons between the old China and the new; it is not easy for them to
understand deeply what hardships the Chinese people had gone through in their
struggle before they could free themselves from the oppression of imperialism and
Kuomintang reactionaries, and what long years of hard work are needed before a
fine socialist society can be built. Therefore we must constantly conduct lively and
true-to-practice political education among the masses. We should constantly explain to them truthfully about the difficulties that emerge and study together with
them ways for overcoming the difficulties.

We do not approve of disturbances, because contradictions among the people
can be resolved through the method of “unity-criticism-unity,” while disturbances
are bound to entail losses and are harmful to the development of the socialist cause.
It is our belief that the broad masses of people in our country support socialism;
they observe discipline and are very reasonable, and they will never make trouble


336 {/ MAO ZEDONG

without reason. But this is not to say that there is no more possibility for the masses
to create disturbances in our country. On this issue we should pay attention to the
following: (1) to eradicate the cause of disturbances, we must resolutely overcome
bureaucratism, effectively strengthen ideological and political education, and
properly resolve all contradictions. If we accomplish this, disturbances, generally
speaking, will be out of the question; (2) if it is because we have not done our work
well that disturbances occur, then we should guide the masses involved in creating
the disturbances onto the right track and use the disturbances as a special device
for improving our work and educating the cadres and masses in order to resolve
problems that were previously left unresolved. In the process of handling the
disturbances, we must carry out painstaking work. We must not resort to any
oversimplified method in handling the problems or “hastily call back the troops.”
As for the ringleaders in the disturbances, they should not be summarily or lightly
fired, except in the cases of those who are criminal offenders or active counterrevolutionaries who would have to be punished according to the law. In a large
country like ours, it is not worthwhile to make a fuss about small numbers of people
who create disturbances. Instead, [such disturbances] may help us overcome
bureaucratism.

In our society there are also a few people who are inconsiderate of the public
interest, impervious to reason, and prone to violence and violation of the law. Such
people may take advantage of our policies and distort them, and deliberately set
forth unreasonable demands to instigate the masses, or deliberately start a rumor
to create trouble and disrupt the normal order of society. As for this kind of people,
we are not in favor of letting them get away with it. On the contrary, necessary
punishments, according to law, must be taken against them. To punish such people
is the demand of the broad masses in society, and not to punish them would be
against the masses’ will.

10. Can Bad Things Be Turned into Good Things?

As I said above, disturbances created by the masses are bad things in our society,
and we do not approve of them. However, when such incidents have occurred, they
can prompt us to draw lessons, overcome bureaucratism, and can educate the cadres
and masses. In this sense, even bad things can be turned into good things.
Disturbances have a dual nature. We can apply this viewpoint in dealing with all
disturbances.

As we all well know, the Hungarian Incident was not a good thing. But it, too,
had a dual character. As the Hungarian comrades acted properly in the course of
the development of the incident, the Hungarian Incident has eventually turned from
a bad thing into a good thing. Hungary is now more consolidated than ever, and all
countries in the socialist camp have learned a lesson.

Likewise, in the latter half of 1956 there was a worldwide anti-Communist and
anti-people storm, and that, of course, was a bad thing. But it educated and tempered
the Communist parties and the working classes in all the countries, and thus turned
into a good thing. In many countries a number of people withdrew from the
[Communist] parties during this storm. Withdrawal of some members from the


JANUARY ~ MARCH 1957 / 337

Party curtails the size of its membership and is, of course, a bad thing. Nevertheless,
there is a good aspect about that, too. With the wavering elements who are unwilling
to carry on [the struggle] quitting the Party, the majority of staunch Party members
can be united even better for the struggle. What is so bad about that?

In sum, we must learn to view a problem in all its aspects. Not only must we see
the obverse side of things, but we must see the reverse side as well. Under certain
conditions, a bad thing can lead to a good result, and a good thing to a bad result.
Said Lao Zi more than two thousand years ago: “Good fortune lieth within bad;
bad fortune lurketh within good.”°6 When the Japanese fought their way into China,
they called it a victory. Vast stretches of China’s land were seized [by the Japanese
enemy], and the Chinese people called it a defeat. But victory was conceived in
China’s defeat, and defeat was conceived in Japan’s victory. Hasn’t history so
proved?

Now people in countries all over the world are discussing whether or not a third
world war will break out. With regard to this issue, we must also be mentally
prepared and must have analysis. We firmly stand for peace and against war.
However, if the imperialists insist on launching a war, we have no need to fear.
Our attitude toward this question, the same as our attitude toward any “disturbance,” is: After the First World War, the Soviet Union emerged, with a population
of 200 million. And after the Second World War, the socialist camp came into
existence, with a combined population of 900 million. If the imperialists insist on
unleashing a third world war, we can be certain that several hundred million more
people will switch to the side of socialism, and there may not be much turf left for
the imperialists. It is even possible that the system of imperialism will fall apart
altogether.

As aresult of the struggle between the opposing aspects of a contradiction, they
invariably will each transform into the other under given conditions. Here it is the
conditions that are important. Without given conditions, neither of the two contradictory aspects can transform itself [into its opposite]. In this world the one that is
most willing to change its position is the proletariat, and next comes the semiproletariat, since the former does not own a thing in the world and the latter barely
anything. The situation now in which the United States controls a majority of votes
in the United Nations and dominates many parts of the world is only temporary;
this situation is bound to change one of these days. China’s position as a poor
country and a country without power and rights internationally will also change.
The poor country will become a rich country; [the country] without power and
rights will change into [one that] enjoys them—a transformation of itself into its
opposite. The decisive conditions here are the socialist system and the people's
unity and unanimity in a heroic struggle.

11. On Practicing Economy
Here I would like to talk briefly on the issue of practicing economy. We wish
to undertake large-scale construction, but ours is still a very poor country. This 1s
a contradiction. Practicing strict economy everywhere and in a lasting way 1s one
| method to resolve this contradiction.

Se


During the “Three Anti’s” movement in 1952, we fought against corruption,
waste, and bureaucratism, with the emphasis on fighting corruption.?® In 1955 we
advocated the practice of economy. Our main thrust then was combating the unduly
high standards for nonproductive [projects of] basic construction and saving on
raw material in industrial production. In this we achieved great successes. At that
time, the policy of practicing economy had not been conscientiously implemented
in the different sectors of the national economy nor in government organs, military
units, schools, and people’s organizations in general. This year we require that
economy be advocated and waste combated tn every sector across the nation. We
still lack experience in construction work. We have made great achievements over
the last few years but we also had waste. We must step by step build up a number
of large-scale modernized enterprises as the backbone. Without such a mainstay,
it would be impossible for us to build our country into a mighty, modern industrial
country within a few decades’ time. But this practice should not be followed with
the majority of enterprises; more efforts should be devoted to building small- and
medium-sized enterprises. In addition, we should fully utilize the industrial base
left behind by the old society and strive to effect the greatest economy so that we
can do more with less money. Since November last year, when the Second Plenum
of the [Eighth] Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party set forth, more
emphatically than ever, the principle of practicing strict economy and combating
waste, things have begun to take effect in these few months.9? The campaign for
economy this time must be conducted in a thorough and sustained way. Combating
waste, like the criticism of any other fault or mistake, can be likened to washing
one’s face. Isn’t it that one washes one’s face every day?!00 The Communist Party
of China, the democratic parties, the democratic personages with no party affiliations, the intellectuals, people engaged in industry and commerce, workers, peasants, and handicrafts people, in short, all our 600 million people must strive to
increase production, practice economy, and combat extravagance and waste.10!
This bears major significance not only economically but politically as well. Among
many of our working personnel there is now breeding a dangerous tendency of
unwillingness to share weal and woe with the masses, but preferring, [instead,] to
calculate personal fame and gain. This is very bad. In the campaign to increase
production and practice economy we call for streamlining the [administrative]
organs and transferring cadres to the lower levels!©2 so that a considerable number
of cadres will return to production. This is precisely one way to overcome such a
dangerous tendency. We must see to it that all the cadres and all the people
constantly bear in mind that ours is a large socialist country but also an economically backward poor country. This is a very big contradiction. To make our country
prosperous and strong will take several decades of hard struggle, which includes,
among other things, a policy of building our country through diligence and
frugality, namely, practicing strict economy and combating waste.

12. The Path of China’s Industrialization
The question of the path to industrialization discussed here mainly refers to the
problem of the relationship among the growth of heavy industry, light industry,


and agriculture. !03 Qur country’s economic construction focuses on heavy industry;
this is a [principle] that must be affirmed. However, full attention must be paid at
the same time to developing agriculture and light industry.

Our country is a large agricultural country, with the rural population accounting
for more than 80 per cent of the [total] national population. Only when the
development of industry is promoted simultaneously with the development of
agriculture can industry secure raw materials and a market and more funds be
accumulated for building a powerful heavy industry. As we all know, li ght industry
is extremely closely linked with agriculture; without agriculture there can be no
light industry. However, that heavy industry must take agriculture as a major
market has not yet been made to be clearly understood by people. With the gradual
development of technological transformation in agriculture, however, and with
agriculture becoming increasingly modemized, there will be more and more
{demand on] machinery, fertilizer, water conservation [projects], electrical power
projects, and transportation facilities geared to the service of agriculture as well as
[of] fuel and building materials for the consumption by [rural] citizens. Then the
fact that heavy industry takes agriculture as a major market will be more easily
appreciated by people. If during the period of the Second and Third Five-Year Plans
our agriculture can achieve still greater growth, thus bringing about a correspondingly greater development of light industry, the entire national economy will
benefit. With agriculture and light industry moving forward, heavy industry will
be assured of a market and of funds, and it will grow even faster. In this way, while
the speed of industrialization may appear to be slower, actually it will not be slow,
and it may even be quicker. In three five-year plans’ time, or perhaps a little longer,
it is still possible for our country to raise its steel output from the pre-Liberation
peak annual output of some 900,000 tons in 1934 to twenty million tons [a year].
This will make the people happy both in the cities and in the countryside.

I do not intend to speak at length on economic questions today. We still lack
experience in economic construction. As it has only been underway for seven years,
we need to accumulate experience. We didn’t have experience in revolution either
when we started it. We took a few tumbles! and gained experience; only then did
we win nationwide victory. We require that we gain experience in economic
construction in a shorter period of time than it took us to gain experience in
revolution, and, in addition, not pay as high a price. Some price has to be paid, but
not as high, we hope, as we paid during the period of revolution. It should be
understood that a contradiction exists over this issue, namely the contradiction
between the objective law of the economic development of a socialist society and
our subjective cognition [of it]. We can only resolve it through practice. This
contradiction will also manifest itself as a contradiction between people, that is, a
contradiction between those who more correctly reflect the objective law and those
who reflect it more incorrectly. Therefore, it, too, is a contradiction among the
people. All contradictions exist objectively. Our task is to give expression to them
and resolve them in as nearly correct a manner as possible.

To turn our country into an industrial country, we must conscientiously learn
from the advanced experience of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union has been


340 {/ MAO ZEDONG

building socialism for forty years already, and its experience is very valuable to us.
You see, who has designed and equipped so many important factories for us? Has
the United States done so? Has Britain? Neither of them has. Only the Soviet Union
was willing to do so, because it is a socialist country, and it is our ally. Aside from
the Soviet Union, some fraternal countries in Eastern Europe have also lent us some
assistance. It is entirely true; we must learn from the good experience of all
countries, whether it is from socialist countries or capitalist countries; this 1s
something we must affirm. Nevertheless, the main thing is still to learn from the
Soviet Union. Toward learning there are two attitudes. One 1s the dogmatic attitude
of transplanting everything regardless of whether it is applicable to one’s country’s
condition or not. This attitude is no good. Another attitude is to use our brains and
think a bit when we are learning so that we can learn things that fit in with our
country’s conditions, that is, absorb experiences useful to us. This is the attitude
we need [to adopt].!0

Strengthening the unity with the Soviet Union and the solidarity with all socialist
countries is our fundamental policy and where our basic interests reside. Next come
the Asian and African countries as well as all the peace-loving nations and peoples
{around the world]. We should strengthen and develop our unity with them. United
with these two forces, we shall no longer be isolated. As for the imperialist
countries, we should also unite with their people and strive to coexist peacefully
with those countries, do business with them, and prevent the eruption of a possible
war. However, under no circumstances should we entertain any unrealistic idea
about them.

Notes

1. For Mao’s idea of the periodization of the revolution and the meaning of the
‘bourgeois democratic revolution” in this context, see text June 15, 1953, vol. I, note 2.

2. According to a report in Shishi shouce, 17 (1956), reprinted in RMSC (1957), pp.
623-624, and RMSC (1958), pp. 650-651, in 1957 there were forty-six minority nationalities
(i.e., ethnic groups besides the most populous Han nationality) that could be identified and
named in the PRC, comprising a population of 35.5 million and territorially spread throughout some 60 per cent of the country. The tabulation here identifies the Zhuang (6.61 million +),
the Uighur (3.64 million +), the Hui (3.55 million +), the Yi (3.25 million +), the Zhang
(Tibetan, 2.77 million +), the Miao (2.51 million +), the Man (Manchu, 2.41 million +), the
Mongol (1.46 million +), the Buyi (1.24 million +), and the Chaoxian (Chosan-Korean, f.12
million +) as the ten largest. For a detailed study of China’s minority nationalities, see J.
Dreyer (1976).

3. The Chinese expression for the first of these sets of contradictions here, di wo zt yian
de maodun, specifically includes the meaning of “contradictions between [my] enemy and
me,” and, in so doing, fully represents the keenness of Mao’s combative edge on the subject
of contradictions in society. Although the term can be, and has been, translated as “contradictions between one’s enemy and oneself,” we find that rendition not only cumbersome,
but also somewhat excessively toned down. Even though Mao was, on the whole, being
conciliatory here and in other speeches of the period, he was clearly conciliatory only toward
issues and cases involving what he called “contradictions among the people”—+1.e., the other
type, or category, of contradictions here. His attitude toward “contradictions between the
enemy and ourselves” was just as sharp as ever.


On this subject, we can also refer to the annotation of the term written by the Japanese
scholar Takeuchi Minoru in Mao Takuto senshu, dai-go-ken (the Japanese translation of
Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, volume 5), vol. III, p. 144. Here Takeuchi points out that
the conventional Japanese translation of the term, in which the word for “self (wo) is
rendered as mikata, meaning “friend” or “ally,” 1s an inaccurate translation that fails to render
fully Mao’s meaning. Although the idea of “friend or foe” is a strong one, in the context of
“contradiction between” it becomes imprecise and, in fact, incorrect. The notion of contradiction conveyed here is clearly the notion of antagonistic interests between the subject itself
(in this case, one’s self) and the subject’s antagonists, and not merely a matter of one’s
distinguishing between “who one’s enemies are, and who one’s allies are.”

The Chinese for the second set of contradictions, renmin neibu de maodun, in fact
conveys an even more specific meaning of “contradictions internal to the people.” This
meaning is even stronger in some renditions where the possessive de is dropped and the
expression becomes simply renmin neibu maodun. Such a translation of the term, we feel,
would even more specifically convey Mao’s concept of the term renmin (people) as an
intrinsic philosophical-ontological as well as political-social entity, a sense that is not
sufficiently conveyed by the customary translations of “contradictions among the people”
or even “contradictions within the ranks of the people.” However, since previous references
have already been made to this document under these conventional translations, we have
followed along. It is hoped that our annotation here and in the next note sufficiently clarify
the specific and profound semantic meanings contained in these expressions.

The idea of drawing a distinction between these two categories of contradictions seems
to have appeared first in the article “Once More on the Historical Experience of the
Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” which appeared in December 1956. This article is not
included in our collection here, even though it is widely recognized that much of it bears the
stamp of Mao’s ideological influence, because it was officially issued under a name other
than Mao’s. In that article it was pointed out that “the contradictions internal to the people”
(or, “the contradictions among the people”) “include contradictions between this part of the
comrades within the Communist Party and the other part, between the government and the
people in a socialist country, [contradictions] among socialist countries, and among Communist parties.” It goes on to suggest that the occurrence of such contradictions is not owing
to “fundamental clashes of class interests,” but to contradictions between correct and
incorrect opinions, or “contradictions of a partial and local nature.”’ Forecasting what Mao
said here in this February 27, 1957 speech, the article further warned that under specific
conditions, “one side of the contradiction gradually moves over to the side of the enemy,”
then “certain contradictions internal to the people ... are capable of being gradually
transformed into antagonistic contradictions. Ultimately, such contradictions will become
totally transformed in nature, and will no longer belong to the category of contradictions
internal to the people, but will become a part of the contradictions between the enemy and
ourselves.” See RMRB (Dec. 29, 1956) for a transcript of this article.

4. The idea of the term “the people” (renmin) as used by Mao here and in CPC usage
generally may be somewhat narrower and more politically specific than the way the term is
interpreted in general. According to the Common Program adopted by the CPPCC (see text
Sept. 21, 1949, vol. I, note 3), the term renmin refers (and applies) to “the working class, the
peasant class, the petty bourgeoisie, the national bourgeoisie, and all patriotic elements that have
awakened and come over from the reactionary classes.” For more on the variations in Mao’s
usage of the term “the people,” see S. K. Chin (1972). See also J. B. Starr (1979), pp. 109-115,
202-205, which also discusses the term, although the discussion is based on a debatable reading
of Mao’s overall conceptualization of the term renmin, and of class relations.

5. The period of the War of Resistance Against Japan (KangRi zhanzheng shiqi) is also
sometimes referred to as the period of the National War of Liberation Against Japan. It refers
to the period beginning with the Lugouqiao Incident on July 7, 1937 (see text Aug. 12, 1953,
vol. I, note 7), and ending with the surrender of Japan on September 3, 1945.

6. The term here, Han jian, has the double meaning of those who were traitors to Han,


342 {/ MAO ZEDONG

or China, and those among the Han, or Chinese, people who were traitors. In this context it
specifically refers to the Chinese collaborators with the Japanese during the War of
Resistance period, including the people who helped the Japanese run the government in the
Japanese-occupied territories, known as /un xian qu. Also included in this category are
people who opposed the war against Japan in any number of ways. The most notorious was
Wang Jingwei (1883-1944), who in 1938 began to promote a collaborationist “peace
movement” and in the following year set up a rival government in Nanjing to the Nationalist
government in Chongqing. People such as Zhou Fohai, who served in Wang’s government,
were also known as Han Jian. Wang died in Nagoya, Japan, in March 1944. See also text
July 8, 1957, note 21.

7. The period of the War of Liberation, also known as the Third Revolutionary Civil
War period, began in August 1945 and ended on October 1, 1949, with the founding of the
PRC.

8. See text Oct. 24, 1949(2), vol. I, note 1.

9. In CPC usage, and in Mao’s usage, the defining characteristics of antagonistic
(duikang xing) contradictions and nonantagonistic (fei duikang xing) contradictions are as
follows: “In a class society, antagonistic contradictions refer to contradictions established
on the basis of the fundamental opposition of class interests, whereas nonantagonistic
contradictions are contradictions that emerge on the basis of a fundamental unanimity of
interests. Antagonistic contradictions are produced on the foundation of a fundamental clash
of interests between mutually antagonistic classes or cliques. When it has developed to a
certain stage, a contradiction of this type is bound to manifest itself in terms of external
conflict and antagonism, and can be resolved only through the form of antagonistic struggle.
... Generally speaking, non- antagonistic contradictions are contradictions produced on the
foundation of the basic unanimity of interests of the people. They do not need to be resolved
through the form of external conflict. Therefore, antagonism ts only one form, but not the
entirety, of the struggle of contradictions.” (See Zhexue mingci jieshi, I, p. 141.) See also
text Aug. 12, 1953(1), vol. I, note 18.

10. See text Mar. 12, 1950, vol. I, note 3.

11. The reference here is clearly to the PRC Constitution promulgated in 1954; see text
June 14, 1954, vol. J, note 1.

12. Mao appears to be alluding to what is known as the “Three Big Mountains that lie
on the back of the Chinese people.” (See text Mar. 12, 1957, note 5.) Here, however, he
substitutes “the landlords” for the term “feudalism” in the conventional formulation. (See
penultimate sentence in the following paragraph. )

13. On the subject of the “people’s democratic dictatorship,” see text Sept. 21, 1949,
vol. I, paragraph 9, and text June 14, 1954, vol. I, paragraph 6.

14. On the subject of the worker-peasant alliance, see texts Oct. 11, 1955(1) and (2) in
volume I. The statement and substance of this part of this 1957 speech are clearly evocative
of the fundamental statement that Mao made in June 1949 about the basic form of
government and society in China in the socialist period. In his essay in commemoration of
the twenty-eighth anniversary of the founding of the CPC, entitled “On the People’s
Democratic Dictatorship,” Mao spelled out the classic formulation that he repeats here,
saying: “The people’s democratic dictatorship is based on the alliance of the working class,
the peasantry, and the urban petty bourgeoisie, and mainly on the alliance of the workers
and the peasants because these two classes comprise 80 to 90 per cent of China’s population.
(See SW, IV, p. 421.)

15. See text Jan. 18, 1957, Version I, note 9.

16. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 80.

17. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 66.

18. See text Jan. 18, 1957, Version I, note 13.

{9. In the context of the next sentences, Mao was thinking primarily about the problem
of people vacillating over the question of the validity of the socialist state system in China
in response to the incidents at Poznan, Poland, and in Hungary in 1956. The problem


emerged largely as the so-called claim fof a big democracy (da minzhu), or a more
broad-based democratic political system, ox the part of people in the democratic parties. See
text Jan. 18, 1957, Version I, text surrounding notes 18 and 26.

20. The terms fai shang and tai Xia, translated here literally as “on stage” and “off stage,”
are common ones denoting “in pgwer” and “out of power.” The metaphor of a stage as the
arena of political competition, however, is especially pronounced in Mao’s speeches and
writings at this time.

21. The text here reads plang fu xiang cheng, meaning “assisting each other and
complementing each other.” {In the essay “On Contradiction,” Mao speaks of aspects of a
contradiction that are mutually opposed and also mutually complementary, or, in Chinese,
xiang fan xiang cheng.

22. The formula of “unity\criticism-unity” evolved over the years in such a way that it
would be impossible to trace the-very beginning of the idea. However, this ts not the only
time that Mao alluded to the notion that, if the idea had already germinated long ago, it was
during the Party rectification campaign of 1942 at Yanan (the zhengfeng campaign; see text
Aug. 12, 1953(1), voi. I, note 24, and text June 30, 1953, vol. I, note 9) that the formula came
to be fully and successfully tested in practice and was established as a basic guideline in the
Party’s work style and methods. In fact, in his speech to the Enlarged Work Conference of
the Central Committee of the CPC in January 1962 (see text Jan. 30, 1962), Mao would be
even more elaborate: “From the founding of the Party in 1921 to the Seventh Party Congress
in 1945, it took altogether these twenty-four years for the understanding throughout the Party
to be fully and completely unified. In the interim, we went through an all-Party rectification
campaign that took three and a half years, from the spring of 1942 to the summer of
1945. That was acareful and meticulous rectification. The method adopted was a democratic
method; that 1s, no matter who committed a mistake, as long as he acknowledged it, corrected
it, things were all right. Moreover, everyone pitched in to help him acknowledge [the
mistake] and correct it. This is called ‘learning from past mistakes to prevent future ones;
curing the illness to save the patient,’ and ‘proceeding from the hope of unity, [we will] go
through criticism or struggle [in order to] distinguish clearly between right and wrong, and
thus arrive at a new unity on a new basis.’ The formula unity-criticism-unity was produced
precisely during that time." The major thrust of the formula, therefore, is that there must be
a premise of unity (or seeking unity) that provides the basis on which criticism can be
developed if the purpose of that criticism is to resolve contradictions effectively and to
correct errors. The formula also emphasizes the point that the intention of criticism 1s to
increase unity rather than to destroy the opposition, or the object of the criticism.

23. This refers particularly to the “Left” deviationist line of Wang Ming (see text Jan.
27, 1957(1), note 76, and text Aug. 12, 1953(1), vol. I, note 23) in the CPC leadership in
1931-1934. In January 1931, with the support of the Comintern and its representative in
China, Pavel Mif, Wang Ming (whose real name was Chen Shaoyu) and other Chinese
Communists who had returned from the Soviet Union and who supported the Comintern
policy in China, and were known as the “Twenty-eight Bolsheviks,” gained leadership in
the CPC Central Committee. Besides pushing through an opportunistic policy of having the
Red Army concentrate its efforts on warfare to take cities and provinces rather than on
guerrilla fighting, this leadership was known for its sectarianism. Wang Ming allegedly
submitted that the proper way to conduct intra-Party struggle in China was to follow the
method with which Stalin had struggled against Trotsky in the Comintern and the Soviet
Union, a method characterized by “ruthless struggle and merciless biows.”

24. See text June 30, 1953, vol. I, note 9, and text Aug. 12, 1953(1), vol. I, note 24.

25. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 63, cross reference to text Aug. 30, 1956, note 2, and
text Mar. 31, 1955, vol. f, note 3.

26. See text Aug. 12, 1953(1), vol. I, note 25.

27. This refers to the dozen or so revolutionary military base areas (genjudi) in which
Communist Party regular and partisan guerrilla units fought the Japanese from 1937 to
1944, The size and number of these base areas fluctuated, but on the whole they were


344 { MAO ZEDONG

constantly in expansion with the enlargement of the Red Army (the Eighth Route Army and
the New Fourth Army later). By 1944, there were said to be more than sixteen such base
areas, but at least sixteen can be identified and named. The largest and most significant of
these—for the subsequent development of the CPC-—was the base area known as the
Shaan-Gan-Ning (Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia) border region, in which Mao’s wartime headquarters, Yanan, was located. For a fuller discussion of this period and the base areas, see J.
Harrison (1972), ch. 14.

28. This refers primarily to Mao’s revolutionary base area in the Jinggangshan area of
western Jiangxi, to which he withdrew after the failure of the “Autumn Harvest Uprising”
in October 1927. See text Mar. 31, 1955, vol. I, note I.

29. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 11, cross reference to text Sept. 21, 1949, vol. I, note 1.

30. See text June 6, 1950(1), vol. I, note I.

31. The essay Mao refers to here was written on June 30, 1949. See SW, IV, pp. 418,

32. See text June 23, 1950, vol. I, last paragraph.

33. See text Oct. 11, 1955(1), vol. I, last paragraph of section I, and text Oct. 11, 1955(2),
vol. I, last paragraph of section I. See also texts Jan. 17, Jan. 24, Mar. 9, Mar. 30, April 2,
May 15, and June 15, 1951, in volume I.

34, This is the basic postulation underlying Mao’s entire concept of contradiction and
was Clearly discussed in his “On Contradiction” of August 1937 (in SW, II). It echoes the
dicta of Lenin in “Let Us Talk a Bit About the Question of Dialectics,” where he says: “The
essence of dialectics is the understanding of the fact that any unity 1s divided into two parts,
and of the contradicting parts of the unity,” and in “An Outline of the Book ‘Logic’ By
Hegel” in which he says: “We can summarily and briefly affirm that dialectics is the doctrine
of the unity of opposites. If we do so we can grasp the core of the dialectical method.” (See
respective essays in V. I. Lenin, Selected Works, vol. 2, and V. I. Lenin, Collected Works,
vol. 38.)

35. Here Mao seems to be casting an oblique barb of criticism against the Khrushchevdominated leadership of the CPSU at the time.

36. See note 12.

37. Apparently, Mao’s figures here conform to the officially published statistics of the
PRC in RMSC (1957). On p. 426 (table 3), the “planned” output of steel for 1956 was given
as 4.516 million tons. (On p. 434, an article from Xinhua News Agency, December 13, 1956,
puts the actual 1956 steel output up to the end of November 1956 as 4.15 million tons.) On
p. 429, it is indicated that the highest annual output of steel before Liberation came in 1943,
when the output was 923,000 tons, and steel output in 1949 was placed at 158,000 tons. On
p. 424, it is displayed that China’s steel output in 1936 was 414,300 tons.

38. See text Dec. 8, 1956, note 6.

39. See text Jan. 18, 1957, note 35, cross reference to text July 9, 1953, source note; text
Nov. 17, 1955, note 4 (both in vol. D; text Jan. 20, 1956, note 13; text Dec. 8, 1956, source
note, note 6, and note 46.

In addition, it should be noted that the SW, V note for the subject in the document for the
Jan. 18, 1957, speech (p. 383) explains: “The payment of a fixed rate of interest [dingxi] was
a means employed by the state in the course of socialist transformation to implement its
policy of redemption with regard to the national bourgeoisie’s means of production. After
the conversion of capitalist industry and commerce into joint state-private enterprises by
whole trades in 1956, the state paid the national bourgeoisie a fixed annual rate of interest
on the money value of their assets for a given period of time. In its nature this interest was
still a form of exploitation.” An annotation of similar import, but different wording, appears
in Xuandu A, p. 364.

Originally the rate of fixed interest was to be set between 1 per cent and 6 per cent.
However, for the purpose of simplification and standardization, the rate was eventually
established at 5 per cent. (See “The Resolution of the State Council on Methods of Carrying
Out Fixed Interest in the Joint State-Private Management of Enterprises,” Dagong bao [Feb.


JANUARY ~ MARCH 1957 / 345

11, 1956], 2.) Beginning in December 1956, the discussion turned to the duration of the
fixed- interest payments. Mao argued that the capitalists could be fully compensated for their
assets by the combination of high profits they had received in the seven years since Liberation
plus an additional seven years of fixed interest; others argued that a full twenty years of fixed
interest at 5 per cent per year would be necessary to achieve a “true buying out.” After some
struggle, the issue was resolved in favor of a seven-year duration. Also, from June 1956
through June 1957, there was a struggle in the pages of Dagong bao and Jingji yanjiu (JJYJ)
over whether or not the payment of fixed interest was by nature a transformed manifestation
of surplus value. After Mao had taken the position that fixed interest was exploitative, J/JYJ
closed its books on the issue by stating, in contrast to Mao’s position, that surplus value was
not a form of exploitation, even though the realization of surplus labor was unique to
capitalism. It also argued at the same time that the payment of fixed interest represented a
special, not normal, form of surplus value and was not exploitative. /Y/ [June 1957],
127-128.) But some two months later, Lu Dingyi, head of the Propaganda Department
and an alternate member of the Political Bureau, stated that fixed-interest payments were
exploitative, and not a form of surplus value. (See RMRB [Sept. 27, 1957], 2.) In any
case, in 1962, when the payments were to be stopped, they were continued for another
five years, allegedly under the influence of Liu Shaogi. (See “Liu Shaogi’s Crimes in
Carrying Out the Capitulationist Line for Transforming the Capitalists at the Center of the
People’s Commerce,” June 1967, trans. in SCMP, 619 [June 10, 1968], 1-79.) With the
beginning of the Cultural Revolution in 1966, these fixed-interest payments were stopped.
AQ, See text Aug. 12, 1953(1), vol. I, note 11, and text Oct. 15, 1953, vol. I, note 2.
41. See text Mar. 5, 1956, note 12, on the two ownership systems. On the question of

‘\the distribution between accumulation and consumption, Xuandu A (p. 183), provides this

annotation: “At the stage of use, the net output value created by all the departments of
uction of a country over a given period ... is divided into the two major parts of
ulation and consumption. Accumulation refers to that part that is used on expanded

./ It is important to note that here Mao makes it clear that he believes that the relations
uction are part of the economic base and not in the category of the superstructure. In
fact/a note in Xuandu A, p. 182 specifically states that “The economic base is the relations
of/production.” This note goes on to delineate that the superstructure “consists of such
ystems as the political and the legal [systems] and viewpoints in politics, law, morality,
philosophy, art, and religion.” A major theoretical debate over this subject would be waged
by Mao against the Soviet Union’s leadership in its interpretation of Stalin’s political-economic views in 1959 and 1960, epitomized in Mao’s “Reading Notes on the Soviet Textbook
on Political Economy.” See also text Jan. 20, 1956, note 5.

43. The term Mao uses here is ji feng bao yu, which stands in contrast to he feng xi yu
(gentle winds and fine rain, or drizzle). See text Aug. 24, 1956, note 29. Mao would be using
these metaphors repeatedly in the months ahead.

44, See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), text surrounding note 10, and point 6 (i.e., paragraphs
58-63).

45. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 5.

46. See text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraph 8.

47. See text Jan. 17, 1951, vol. I, note 1.

48. The term that Mao uses here, fan an, is a common one referring to “overturning
verdicts.” See also text Oct. 11, 1955(1), vol. I, note 65.

49. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 80. See also note 33 in this document.

50. The Xuandu A (p. 364) annotation on this subject reads: “In 1957, in accordance
with this proposal made by Comrade Mao Zedong, the Central Government and local


governments at all levels made an overall inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries. The result of this inspection proved that we have achieved great success
in our country in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries. The vast majority of the
cases handled in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries were handled correctly, and
there were mistakes only in the most extremely isolated cases, and moreover, once these
were discovered they were corrected. In the summer of 1957, right-wing bourgeois elements
took advantage of this inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries as an
opportunity to raise waves and stir up winds, in an attempt to negate the achievements in the
elimination of counterrevolutionaries and to attack the Party’s policy in eliminating counterrevolutionaries. This conspiracy of theirs came to naught, in the face of the opposition of
the people of the entire country.”

51. The terms for “injustice” and “evil trends” here are zhengqi and waifeng. The
characters gi and feng both have the connotation of wind, or spirit, and, taken together, the
term fenggi has the meaning of practice or trend, or a general mood or custom. The term
zhenggi (literally, correct air, or spirit) classically refers to a metaphysical quality, a spirit
of rectitude and justice that in the teaching of Confucianism, especially that of Mencius, is
the fundamental spirit that is embodied in Heaven and Earth. In Mencius’s teaching, it is
also known as haoran zhi gi (the spirit of great nobility), and the term can be found in the
chapter ‘““Gongsun chou,” part 1, in the book Meng zi. The most famous literary expression
of this in Chinese traditional literature is the poem ‘“Zhengqi ge” (Ballad on the Noble Spirit)
written by the Song-dynasty scholar and soldier-patriot-martyr Wen Tianxiang, who died
defending the Song realm from the Mongols (Yuan) in the year 1283. The first six lines of
the ballad translate as: “There is a spirit of justice in Heaven and Earth; Dissipated, it blends
into and is endowed in all flowing forms; Descending, it becomes the great rivers and the
mighty mountains; Ascending, it becomes the Sun and the Stars. In Man, it is called the
grand [spirit] of nobility. It is full, and fills the Great Void.”

The term waifeng is obviously a juxtaposition for the expression zhenggqi. As a matter of
fact, the character for wai is made up of the character bu (not, or negative), sitting above the
character for zheng. The CPC has gone through quite a few processes in which ail kinds of
feng (or fengqi) within it have been considered improper or incorrect (therefore wal, or not
zheng) and have stood in need of being rectified. (Interestingly, the term for “rectification”
and the term for “correct” both have the sound zheng, although of different tones, and the
latter is a root for the former.) The Party rectification of 1942 in Yanan, for instance, was to
correct the waifeng of subjectivism, sectarianism, and the so-called eight-legged type of
stereotyped writing in the Party. The three areas—dangfeng, or the prevailing practice in the
Party, wenfeng, or the area of writing, and xuefeng, or the area of learning—had to be
rectified. (See Mao, “Zhengdun dang de zuofeng” [Rectify the Party’s Style of Work], Feb.
1, 1942, in Xuanji, Ul, pp. 769-786, especially p. 770.) Itis significant, therefore, that these
terms, zhenggi and waifeng, are once again brought up at a moment when a new Party
rectification movement for the CPC is to be launched.

52. For the Political Consultative Conference, which is officially known as the Chinese
People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), see text Sept. 21, 1949, vol. I, source
note. Local committees of the CPPCC were formed in major municipalities, provinces, and
autonomous regions. The function of the CPPCC and these local committees is to enable
consultation between people’s government bodies and the democratic parties. (See RMSC
[1951], “yi” section, p. 14.)

53. The term is fazhi. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 84.

54. The expression translated literally here is a classical aphorism, gao zhen wu you,
which means “having not a care in the world.” It is derived from several places in the book
Zhanguo ce (Books of the Warring States)—from the “Qi ce” (Book of Qi) and the “Wei
ce’ (Book of Wel). It is also found in the fifth Au: of the popular novel Sanguo yanyi
(Romance of the Three Kingdoms).

55. See text Jan. 17, 1951, vol. I, note 1.

56. Mao is referring to people who at the height of agricultural cooperativization in 1955


argued that it was wrong to have such an “adventurist advance,” and warned the CPC to “get
off the horse quickly,” advocating a policy of “drastic, or resolute, reduction.” See text July
31, 1955, vol. I, section 9 and note 18; also see text Dec. 6, 1955, voi. I, notes 6 and 10, and
text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, source note. (Note here that in the last of these, on p. 693 of
vol. I, “note 13” was mistakenly written for what should be “note 18.’’)

D7. See text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraphs 4, 5, 6, also paragraph 12 for a different context
for the use of the expression “typhoon.”

58. See text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, note 5.

59. See text Jan. 18, 1957, note 11; also see text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, note 5.

60, See text Jan. 18, 1957, note 10, and text Mar. 12, 1950, vol. 1, note 1.

61. See text Feb. 10, 1953, vol. I, note 2, on the First Five-Year Plan, and text Dec. 27,
1955(2), vol. I, note 117; text April 25, 1956, note 22, and text Aug. 30, 1956, note 8, on
the Second Five-Year Plan.

62. See text July 31, 1955, vol. I, note 21.

63. In the temporai context of this speech, the shengchan dui, or “production team,”
referred to here is the basic unit of collective production outside of and beneath the level of
the agricultural producers’ cooperative. The delineation of this unit at this time does not
involve the questions of the level-by-level size and ownership status (1.e., whether ownership
of certain means of production is to be vested in one level or the other) of the various units
known as the shengchan dadui (production brigade) and the shengchan dui (production
team), and the shengchan xiaodui (small production team). These problems came into the
picture in fate 1958 and early 1959 in the early stages of agricultural communization.

64. See text April 25, 1956, section 4.

65. The “cooperatives’ accumulation” here refers primarily to the accumulation of
certain funds by the cooperatives to be held in reserve for their own development and
expense. Seetext April 25, 1956, note 26. In terms of the state’s taxation (or revenue) here
the term ts guojia de shutshou—we have in light of the context added the word “agricultural”
in brackets. The states taxation on the agricultural sector at this time was primarily and
overwhelmingly, thoughnot exclusively, conducted in the form of grain accumulation. Thus
it is also known as gong liang, or public grain. The amount of tax is calculated for the year,
and collection is done in the\summer and autumn. The major item is the chief grain crop of
the area, supplemented occasignally by other products and even cash. This is “requisitioned”
grain, or grain tax, and is considered apart from the state purchase of grain. It is considered
a part of public accumulation. See also text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraph 15; and text Jan. 27,
1957(1), paragraphs 72, 73, 74.

66. See text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraphs 4 and 16.

67. According to RMSC (1957), p. 471, in accordance with data submitted by the
National Exhibition of Agriculttre of the PRC, the total grain output in 1956 was 368.59
billion catties. It claims that this represents an increase of 152.4 billion catties above the
output of 1949, The same page in RMSC (1957) displays other tables on grain-(and other
products) output from 1949 to 1955 in metric tonnage. It should be noted that there are
Western scholars and statisticians who disagree with the growth rate suggested by Mao here,
and generally dispute PRC statistics on these matters. See J. Prybyla (1970), pp. 124—
130. Also see Kang Chao (1970), pp. 225-229.

68. The PRC’s official statistics on grain requisition and state purchasing lump the two
categories together under the “unified purchasing and unified marketing” rubric. Moreover,
the statistics run annually from the second half of one year to June the following year. Hence
it is not possible to find out specifically about 1956’s figures, or those of any calendar year.
According to RMSC (1958), p. 541, the total amount of requisitioned grain for the 1955—1956
twelve-month period was 85.99 billion catties, and that for the 1956-1957 period was 83.43
billion catties.

69. See text Dec. 8, 1956, note 6.

70. The aphorism that Mao uses here, zi si gi li, literally means “eating of one’s own
strength,” and here refers to the ability to feed oneself. The saying is derived from the “‘Fa


346 {/ MAO ZEDONG

governments at all levels made an overall inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries. The result of this inspection proved that we have achieved great success
in our country in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries. The vast majority of the
cases handled in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries were handled correctly, and
there were mistakes only in the most extremely isolated cases, and moreover, once these
were discovered they were corrected. In the summer of 1957, right-wing bourgeois elements
took advantage of this inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries as an
opportunity to raise waves and stir up winds, in an attempt to negate the achievements in the
elimination of counterrevolutionaries and to attack the Party’s policy in eliminating counterrevolutionaries. This conspiracy of theirs came to naught, in the face of the opposition of
the people of the entire country.”

51. The terms for “injustice” and “evil trends” here are zhengqi and watfeng. The
characters gi and feng both have the connotation of wind, or spirit, and, taken together, the
term fenggi has the meaning of practice or trend, or a general mood or custom. The term
zhengqi (literally, correct air, or spirit) classically refers to a metaphysical quality, a spirit
of rectitude and justice that in the teaching of Confucianism, especially that of Mencius, is
the fundamental spirit that is embodied in Heaven and Earth. In Mencius’s teaching, it is
also known as haoran zhi gi (the spirit of great nobility), and the term can be found in the
chapter ““Gongsun chou,” part 1, in the book Meng zi. The most famous literary expression
of this in Chinese traditional literature is the poem “Zhengqi ge” (Ballad on the Noble Spirit)
written by the Song-dynasty scholar and soldier-patriot-martyr Wen Tianxiang, who died
defending the Song realm from the Mongols (Yuan) in the year 1283. The first six lines of
the ballad translate as: “There is a spirit of justice in Heaven and Earth; Dissipated, it blends
into and is endowed in all flowing forms; Descending, it becomes the great rivers and the
mighty mountains; Ascending, it becomes the Sun and the Stars. In Man, it is called the
grand [spirit] of nobility. It is full, and fills the Great Void.”

The term waifeng is obviously a juxtaposition for the expression zhengqi. As a matter of
fact, the character for wai is made up of the character bu (not, or negative), sitting above the
character for zheng. The CPC has gone through quite a few processes in which all kinds of
feng (or fenggi) within it have been considered improper or incorrect (therefore wai, or not
zheng) and have stood in need of being rectified. (Interestingly, the term for “rectification”
and the term for “correct” both have the sound zheng, although of different tones, and the
latter is a root for the former.) The Party rectification of 1942 in Yanan, for instance, was to
correct the waifeng of subjectivism, sectarianism, and the so-called eight-legged type of
stereotyped writing in the Party. The three areas—dangfeng, or the prevailing practice in the
Party, wenfeng, or the area of writing, and xuefeng, or the area of learning—had to be
rectified. (See Mao, “Zhengdun dang de zuofeng” [Rectify the Party’s Style of Work], Feb.
1, 1942, in Xuanji, III, pp. 769-786, especially p. 770.) Itis significant, therefore, that these
terms, zhenggi and waifeng, are once again brought up at a moment when a new Party
rectification movement for the CPC is to be launched.

52. For the Political Consultative Conference, which 1s officially known as the Chinese
People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), see text Sept. 21, 1949, vol. I, source
note. Local committees of the CPPCC were formed in major municipalities, provinces, and
autonomous regions. The function of the CPPCC and these local committees is to enable
consultation between people’s government bodies and the democratic parties. (See RMSC
[1951], “yi” section, p. 14.)

53. The term 1s fazhi. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 84.

54. The expression translated literally here is a classical aphorism, gao zhen wu you,
which means “having not a care in the world.” It 1s derived from several places in the book
Zhanguo ce (Books of the Warring States)—from the “Qi ce” (Book of Qi) and the “Wei
ce” (Book of Wei). It is also found in the fifth Au: of the popular novel Sanguo yanyi
(Romance of the Three Kingdoms).

55. See text Jan. 17, 1951, vol. I, note 1.

56. Mao is referring to people who at the height of agricultural cooperativization in 1955


argued that it was wrong to have such an “adventurist advance,” and warned the CPC to “get
off the horse quickly,” advocating a policy of “drastic, or resolute, reduction.” See text July
31, 1955, vol. I, section 9 and note 18; also see text Dec. 6, 1955, vol. I, notes 6 and 10, and
text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, source note. (Note here that in the last of these, on p. 693 of
vol. I, “note 13” was mistakenly written for what should be “note 18.’’)

57. See text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraphs 4, 5, 6, also paragraph 12 for a different context
for the use of the expression “typhoon.”

58. See text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, note 5.

59. See text Jan. 18, 1957, note 11; also see text Dec. 27, 1955(2), vol. I, note 5.

60. See text Jan. 18, 1957, note 10, and text Mar. 12, 1950, voi. I, note 1.

61. See text Feb. 10, 1953, vol. I, note 2, on the First Five-Year Plan, and text Dec. 27,
1955(2), vol. I, note 117; text April 25, 1956, note 22, and text Aug. 30, 1956, note 8, on
the Second Five-Year Plan.

62. See text July 31, 1955, vol. I, note 21.

63. In the temporal context of this speech, the shengchan dui, or “production team,”
referred to here is the basic unit of collective production outside of and beneath the level of
the agricultural producers’ cooperative. The delineation of this unit at this time does not
involve the questions of the level-by-level size and ownership status (1.e., whether ownership
of certain means of production is to be vested in one level or the other) of the various units
known as the shengchan dadui (production brigade) and the shengchan dui (production
team), and the shengchan xiaodui (small production team). These problems came into the
picture in late 1958 and early 1959 in the early stages of agricultural communization.

64. See text April 25, 1956, section 4.

65. The “cooperatives’ accumulation” here refers primarily to the accumulation of
certain funds by the cooperatives to be held in reserve for their own development and
expense. Seetext April 25, 1956, note 26. In terms of the state’s taxation (or revenue) here
the term ts guojia de shuishou—we have in light of the context added the word “agricultural”
in brackets. The states taxation on the agricultural sector at this time was primarily and
overwhelmingly, thoughnot exclusively, conducted in the form of grain accumulation. Thus
it is also known as gong lrang, or public grain. The amount of tax is calculated for the year,
and collection is done in the\summer and autumn. The major item is the chief grain crop of
the area, supplemented occasignally by other products and even cash. This is “requisitioned”
grain, or grain tax, and is considered apart from the state purchase of grain. It is considered
a part of public accumulation. See also text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraph 15; and text Jan. 27,
1957(1), paragraphs 72, 73, 74.

66. See text Jan. 18, 1957, paragraphs 4 and 16.

67. According to RMSC (1957), p. 471, in accordance with data submitted by the
National Exhibition of Agriculture of the PRC, the total grain output in 1956 was 368.59
billion catties. It claims that this represents an increase of 152.4 billion catties above the
Output of 1949, The same page in RMSC (1957) displays other tables on grain-(and other
products) output from 1949 to 1955 in metric tonnage. It should be noted that there are
Western scholars and statisticians who disagree with the growth rate suggested by Mao here,
and generally dispute PRC statistics on these matters. See J. Prybyla (1970), pp. 124—
130. Also see Kang Chao (1970), pp. 225-229.

68. The PRC’s official statistics on grain requisition and state purchasing lump the two
categories together under the “unified purchasing and unified marketing” rubric. Moreover,
the statistics run annually from the second half of one year to June the following year. Hence
it is not possible to find out specifically about 1956’s figures, or those of any calendar year.
According to RMSC (1958), p. 541, the total amount of requisitioned grain for the 1955-1956
twelve-month period was 85.99 billion catties, and that for the 1956-1957 period was 83.43
Dillion catties.

69. See text Dec. 8, 1956, note 6.

70. The aphorism that Mao uses here, zi si gi li, literally means “eating of one’s own
strength,” and here refers to the ability to feed oneself. The saying is derived from the “Fa

i


346 {/ MAO ZEDONG

governments at all levels made an overall inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries. The result of this inspection proved that we have achieved great success
in our country in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries. The vast majority of the
cases handled in the struggle to eliminate counterrevolutionaries were handled correctly, and
there were mistakes only in the most extremely isolated cases, and moreover, once these
were discovered they were corrected. In the summer of 1957, right-wing bourgeois elements
took advantage of this inspection of the work of eliminating counterrevolutionaries as an
opportunity to raise waves and stir up winds, in an attempt to negate the achievements in the
elimination of counterrevolutionaries and to attack the Party’s policy in eliminating counterrevolutionaries. This conspiracy of theirs came to naught, in the face of the opposition of
the people of the entire country.”

51. The terms for “injustice” and “evil trends” here are zhenggi and waifeng. The
characters gi and feng both have the connotation of wind, or spirit, and, taken together, the
term fenggi has the meaning of practice or trend, or a general mood or custom. The term
zhengqi (literally, correct air, or spirit) classically refers to a metaphysical quality, a spirit
of rectitude and justice that in the teaching of Confucianism, especially that of Mencius, is
the fundamental spirit that is embodied in Heaven and Earth. In Mencius’s teaching, it is
also known as Aaoran zhi gi (the spirit of great nobility), and the term can be found in the
chapter ‘““Gongsun chou,” part 1, in the book Meng zi. The most famous literary expression
of this in Chinese traditional literature is the poem “Zhengqi ge” (Ballad on the Noble Spirit)
written by the Song-dynasty scholar and soldier-patriot-martyr Wen Tianxiang, who died
defending the Song realm from the Mongols (Yuan) in the year 1283. The first six lines of
the ballad translate as: “There ts a spirit of justice in Heaven and Earth; Dissipated, it blends
into and is endowed in all flowing forms; Descending, it becomes the great rivers and the
mighty mountains; Ascending, it becomes the Sun and the Stars. In Man, it is called the
grand [spirit] of nobility. It ts full, and fills the Great Void.”

The term waifeng ts obviously a juxtaposition for the expression zhenggi. As a matter of
fact, the character for wai is made up of the character bu (not, or negative), sitting above the
character for zheng. The CPC has gone through quite a few processes in which ail kinds of
feng (or fengqi) within it have been considered improper or incorrect (therefore wai, or not
zheng) and have stood in need of being rectified. (Interestingly, the term for “rectification”
and the term for “correct” both have the sound zheng, although of different tones, and the
latter is a root for the former.) The Party rectification of 1942 in Yanan, for instance, was to
correct the waifeng of subjectivism, sectarianism, and the so-called eight-legged type of
stereotyped writing in the Party. The three areas—dangfeng, or the prevailing practice in the
Party, wenfeng, or the area of writing, and xuefeng, or the area of learning—had to be
rectified. (See Mao, “Zhengdun dang de zuofeng” [Rectify the Party’s Style of Work], Feb.
1, 1942, in Xuanyji, IH, pp. 769-786, especially p. 770.) Itis significant, therefore, that these
terms, zhenggi and waifeng, are once again brought up at a moment when a new Party
rectification movement for the CPC is to be launched.

52. For the Political Consultative Conference, which is officially known as the Chinese
People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), see text Sept. 21, 1949, vol. I, source
note. Local committees of the CPPCC were formed in major municipalities, provinces, and
autonomous regions. The function of the CPPCC and these local committees is to enable
consultation between people’s government bodies and the democratic parties. (See RMSC
[1951], “yi section, p. 14.)

53. The term is fazhi. See text Jan. 27, 1957(1), note 84.

54. The expression translated literally here is a classical aphorism, gao zhen wu you,
which means “having not a care in the world.” It 1s derived from several places in the book
Zhanguo ce (Books of the Warring States)—from the “Qi ce” (Book of Qi) and the “Wel
ce” (Book of Wei). It is also found in the fifth Au: of the popular novel Sanguo yanyi
(Romance of the Three Kingdoms).

55. See text Jan. 177, 1951, vol. I, note 1.

56. Mao is referring to people who at the height of agricultural cooperativization in 1955