Chapter 24 Redefining Revolution

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Chapter 24Redefining Revolution

• Nate Schisler
• HIST 346E - Shao

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Deng Xiaoping

• Emerged as the most important leader within party
  regime
• Made a speech at the end of major CCP conference
• Meeting worked out the details of the program for
  the Four Modernizations
• Agriculture
• Science and Technology
• National Defense
• Industry

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Deng Xiaoping

• Speech emphasized freedom of though
• Mao Zedong Thought
• Marxism-Leninism
• Adherence to party lines
• Believed that the fruition of these mindsets
  could not truly be achieved without an
  emancipation of the mind

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Deng Xiaoping The Speech

• Believed the party and the people were
  endeavoring on a new Long March
• Asked the people to seek truth from facts

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Deng Xiaoping The Speech

• Argued that the rigidity in thinking of his CCP
  comrades was a result of specific historical
  conditions
• Idealogical taboos set up by Lin Biao
• Over-beuracratization of the party
• No clear distinction between right and wrong
• Being content with the status quo
• Once peoples thinking becomes rigid, they will
  increasingly act according to fixed notions.

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Deng Xiaoping The Speech

• Xiaoping cites an interesting paradox
• People whos thinking becomes rigid tend to veer
  with the wind
• Points out that intellectual study that isnt
  juxtaposed on reality is a grave malady
• Sought the integration of theory and practice
• Believed this could finally lead to the
  integration of Mao Zedong Thought and
  Marxism-Leninism

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Deng Xiaoping The Speech

• Believed that while Mao was a great leader, he,
  like any other leader, was not infallible
• To demand that of any revolutionary leader would
  be inconsistent with Marxism.
• Suggested the party must start learning all over
  again
• The party should try to integrate their studies
  with the concrete practice of our modernization
  drive.
• Believed true learning can only be accomplished
  by learning in different ways practice, books,
  experience, others

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Questions

• What were the four modernizations?
• What did Xiaoping believe the Chinese people
  needed to do?
• What did Xiaoping believe some of the effects of
  rigid thinking were?

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On a village market street

• The Four Modernizations had immediate impacts in
  the rural community and peasant life
• This story is an account of a trial taking
  place in a market street where Uncle Feng was
  being asked to testify as to events that took
  place earlier that day

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Uncle Feng

• Peasant farmer in the small town of Pear Blossom
  Village.
• Tall, 40-ish, known drunkard and penniless
  farmhand
• Feng is being questioned about something that
  took place earlier that morning...then he starts
  to give crowd-pleasing responses
• We all live on this street, why fuss?

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Uncle Feng The Rant

• Secretary Cao, running the investigation, uses
  Xiaopings trademark line If I were you Uncle
  Feng, I would seek the truth from facts and speak
  out!
• His response is not what the secretary was
  expecting
• Begins a self-deprecating rant, then talks about
  how much extra crop he was able to grow and
  harvest that year.
• Secretary Cao, its up to you whether I get my
  grain ration. But I dont care! This year, even
  without it, I, Uncle Feng, can still survive.

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Uncle Feng The Rant

• What can you do? Do you dare to touch me? If
  you want to have a fight, try it today!
• Secretary Coa tries several times to calm him
  down but to no avail.
• He completely refutes all authority she has over
  him, past, present and future
• Uncle Feng quickly won the adoration of the crowd
  and were made to believe that this liberation in
  thinking will lead to a new culture in the town
  of Pear Blossom Village

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Questions

• What is the significance of Uncle Fengs arguably
  disrespectful rant towards Secretary Cao?
• Is this emancipation of the mind or a
  revolutionary leader who just cant be expected
  to be infallible?