Applied in China from 1958 to 1960, the Great Leap Forward was an economic, social and political program designed by Mao Zedong in an attempt to move away from the Soviet model. Inaugurated at the 8th Congress of the Communist Party held from May 5 to 23, 1958, this friendly plan for social and economic reform and modernization of the country was to make it possible to achieve socialism more quickly, by a path adapted to the situation and to Chinese specificities. Unsuitable, this program turned out to be a fiasco, with China narrowly escaping bankruptcy. The Great Leap Forward will be a failure, particularly in the agricultural field, with disastrous consequences for the population (several tens of millions of victims).
Historical background to the Great Leap Forward
China at the end of the 1950s was a country in full swing. Communist China was originally built economically on the Stalinist model, giving priority to heavy industry. However, contrary to the Soviet Union, China at the time was still far from having ensured agricultural surpluses, because of the backwardness of the Chinese countryside. The Sino-Soviet split that began in 1956 was an opportunity for Mao to reconsider this economic policy which in any case granted only a marginal place to the peasantry, once the pivot of the Chinese revolution. /P>
To this break with the Soviet model, is added the rise in power of a contestation of the monopoly on the power of the PCC, which revealed in 1957 the Campaign of Hundred Flowers. Mao believes he must radically re-mobilize the Chinese population behind an ambitious objective, which should provide him with the opportunity to crush all opposition. This "Great Leap Forward" will however be one of his worst failures.
An ambitious program
Concretely, this program consists of the creation of a new socio-economic architecture. The country will be organized around "People's Communes", communities theoretically autonomous and controlling all the means of production available. Endowed with a quasi-military organization, highlighting the role of families and a frenzied productivism, the People's Communes must quickly become self-sufficient.
Everyone is invited to participate in manual labor, including Communist Party cadres. All available metals are collected to be smelted and turned into tools or weapons. A daily quota of harmful animals to kill, such as birds, is assigned to everyone, even children. Huge construction sites are launched, employing armies of workers.
This should make it possible to release enough resources for the Central State to set up major infrastructure programs. In practice, this policy will result in a complete disorganization of the functioning of industry and especially of Chinese agriculture. The statistics largely rigged by the Chinese regime will only hide the facts for about twenty years.
The great leap forward... or backward!
This utopian project, advocating collective development in all areas of daily life, marks an ideological break with the Soviet model. Some aspects, such as the attempt to apply health and education programs tailored to Chinese needs rather than depending on Soviet programs, respond to real needs. Overall, however, the result was a failure, particularly in agriculture, where bad weather and Mao's refusal to acknowledge mistakes made matters worse and production plummeted. In addition, the lack of competent personnel and the withdrawal of Soviet technicians in 1960 handicapped the industry.
Thus industrial production, undermined by the very low quality of products from the People's Communes, will eventually collapse , delaying China's modernization for a long time. Even worse, it is estimated that the famines caused by the Great Leap Forward resulted in the death of 20 to 43 million Chinese. Mao had to leave the head of state in 1959. The disillusioned communist leaders returned to a pragmatic policy. Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping prioritize light industry and agriculture, and tolerate a private market and the ownership of small plots of land. Power rests with a cultured elite.
This catastrophic failure of Mao will earn him a crossing of the political desert of half a dozen years, from which he will only emerge by an equally disastrous initiative:"The Cultural Revolution ."
Bibliography
- The People's Republic of China:General History of China (1949 to the Present), by Gilles Guiheux. The Beautiful Letters, 2018.
- Mao:Practice and Contradiction, by Alain Badiou. The Factory, 2011.