LET A HUNDRED FLOWERS BLOOM / MOVEMENT

The year of 1956 witnessed the cooling of relations between China and Soviet Union and the upheaval in Hungary against Russian control. The eight congress of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) adopted a new party constitution which indicated the following changes in the policy.

1. A policy of peaceful co-existence in domestic affairs
2. Admission by the CCP that accesses had been committed during the movement against the counter revolutionaries
3. Policy of co-existence with non communist parties

The relaxation in the policy of ideological regimentation was indicated by the slogans first used in May 1959 by the director of the propaganda department of the Central committee, ‘Let a Hundred schools of thought contend’. The upheaval in Poland and the student unrest and the consequent revolution in Hungary in October 1956 had created tensions in the Soviet Bloc. In November 1956 Mao Tse Tung at a meeting of the Central Committee initiated a policy of criticism of party members and welcomed a rectification campaign of party politics. The new policy was announced in a speech by Mao before the Supreme State conference on 27 February 1957.

The events in eastern Europe especially concerning the Soviet Satellite States of Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia were keenly watched by the Chinese leaders. The cautious statements of liberalization of civil rights was undertaken and a campaign to rectify the errors in the policy was guardedly launched. The speech given by Mao in February 1957 was published in June 1957 with the addition of the following six criteria to judge the words and actions of those expressing themselves under the new policy of the Hundred Flowers. (The February 1957 speech of Mao is also translated as ‘let flowers of all seasons blossom and a hundred schools contend’. The latter part refers to the Sung period – 6^th and 3^rd century B.C. – where contending schools of thought flourished in ancient china). The policy permitted the expression of those discussions which showed the following characteristics:

1. Promoting unity among the various nationalities in china, actions and words destroying this would not be permitted.
2. Promoting socialist transformation and socialist construction.
3. Consolidating and not weakening the people’s democratic dictatorship.
4. Consolidating did not weaken democratic centralism
5. Strengthening and not weakening the leadership of the Communist Party.
6. Benefiting and not harming international socialist solidarity of the peace loving people of the world. 

Mao had also emphasized that out of these six criteria, the most important ones were those relating to the socialist path and the leadership of the party. The drive for rectification of the party members, of the style of party work was to be directed against sectarianism, subjectivism and bureaucratism and was to lead to criticism and self-criticism of party action. Persuasion and not force was to be used for correcting the errors.

Immediately after the announcement of the rectification campaign of the party a wave of criticism of the policies and leaders of the party occurred throughout the country. The students of the Universities were in the lead of criticism of the communist party. The criticism expressed in the speeches and writings brought about numerous strikes and peasant riots in several parts of the country. This outbreak started immediately after the publications of Mao’s speech in June 1957.

As a consequence of the violent expression of the peoples opposition to some of the policies of the government and the encouragement provided by the Hungarian revolts, Mao had to direct the comrades to suspend the plan of holding such controlled criticism meetings. In July 1957 it was disclosed in the People’s Daily that the rectification campaign was designed to tempt the hidden counter revolutionaries and the ‘rightist opportunists’ to come out. An anti rightist campaign was undertaken to eliminate the opposition in the usual way – self denunciation, humiliating confessions, social pressures, loss of position, imprisonment and even execution.

After expressing opposition of the intellectuals, democratic parties and academicians, now their attention was directed to the military leaders. Teng Hsiao-Ping the Secretary general of the communist party in November 1957 pointed out that ‘individualistic tendencies’ had appeared among the military officers. They had become alienated from the main stream and joined the rightists in denouncing the colletiveization of agriculture. There was a need to reestablish discipline even if it meant reverting to the old policy.

As a first step to revert to the old policy of violence and political persecution to a policy termed Hsiafang drive or a ‘downward transfer’ drive was initiated in September 1957. It began as a movement to discipline the teacher and university students who had displayed unrest during the Hundred Flowers Period.

The downward transfer in a couple of months covered hundreds of thousands of young educated elite. In November 1957 nearly three million students were sent to rural sections to work on collective farms. This was intended to combat ‘bureaucratism’ and prevent a ‘separation from the masses’ of the cadres and the educated. This became a permanent programme of education as all functionaries including high army officers were to serve one month a year in rural areas or at lower levels of their own organizations thus establishing contacts with the masses.