The Great Leap Forward

The Great Leap Forward

Analysis of its failure and consequences

The Great Leap Forward

• What is the Great Leap Forward?• A five year plan to develop the agriculture

and industry in China

• When did the Great Leap Forward take place?• 1958-c.1960

Why did Mao launch the Great Leap Forward?

• Mao believed that both industry and agriculture had to grow to make the other work. The industry had to be well fed to be good industry workers, and agriculture needed industry to make good tools for them

• Also as a means to pay the Soviet Union for the expertise it offered for the first Five-Year Plan

How did the Great Leap Forward affect China?

Commune System• In order to make the industry and agriculture

grow, China was reformed into a series of communes.

• A commune is a relatively small, often rural community whose members share common interests, work, and income and often own property collectively.

“Back-yard" production plantsThe most famous were 600,000 backyard furnaces which

produced steel for the communes.


Consequences of the backyard furnaces• Many of the male agricultural workers were

diverted from the harvest to help the iron production, eventually leaving the harvest to rot or feasted by pests

• Due to lack of knowledge on metallurgy, the output of backyard furnaces consisted of low quality lumps of pig iron which was of negligible economic worth


Mao’s reaction towards the backyard furnaces fiasco• Only in January 1959, Mao found out that high

quality steel could only be produced in large scale factories using reliable fuel such as coal, not backyard furnaces

• However, he decided not to order a halt to the backyard steel furnaces so as not to dampen the revolutionary enthusiasm of the masses.

• The program was only quietly abandoned much later in that year.


Industrialization• Mao saw grain and steel production as the key

pillars of economic development and forecast that within 15 years of the start of the Great Leap, China's steel production would surpass that of the UK.

• Millions of Chinese became state workers and the urban population swelled by 31.24 million people.


Consequences of industrialization• The millions of new workers and urban

residents placed major stress on China's food-rationing system, which led to increased and unsustainable demands on rural food production.

• (Why unsustainable demands on rural food production?)


Large-Scale Construction Projects• In order to increase agricultural output and

improve farming techniques, major irrigation works were carried out.

• These works were often built without input from trained engineers.


Consequences of the large-scale projects• Lack of technical expertise from trained

engineers caused the projects to poorly planned

• A large number of villagers, working as corvée, were left exhausted and starving, in order to complete the mismanaged irrigation projects


Mao’s reaction to the consequences of large projects• "Wu Zhipu claims he can move 30 billion cubic

metres; I think 30,000 people will die. Zeng Xisheng has said that he will move 20 billion cubic metres, and I think that 20,000 people will die. Weiqing only promises 600 million cubic metres, maybe nobody will die.”

• Nevertheless, Mao still did not prohibit the use of corvée in irrigation works.


Farming Techniques• Belief in “close cropping”, whereby seeds

were sown far more densely than normal on the incorrect assumption that seeds of the same class would not compete with each other.

• Belief in concentrating fertilizers, effort and resources only the most fertile land would lead to large per-acre productivity gains


Consequences of the farming techniques• Crop failure• The belief that the most fertile land should be

worked on left other moderately productive land to be unplanted

• This resulted in shortage of food supply to meet the increasing demands of the urban population and also to pay of Soviet debts


Mass mobilization and propaganda• Increasing use of propaganda to mobilize the

masses to participate in the Great Leap Forward• Party leaders modeled the way by working on

the ground• Propaganda brought about high enthusiasm for

the project and the self-belief that it would succeed

Card issued to celebrate the Great Leap Forward

Human-sized Melons


• The success of the first Five-Year Plan also contributed to the self-belief that the GLF would be able to achieve its objectives

• Villages that were able to exceed production targets would be praised and featured as examples for other villages to follow


Consequences of the political action over GLF• Agricultural output was low due to crop failures, lack

of manpower for harvest (and later natural disasters destroying the fields)

• But the party’s demands must be met and to avoid political repercussions, false output figures were reported to the party committee

• The State took away grains based on what was reported, leaving little or no food for the villagers

How much of GLF’s failure was due to human error?

• Lack of expertise in pursuing the projects• Lack of honesty in reporting output figures to

the State• Mao’s inaction, and at times, indifference

towards the problems facing GLF (Why?)• Lack of criticism towards the policies

implemented (Why?)


• Lack of criticism towards the policies implemented because– Fear of political persecution, criticisms towards Mao

or the Party would be seen as anti-Rightist– Climate of fear was entrenched due to

• Persecution of class enemies at the beginning of CCP’s rule in China

• Anti-Rightist Campaign targeted people who criticized the Party during the Hundred Flowers Campaign

• Defence Minister, Peng Dehuai, was demoted because he criticized GLF


• Mao did not take much action to rectify the mistakes of the Great Leap Forward because– He did not want to dampen the revolutionary

enthusiasm of the masses• Mao believed that there must be constant revolutions

in order to reach the Communist state and therefore the revolutionary spirit must not be extinguished from the people.


• Mao did not take much action to rectify the mistakes of the Great Leap Forward also because of– Admission of the GLF failure will result in him

being seen as fallible– This would put his legitimacy as a leader and the

legitimacy of CCP as sole ruling party in China in serious doubt

How much of GLF’s failure due to natural circumstances?

• Proponents of the theory that GLF failed largely due to natural circumstances argued that– Natural disasters affected GLF and China greatly• In 1959 and 1960, droughts, floods, and general bad

weather caught China completely by surprise• In July 1959, the Yellow River flooded in East China,

destroying crops and homes, displacing people and causing famine

How much of GLF’s failure due to unforeseen circumstances?

• Proponents of the theory that GLF failed largely due to unforeseen circumstances argued that

• Mao believed so much in the ability of the willpower and revolutionary spirit of the Chinese people– Due to past precedents how China and the CCP had overcome

the Long March, civil war with KMT, Japanese invasion, the Korean war and the first Five Year Plan objectives

• Hence he did not foresee the need to rely on intellectual and technical expertise for GLF

How much of GLF’s failure due to unforeseen circumstances?

• Proponents of the theory that GLF failed largely due to unforeseen circumstances argued that– The masses just followed what the CCP ordered

because• The CCP had introduced certain reforms to transform

China from a backward country to one moving towards modernization

• To disobey CCP would result in repercussions

– Hence they did not foresee that for once, CCP’s policies would result in a disaster

Counter-argument to GLF failed due to natural and unforeseen circumstances

• Mao did not use the power and the authority that he had to stop the GLF even if he could not foresee that unforeseen circumstances like lack of knowledge and blind following were hampering GLF and affecting the people


• Party leaders knew about famine and starvation yet the following were their responses:

• "When there is not enough to eat people starve to death. It is better to let half of the people die so that the other half can eat their fill.”– Mao Zedong


• “This is the price we have to pay, it's nothing to be afraid of. Who knows how many people have been sacrificed on the battlefields and in the prisons [for the revolutionary cause]? Now we have a few cases of illness and death: it's nothing!”– Chen Yi, foreign minister

The end of the Great Leap Forward

• By 1960, the Great Leap Forward was abandoned without any official statement

• Mao stepped down as State Chairman of the PRC though he did retain his position as Chairman of the CPC

• Liu Shaoqi (the new PRC Chairman) and reformist Deng Xiaoping (CPC General Secretary) were left in charge to change policy to bring about economic recovery.

The end of the Great Leap Forward

• Among the reforms introduced by Liu and Deng in order to reverse the effects of GLF were– Private land was reinstated and the communes

and collectives were cut down– Small enterprises were allowed to make profits

• How would Mao respond to the reversal of the socialist policies that he implemented?

Documents

The Great Leap Forward