Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Great Leap Forward
- launched in January 1958
- 1958-1961
- AIMS
- POLITICAL
- to achieve economic
independence and freedom from
USSR
- to become fully Comminist
- overtake Britain and the USA in 15 years
- to become "one of the richest,
most advanced and powerful
countries in the world"
- to decentralise political control to local party cadres
- those would mobilise workforce
- SOCIAL
- to group agricultural cooperatives
into larger units - communes (about
20 000 people each)
- for communes to become military units
- every commune member
age 15-50 would become a
member of a platoon
- to abolish the private sphere of peasant life
- children would be cared for
in kindergardens, meals
provided in mess halls
- AGRICULTURAL
- to produce 430 million
tonnes of grain a year.
- a surplus can be sold
abroad to support
industries
- to force peasants to follow
Mao's eight point agricultural
constitution ased on Lysenko
methods
- to increase production
- INDUSTRIAL
- to produce 700 million tonnes of steel
per year by early 1970s
- only 5.35 tonnes per year by 1958
- to mobilise labourers to
build bridges, canals and
dams
- more, faster, better, cheaper!
- FACTORS that
influenced Mao's thinking
- ECONOMIC
- agricultural
production had
risen by only
3.6% during
the First Five
Year Plan
- needed
more
efficient
way
- mass
mobilisation of
peasant - the
best/cheapest
option
- peasants
- 70% of
population
- POLITICAL
- Mao - undisputed
leader of CPC
- does what
he wants
- Consequences of the Hundred Flowers
campaign
- no intellectuals
- party
members
fear Mao
- no one
could stand
up to him
- Feb 1958 -
responsibility for
economic went
to CPC
- party cadres
replaced experts
- INTERNATIONAL
- USSR
- the launch of
soviet Sputnik
demonstrated
Soviet superiority
to Mao
- Soviet
methods
didn't work
for China
- had to find his own way
- Mao wanted
independence
from USSR
- Mao wanted China to
become superpower
- IDEOLOGICAL
- Mao thought
economical laws
may be ignored
by mass
mobilisation
- believed in
power of
human will
- WHY DID IT FAIL
- MAO'S FAULT
- the anti-rightist campaign
1957
- crucial experts
purged
- party cadres were afraid of Mao
- did not stand up
- lied to protect their position
- huge demands
- break with the USSR
- experts withdrawn
- loans withdrawn
- debt still had to be paid for
- in grain
- a lot of
harvested
grain was
sent to the
USSR
- NOT MAO'S FAULT
- weather conditions
- 1959 - floods in the
south and drought in
the north
- peasants could not
work that efficiently
- peasants were lazy/unwilling to cooperate