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Book

The world turned upside down : a history of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

Call Number

  • 951.056 Y225 (CEN)

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Edition

First American edition.

Publication Information

New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021.

Physical Description

xlii, 722 pages : map ; 24 cm

Summary

"The only complete history of the Cultural Revolution by an independent scholar based in mainland China, 'The World Turned Upside Down' makes a crucial contribution to understanding the Cultural Revolution and its lasting influence today"--

As a major political event and a crucial turning point in the history of the People's Republic of China, the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) marked the zenith as well as the nadir of Mao Zedong's ultra-leftist politics. Reacting in part to the Soviet Union's "revisionism" that he regarded as a threat to the future of socialism, Mao mobilized the masses in a battle against what he called "bourgeois" forces within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). This ten-year-long class struggle on a massive scale devastated traditional Chinese culture as well as the nation's economy. Yang makes a crucial contribution to understanding those years' lasting influence today. -- adapted from jacket

Notes

Originally published in Chinese by Cosmos Books, Hong Kong, 2016.

Contents

  • Major events preceding the Cultural Revolution
  • Lighting the fuse
  • Removing obstructions
  • The May Conference : formal launch of the Cultural Revolution
  • Liu Shaoqi's Anti-Rightist Movement
  • Major incidents during the eleventh plenum
  • The Red Guards and Red August
  • Denouncing the bourgeois reactionary line
  • The rise : actions, and demise of mass organizations
  • The "Workers Command Post" and Shanghai's "January Storm"
  • The "February Countercurrent" and the "February suppression of counterrevolutionaries"
  • The armed formed forces and the "three supports and two militaries"
  • "Red through every hill and vale"
  • The Wuhan incident and Mao's strategic shift
  • The baffling "May 16" investigation
  • The cleansing of the class ranks
  • The one strilke and three antis campaign
  • Mass killings carried out by those in power
  • The twelfth plenum of the Eighth Central Committe eliminating Liu Shaoqi
  • The Ninth National Party Congress: from unity to division
  • Fogged in on Lushan : the second plenum of the Ninth Central Committee
  • Chen Boda's denunciation and Lin Biao
  • as a leftist or rightist?
  • Internal struggle during the campaign to criticize Lin Biao and Confucius
  • From general overhaul to the campaign against Deng and right-deviating verdict-reversal
  • The April Fifth Movement
  • The curtain falls on the Cultural Revolution
  • China's foreign relations during the Cultural Revolution
  • Reform and opening under the bureaucratic system.
  • Major events preceding the Cultural Revolution
  • Lighting the fuse
  • Removing obstructions
  • The May Conference: formal launch of the Cultural Revolution
  • Liu Shaoqi's Anti-Rightist Movement
  • Major incidents during the eleventh plenum
  • The Red Guards and Red August
  • Denouncing the bourgeois reactionary line
  • The rise, actions, and demise of mass organizations
  • The "Workers Command Post" and Shanghai's "January Storm"
  • The "February Countercurrent" and the "February suppression of counterrevolutionaries"
  • The armed forces and the "three supports and two militaries"
  • "Red through every hill and vale"
  • The Wuhan incident and Mao's strategic shift
  • The baffling "May 16" investigation
  • The cleansing of the class ranks
  • The one strilke and three antis campaign
  • Mass killings carried out by those in power
  • The twelfth plenum of the Eighth Central Committe: eliminating Liu Shaoqi
  • The Ninth National Party Congress: from unity to division
  • Fogged in on Lushan: the second plenum of the Ninth Central Committee
  • Chen Boda's denunciation and Lin Biao's escape attempt
  • Critizing Lin Biao--as a leftist or rightist?
  • Internal struggle during the campaign to criticize Lin Biao and Confucius
  • From general overhaul to the campaign against Deng and right-deviating verdict-reversal
  • The April Fifth Movement
  • The curtain falls on the Cultural Revolution
  • China's foreign relations during the Cultural Revolution
  • Reform and opening under the bureaucratic system.

Subjects