THE THOUGHT REFORM OF INTELLECTUALS

In: The annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Band 321, S. 82-89

Abstract

The Chinese Communists (C's) need the services of the Chinese intellectuals & yet distrust them as products of bourgeois society. Since 1949, the regime has adopted various measures to reform the intellectuals to make them acceptable & useful to the new C society. At first, comparatively mild forms of `study' & pol'al indoctrination were used. Later, the intellectuals were asked to take part in various `revolutionary movements' & in `class struggle' in both countryside & city. By 1951 the pressure was intensified, & the intellectuals were organized to practice criticism & self-criticism & to make public confessions of past errors. Then, in an attempt to curb deviant ideas not compatible with Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideology, the C's launched successive campaigns against bourgeois & other `unproletarian' thinking. A new trend in the treatment of the intellectuals seemed to be appearing in 1956, when the intellectuals were offered new privileges, even a measure of freedom of thought. However, when the intellectuals took advantage of the liberalization & frankly expressed their criticism of the C program, they were branded as `rightists' & attacked again. Since 1957 there has, been a further tightening of ideological controls on the mainland. AA.