The Cultural Revolution: Memories and legacies 50 years on
The year 2016 marks the 50th anniversary of the launch of the Cultural Revolution in China, where controversy continues to rage over its meaning and its legacies. The Communist Party's unequivocal condemnatory labelling of the entire movement as"a grave'left' error…responsible for the most severe setback and the heaviest losses suffered by the Party, the state and the people since the founding of the People's Republic" has remained in place since 1981. Yet, even decades after the Party's official resolution, the Cultural Revolution remains a lightning rod for contention, particularly in Chinese cyberspace. As a result, in March 2016, with the anniversary of the start of the Cultural Revolution still months away, the Party tabloid, Global Times (Huanqiu shibao环球时报), issued an ominous warning against "small groups" that might seek to generate "a totally chaotic misunderstanding of the Cultural Revolution."The editorial sternly remindedGlobal Timesreaders that"discussions strictly should not depart from the Party's decided politics or thinking," a prohibition that appears to have short-circuited both popular discussion and scholarly reflection on this critical watershed in 20th-century Chinese politics.