Sufan movement
Sufan Movement | |
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Native name | 肃反运动 |
Location | China |
Date | 1955 July 1955 – October 1957 |
Target | Counter-revolutionaries, intellectuals, former KMT officials and political opponents of Mao Zedong, attack against "bureaucraticism" and soviet sympathetic officials |
Attack type | Political repression |
Deaths | 53,000 (Estimated) |
Victims | 214,000 (Arrested), 18 Million (Total targeted for "investigation") |
Perpetrators | Chinese Communist Party, Mao Zedong |
Motive | Elimination of political opponents of Mao Zedong, intellectuals and foreign forces |
History of the People's Republic of China |
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The Sufan movement (
Origins
The Sufan campaign originated as the development of a campaign by Mao in early 1955 against Hu Feng, a Marxist literary critic, and a purported clique of writers and intellectuals who had criticised the Communist Party's restrictive policies towards literature and the arts. They called for more freedom of expression, but were persecuted as counterrevolutionaries. 81,000 intellectuals were "unmasked and punished" and another 300,000 were deprived of their civil rights on the grounds that they were "politically unreliable".[10]
The campaign officially began after the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party issued a "Directive on launching a struggle to cleanse out hidden counter-revolutionary elements" (關於開展鬥爭肅清暗藏的反革命分子的指示) on 1 July 1955.[3] On 25 August 1955, it issued "The directive on the thorough purge and cleansing of hidden counter revolutionaries" (關於徹底肅清暗藏反革命分子的指示).[1]
Aims and targets
Unlike the 1951
The People's Daily, in an attempt to provide justification for the purge, reported that ten percent of Communist Party members were secret traitors and needed to be purged. This number appears to have been taken as a quota for the number of arrests that needed to occur.[12] There was no judicial process involved; instead, people were targeted through administrative edicts in which regular criminal procedures were ignored.[13] 2.2 million people were reported to have been investigated by September 1955. 110,000 people were purportedly "exposed" as counterrevolutionaries, though Mao continued the campaign for a further two years in the belief that another 50,000 major suspects were still at large.[10]
The ostensible aims of the Sufan campaign were the defeat of so-called "bureaucratism" within government organisations, the generation of revolutionary fervor and the eradication of purported counterrevolutionaries within the state. Alternatively, as one writer suggests, the campaign was intended to crush opponents of the socialist transformation of industry and commerce.[14] It was effectively a reaction by Mao against the rise of a technocratic bureaucracy dominated by pro-Soviet officials, following the implementation of China's Soviet-inspired First Five-Year Plan from 1953 onwards. Mao saw the new technocratic ethos in China's administration as a corruption of the "revolutionary spirit". The officials responsible were cast as "functional bourgeoisie" whose power was based on their bureaucratic authority rather than private property. Gao Gang became a particular target for his embrace of Soviet methods of industrial organisation in Manchuria; he was purged after being accused of attempting to run "an independent kingdom".[15]
Outcomes
The campaign was brought to an end in October 1957 after more than 18 million people had been targeted. Another 11 to 12 million people were still to be investigated when the campaign was ended.
According to Chinese researchers, government data (including Hu Qiaomu's figure) show that some 1.4 million intellectuals and officials were persecuted during the Sufan movement.[7][9] In addition, 214,000 people were arrested, 22,000 were executed and a total of 53,000 died.[8][9]
Jean-Louis Margolin writes in The Black Book of Communism that one source indicates 81,000 arrests during the campaign (which he claims is rather modest), while another gives 770,000 deaths. He concludes that there is no way to determine which is accurate.[16]
See also
References
- ^ a b Lowell, Dittmer (1989). "China's Continuous Revolution". University of California Press. Archived from the original on 1 July 2020. Retrieved 30 June 2020.
- ^ Lieberthal, Kenneth. (2003). Governing China: From Revolution to Reform, W.W. Norton & Co.; Second Edition.
- ^ a b "1955年7月1日 中共中央发出《关于展开斗争肃清暗藏的反革命分子的指示》". The State Council Information Office of the People's Republic of China (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 30 June 2020.
- ^ According to Lin Yutang Archived 31 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine, 肅 (su) can be translated as 整肅 [zheng3su4]2, v.t., (in communist China) to purge.
- ISBN 978-1-107-02323-9.
- ISBN 978-0-674-45536-8. Archivedfrom the original on 30 June 2020. Retrieved 30 June 2020.
- ^ a b Zhu, Zheng. "陆定一和尤金谈肃反运动". Yanhuang Chunqiu (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 30 June 2020. Retrieved 30 June 2020.
对于这一场肃反运动的审查面,"七一指示"和"八二五指示"都做出了"大约百分之五"的规定。
- ^ ISBN 978-1-940266-12-1.
- ^ a b c Wang, Gongbiao (2015). "日本侵略軍與中共暴政對中國人民造成傷害的比較". Yibao (议报) (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 23 June 2019. Retrieved 5 April 2020.
根據解密檔案:全國有140多萬知識分子和幹部在這場運動中遭受打擊,其中逮捕21.4萬人,槍決2.2萬人,非正常死亡5.3萬人。
- ^ ISBN 978-0-520-06599-4.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8108-7225-7.
- ^ Jean-Luc Domenach, "Chine: L'archipel oublie" (Paris: Fayard, 1992), p. 118
- ^ ISBN 978-0-684-85635-3.
- ISBN 978-0-389-20086-4.
- ISBN 978-1-58901-987-4.
- ISBN 0-674-07608-7p. 485