Mao Zedong's legacy is littered with economic and social policies whose only successes were in bringing pain and suffering to millions of Chinese citizens. Even before the 1966 Cultural Revolution, Mao had embarked on several experiments designed to make China a classless society and a world superpower. Disaster after disaster failed to curb his misguided enthusiasm for building a communist utopia.
1951-52: Purging Enemies of the State
These enemies consisted of 'war criminals, traitors, bureaucratic capitalists and counter revolutionaries'. The campaign was combined with party-sponsored mass trials attended by large crowds. The major targets were foreigners and Christian missionaries who were branded as United States agents. The purges were accompanied by land reform targeting landlords and wealthy farmers. An ideological campaign requiring self-criticism and public confessions by university faculty members, scientists and other professionals received wide publicity. Artists and writers were soon the objects of similar treatment for failing to heed Mao's dictum that culture and literature must reflect the interest of the workers.
1953-57: First Five-Year Plan
Among China's most pressing demands in the early 1950s was for Soviet-supplied technology, capital equipment and military hardware. To pay for these items China had to export the one thing it didn't have in abundance - food.
1956-57: The Hundred Flowers Movement