The Chinese developmental state during the Cold War: the making of the 1956 twelve-year science and technology plan

Abstract

In 1956, the government of the People’s Republic of China made a 12-year plan for scientific and technological developments (‘The Long-term Plan for the Development of Science and Technology for 1956–1967’), often credited as a visionary blueprint for its nuclear weapons programs and industrialization. Yet, this study suggests that the plan was not the logical manifestation of a unified national leadership, but rather the result of political contestations and compromises among the Communist party-state leaders, especially between Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, and between the state and the scientific–technological elite. It further indicates that the making of Chinese science and technology policy was shaped by the cold war geopolitics, national developmental aspirations and transnational influences, especially from the Soviet Union and the USA.