Wang Jiaxiang, Mao Zedong and the ‘Triumph of Mao Zedong-Thought’ (1935–1945)

Reviewed by: Zhou Enlai: The Enigma Behind Chairman Mao by Michael Dillon Yafeng Xia (bio) Michael Dillon. Zhou Enlai: The Enigma Behind Chairman Mao. London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2020. xi, 302 pp. Paperback $29.95, isbn 978-178-831-930-0. Among several books in English on the late Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai (who served from 1949 to 1976), two stand out. The first, by Barbara Barnouin and Yu Changgen, “explores the nature of” Zhou’s political behavior and assesses how such behavior affected twentieth-century Chinese history.1 The second, by former senior Chinese Communist Party (CCP) historian Gao Wenqian, which is based on classified party documents and personal interviews with high-level party officials, provides a revisionist account of Zhou Enlai. This volume is an abridged English translation of Gao’s Wannian Zhou Enlai (Zhou Enlai’s Later Years), which, having been adapted for Western readers, includes the stories of Zhou’s earlier years prior to the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) and elaborates the political context of the Cultural Revolution and the behavior of other actors (chapters 2–7, pp. 21–104).2 Relying primarily on Chinese sources supplemented with writings by Western journalists who visited CCP bases during the War of Resistance against Japan and foreign diplomats stationed in Beijing in the 1950s and the 1960s, Michael Dillon presents a sympathetic account of Zhou’s life from his birth in 1898 to his death in 1976 in twenty-three chapters. This is a standard biography of Zhou, covering his childhood, education, upbringing, personality, political activism, and revolutionary activities, presenting a thorough picture of Zhou the diplomat and statesman. Dillon argues, “This private side of Zhou Enlai is one [End Page 263] of the reasons why he became the world’s favorite Chinese Communist, but Zhou’s character was complex” (p. viii). According to Dillon, Zhou “was a statesman rather than simply a political operator and achieved much on the international stage” (p. ix). But scholars on Zhou Enlai and the history of the CCP will not be pleased, as the book does not add much to what they have already known about Zhou. To correctly understand and evaluate Zhou’s historical role in the Chinese Communist movement and the People’s Republic of China (PRC), it is crucial that we correctly understand Zhou’s relationship with Mao Zedong, the CCP Chairman and China’s paramount leader from 1949 to 1976. The reviewer cannot agree with several of Dillon’s major assertions, such as, “Zhou had remained personally close to Mao, never criticized him in public, and was himself never criticized openly :: : . Eventually he was attacked, viciously but covertly, by Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing” (p. 264). I feel that the author is unfamiliar with some of the new findings on Zhou Enlai that have been revealed in the last two decades. In the following paragraphs, I try to set the record straight. The relationship between Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong has attracted much scholarly attention, and it is a key issue in our understanding of Chinese politics in the late 1960s and early 1970s. There are three popular models of the relationship: Zhou was a faithful follower of Mao; Zhou was a puppet of Mao; and Zhou was a moderating force on Mao, which is the version the official Chinese Communist historiography promotes.3 Dillon falls into the third model, as he writes, “During the Great Leap and particularly the Cultural Revolution, Zhou was in an impossible position. To survive, he said and did things he would have preferred not to. By surviving, he ensured a degree of damage limitation and protected many friends and colleagues” (p. 270). For years, Zhou was “the Beloved People’s Premier,” a sensitive and effective administrator and a moderating force in the PRC’s politics. He was good-looking, urbane, brilliant, and a master diplomat. He always valued the nation’s needs above his own. He managed to save hundreds of purged officials during the Cultural Revolution. But Gao Wenqian turns the tables on Zhou. According to Gao, Zhou was a tragic backroom schemer, a puppet of his master Mao, and a man who so rigorously observed a...

Throughout the history of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), disagreement has existed concerning the extent to which Chinese Communism might be considered authentically Marxist. In general, most of the available literature tends to simply accept the Chinese Communist self-identification as Marxist. No binding consensus among independent Sinologists, however, is found and resistance has taken on a variety of forms throughout the history of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)—some partisan and some genuinely analytic. The academic literature produced during the entire period of CCP rule in China has been characterized by wide differences in the acceptance of its Marxist authenticity. It has always been tacitly or explicitly accepted that the Marxism of the CCP at its founding in 1920–1921 was in a form acceptable to the Bolshevik rulers of revolutionary Russia. Having been founded directly through the influence of the Third (or Leninist) International, the CCP had to conform to the Bolshevik interpretation of Marxism. Since Lenin had taken “creative” liberties with the original doctrine, some have maintained that the Marxism of the CCP had never been truly Marxist. To add further difficulty to any analysis of the Marxism of the CCP, it is generally understood that Mao Zedong, who gradually assumed the leadership of the CCP, was not particularly well versed in any variant of Marxism. Over the years and under the pressure of circumstances, Mao delivered varied formulations of his revolutionary ideology. How much those formulations accorded with any variant of Marxism became a matter of interpretation. Some scholars hold that by the time of the “Great Leap Forward,” Mao had devised his own ideology. All of this speculation generated controversy within the CCP leadership. By the time of Mao’s demise in 1976, the doctrine of a “second revolution” animated Deng Xiaoping and his followers. It is still a matter of considerable controversy whether that post-Maoist doctrine, in any sense, is Marxist in content or aspiration.

It All Hinges on China: Environmental Governance in the Twenty-First Century

Reviewed by: Staging Chinese Revolution: Theater, Film, and the Afterlives of Propaganda by Xiaomei Chen Rosemary Roberts Staging Chinese Revolution: Theater, Film, and the Afterlives of Propaganda by Xiaomei Chen. New York: Columbia University Press, 2016, Pp. xiv + 363. $60.00 cloth, $59.99 e-book. Xiaomei Chen begins Staging Chinese Revolution with an acknowledgments section that reveals her distinctive positioning as author in relation to her subject matter. Very much in the manner of Ruru Li’s excellent study of Beijing opera performance in modern China, Xiaomei Chen’s book combines the intimate subjective understanding of the insider with the objective and critical eye of the outsider.1 Chen’s acknowledgments, along with personal recollections scattered through the book, locate a crucial part of her own life experience as part of the “big family” of the China Youth Art Theater in Beijing during the 1950s and 1960s, when it was performing many of the “red classic” (hongse jingdian 红色经典) plays under discussion in Chen’s book. This intimate personal knowledge of China’s theater world informs Chen’s central argument: political propaganda in Chinese theater and film has never been just a task imposed from the top down; rather, it has been a complex and fundamentally willing collaboration between Chinese Communist Party (CCP) elites and a performing arts community that was ideologically committed to communist ideals and a socialist society. Playwrights, directors, and performers were not and are not hapless victims of the regime. Instead, they are active participants in the creation of political propaganda that functions through changing political and social environments to support the Party-state. To substantiate her argument, Chen investigates the most extreme forms of communist theater and film propaganda of the post-1949 era: historical narratives of Party leaders and revolutionary music-and-dance epics. Representations of former Party leaders Chen Duxiu 陈独秀, Mao Zedong 毛泽东, and Deng Xiaoping 邓小平 each form the central focus of a single chapter, while a separate chapter discusses the [End Page 204] three major music-and-dance epics, The East Is Red (Dongfang hong 东方红, 1964), The Song of the Chinese Revolution (Zhongguo geming zhi ge 中国革命之歌, 1984), and The Road to Revival (Fuxing zhi lu 复兴之路, 2009). An epilogue briefly considers how the representation of the revolution’s “founding mothers” has dwindled to traditionally gendered “supporting roles” (p. 287). Chen’s introductory chapter begins by locating her research within contemporary propaganda studies and then previews the core chapters listed above. Its most valuable contribution, however, lies in the second half of the chapter, which delves into the contemporaneous beginnings of the CCP and modern Chinese theater during the 1920s to demonstrate that close ideological and often personal links have existed between the two since their inception. Through an analysis of the work of the three “founding fathers” of modern Chinese theater, Tian Han 田汉, Hong Shen 洪深, and Ouyang Yuqian 歐阳玉倩, Chen argues: Tian and his cohorts visualized and staged a socialist blueprint in the leftist literary and dramatic tradition of the Republican period that paved the way for the construction of a socialist canon through his early writings during the first decades of the twentieth century, the war years, and the early years before and after the founding days of the PRC. (p. 30) Further, Chen argues that these three founding fathers trained generations of theater artists in the realist tradition. Their students have, in turn, gone on to participate in the creation of modern and contemporary canons, continually producing theater, film, and TV productions on revolutionary histories and the CCP leadership. Examples of the links between the early generations of Party elites and the theater world are well known. Mao trusted Tian Han to recommend which of two thousand submissions should be chosen as the design for the new national flag, and Zhou Enlai 周恩来 supported the use of Tian’s lyrics for the new national anthem (p. 31). Zhou Enlai himself is also known to have performed in progressive plays as a university student during the May Fourth period, and he personally over-saw the production of The East Is Red in 1964. In an era when theater was the primary vehicle available for spreading the socialist message— a message to which both theater professionals...

Thirty years of reform have brought significant changes not only to the economy but also to the nature of governance and the challenges that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will face in the future. Before the reform program started, policy was decided by a small elite based in Beijing, with Mao Zedong often dominant, and with few alternative sources of information for China’s citizens either with which to assess government performance or to compare China with government performance in other countries. A relatively small percentage of the population was urbanized and a modern middle class was nonexistent. The current situation faced by the CCP is dramatically different with an urban population that exceeds 50 percent, a growing middle class, an economy that is increasingly integrated with global production chains and a population that is networked. This creates new challenges for governance, especially with respect to rising expectations from an increasingly affluent population, and from the challenge of new social media and information flows. The CCP leadership under General Secretary Xi Jinping has clearly identified control over new social media as a significant challenge together with more effectively combatting corruption within the CCP. However, the major factor determining the CCP’s continued rule will rest primarily on its management of the economy, the subject of another paper.

One of the most distinctive aspects of modern Chinese politics is the role of Tse-tung's This study investigates the concrete political and ideological process which gave rise to Mao's thought within the Chinese Communist Party, with special reference to the years 1935-45. This decade, which overlaps the Yenan period in Chinese Communist historiography, opens with Mao Tse-tung's rise to power at the Tsunyi Conference, and closes with the formal incorporation of his thought into the new CCP constitution at the Party's Seventh Congress. In the course of the study, it became apparent that Mao Tse-tung played a strong personal role in fostering the cult of his own person and thought. However, he received the enthusiastic support of a small group of Party intellectuals who gathered around him, of whom the most important is Ch'en Po-ta. Pending further research, conclusions regarding Ch'en's role must remain tentative, hut the initial evidence does suggest his influence on certain aspects of Mao's thinking, and in the formulation of a historio-philosophical rationale for Mao's claim to ideological supremacy. The study falls into two main periods; 1935-40 were years of ideological creativity, when the basic ideas behind Sinified were worked out by Mao and Ch'en; 1940-45 were years of ideological console idation, when the two men worked to systematize and disseminate Mao's thought as the CCP's official guiding doctrine. The conclusion emerges that the cult of Mao and his thought was not merely a simple concomitant of Mao's rise to power during this period. Rather, the dual cult was consciously created and propagated within and without the CCP as a deliberate act of policy on the part of the ascendant Maoists, with Mao and Ch'en very much at the core of this policy. From time to time, developments within the CCP, in Chinese domestic politics, and in the international arena intervened to accelerate or retard the Maoists' deliberate campaign to foster the ascendancy of Mao's thought. However, by the time of the CCP's Seventh Congress in 1945, the victorious Maoists had succeeded in their joint drive for the ''primitive accumulation of political and ideological power. Mao's power was by no means absolute, but the Chinese Communist Party -- and shortly the entire nation -- had entered the era of Tse-tung's In sum, this study contributes to our understanding of the Chinese Communist movement in four areas. It develops previous discussions of the ideological history of the CCP, especially regarding the emergence of the concepts of the Sinification of Marxism and Tse-tung's In using these ideological concepts as points of reference, this thesis also offers a distinctive approach to the study of elite politics within the CCP during the Yenan period. At the same time, Mao Tse-tung's personal role in fostering the twin cult of himself and his thought is brought into sharper focus than in previous studies. Finally, our knowledge of the early career of Ch'en Po-ta is considerably enhanced, particularly regarding his role as Party ideologist and historian in the service of Mao Tse-tung.

Research Article| January 01 1966 Communist China: A Quiet Crisis in Revolution Michel Oksenberg Michel Oksenberg Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Far Eastern Survey (1937) 6 (1): 1–12. https://doi.org/10.2307/2642254 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Twitter LinkedIn Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Michel Oksenberg; Communist China: A Quiet Crisis in Revolution. Far Eastern Survey 6 January 1937; 6 (1): 1–12. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/2642254 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAsian Survey Search This content is only available via PDF. Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

The early relationship between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Kuomintang (KMT) is regarded as an important issue in contemporary Chinese history, but the explanation of this phenomenon has differed for a long time. There is a major dispute in controversy in interpretations of this event. Some hold that the KMT ”accommodated Communists,” and the CCP insists that the Communists ”allied with the KMT,” The CCP realized that allying with the KMT was the correct choice at the time, and it was also in accordance with the Marxist-Leninist revolution strategy. Why dose the CCP say so? And what is the truth? This essay, from the perspective of the history of the Chinese Communist movement, attempts to understand what the CCP means by the ”historical conditions of the time?” Why was cooperation with the KMT the right historical choice? Is it possible or not to say, from the point of view of the CCP, that joining the KMT was ”the only choice?” In the 1920's, both parties were facing the difficulties of social mobilization, and there also existed the complementary interaction for revolutionary identification. In fact, the CCP leaders of that time clearly recognized that the only method which Dr. Sun Yet-sen would accept was that Communists could join the KMT as individuals, instead of as a group under the name of the CCP. On the other hand, because the Comintern was supporting both the CCP and the KMT, if the CCP did not join the KMT, the Comintern might have had to choose between the two parties. Since the danger of losing the support of the Comintern was much greater than that of joining the KMT, we may say that for the CCP, joining the KMT was in fact the one and only choice they had at the time.

Mao Tse-tung was clearly the unchallenged leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) throughout the 1949-57 period. In this period, broad agreement existed within the CCP leadership on adopting the Soviet model of socialism. The essence of Mao's program for revolution before 1949 had been the need to address Chinese realities, and he was not about to disown that principle during the stage of building socialism. Differences in economic and cultural levels, agricultural patterns, local customs, and ethnic composition all required suitably varied responses. The crucial difference, however, was the degree of CCP presence in various areas before 1949. In addition to gradualism, the common program adopted the classic united front tactic of narrowly defining enemies as 'imperialism, feudalism and bureaucratic capitalism'. The crucial task for the new liberated areas generally was land reform. To this task the CCP brought experience and personnel that were often lacking for the more complex conditions of the cities.

Between 1949 and 1976, under Mao Zedong’s 毛泽东 leadership, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) implemented socialist economic policies. In the 1950s, the central planning of industry (with an emphasis on heavy industry) was introduced, modeled on the five-year plans of the Soviet Union, and agriculture was collectivized. Following the collapse of the Great Leap Forward and the political split with Moscow, China’s economic policies in the 1960s and 1970s vacillated between Mao’s ultraleftist tendencies and more conventional socialist policies advocated by such leaders as Liu Shao-ch’i 刘少奇 and Deng Xiaoping 邓小平. Mao attacked his opponents for taking the capitalist road and largely succeeded in suppressing their proposed policies until his death in 1976. After Mao’s death, advocacy of various reforms became more acceptable. One important early sign of the new atmosphere was the announcement in 1977 that entrance examinations for China’s universities (which had been attacked and closed down during the Cultural Revolution) would be reestablished. Deng Xiaoping returned to power, and at the Third Plenum (of the Eleventh Central Committee of the CCP) in December 1978 the famous four-character policy gaige kaifang (改革开放), a reform of the economic system and an opening up to the outside world, was promulgated. Beyond the strong signal that the reforms were intended to remedy some of Mao’s mistakes, it was not clear exactly what the slogan would entail in practice. Indeed, even in the early 21st century the specifics of the reforms are still the subject of substantial disagreements within the CCP leadership. However, there can be no doubt that the reforms since 1978 generally have succeeded in both the system reform aspect, marked by the decollectivization of agriculture and the dismantling of Soviet-style central planning in industry, and the opening-up aspect, leading to China’s entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001. It is also beyond doubt that the reforms have resulted in rapid economic growth (by the official statistics, an average annual growth of real gross domestic product of 9.7 percent between 1980 and 2009). However, it is also true that in the early 21st century many Chinese people remain desperately poor, and the reforms continue to be incomplete and controversial.

The three periods, 1937-8, 1939-43, and 1944-5 were the principal phases of the Communist movement during the Sino-Japanese War. The outbreak of war transformed the political and military environment for all Chinese parties and forced the Chinese Communists into fundamental reconsideration of all important policies, of strategy and of tactics. The principal issues confronting Party Central during the first year and a half of the war were the following: The united front; Military strategy and tactics; and Leaders and leadership. At the outbreak of the war, Mao Tse-tung's position in the Chinese Communist movement was that of primus inter pares. The Communists used the euphemism ' friction' to describe their conflicts with the Nationalists during the middle years of the war. Chinese Communist Party and its principal armies expanded greatly during the Sino-Japanese War. The Japanese were preparing for their greatest military offensive in China since 1937-8, Operation Ichigo.

The central locus of political power in Communist China is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), now the largest single Communist organization in the world. Organizationally, the CCP is a pyramidal structure based on the National Party Congress which elects the Central Committee, which in turn elects the Political Bureau. The present Eighth Central Com mittee, elected in 1956 and expanded in May 1958, manifests both the stability of the party leadership and its adaptation to new circumstances. The core of decision-making power in the party structure is the Political Bureau and its seven-man Stand ing Committee. Analysis of the membership of the present Central Committee indicates that this elite group is relatively young, drawn largely from the interior provinces of China, well-educated by Chinese standards, and predominantly in digenous in background and training. Almost all have rela tively long party membership. Several aspects of the Chinese Communist Party leadership are striking. First, it has demon strated a higher level of political stability than that of any other major Communist party in the world. Second, it has developed notable organizational skills which greatly assist mobilization of the population and implementation of its major domestic pro grams. Third, it has demonstrated significant flexibility and realism in the handling of complex problems. Despite recur rent outside speculation about factionalism and schisms, the Chinese Communist Party leadership under Mao Tse-tung still appears to be both durable and determined.

Object of the study is the image of the May 4th Movement of 1919 in the official interpretation of history of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in PRC. The goal is to trace changes in the interpretation of the Movement in speeches of Chinese Communist Party's leaders on the occasion of its anniversary. To do this, author conducts qualitative and quantitative content analysis of the relevant speeches of 1979, 1989, 1999, 2009 and 2019. There are five main conceptual blocks present in every speech: attitude towards tradition, assessment of past mistakes of CCP and role of Mao Zedong, "spirit of May 4th Movement", development goals and youth policy. In the course of analysis, changes in content of these blocks are traced. Thus, ideological transformation of PRC is viewed in the context of changes in official interpretation of a significant historical event. Memory of this event in China is filled with various meanings, including themes of democracy and youth rebellion, inconvenient for the ruling Communist Party. Author comes to the conclusion that at least since late 1990s CCP has begun to rely on nationalism as a new source of legitimization of its power. In the analyzed speeches it can be seen how, with a greater emphasis on the patriotic component of the "Movement", other meanings associated with it, primarily democracy and science, have fallen by the wayside. At the same time, there has been a transition from rejection of traditional culture to its acceptance.

Reviewed by: From Nothing to Nothing: The Chinese Communist Movement and Hong Kong, 1921-1936 Gordon Y. M. Chan (bio) Chan Lau Kit-Ching . From Nothing to Nothing: The Chinese Communist Movement and Hong Kong, 1921-1936. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999. ix, 342 pp. Hardcover $59.95, ISBN 0-312-22428-1. As Professor Chan Lau Kit-Ching aptly observes, Hong Kong's first encounter with Chinese Communism predates July 1, 1997. It has been involved in the Chinese Communist movement ever since the movement's inception in 1921, and for many years before the Communist takeover in 1949 Hong Kong had served as headquarters for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Guangdong. The examination of this previously neglected history promises to shed light on our knowledge of the revolutionary movement not just in the locality of Hong Kong but also in Guangdong and the Chinese nation as a whole (pp. 1-2). Based in Hong Kong, Chan enjoyed a favorable position while exploring this topic. Besides ready access to local archives, both government and private, the proximity of Hong Kong to Guangzhou allowed her to conduct archival research conveniently in the Guangdong Provincial Archives, which hosts the most comprehensive collection of pre-1949 Party documents on Guangdong (including Hong Kong) accessible to both Chinese and foreign historians.1 Furthermore, the Feng Ping Shan Library at the University of Hong Kong has an impressive and expanding acquisition of historical materials on the CCP in Guangdong, published [End Page 412] both publicly and internally in the People's Republic of China (PRC). These resources were within "easy reach" (p. 12) for Chan, who teaches at the University. Given Chan's obvious advantages, the outcome of her research is, however, disappointing. Notwithstanding some shrewd observations, this present work is marred by a marked unfamiliarity with the historiography of the Chinese Communist Revolution. A quick historiographical survey will refute Chan's belief that there is "a dearth of regional studies of the Chinese Communist Movement, especially in the English language" (p. 2). Over the last two decades, Western scholarship has produced intensive studies of the revolution in local contexts,2 although they are predominantly rural in focus. Chan's study could well be a valuable contribution to the underrepresentation of the Chinese Communist urban revolution in the recent literature. Unfortunately, her lack of awareness of many major issues at stake, coupled with her reluctance to discuss the possible implications of her own findings with other scholars in order to enhance our general understanding of the CCP's history, suggests otherwise. The structure of this book is simple. Its four main parts trace the history of the CCP in Hong Kong and Guangdong from 1921 to 1936. The story begins with the small Guangzhou Communism Group that was initiated, in 1921, by Chen Duxiu, together with three Guangdong students he had taught in Beijing who had been exposed to the "new thoughts" of the May Fourth Movement. About a year later, the Socialist Youth League, which was to be superseded by the Communist Youth League in 1925, was established in the province. This organization represented the earliest Communist presence in Hong Kong (the CCP was not founded in the colony until 1924). As a British colony, Hong Kong expectedly exhibited many political and socioeconomic features distinct from those of Guangdong. The awareness of their existence impelled many Hong Kong cadres to ask their superiors on the other side of the border for special treatment and greater autonomy in pursuing revolutionary activities. Several times Chan emphasizes that these appeals mark the initial conception of "one country two systems"—a principle that the PRC employed to resolve the colonial questions of Hong Kong and Macao. The inference drawn here is interesting. Readers should bear in mind, however, that the desire of the regional Party branches for more autonomy based on concerns about their peculiar local conditions was common in the early history of the CCP and was by no means unique to the Communists in Hong Kong.3 Before 1925, Communists had made little headway in Hong Kong; it took the Guangzhou-Hong Kong Strike/Boycott to bolster their position. Because of this...

After 22 years of conflict with its nationalist rivals domestically and Japanese invaders, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) took control of Beijing in January 1949 and Shanghai in May the same year. By 1950 the Guomindang (Nationalist) forces only retained control of the island of Taiwan. Though CCP leader Mao Zedong told the Chinese people that they had stood up, the country the CCP now controlled in their name was economically backward, predominantly agrarian and contained considerable opposition to communist rule. Victory returned the CCP to the cities they had been forced to abandon following repression by the nationalists. CCP leaders now had to return the revolution to the cities, build an industrial base and a working class whom they were supposed to represent, create new political institutions and train officials to staff them. Pockets of opposition remained from troops loyal to the nationalists with whom the CCP had fought two civil wars (1927– 37 and 1945–49, see Box 2.1) and there was armed fighting with Tibetans who resisted incorporation into the PRC. In addition many, especially in the cities and the south, were suspicious of the CCP’s motives and intent. The economy had suffered badly from the dislocation and destruction not only of the civil wars but also the Japanese invasion (1937–45), and the country was suffering from rampant inflation.