Mao topic 4 - Social and cultural changes, 1949-76

Question 1

What was traditional chinese society like?

Answer 1

it was patriarchal and based on Confucian values (women had to obey men)

Question 2

How did the 1911 Revolution change women’s rights?

Answer 2

women received more rights, but they are not equal to men.
many old practices were still being followed even during the Communist revolution, especially in rural areas where there was slower change.

Question 3

What was Clause Six of the Communist Common Program of 1949?

Answer 3

promised the abolition of restrictions affecting women.
affirmed women’s equal treatment with men in political, economic, cultural, educational and social spheres.
the freedom for men and women to marry whoever they want

Question 4

Why did the communists want to destroy the concept of family as the basic social unit?

Answer 4

• family relations embodied the confucian values of obedience to parents and elders
• the existence of the family encouraged a bouregois mindset, it tempted people to attach sentimental value to personal possession

Question 5

What was foot binding?

Answer 5

a traditional chinese practice – toes of young girls are broken and folded back underneath the foot, then tightly bounded.
this purposely restricted foot growth and it was regarded as a sign of beauty and restriction

Question 6

What happened to foot binding?

Answer 6

outlawed in 1911
it still persisted in some rural areas
when the communists came to power, it brought it to a speedier end (was already on its way out tho)

Question 7

Why did Mao approve the 1950 Marriage Law

Answer 7

Mao personally opposed arranged marriages, at 14 years old he was arranged to marry a woman seven years older than him and he opposed.
in 1919, he was inspired by a controversy in Changsha where an unhappy young bride who slit her own throat in front of the guests rather than going forth with her wedding
Mao became an advocate for women’s rights after this

Question 8

Aims of the 1950 Marriage Law

Answer 8

marriage should be a free choice between both partners and on equal rights

• arranged marriages and payment of dowries were outlawed
• men and women are allowed to divorce
• divorce on equal terms, except that a man cannot divorce his wife if she was pregnant or within a year of her giving birth
• children born out of wedlock had equal rights with other children
• women allowed to keep property they already owned when they married
• concubinage and polygamy outlawed

Question 9

Response to 1950 Marriage Law

Answer 9

limited by traditional resistance
especially in Muslim regions in the west
this led to a second propaganda drive in 1953 (which was again undermined by the outlook of the cadres who resented change)

Question 10

How were the communes designed to be beneficial for women

Answer 10

communes would provide canteens, laundries and kindergartens to free women from domestic chores, enabling them to concentrate on working on the land or other enterprises

Question 11

What were the actual working conditions for women in communes

Answer 11

placed women at a serious disadvantage
they would typically earn fewer work points than men due to the physically demanding nature of labour.
cadres who were responsible for enforcing discipline also held traditional attitudes towards sexual equality – intolerant of requests from women who were pregnant or during menstruation

Question 12

How collectivisation and communes affected women during the great famine

Answer 12

food became scarcer, productive workers (men) could claim more food rations when women would claim less and mothers would have to decide whether to eat or to feed their children.
women were also driven into prostitute during the famine.
divorce rates rose by 60% during the famine years
Wife-selling was also a desperate remedy to get more resources

Question 13

How was traditional family life affected by the Cultural Revolution?

Answer 13

family as a unit came under renewed attack, it fell into the category of the ‘four olds’
Children told that Mao and the Party were their true parents, to whom they owed loyalty
Children were taught to inform on relatives who hung onto traditional, old attitudes
this led to a disruptive effect on family relationships

Question 14

How did ‘up to the mountains and down to the countryside’ campaign affect traditional family life?

Answer 14

the damage red guards caused to family stability was ended
but it uprooted around 12 million teenagers (between 1968 and 1972) from their families
teenagers who came back after serving time in the countryside found it hard to reintegrate, described by historians as China’s ‘lost generation’

Question 15

How did population policy affect women and the family

Answer 15

In public, Mao celebrated the continued growth of the population.
Mid-50s, growing concern that a huge population would limit resources, this led to discussions of restricting population growth
Contraceptives were made widely available in 1962, female cadres were given an increased role in encouraging mothers to restrict the number of children they have
1971 - Mao clarified a policy stating that birth rate should be reduced to 2%
Propaganda drive launched, pressuring mothers to marry later and restricting family size to 2 children
(1 child policy introduced in 1979, 3 years after Mao’s death)

Question 16

the nature and extent of change in marriages

Answer 16

Arranged marriages were much less common, after the 1950 marriage law, over a million women divorced to leave arranged marriages

late 1930s, 30% were arranged marriage and in 1966-76, it dropped to 0.8%

this also reduced the power of parents over their daughters – the authority of parents were replaced by the heads of work units

Question 17

the nature and extent of change for women in education and employment

Answer 17

proportion of women in overall workforce quadrupled between 1949 and 1976 from 8%-32% – but still less than 1/3 of workforce and opportunities for career progression were limited by male domination in higher positions
growth of working women were significant in the first 5-year-plan (women working in heavy industry), and services sector (office and clerical work)
higher education was still limited – it wasn’t free or compulsory, many students took up domestic roles rather than to train for careers

Question 18

the nature and extent of change for gender equality

Answer 18

communist propaganda stressed the importance of gender equality – posters portrayed women as happy and fulfilled when filling roles traditionally occupied by men
but there was still no opportunity for women to gain more rights while retaining their feminine roles

Question 19

the influence of cultural revolution on women

Answer 19

worsened the position of women – cause of emancipation went backwards, and the role of women in family was being undermined by the attack on the four olds
women who took up roles as Red Guards only found themselves accepted if they exhibited similar violence as their male counterparts

Question 20

resistance to female emancipation in rural areas

Answer 20

it was the strongest in rural areas – changes were slower to arrive and to be accepted
greatest resistance was from Muslim provinces where arranged marriages was a huge part of muslim culture

Question 21

how the government responded to male resistance to the Marriage law

Answer 21

they stepped up their promotional propaganda campaigns in the early 1950s, using All-China Women’s Federation to train cadres in the workings of the new law

Question 22

the problem of changing the traditional views of women (agriculture)

Answer 22

attitudes to women’s pay were slow to change – especially in northern areas where women rarely worked in fields before the Great Leap Forward
prejudice against women was weakened as they took up more labour positions
but there is still much evidence that men and women were not paid equally for their efforts

Question 23

illiteracy statistics from 1949 to 1976

Answer 23

1949 - 20%
1960 - 50%
1964 - 64%
1976 - 70%

Question 24

limitations to the growth of literacy

Answer 24

early progress could’ve been faster if the government spent more on primary education and less on the Korean war (6.4% spent on culture and education)
by 1956, fewer than half the children, aged 7-16 were in full-time education
good schools had the best teachers but children had to spend strict entrance exams and places were reserved for the children of high-ranking Party and government officials

Question 25

what is pinyin

Answer 25

a modernised form of phonetic Mandarin
offically adopted in 1956 to help with the spread of literacy
standardised the pronunciation of mandarin

Question 26

Who created pinyin

Answer 26

Zhou Yougang

an economic professor at Shanghai University

Question 27

How did education collapse after 1966

Answer 27

the closure of schools and universities in 1966-70 stopped the education of 130 million young people
when the schools opened, it was hard to restore belief in the system, teachers were attacked and ridiculed and the curriculum was seen as a waste of time
during the cultural revolution, learning wasn’t regarded as having any intrinsic value

Question 28

What was the purpose of the barefoot doctors

Answer 28

medical - to tackle endemic diseases (notably cholera, typhoid, dysentery, malaria and scarlet fever), high mortality rates were a chronic feature of rural China

ideological - hoped that exposure to peasant conditions will prevent young intellectuals to have a bourgeois mindset. also with practical skills in training, their education directly served the revolution

economic - it was cheap, training only lasted 6 months and wages were much lower

Question 29

What was the outcome of the barefoot doctors

Answer 29

it was a great success - the basic medical treatment was useful to the peasants, 90% of villages were involved in the scheme by 1976
the regime also claimed to make basic health care a universal right
it received significant international attention and inspired WHO

Question 30

Successes of health care reform

Answer 30

• reduced death rate from waterborne diseases
• educated the peasants in preventing diseases (e.g. discouraging using human waste as a source of fertiliser in fields)
• life expectancy rose from 41 years in 1950 to 62 in 1970 and infant mortality rates fell

Question 31

Failures of health care reform

Answer 31

• the eradication of the ‘four pests’ caused damage to the ecological balance
• hospital facilities were limited to those who were sick, in rural areas county hospitals had trained doctors, but most care was administered at a lower level through out-patient care in village health centres