Was the Cultural Revolution Cultural? Was It a Revolution?

Chapter 12 Was the Cultural Revolution Cultural? Was it a Revolution?

Concerning a definition of the CR, two fundamental questions are whether the CR had anything to do with “culture” and whether it was in fact a “revolution.” Under the banner of destroying “the four olds” (i.e. old customs, old culture, old habits and old ideas), many ancient works of architecture, numerous classical works of literature and painting, and many ancient temples were destroyed by the Red Guards. No official statistics have ever been released codify- ing these enormous cultural losses. At the same time, hundreds of millions of Chinese were involved in rebellion and in criticizing “capitalist roaders.” The result was indeed “a turmoil under the heavens,” with the Party and State agen- cies largely paralyzed at various levels except for the very top of the Party and the Party’s handmaiden, the Chinese military.

12.1 The CR and Chinese Culture

The Cultural Revolution is the term usually used to refer to the upheaval in China in the late 1960’s. Nevertheless, the Chinese Communists did not invent the term. The former Soviet Union waged a cultural revolution from 1928 to 1931 during their First Five-Year Plan. The campaign was aimed to strengthen cultural dictatorship as well as to enhance culture at large and the overall cultural quality of the society. The old Russian intelligentsia was buffeted by younger and more militant Communists during this period. Communist and working- class students were recruited to higher education in unprecedented numbers. At the same time, the authorities tried to improve the level of civilization of workers and peasants by calling on them to build up their personal hygiene, avoid use of rude and indecent language, read classic works of Russian literature, and attend classical music concerts. Improved personal hygiene included washing hands with soap, brushing your teeth every day, and no spitting. Even table manners were included in the campaign. Eliminating illiteracy and im- proving courteous conduct were also part of the effort. The ruling clique of the former Soviet Union was composed mostly of intellectuals who accepted Western civilization and treated it as a model to which workers and peasants should be encouraged to aspire (Cheng Xiaonong, 2007).

Another cultural revolution was waged in early Soviet Kazakhstan from 1921 to 1941. This revolution criminalized a number of everyday practices such as bride price, polygamy and underage marriage and in the process reshaped Kazakhstani culture. Simultaneously, the government developed a state edu- cational system and waged mass literacy campaigns in rural areas; education and literacy in turn became the basis for a common, integrated culture. In both these cases, the cultural revolution project helped modernize the country (Ramsay, 2014). The Chinese CR, in contrast, did nothing of the sort. Under the aegis of the CR, the Red Guards damaged or completely destroyed numerous cultural relics and artifacts and the traditional Chinese culture that these relics and artifacts represented was ruthlessly savaged. The Red Guards were to traditional Chinese culture and its artifacts what, a half century later, ISIS warriors were to the ancient ruins and tombs of Palmyra. Young Red Guards and students took pride in their rudeness, as if rudeness made for better political expres- sion. Indeed, it was very fashionable at the time to employ dirty and coarse words. The CR did not strive to elevate the culture of the Chinese masses in any way. Indeed, it will take generations for the Chinese people to recover from the damages to their culture sustained in the CR. And much that was lost can never be recovered. A lot of the Chinese heritage is gone for good. Although it was known as the Cultural Revolution, it had little to do with Chinese culture except to devastate the country’s cultural heritage. Indeed, and perhaps ironi- cally, the CR was profoundly anti-cultural.

12.2 The CR and Revolution

During the CR, hundreds of millions of Chinese were mobilized. Some people were active, some were passive, and others began as active and later became passive. Regardless of the various degrees of involvement, mass behaviors during the CR were clearly collective rather than individual. A common form of collective behavior is the social movement. What, then, do we learn of value in looking at the CR from a social movements perspective? In the 1960s, Killian (1964: 426) noted that social movements had re- ceived relatively little emphasis in the study of social change. At the time, the world was undergoing deep, dramatic transformation. The Chinese Red Guard movement, the American antiwar and civil rights movements, the student movements in European countries such as Britain, France, and Germany, and the pro-democratic movements in Madrid, Paris and Prague were all portents of profound changes in the making. The study of social