Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution

The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (无产阶级文化大革命, Wúchǎnjiējí Wénhuà Dà Gémìng) was a sociopolitical upheaval in the People's Republic of China that lasted from 1966 to 1976. It was launched by Chairman Mao Zedong, then Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), partly to reclaim authority he had lost after the catastrophic failure of the Great Leap Forward (1958–1962), and partly to forestall what he termed the rise of "revisionism" and a "bourgeois restoration" within the Party. The movement's official inauguration is dated to the "May 16 Notification" (5·16通知) of 1966, drafted under Mao's direction, and the publication of the "Decision Concerning the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution" (the "Sixteen Points") by the CCP Central Committee in August 1966. Mao's wife Jiang Qing and the radical faction later known as the "Gang of Four" became central instruments of the campaign.

Operationally, the Cultural Revolution mobilised the nation's youth into paramilitary groups called the Red Guards (红卫兵), who were directed to attack the "Four Olds" (旧思想, 旧文化, 旧风俗, 旧习惯 — old ideas, culture, customs and habits). Veteran cadres, intellectuals, teachers and perceived "class enemies" were subjected to public humiliation, "struggle sessions" (批斗会), imprisonment and execution. Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung — the "Little Red Book" — became a quasi-scriptural text, and a pervasive personality cult enveloped Mao. Senior leaders were purged: Liu Shaoqi, the head of state, died in detention in 1969, and Deng Xiaoping was twice removed from office. The Lin Biao affair of 1971, in which Mao's designated successor allegedly attempted a coup and died in a plane crash fleeing to the USSR, marked a turning point that discredited the movement's militant phase.

The Cultural Revolution effectively ended with Mao's death in September 1976 and the arrest of the Gang of Four in October 1976 by Hua Guofeng. The CCP's authoritative verdict came in the "Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China" (1981), adopted under Deng Xiaoping, which condemned the decade as "responsible for the most severe setback and the heaviest losses suffered by the Party, the country and the people since the founding of the People's Republic." Estimates of deaths range from hundreds of thousands to several million; economic output, education and cultural heritage suffered profound damage. As of 2026 the topic remains politically sensitive within China, with public discussion tightly controlled.

For competitive examinations, the Cultural Revolution appears most prominently in World History and International Relations papers — in the UPSC syllabus under the history of communism and post-1945 East Asia, and centrally in China-focused modern-history courses and the Guokao's political-theory components. Typical question angles include its causes (Mao's post-Great-Leap-Forward marginalisation), its instruments (Red Guards, the cult of personality), its key episodes (Lin Biao, the Gang of Four), and its long-term significance as the precondition for Deng Xiaoping's "Reform and Opening Up" from 1978. Candidates should be able to link it to the 1981 Resolution that institutionalised the official assessment.