The Great Leap Forward was an industrialization campaign within China from 1958 to 1962, initiated by Mao Zedong, chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, whose goal was to transform the country from an agrarian society to an industrialized society through the formation of people's communes. The Great Leap Forward led to between 15 and 55 million deaths in mainland China during the 1959–1961 Great Chinese Famine it caused, making it the largest or second-largest famine in human history.
The Great Leap Forward grew out of Mao's push for rapid development through mass mobilization and a reaction against the Soviet development strategy. Anti-intellectual politics and the surge of less-educated radicals helped sideline technical constraints and dissent. The strategy relied on mobilizing peasants to sustain themselves while supplying grain, cash crops, and even steel for urban industry, without major new state investment. Famine worsened when procurement quotas were set using false reports from the countryside. After the 1959 Lushan Conference, anti-"rightist" campaigns intensified misreporting and coercive collection even as output fell, deepening rural famine.
In rural China, the campaign expanded mandatory collectivization and banned private farming; those who resisted were punished as "counterrevolutionaries". Authorities enforced restrictions through public struggle sessions, social pressure, and forced labor. Although rural industrialization was an official priority, its development was derailed by Great Leap policies. Economist Dwight Perkins argues that heavy investment produced little gain, calling the Great Leap Forward an expensive disaster.
The CCP studied the damage that was done at various conferences from 1960 to 1962, especially at the Seven Thousand Cadres Conference in 1962, during which Mao Zedong ceded day-to-day leadership to pragmatic moderates like Chinese President Liu Shaoqi and Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping. In the early 1960s, Mao endorsed a period of economic "readjustment" and acknowledged responsibility for mistakes, while maintaining that the "three red flags" could not be challenged.
From 1961 to 1965, official propaganda portrayed Mao as virtually infallible and shifted blame for the Great Leap Forward disaster onto lower-level officials. He initiated the Socialist Education Movement in 1963 and the Cultural Revolution in 1966 in order to remove opposition and re-consolidate his power. Dozens of dams constructed during the Great Leap Forward in Zhumadian, Henan collapsed in 1975 (under the influence of Typhoon Nina) and resulted in the 1975 Banqiao Dam failure, with estimates of its death toll ranging from tens of thousands to 240,000.
Background
The core goal of the Great Leap Forward was to increase industrial and agricultural outputs by using mass mobilization to raise labor inputs and therefore overcome China's lack of material, technological and monetary inputs. The Great Leap Forward also sought to address imbalances between rural China and urban China that existed in the prerevolutionary period and continued into the 1950s.
Classical Marxist theory hypothesized a relatively linear progression of development and a worldwide revolution beginning with the most developed countries. At the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the country was one of the poorest in the world. The Great Leap Forward attempted to defy the conventional understanding of the time required for economic development. Through rapid industrialization, it aimed to close the gap between China's developmental stage and its political aspirations. In March 1955, at a national conference of the Party, Mao declared that China "would catch up with and surpass the most powerful capitalist countries in several dozen years", and in October, Mao announced that he would complete the building of a socialist state in 15 years.
In the late 1950s, China's socio-political landscape experienced significant rural reforms and the aftermath of previous policies aimed at collectivization rather than individualism. Before the Great Leap Forward, the Chinese government initiated land reforms that redistributed land from landlords to peasants, but these reforms still needed to attain the expected agricultural productivity. The early 1950s saw the establishment of agricultural cooperatives, yet these changes brought mixed outcomes. However, the push towards rapid industrialization and the establishment of people's communes in rural areas were central to the Great Leap Forward, reflecting the government's belief that collectivization and large-scale projects would boost agricultural and industrial outputs. The communes were meant to centralize farming and labor, supposedly leading to increased efficiency and output; still, in reality, and practice, these measures often disrupted traditional farming practices and led to decreased productivity. Dali Yang stated, "The initial stages of collectivization brought chaos and inefficiency, with agricultural productivity often declining".
By the time of the Great Leap Forward, increased Sino-Soviet tensions meant that China could not depend on Soviet technological assistance. Mao became frustrated by Soviet reluctance to share nuclear technology and the mode of bureaucracy that they promoted. Mao emphasized China's self-reliance in technology and industry and discouraged reliance on foreign technology.
In November 1957, party leaders of communist countries gathered in Moscow to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the October Revolution. Soviet Communist Party First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev proposed not only to catch up with but exceed the United States in industrial output in the next 15 years through peaceful competition. Mao Zedong was so inspired by the slogan that China put forward its own one: to catch up with and surpass the United Kingdom in 15 years. As with its approach to agriculture, the Chinese government attempted to compensate for its inability to invest in industry with mass mobilizations to increase human labor inputs.
Agricultural collectives and other social changes
Before 1949, peasants had farmed their own small pockets of land and observed traditional practices—festivals, banquets, and paying homage to ancestors. It was realized that Mao's policy of using a state monopoly on agriculture to finance industrialization would be unpopular with the peasants. Therefore, it was proposed that the peasants should be brought under Party control by the establishment of agricultural collectives which would also facilitate the sharing of tools and draft animals.
This policy was gradually pushed through between 1949 and 1958 in response to immediate policy needs, first by establishing "mutual aid teams" of 5–15 households, then in 1953 "elementary agricultural cooperatives" of 20–40 households, then from 1956 in "higher co-operatives" of 100–300 families. From 1954 onward peasants were encouraged to form and join collective-farming associations, which would supposedly increase their efficiency without robbing them of their own land or restricting their livelihoods.
By 1958, private ownership was abolished and all households were forced into state-operated communes. Mao demanded that the communes increase grain production to feed the cities and to earn foreign exchange through exports. China must follow a path to socialism different from the Soviet Union's, Mao told delegates, by allowing its peasants to participate in economic modernisation and making more use of their labour.
Apart from progressive taxation on each household's harvest, the state introduced a system of compulsory state purchases of grain at fixed prices to build up stockpiles for famine-relief and meet the terms of its trade agreements with the Soviet Union. Together, taxation and compulsory purchases accounted for 30% of the harvest by 1957, leaving very little surplus. Rationing was also introduced in the cities to curb 'wasteful consumption' and encourage savings (which were deposited in state-owned banks and thus became available for investment), and although food could be purchased from state-owned retailers the market price was higher than that for which it had been purchased. This too was done in the name of discouraging excessive consumption.
Besides these economic changes, the CCP implemented major social changes in the countryside including the banishing of all religious and mystic institutions and ceremonies, replacing them with political meetings and propaganda sessions. Attempts were made to enhance rural education and the status of women (allowing them to initiate divorce if they desired) and ending foot-binding, child marriage and opium addiction. The old system of internal passports (the hukou) was introduced in 1956, preventing inter-county travel without appropriate authorization. Highest priority was given to the urban proletariat for whom a welfare state was created.
The first phase of collectivization resulted in modest improvements in output. Famine along the mid-Yangzi was averted in 1956 through the timely allocation of food-aid, but in 1957 the Party's response was to increase the proportion of the harvest collected by the state to insure against further disasters. Moderates within the Party, including Zhou Enlai, argued for a reversal of collectivization on the grounds that claiming the bulk of the harvest for the state had made the people's food-security dependent upon the constant, efficient, and transparent functioning of the government.
Hundred Flowers Campaign and Anti-Rightist Campaign
In 1957, Mao responded to the tensions which existed in the Party by launching the Hundred Flowers Campaign as a way to promote free speech and criticism. Some scholars have retrospectively concluded that this campaign was a ploy designed to allow critics of the regime, primarily intellectuals but also low ranking members of the party who were critical of the agricultural policies, to identify themselves.
By the time of the completion of the first 5 Year Economic Plan in 1957, Mao had come to believe that the path to socialism that had been followed by the Soviet Union was not appropriate for China. He was critical of Khrushchev's reversal of Stalinist policies and he was also alarmed by the uprisings that had taken place in East Germany, Poland and Hungary, and the perception that the USSR was seeking "peaceful coexistence" with the Western powers. Mao had become convinced that China should follow its own path to communism. According to Jonathan Mirsky, a historian and a journalist who specialized in Chinese affairs, China's isolation from most of the rest of the world, along with the Korean War, had accelerated Mao's attacks on his perceived domestic enemies. It led him to accelerate his designs to develop an economy where the regime would get maximum benefit from rural taxation.
The Anti-Rightist Campaign started on 8 June 1957. The main goal was to purge "rightists" from the CCP and China altogether. It was believed that approximately 5 percent of the population was still "rightists" (Political conservatives sabotaging the revolution).
Rash advance movement and anti-rash advance movement
In the early years of the New China, due to the lack of experience in financial and economic work, it was a common practice to include the fiscal surplus of the previous year in the budget of the current year. Because of the low level of budgeting in the fiscal sector and inaccurate estimates of economic development, revenues and expenditures were underestimated. However, no problems arose because the government usually managed to end the fiscal year with a surplus. In 1953, when China entered the first five-year plan period, the Chinese economy had improved and the Ministry of Finance still decided to include the fiscal surplus of the previous fiscal year as credit funds in the 1953 budget revenue to cover the current year's expenditures. As a result, budget expenditures were expanded and so was the size of the budget. At that time, only the Soviet expert Kutuzov warned the Chinese fiscal authorities not to use the fiscal surplus of the previous year, however, it was not heeded by the Ministry of Finance. In that year, the gross industrial and agricultural output grew by 21.3%, while the capital construction budget increased by 50% compared to the previous year, which led to an imbalance between production and demand. Such was the "small rash advance" (小冒進) at the start of the first five-year plan period. The issue had caused widespread social controversy. This marked one of the first times people questioned Mao's authority. The faction of Li Xiannian, Chen Yun and others did not think it was appropriate to continue this practice, but they also had opponents. Li Xiannian finally decided to hold a collective meeting to discuss the issue, and after listening to the views of all parties, he decided to abolish the practice.
Nevertheless, the controversy over the use of the fiscal surplus persisted, which brought another reckless "rash advance" to China's economic development in 1956. At that time, China lacked consideration in three areas: capital construction, employee wages, and agricultural loans. This made the central treasury "tight" again. This drew the attention of Zhou Enlai, Li Xiannian, and others. At a state meeting held on 5 June 1956, proposals were made to curb impetuousness and rash advances, revise the 1956 national economic plan, and cut capital construction investment. Such was the anti-"rash advance" movement.
The excess of the first five-year plan gave the nation great confidence, and at the Second Plenary Session of the 8th Central Committee, "go all out, aim high, and build socialism with greater, faster, better, and more economical results" (simplified Chinese: 鼓足干劲、力争上游、多快好省地建设社会主义; traditional Chinese: 鼓足幹勁、力爭上游、多快好省地建設社會主義) was adopted as the "General Line for Socialist Construction" in China. In 1955, Mao had already expressed his belief that socialist construction should achieve "greater, faster, better, and more economical" results. These led to the re-emergence of "rash advances", which further led to the reintroduction of policies and tendencies that had previously been overturned. Those who opposed Mao's policies were accused of not upholding the tenets of the "class struggle" under the people's cult of Mao.