Tiananmen Square Massacre - Background
In the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, China says its armed forces killed 241 civilians but NATO intelligence says they killed 7,000 people. After a decade of expanding freedoms to its citizens, the Chinese government again cracked down on political protesters, resulting in tragic consequences at Tiananmen Square in 1989. People whose activities are suspicious - whether for patriotic, religious, spiritual, or intellectual reasons - are once again jailed for a variety of charges. Today, a revival of liberal ideas has brought another government backlash against prominent Chinese writers, economists, teachers, and scientists. Journalist Wang Shuo is one who views the repression with a sense of irony, saying, "If your work hasn't been banned, maybe it's not good enough."
In the early 1980s the transfer of political authority to Deng Xiaopeng’s picked successors, party Chairman Hu» Yaobang and Premier Zhao Ziyang, appeared to be off to a fairly smooth start. Hu and Zhao were both officials of considerable ability, but Zhao had gained his experience primarily at the provincial level, and neither was initially widely known in his own right as a national figure nor were they apparently backed up by extensive senior cadre support of their own. Zhao Ziyang had some of the makings of a Zhou Enlai. Zhao was a tough, able official who might outlast Hu.
Party Chairman Hu Yaobang had been a close associate of Deng since the 1940s, far longer than had Zhao. Hu gained much ofhis early experience in Deng’s home base, Sichuan Province, then had years of senior party assignments in Bejiing, was purged during the Cultural Revolution and again in 1976, together with Deng, and at last was rehabilitated and elected to the Politburo in 1978 and to General Secretary of the party in 1980. A sometimes self-effacing official, Hu concentrated on rebuilding a party wracked by the Cultural Revolution. In so doing he appeared to enioy Deng's full trust.
By contrast, Premier Zhao Ziyang was a smooth, urbane official who generally projected an attractive image and self-confident manner. He came from a privileged background and served as an agricultural expert and then party first secretary in Guangdong Province before being purged in 1967 in the Cultural Revolution. Rehabilitated in 1971, he was stationed in Inner Mongolia until April 1972, when Zhou Enlai transferred him to Guangdong Province and then — in late 1975 - to Sichuan Province, where Zhao became the top party and government official. Zhao gained repute in Guangdong and Sichuan, deservedly or not, for successfully introducing a number of far-reaching improvements in agricultural production, economic integration, administrative decision making, and the combining of agricultural, industrial, and commercial enterprises — indeed almost prototypes of certain of the measures he and Deng initiated at the national level. He became a full Politburo member in 1979, and Premier in 1980. He traveled to Europe, the Near East, Southeast Asia, and Japan, and had occasional responsibility for foreign policy or military matters. Zhao's principal asset was the supportofDeng, whose trust was early shown in him when in 1975 Deng made him the top man in Deng's own home base of power, Sichuan, just a very few years after Zhao had been paraded in the streets as a Cultural Revolution enemy of the people.
Deng and his pre-Tiananmen protege, Zhao Ziyang, employed a variety of rhetorical strategies that were designed to justify and legitimate the reforms in the face of orthodox Marxist opposition. The catch phrase, "primary stage of socialism," was a redefinition of orthodox Marxist theory which enabled the reforms to continue in the face of Chinese cultural constraints on political rhetoric. It enabled the reform faction in China to demonstrate loyalty to orthodox Marxism, while introducing quasi-capitalistic measures into the centrally planned Chinese economy. Part of the reason for the failure of the reforms was the inability to fully legitimate the reform program without a complete revamping of Marxist orthodoxy.
Deng Xiaopeng's rise to leadership in the People's Republic of China was accompanied by massive economic and structural reforms. Some claim that these reforms led to the rise of the pro-democracy student movements of 1987 and 1989. Political and individual freedoms had been tolerated in China, even encouraged, for about ten years. But in 1986, when thousands of students protested government policies, the Communists jailed or demoted the leaders.
In late 1986, during the critical period when the Chinese political system appeared threatened by student demonstrators burning copies of party official newspapers, General Secretary Hu Yaobang failed to act to restore order. Hu refused to denounce the demonstrators or their intellectual mentors or to retreat from the political reform agenda. Instead, Hu favored the introduction of more "democratization" or plurality into the political system. He called for more movement on political reform than the system could bear. In effect, Hu had outstripped the consensus concerning the pace and content of the reform agenda. In January 1987 Hu Yaobang lost the position of general secretary when he failed to control violent student demonstrations. Zhao Ziyang became acting general secretary, in addition to serving as premier.
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