Communism in China DBQ

 

 

 

Directions:

This question is based on the accompanying document (1 ‑6). This question is designed to test your ability to work with historical documents. Some of these documents have been edited for the purposes of this question. As you analyze the documents, take into account both the source of each document and any point of view that may be presented in the document.

 

Historical Context

The Communist Revolution in China has had a major impact on the economic, social and political development of China. In some ways, the Communist Revolution in China has had a positive impact, while in other ways the Communist Revolution has had a negative impact on China.

 

Task: Using information from the documents and your knowledge of global history, answer the questions that follow each document in Part A. Your answers to the questions will help you write the Part B essay in which you will be asked to:

• List & explain two (2) ways the Communist Revolution has had a positive affect on China.
• List & explain two (2) ways the Communist Revolution has had a negative affect on China.
• Has the Communist Revolution had a more positive or more negative affect on China? Explain in detail.

 

 

 

 

Part A- Short Answer Questions

Document 1:
When Li Zhen [ a Chinese woman] returned to Shanghai, the city was suffering from a severe food shortage as a result of the catastrophic economic failure of the Great Leap Forward Campaign launched by Mao Zedong, in 1958. Long lines of people were forming at dawn at Shanghai police stations, waiting to apply for exit permits to leave the country. This was such an embarrassment for the Shanghai authorities that they viewed Li Zhen's return from affluent Hong Kong to starving Shanghai as an opportunity for propaganda .... to help project an image of popular support for the Communist Party ... The government granted members of this organization [the Communist Party] certain minor privileges, such as better housing and the use of special restaurant.

--Life and Death in Shanghai, Cheng, 1986

1. What was the effect of the Great Leap Forward on the people?

 

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Document 2:
It is up to us to organize the people. As for the reactionaries in China, it is up to us to organize the people to overthrow them. Everything reactionary is the same; if you don't hit it. It won't fall. This is also like sweeping the floor; as a rule, where the broom does not reach, the dust will not vanish of itself.

We communists are like seeds, and the people are like the soil. Wherever we go, we must unite with the people, take root and blossom among them.

We should pay close attention to the well‑being of the masses, from the problems of the land and labor to those of fuel, rice, cooking oil, and salt ... All such problems concerning the well-being of the masses should be placed on our agenda. We should discuss them, adopt and carry out decisions, and check up on the results. We should help the masses to realize that we represent their interests, that our lives are intimately bound up with theirs.

--Excerpts from Mao's "Little Red Book."

2. According to the excerpt, how would Mao legitimize the Cultural Revolution?

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Document 3
... If he was to get the population to act, Mao would have to remove authority from the Party and establish absolute loyalty and obedience to himself alone. To achieve this he needed terror‑an intense terror that would block all other consideration and crush all other fears. He saw boys and girls in their teens and early twenties as his ideal agents. They had been brought up in the fanatical personality cult of Mao and the militant doctrine of "class struggle." They were endowed with the qualities of youth‑they were rebellious, fearless, eager to fight for a just cause, thirsty for adventure and action. They were also irresponsible, ignorant, and easy to manipulate‑and prone to violence. Only they could give Mao the immense force that he needed to terrorize the whole society, and to create a chaos that would shake, and then shatter the foundation of the Party. One slogan summed up the Red Guards' Mission: "We vow to launch a bloody war against anyone who dares to resist the Cultural Revolution, who dares to oppose Chairman Mao!

--Wild Swans, Jung Chang, 1991

3. What was the role of the Red Guard during the Cultural Revolution?

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Document 4
"...The crux of the four modernizations is the mastery of modern science and technology. Without modem science and technology, it is impossible to build modem agriculture, modem industry, or modem national defense. Without high speed development of science and technology, it is impossible to develop the national economy at high speed."

-On the Science and Modernization, Teng Hsiao-p'ing

4. What was the purpose of the Four Modernizations?

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Document 5

 

5. What is the point of view of the cartoon?

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Document 6

TRADITIONAL WOMEN

"To be unassuming, to yield; to be respectful, to revere, to think first of other people afterwards of herself, if she performs a kind of action, to make no mention thereof, if she commits a find, to make no denial; to endure reproach, treasure reproof, to behave with veneration and right fear; such demeanor is described as exemplify humility and adaptability....

To lit down to sleep when it is late, to be at work, early, from dawn fill dark not to shirk puffing forth strength, to bend the mind to domestic affairs, nor to evade such, be they troublesome or easy, to accomplish that which must be done, to be orderly, to systernatize the way of conduct; such behavior is said to be absorption in diligent too.... .

To be sedate in manner, of upright purpose, to serve her lord her husband; to keep herself pure, composed, not being given to misplaced jest or laughter; free from pollution, reverently to arrange the wine and food to be placed before tablets of progenitors, ancestors, the oblations of dead forefathers....

Nothing equals in importance the imperative duty of obedience! If the mother‑in‑law say, 'It is not so' and it be so, assuredly, it is right to obey her order. If the mother-in-­law say, 'It is so' even if it be not so, nevertheless, act in accordance with the command. Do not think of opposing, or of discussing what is, what is not; do not struggle to divide the crooked from the straight. This is what is called the imperative duty of obedience. The ancient book Nu Hsien- Patterns for Woman-states: 'A wife is like the shadow from high sunlight, the echo following sound."

MODERN WOMEN

... You'd better think it over and choose some other job. Driving tractors is no work for a slip of a girl like you.'

The man in charge of registration for the tractor-drivers' training class had clearly made up his mind that I was unsuitable. I felt angry because it seemed unjust that he should try and turn me down without even a trial.

'Let me take the entrance examination anyway,' I said. 'If I fail, I shall have nothing more to say.'

I passed the examination. In the six years that followed I achieved my ambition of becoming a tractor driver, worked for a while as instructor to a women's tractor-drivers team, and became the vice-director of the Shuangchiao State Farm near Peking. That is still my work today."

--Chinese Women: Yesterday and Today, F. Ayscough

 

 

6. How have women's roles changed in China?

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Part B

Essay

Historical Context

The Communist Revolution in China has had a major impact on the economic, social and political development of China. In some ways, the Communist Revolution in China has had a positive impact, while in other ways the Communist Revolution has had a negative impact on China.

Task: Using information from the documents and your knowledge of global history, answer the questions that follow each document in Part A. Your answers to the questions will help you write the Part B essay in which you will be asked to:

• List & explain two (2) ways the Communist Revolution has had a positive affect on China.
• List & explain two (2) ways the Communist Revolution has had a negative affect on China.
• Has the Communist Revolution had a more positive or more negative affect on China? Explain in detail.

Type or neatly write your response on a separate paper.