In Xi’s China, the cult of Mao comes roaring back

Seeking more control over the country and the Communist Party, he has put the revolutionary chairman on a pedestal — and cracked down on critics

n President Xi Jinping’s China, it is again a risky proposition to openly criticise Mao Zedong. The Chinese Communist Party thought it had resolved the discussion in 1981 when it decreed that the reign of Mao, the founder of the People’s Republic of China, had been 70 per cent good and 30 per cent bad. But since Xi’s rise to power more than four years ago, he has been feeding the cult of the Great Helmsman and clamping down on any criticism of Mao’s legacy.

More than 40 years after Mao’s death, the “red emperor”, whose face still appears on banknotes, remains a guardian figure for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). What position people take on Mao usually indicates their political shade: The regime’s Left wing, embarrassed by the boom of capitalism, worships him, while the country’s reformist fringe calls for more pluralism by pointing to Mao’s errors and bloody legacy. As Xi expands his control over the party and society, the clampdown against those with dissenting opinions has intensified.

The renowned economist, Mao Yushi, a fierce critic of monopolistic stateowned companies, was one such dissenter who fell victim to this clampdown. On January 20, authorities closed down the website of the think tank founded by the 88-year-old intellectual.

In early January, Deng Xiaochao, 62, a Chinese academic, was sacked from his job for “tarnishing” Mao’s image on the commemoration of the leader’s birthday. Deng suggested on the microblog platform Weibo that Mao was responsible for the deaths of millions. Deng also posted a message that said: “The one good thing Mao did in his life was to die.” In retaliation, he was banned from teaching and dismissed from his prestigious post in a provincial government. His action also provoked the furore of scores of neo-Maoists who began to demonstrate outside Shandong Jianzhu University, where Deng taught, attacking students who supported the professor.

A new side to Beijing

The director of the Shijiazhuang bureau of culture and media, in northeast China, was also fired in January after he called Mao Zedong a “devil”.

These attacks are a new side to Beijing, which tries its best to downplay the dark side of the Communist Party’s history. Last year, Yang Jisheng, a famous chronicler of the Mao era, was reportedly pressured not to publish a book on the Cultural Revolution on the 50th anniversary of this bloody episode of Chinese history. Instead, his work was discreetly released in Hong Kong, where freedom is much greater despite Beijing’s tightening grip.

China’s growing censorship comes before the CCP’s 19th National Congress later this year, during which Xi is expected to be given a second five-year term. The president, who wants to be in a position of strength this fall, intends to seize the occasion to reinforce “discipline”.

By relentlessly praising Mao, Xi seeks to smooth the rough edges of the revolutionary period and the era of reforms that followed. By assuming a neo-Maoist position, the Chinese president can “pull the rug out from under the party’s Left wing, which he wants to keep under his thumb”, says Jean-Pierre Cabestan of the Hong Kong Baptist University, adding that it’s also a warning to proreform intellectuals. Still, Beijing will no doubt be wary of pushing the cult of Mao too far. “There’s a risk that social movements will seize Communist ideology and Mao’s figure to express their resentment,” says Florence. “That’s something the regime wants to avoid at all cost.”

Le Figaro/