Ten Theses of The Chinese Revolution

Ten Theses on the Chinese Revolution By Joseph Esherick

Esherick says his purpose in the essay is to convince us to re-think the chinese revolution, of the historical process that brought to power a revolutionary party that radically reshaped the Chinese polity, economy, and society. He came up with ten Theses to discuss why the revolution happened.

1. Guomindang rule was as much the precursor of the Chinese Revolution as its political enemy

   Logic can prove that the Guomindang party essentially paved the way for Communists, who laid foundations based on the Guomindang patterns.

2. The Revolution was not a Liberation, but (for most) was the replacement of one form of domination with another.

   Communists referred to the revolution as a liberation, thus gaining support and momentum.  This referred mainly to liberation from landlords’ rule and employers’ exploitation and women’s struggles to escape the bondage of patriarchy. Peasants wanted fairness (Gongdao). They wanted simple lives.  This got rid of the rich being born into rich families and never having to work a day in their life.  As was mentioned in class last time, we learned that the Communists said they would distribute land to all peasants. they did not disclose that their way to do so was to kill the rich landowners and steal their land.

3. Despite Mao’s “Sinification of marxism” the Soviet model of Lenin and Stalin exerted a powerful influence on the Chinese Revolution.

   The Chinese had significant involvement from the Russians in receiving tutoring and learning of their examples from the Russians.  

4. The triumph of the CCP was the product of a series of contingent events.

5. The revolution was produced by a conjuncture of domestic and global historical processes among which the worldwide depression and Japanese imperialism were particularly important.

6. The larger structures of China's state and society did not make revolution inevitable, but they imposed significant constraints on the agents of revolution and counterrevolution.

7. The determination, sacrifice, and commitment of individual Communist revolutionaries - the subjective element of the revolutionary dialectic - were both essential to the revolution’s success and critical in shaping its nature.

8. The CCP was a social construct of considerable internal complexity, not an organizational weapon of obedient apparatchiks commanded by the Party Center.

9. Revolution is a process

10. The history of modern China is not a teleology of revolution.