Liu Shaoqi summary

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Liu Shaoqi , or Liu Shao-ch’i, (born Nov. 24, 1898, Ningxiang district, Hunan province, China—died Nov. 12, 1969, Kaifeng, Henan province), Chairman of the People’s Republic of China (1959–68) and chief theoretician of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). An activist communist background from the 1920s helped Liu’s rise within the CCP in the 1930s and ’40s, while his excellent education and studies in the Soviet Union made him an effective spokesman for the new government in China. When Mao resigned as chairman after the failure of his Great Leap Forward, Liu assumed the title. His policies for revitalizing agriculture by permitting peasants to cultivate private plots and giving them monetary incentives were ones to which Mao later strongly objected. In 1968 Liu was purged from power for being a “capitalist roader,” and Lin Biao was appointed Mao’s successor.

Chinese Communist Party Summary

Chinese Communist Party (CCP), political party of China. Since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the CCP has been in sole control of that country’s government. The CCP was founded as both a political party and a revolutionary movement in 1921 by revolutionaries such as Li

communism Summary

Communism, political and economic doctrine that aims to replace private property and a profit-based economy with public ownership and communal control of at least the major means of production (e.g., mines, mills, and factories) and the natural resources of a society. Communism is thus a form of

government Summary

Government, the political system by which a country or community is administered and regulated. Most of the key words commonly used to describe governments—words such as monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy—are of Greek or Roman origin. They have been current for more than 2,000 years and have not

China Summary

China, country of East Asia. It is the largest of all Asian countries. Occupying nearly the entire East Asian landmass, it covers approximately one-fourteenth of the land area of Earth, and it is almost as large as the whole of Europe. China is also one of the most populous countries in the world,