"China, despite many imperfections in its economic and political system, has been the most rapidly growing nation of the past three decades. Chinese poverty until Mao Zedong’s death had nothing to do with Chinese culture; it was due to the disastrous way Mao organized the economy and conducted politics. In the 1950s, he promoted the Great Leap Forward, a drastic industrialization policy that led to mass starvation and famine. In the 1960s, he propagated the Cultural Revolution, which led to the mass persecution of intellectuals and educated people—anyone whose party loyalty might be doubted. This again led to terror and a huge waste of the society’s talent and resources. In the same way, current Chinese growth has nothing to do with Chinese values or changes in Chinese culture; it results from a process of economic transformation unleashed by the reforms implemented by Deng Xiaoping and his allies, who, after Mao Zedong’s death, gradually abandoned socialist economic policies and institutions, first in agriculture and then in industry."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Anti-fascistsPoets from ChinaGeneral Secretaries and Chairmen of the Communist Party of ChinaAnti-imperialistsNon-fiction authors from China
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson, Why Nations Fail (2012), Chap. 2 : Theories that Don't Work
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Mao Zedong
1893 – 1976
chinesischer Revolutionär
338 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Mao Zedong →
Related Quotes
"Despise the enemy strategically, but take him seriously tactically."
"Mao then rose from guerrilla chief in the late 1920s to a party leader in the mid-1930s on the Long March, the flight…"
"The question of how to deal with the legacy of Mao Zedong, how to separate man from myth, ranged among the most diffi…"
"One of the paradoxes in Mao as a revolutionary thinker is that despite the emphasis in his teaching on the need for r…"
"As he approached his death in 1976, Mao ruminated that he could claim two great victories: the conquest of China and …"
"Mao lies a-mouldring in his tomb, but his soul and his body of work will keep marching on as long as the C.C.P. remai…"
"Paradoxes are found in all great men. One need think only of the contradictory principles and impulses that motivated…"
"Mao’s key idea about the need for violent rebellion to sweep away social injustice and his practical strategies to ac…"
"The adulation Mao received during his lifetime and the outpouring of national grief evoked by his death may have appe…"
"The ever-growing historiography devoted to Mao does not present the clearest of pictures. Often depending on the poli…"