|
|
society upside down and reorganised it based upon the citizens' degree of loyalty to their new regime. A purge was undertaken at every level of governmental institution to remove all who were openly disloyal or suspected of being so. This distrust was further expanded to include family, friends, and business associates of those who were considered to be opposed to the leadership. Instead of extending the same rights to each citizen, a spectrum of degraded rights was distributed to ranked social groups according to assumed political attitude.
The Communists were not satisfied with a new Constitution of 1954 or with their status as the ruling party, as is customary in Western majority governments. Like the Nationalists before them, the Communists' victory had to be complete and their supporters had to be pure. Therefore, they launched endless political movements (between 1951 and 1965) and segregated anyone who had differing opinions, even those with the best of intentions.8 Nothing could stop them in their quest for absolute control, not even the law. Once their opposition was totally silenced, they set about the task of establishing a new political hierarchy to ensure their above-law position.
The Communist Party had become the sole legislator, legal administrator, and judge of the Chinese people. A mountain of specified, degraded, and unequal rights and entitlements that stipulated a unique place for each citizen was enacted, thus guaranteeing the absolute control of the party.
Chapter 5: Words of Mao and Law
in the Cultural Revolution
The Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) created a lawless state in China. Unlike the West, where political movement often emerges from grassroots activity, the Cultural Revolution was conceived and orchestrated every step of the way by the divine voice and words of Chairman Mao. For ten years, all rules of Chinese law—be they constitutional, patrician, moral, ancient, or modern—were completely overridden by the words of a single man.