Yan'an Rectification Movement - Background

Background

In the 1930s the remote region of Yan'an had not experienced the same turmoil and hostilities as other mainland territories. Situated in northwest China, the area was also difficult to attack. CCP members mostly arrived there after the Long March (1934–1935). The area was known as a territory of camaraderie without corruption, though the Rectification Movement essentially changed everything.

According to official CCP sources, the purpose of the Rectification Campaign was to give a basic grounding in the Marxist theory, and Leninist principles of party organization to the thousands of new members who had joined the CCP during its expansion after 1937. A second, equally important aspect of the movement was the elimination of the blind imitation of Soviet models, obedience to Soviet directives (mostly communicated to China via the Comintern), and "empiricism". Mao emphasized that the campaign aimed at "rectifying mistaken ideas" and not the people who held them.

Modern research by Chinese and Western scholars, in particular the interpretation of Professor Gao Hua in his work "How Did The Red Sun Rise: The Cause And Effect Of Zhengfeng In Yan'an", have focused on the political nature of the Rectification Movement. Modern scholars have increasingly viewed the movement as being initiated by Mao in order to ensure his status as paramount leader of the CCP. Most historical sources refer to multiple phases of "rectification", often with inconsistent names and imprecise start and end times.

Throughout the Rectification Campaign, Yan'an was not seriously threatened by either the Japanese or the Nationalists. With Russia at war with Nazi Germany and unable to intervene, Mao seized the opportunity in Yan'an to "go to work" on his Party and "mold it into an unquestioning machine" in preparation for the all-out civil war against Chiang Kai-shek that was expected to follow the defeat of the Japanese. (This is according to Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, whose treatment of Mao has been regarded as flawed by some China scholars.)

The Yan'an era had a profound effect on the CCP and its future fortunes. When the Communists completed the Long March the CCP was a relatively small band of less than 10,000 worn out troups from the south, displaced to an isolated and poor area in the hinterlands of northern China. By the end of the Yan'an era, however, the CCP's forces had grown to nearly 2.8 million members, and the Party governed nineteen base areas that contained a population of nearly one hundred million people.