Liu Shaoqi 劉少奇 刘少奇
2nd President of the People's Republic of China
In office 27 April 1959 – 31 October 1968
Preceded by	Mao Zedong
Succeeded by	Dong Biwu and Song Qingling
Born	24 November 1898(1898-11-24)
Died	12 November 1969 (aged 70)
Nationality	Chinese
Political party	Communist Party of China

An anti-Liu Shaoqi poster, 1968. It reads, "The renegade, traitor and scab Liu Shaoqi must forever be expelled from the Party!" Note that the characters that form Liu Shaoqi's name are crossed out.

Liu Shaoqi (simplified Chinese: 刘少奇; traditional Chinese: 劉少奇; pinyin: Liú Shàoqí; Wade-Giles: Liu Shao-ch'i) (November 24, 1898 – November 12, 1969) was a Chinese Communist leader. He was Chairman of the People's Republic of China from April 27, 1959 to October 31, 1968. Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... The President of the Peoples Republic of China (Simplified Chinese: 中华人民共和国主席; Pinyin: Zhōnghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó ZhÇ”xí, or abbreviated Guójiā ZhÇ”xí 国家主席) is the head of state of the Peoples Republic of China. ... April 27 is the 117th day of the year (118th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 248 days remaining. ... Year 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 304th day of the year (305th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Mao redirects here. ... Dong Biwu (Chinese: 董必武, Wade-Giles: Tung Pi-wu) (1886 - April 2, 1975) was a Chinese communist political leader during the regime of Mao Zedong. ... Soong Ching-ling (Simplified Chinese 宋庆龄, Traditional Chinese 宋慶齡, pinyin: Sòng Qìnglíng, Wade-Giles: Sung Ching-ling) (January 27, 1893 - May 29, 1981) was one of the Soong sisters—three sisters whose husbands were amongst Chinas most significant political... is the 328th day of the year (329th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1898 (MDCCCXCVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Monday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ... is the 316th day of the year (317th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also: 1969 (Stargate SG-1) episode. ... The Communist Party of China (CPC) (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ), also known as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the ruling political party of the Peoples Republic of China, a position guaranteed by the countrys constitution. ... Image File history File links This is a copyrighted poster. ... Image File history File links This is a copyrighted poster. ... Simplified Chinese character (Simplified Chinese: or ; traditional Chinese: or ; pinyin: or ) is one of two standard sets of Chinese characters of the contemporary Chinese written language. ... Traditional Chinese characters refers to one of two standard sets of printed Chinese characters. ... Pinyin, more formally called Hanyu Pinyin (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ), is the most common variant of Standard Mandarin romanization system in use. ... 劉 pinyin: Liú (in traditional form) Liu is a common Chinese family name. ... Wade-Giles, sometimes abbreviated Wade, is a Romanization (phonetic notation and transliteration) system for the Chinese language based on Mandarin. ... is the 328th day of the year (329th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1898 (MDCCCXCVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Monday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ... is the 316th day of the year (317th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also: 1969 (Stargate SG-1) episode. ... The President of the Peoples Republic of China (Simplified Chinese: 中华人民共和国主席; Pinyin: Zhōnghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó ZhÇ”xí, or abbreviated Guójiā ZhÇ”xí 国家主席) is the head of state of the Peoples Republic of China. ... April 27 is the 117th day of the year (118th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 248 days remaining. ... Year 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 304th day of the year (305th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Biography

Born into a rich peasant family in Yinshan, Hunan province (near Mao's Shaoshan), Liu attended the same school as Mao Zedong in Changsha, and then went to the Soviet Union and received his university education at the University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow. In 1921 he joined the newly formed CCP. He went back to China in 1922, and led several railway workers' strikes. During the period of 1925 to 1926, he led many political campaigns and strikes in Hubei and Shanghai. In 1927 he was elected to the Party's Central Committee. Not to be confused with the unrelated provinces of Hainan, Henan, and Yunnan. ... Mao redirects here. ... Changsha (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Chang-sha) is the capital city of Hunan, a province of Southcentral China, located on the lower reaches of Xiangjiang river, a branch of the Yangtze River. ... The Communist University of the Toilers of the East or KUTV (Russian: Коммунистический университет трудящихся Востока or КУТВ; also known as the Far East University) was established April 21, 1921 in Moscow by the Communist International (Comintern) as a training college for communist cadres in the colonial world. ... For other uses, see Moscow (disambiguation). ... Hubei (Chinese: 湖北; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Hu-pei; Postal System Pinyin: Hupeh) is a central province of the Peoples Republic of China. ... For other uses, see Shanghai (disambiguation). ... Central Committee most commonly refers to the central executive unit of a communist party, whether ruling or non-ruling. ...

In 1932 Liu became the Party Secretary in Fujian Province. Two years later he joined the Long March and was one of the supporters of Mao Zedong during the Zunyi Conference. In 1936 he was Party Secretary in North China, leading the anti-Japanese movements in that area. He was elected as one of 5 CPC Secretaries in 1945.   (Chinese: ; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Fu-chien; Postal map spelling: Fukien, Foukien; local transliteration Hokkien from Min Nan Hok-kiàn) is one of the provinces on the southeast coast of the Peoples Republic of China. ... Combatants Nationalist Party of China and allied warlords Communist Party of China Commanders Chiang Kai-shek various, eventually Mao Zedong Strength over 300,000 First Front Red Army: 86,000 (October 1934) 7,000 (October 1935) The Long March (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: ; pinyin: ) was a massive military retreat undertaken... Mao redirects here. ... As a well-organized and highly disciplined party, the Communist Party of China made important decisions and enforced its policies by holding different meetings. ...

After the establishment of the People's Republic of China, Liu worked mainly in economic areas. In 1956 he was Party Deputy Chairman and was regarded as number two person in Party and State leadership. An orthodox Soviet-style Communist, he favored state planning and the development of heavy industry. He was therefore skeptical about Mao's Great Leap Forward movement which began in 1958. Alerted by his sister to the developing famine in rural areas in 1960, he became a determined opponent of Mao's policies, while at the same time, his dedication of orthodox Soviet-style communism was significantly decreased after witnessing Mao's disastrous policy. In the wake of the Great Leap Forward's catastrophic failure he began to be seen as Mao's likely successor. His more moderate economic policies helped to lead China from the depths of the Great Leap Forward. Liu Shaoqi favored and implemented Deng Xiaoping's idea of piece work, greater wage differentials and other measures that sought to undermine collective farms and factories. The Great Leap Forward (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ) of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) was an economic and social plan used from 1958 to 1960 which aimed to use Chinas vast population to rapidly transform mainland China from a primarily agrarian economy dominated by peasant farmers... The Great Leap Forward (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ) of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) was an economic and social plan used from 1958 to 1960 which aimed to use Chinas vast population to rapidly transform mainland China from a primarily agrarian economy dominated by peasant farmers... Deng Xiaoping   (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Teng Hsiao-ping; August 22, 1904 – February 19, 1997) was a prominent Chinese politician and reformer, and the late leader of the Communist Party of China (CCP). ... Piece work or piecework describes types of employment in which a worker is paid a fixed piece rate for each unit produced or action performed. ...

Halfway through the 1960s, however, Mao rebuilt his position in the Party and in 1966 he launched the Cultural Revolution as a means of destroying his enemies in the Party. Liu and Deng Xiaoping, along with many others, were denounced as "capitalist roaders." Liu was labeled as a "traitor," "scab," and "the biggest capitalist roader in the Party." In July 1966 he was displaced as Party Deputy Chairman by Lin Biao. By 1967 Liu and his wife Wang Guangmei were under house arrest in Beijing. The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution [1] in the Peoples Republic of China was a struggle for power within the Communist Party of China that manifested into wide-scale social, political, and economic chaos, which grew to include large sections of Chinese society and eventually brought the entire country to... Deng Xiaoping   (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Teng Hsiao-ping; August 22, 1904 – February 19, 1997) was a prominent Chinese politician and reformer, and the late leader of the Communist Party of China (CCP). ... Strike action, often simply called a strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal by employees to perform work. ... The essentially Maoist concept of capitalist roader (走资派）denotes persons or groups on the political left who demonstrate a marked tendency to bow to pressure from bourgeois forces and subsequently attempt to pull the Revolution in a capitalist direction, and eventually restore the political and economic rule of capitalism--hence the... An artistic rendition of Mao Zedong and Lin Biao as his heir apparent in the style of socialist realism in the prime of the Cultural Revolution. ... Wang Guangmei (26 September 1921 – 13 October 2006) was the wife of Liu Shaoqi. ... “Peking” redirects here. ...

Liu was removed from all his positions and expelled from the Party in October 1968 and disappeared from view. The exact conditions of his death remain uncertain and contested. One version states: after Mao's death in 1976 it was revealed that Liu had been confined under terrible conditions in an isolated cell in Kaifeng, where he faced beatings and struggle sessions on a daily basis. This isolation and torture eventually led to his death from "medical neglect", (untreated diabetes and pneumonia). Several weeks after his death, Red Guards discovered him lying on the floor covered in Diarrhea and vomit, with a foot of unkempt hair protruding from his scalp. It was here that the former premier of China died on November 12, 1969. At midnight, under secrecy, his remains were brought in a jeep to a crematorium, his legs hanging out the back, and he was cremated under the name Liu Huihuang. The cause of death was recorded as illness., and his family was not informed for another 3 year after this date, and the people on China for 10 years. The ashes of his body are said to be held on Babaoshan. Kaifeng (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: Kāifēng; Wade-Giles: Kai-feng), formerly known as Bianliang (汴梁; Wade-Giles: Pien-liang), is a prefecture-level city in eastern Henan province, Peoples Republic of China. ... This article is about the disease that features high blood sugar. ... This article is about human pneumonia. ... is the 316th day of the year (317th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also: 1969 (Stargate SG-1) episode. ...

After Deng Xiaoping came to power in 1978, Liu was politically rehabilitated (in February 1980), with a belated state funeral over a decade after his death. Deng Xiaoping   (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Teng Hsiao-ping; August 22, 1904 – February 19, 1997) was a prominent Chinese politician and reformer, and the late leader of the Communist Party of China (CCP). ...

Liu's best known writings include How to be a Good Communist (1939), On the Party (1945), and Internationalism and Nationalism (1952).

See also

• History of the People's Republic of China

The history of the Peoples Republic of China details the history of mainland China since October 1, 1949, when, after a near complete victory by the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the Chinese Civil War, Mao Zedong proclaimed the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) from atop Tiananmen...

References

• "Fifth Plenary Session of 11th C.C.P. Central Committee," Beijing Review, No. 10 (March 10, 1980), pp. 3–10, which describes the official rehabilitation measures.

External links

• The Liu Shaoqi Reference Archive

v • d • e Presidents of the People's Republic of China
Mao Zedong | Liu Shaoqi | Li Xiannian | Yang Shangkun | Jiang Zemin | Hu Jintao