Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962 Review

Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962
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Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962 ReviewThis important and very revealing book is a serious effort to enhance understanding of the horrendous famine resulting from the Great Leap Forward of the last 1950s and early 1960s. In reading this book, its important to understand DiKotter's method with its strengths and limitations. A complete and systematic narrative and analysis of the Great Leap Forward is not possible at this time. Much of the key documentation is hidden in closed archives in China and will probably remain inaccessible until the Communist Party loses its political monopoly. DiKotter pursued documents related to the Great Leap Forward in a number of less tightly guarded provinical archives. This effort produced a number of revealing documents generated by provincial party and government (often the same thing) officials, and copies of important documents from the central party-government apparatus. Supplemented by prior secondary sources and some other archival research, DiKotter was able to assemble a great deal of revealing information about the Great Leap Forward. Since DiKotter's approach is driven heavily by his archival research, this book often has an anecdotal quality, though DiKotter supplements his vignettes with some background narrative and analysis.
The cumulative effect of DiKotter's reliance on his primary sources is, however, a powerful and devastating exposure of the dimensions of this tragedy and the culpability of the Chinese Communist Party. DiKotter takes pains to rebut the common impression that the famine of the Great Leap Forward was the inadvertant consequence of a terribly mistaken policy exacerbated by bad weather. DiKotter shows very well that the famine and its accompanying events go well beyond simple criminal negligence. The Great Leap Forward was not just an ill-advised attempt at forced industrialization. DiKotter demonstrates a number of other important aspects including incredibly stupid and destructive efforts to completely re-engineer the hydrology of China and Chinese agriculture, to extend the power of the Party into all aspects of Chinese life, and to make China the leading nation of the Communist bloc. In common with other writers on this topic, DiKotter emphasizes Mao's crucial role in generating and sustaining the policies of the Great Leap Forward. DiKotter also makes clear that Mao would never have succeeded without the support of other important figures in the Party, and DiKotter shows well that Mao's messianism and incredibly callous attitude extended throughout the Party.
DiKotter favors a high estimate of the death toll associated with the Great Leap Forward, some 45 million people. If correct, this would be the greatest human caused slaughter in history, and it occurred in a span of about 4 years. The magnitude of the death toll, even at the smaller estimates of about 30 million, is unimaginable. DiKotter provides many examples of the ways in which the Chinese people died and these clearly written sections make for excruciating reading.Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962 Overview

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