Description
Book SynopsisThe Communist Labor University introduced uneducated farmers and peasants to basic agricultural science and farming techniques until 1980. The author explores the inner workings of this Chinese institution and the direct personal involvment in its affairs by the nation's key communist leaders.
Trade ReviewA well-written book. * The China Journal *
The book is engagingly written. * Labor History *
This book can help readers understand Chinese politics or education before 1980. * History of Education Quarterly *
Specialists on Chinese education and on modern China more generally will welcome this volume for the new insights and understandings it contributes to the study of Chinese socialist development, and the role of higher education within that development. Comparative educators will find it fills important gaps in knowledge within the wider historical project of socialist higher eduction development. * Comparative Education *
Cleverley's treatment of the history of the Communist Labour University is detailed, effective and quite readable. * Pacific Affairs *
Cleverley's book is a model of educational history. With a deep and surefooted understanding of his subject he takes the reader lucidly and impartially through the permeations of power and ideology. -- Richard Davis, University of Tasmania * History Of Education Review *
Offers an interesting glimpse into attempts to translate revolutionary ideology into meaningful, pragmatic, and mass-based educational actualization. As such, the Gongda story, as narrated in this volume, merits attention as a daring and even noble facet of twentieth-century Chinese societal transformation. * The Historian *
Table of ContentsChapter 1 List of Photographs Chapter 2 Abbreviations and Terms Chapter 3 Preface Chapter 4 Map Chapter 5 Introduction: Setting the Scene Part 6 I: ESTABLISHMENT Chapter 7 1 Great Expectations Chapter 8 2 The Founding Chapter 9 3 Branches of Gongda Chapter 10 4 A Dark Side Part 11 II: EDUCATIONAL WORK Chapter 12 5 Classroom and Farm Chapter 13 6 “Staffers, Laborers, and Researchers.” Part 14 III: ON POLITICS Chapter 15 7 Guidance from the Chairman Chapter 16 8 A Role for Ideology Chapter 17 9 On Political Movements Part 18 IV: STEPS BACK AND FORWARD Chapter 19 10 Famine and Fortitude Chapter 20 11 A Letter from Mao Zedong Chapter 21 12 Good Friends Rally Chapter 22 13 “The Golden Years" Part 23 V: CYCLE OF REVOLUTION Chapter 24 14 Cultural Wars Chapter 25 15 An Open Door Chapter 26 16 Trial by Media Chapter 27 17 Attacked by Left and Right Part 28 VI: LIFE AND LEGEND Chapter 29 18 Decision Point Chapter 30 19 Life after Death Chapter 31 Afterword Chapter 32 Notes Chapter 33 Select Bibliography Chapter 34 Index Chapter 35 About the Author
