What Mao Actually Taught

Abstract

This chapter establishes what exactly Mao taught about insurgency from his earliest political writings and speeches in 1917 to his final works in 1971. This analysis is crucial because many of the myths and conflicting interpretations about Mao’s teachings on insurgency have arisen from incomplete or selective readings of his works. Using qualitative content analysis, the chapter generates a breakdown of 16 themes that can be found within Mao’s teachings, spread across four categories: Politicised Warfare, Military, Population, and Resources. The outcome of the chapter is a comprehensive and evidence-based articulation of exactly what Mao’s teachings about insurgency involved. This differs from previous examinations of Mao’s writings on this topic, which have tended to draw selectively from a few overestimated works.

Appendix: Expanded Methodology

In order to carry out a reliable, valid, and rigorous quantitative content analysis, the book adopted the eight-stage process outlined by Zhang and Wildemuth (2009), as follows:

• 1. Prepare the data.

• 2. Define the unit of analysis.

• 3. Develop categories and a coding scheme.

• 4. Test the coding scheme on a sample of text.

• 5. Code all of the text.

• 6. Assess coding consistency.

• 7. Draw conclusions from the coded data.

• 8. Report methods and findings.

Prepare the Data

The data selected will be the Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung and the Collected Works of Mao Tse-Tung. These volumes have been selected because they contain the largest collections of works by Mao available and comprise the overwhelming majority of his writing on insurgencies. Volumes I to V of the Selected Works were published by the Foreign Languages Press, Peking. Volumes VI to IX were published by Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, and Sramikavarga Prachuranalu, Hyderabad. The entire Collected Works were published by the US Government’s Joint Publications Research Service.

Define the Unit of Analysis

The units of analysis (the portions of text that will be considered during the qualitative content analysis and from which the units of coding will be drawn) will be the individual works contained within each of the Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung and the Collected Works of Mao Tse-Tung. The units of coding (the portion of each unit of analysis that will be examined for categories and subcategories) will also be the individual works within these two collections. This represents an academically recognised approach that has been adopted here in order to trace the differences that exist between the different works themselves and trace the development of Mao’s positions throughout his writings (Schreier 2012, 131–132). Units of context (those elements of surrounding portions of text within the data being used and/or general background knowledge) will be unlimited—Mao was widely read, able to receive news through radio transmissions and had many spies in enemy camps—and would have been familiar with his own work. The only exception is that only those texts or events that occurred prior to each work may be included: Mao could not see into the future. The footnotes in each volume represent later annotations made by party officials to supply additional context, further commentary, and ‘correct’ previous positions. These portions of the text have been disregarded because they are typically written many years after the original works and are influenced by hindsight and later policy changes. To include them would detract from the ability of the content analysis to identify which changes occurred with Mao’s written positions regarding insurgency throughout his life.

Develop Categories and a Coding Scheme

Categories and subcategories have been developed deductively, drawing from a range of established perceptions of what characterises and defines Mao within the academic literature, as outlined in Chap. 2. Through these two processes, 32 separate categories were generated. Each theme of Maoism has been broken into separate positive and negative categories. This is because it is possible for Mao to have made both positive and negative references to a particular element of warfare within a text, so that positive and negative references cannot be seen as mutually exclusive. The full list of categories and subcategories for the analysis are listed further down in this section of the appendix.

For each category, there exist three subcategories: mild, firm, and instructional. These levels are differentiated by the following rules:

• Mild: brief or implicit references are made to support the category or refute its anti-thesis. This includes passing references or short statements with little explanation.

Example 1: Mildly in Favour of Popular Mobilisation

With the support of the masses, we have issued economic construction bonds to the value of three million Yuan in order to develop state enterprise and assist the co-operatives. Such reliance on the strength of the masses is the only possible way to solve the problem of funds for economic construction at this time . (Mao 1965a, 144)

Example 2: Mildly in Favour of a United Front

If Chiang can clean up the dirt created by the Kuomintang’s reactionary policy over the past ten years, thoroughly correct his fundamental errors of compromise in foreign affairs and of civil war and oppression at home, immediately join the anti-Japanese front uniting all parties and groups and really take the military and political measures that can save the nation, then of course the Communist Party will support him. (Mao 1965a, 257–258)

• Firm: strong reference, overt endorsement or repeated mentions are made to support this category or refute its anti-thesis.

Example 1: Firmly in Favour of Popular Mobilisation

First, we have decided on the line of our Party, which is boldly to mobilise the masses and expand the people’s forces so that, under the leadership of our Party, they will defeat the Japanese aggressors, liberate the whole people and build a new-democratic China . (Mao 1965c, 238)

Example 2: Firmly in Favour of Politicised Military

We must first raise the political consciousness of the vanguard so that, resolute and unafraid of sacrifice, they will surmount every difficulty to win victory. But this is not enough; we must also arouse the political consciousness of the entire people so that they may willingly and gladly fight together with us for victory . (Mao 1965c, 238)

• Instructional: specific instructions or in-depth explanations are offered regarding the implementation of this category or the refutation of its anti-thesis.

Example 1: Instructions in Favour of a United Front

China’s democratic revolution depends on definite social forces for its accomplishment. These social forces are the working class, the peasantry, the intelligentsia and the progressive section of the bourgeoisie, that is, the revolutionary workers, peasants, soldiers, students and intellectuals, and businessmen, with the workers and peasants as the basic revolutionary forces and the workers as the class which leads the revolution. It is impossible to accomplish the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal democratic revolution without these basic revolutionary forces and without the leadership of the working class. Today, the principal enemies of the revolution are the Japanese imperialists and the Chinese traitors, and the fundamental policy in the revolution is the policy of the Anti-Japanese National United Front, consisting of all workers, peasants, soldiers, students and intellectuals, and businessmen who are against Japanese aggression. Final victory in the War of Resistance will be won when this united front is greatly consolidated and developed. (Mao 1965b, 238)

Example 2: Instructions in Favour of Courteous Conduct

I earnestly suggest to this congress that we pay close attention to the well-being of the masses, from the problems of land and labour to those of fuel, rice, cooking oil and salt. The women want to learn ploughing and harrowing. Whom can we get to teach them? The children want to go to school. Have we set up primary schools? The wooden bridge over there is too narrow and people may fall off. Should we not repair it? Many people suffer from boils and other ailments. What are we going to do about it? All such problems concerning the well-being of the masses should be placed on our agenda. We should discuss them, adopt and carry out decisions and check up on the results. We should convince the masses that we represent their interests, that our lives are intimately bound up with theirs … we must be with them, arouse their enthusiasm and initiative, be concerned with their well-being, work earnestly and sincerely in their interests and solve all their problems of production and everyday life—the problems of salt, rice, housing, clothing, childbirth, etc. (Mao 1965b, 147)

Test the Coding Scheme on a Sample of Text

In order to ensure the reliability of the coding framework, two complementary methods were employed (Schreier 2012, 166–167). A sample of text was coded by the author as primary coder, and then two weeks later recoded from a fresh start. The two coding results were compared and any differences identified and reconciled. After this had been carried out, a group of second coders—independent to the project—with appropriate skill sets and analytical knowledge were asked to code selected portions of text, using the same coding rules. The coding results were again compared and any differences identified and reconciled. As these reliability tests showed that the coding results were within acceptably close proximity to one another, it was deemed that consistency was sufficiently high for the coding scheme to be considered scientifically reliable.

Code All of the Text

The code was then systematically and comprehensively applied to all of the texts. The coding framework will be referred to consistently throughout to ensure that the meanings of the codes are applied appropriately and accurately throughout, without losing sight of their meaning. The data was captured by annotations written in the margins of the text each time a theme was identified, with the summary scores annotated on the title page of each work. The summary scores were then inputted into a coding sheet, which has been included in the Results section.

Assess the Coding Consistency

Randomly selected samples from different parts of the text were recoded to confirm consistency of coding. This process confirmed that coding consistency had indeed been applied appropriately throughout.

Draw Conclusions from the Data

Conclusions were drawn based on the coding completed. These have been recorded in the main body of this thesis.

Report the Methods and Findings

The method and findings have been reported in the main body of this thesis.

A number of potential critiques exist regarding the use of qualitative content analysis as a technique. The book briefly outlines and rebuts three of these critiques here. One critique of qualitative content analysis suggests that quantitative content analysis can, through its complex statistical analysis of bodies of text, more systematically and reliably describe the meaning of a text than qualitative content analysis. This makes the use of qualitative content analysis unnecessary and comparatively unproductive. Kracauer (1952, 631) provides three rebuttals to this point of view:

• 1. One-sided reliance on quantitative content analysis may lead to a neglect of qualitative explorations, thus reducing the accuracy of analysis.

• 2. The assumptions underlying quantitative analysis tend to preclude a judicious appraisal of the important role which qualitative considerations may play in communications research. Hence the need for theoretical reorientation.

• 3. The potentialities of communications research can be developed only if, as the result of such a reorientation, the emphasis is shifted from quantitative to qualitative procedures.

A second critique of qualitative content analysis argues that, because coding is conducted by a human researcher rather than computer software, the potential for problems with reliability is greater. This critique has some merit to it, as it is possible a human may be prone to subjectivity when reading through a text, including bringing pre-existing biases with them into the process that skew their reading of the text in a way that a computer would not. In order to mitigate this problem, the field of qualitative content analysis has stressed the importance of using multiple coders for test portions of text (Schreier 2012, 16). By ensuring that the methods being used to derive meaning from the text, as well as the interpretation of this meaning, are replicated by more than one coder, it is possible to create a considerably higher level of reliability than would be generated if no portions of the text were double coded. For this qualitative content analysis of Mao’s works, a substantial portion of text was coded by both the primary researcher and four secondary coders. The closeness between the results generated by the primary researcher and secondary coders was sufficiently high to demonstrate strong levels of reliability in the text, thus alleviating this potential challenge.

A third critique asserts that, because qualitative content analysis often generates numerical data, it is really a quantitative rather than qualitative research method. However, while it is true that qualitative content analysis does often produce numerical data—and in the appraisal of Mao conducted here it has generated considerable numerical data—this numerical data can be used as much or as little as is appropriate for reporting the results. This differentiates the method from quantitative research techniques, which tend to require the numerical information to act as the driving force for the entire analysis, including when reporting the results (Schreier 2012, 36). Qualitative content analysis gives the power to the researcher to decide how to best report the findings of their research in appropriate and meaningful ways. In contrast, quantitative content analysis demands a more pre-set, less flexible reporting structure, in which the numbers rather than the researcher decide on how the results will be presented.

References

• Kracauer, Sigfried. 1952. The Challenge of Quantitative Analysis. The Public Opinion Quarterly 16(4): 631–642.

• Mao Tse-tung. 1965a. Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung. Vol. I. Peking: Foreign Languages Press.

• Mao Tse-tung. 1965b. Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung. Vol. II. Peking: Foreign Languages Press.

• Mao Tse-tung. 1965c. Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung. Vol. III. Peking: Foreign Languages Press.

• Schreier, Margrit. 2012. Qualitative Content Analysis in Practice. London: Sage Publications Ltd.

• Zhang, Yan, and Barbara Wildemuth. 2009. Qualitative analysis of content. In Applications of Social Research Methods to Questions in Information and Library, ed. Barbara Wildemuth, 308–319. Westport: Libraries Unlimited.