Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing’s significance in this account lies in her role within the Gang of Four, the faction that sought to continue the Cultural Revolution after Mao’s death. The book presents her as a political actor in a contest over whether China would preserve Maoist policies or move toward economic change while maintaining Communist Party rule.

Position in the Cultural Revolution

Jiang Qing was Mao Zedong’s wife and, with three close associates, formed the Gang of Four. The group had strongly supported the Cultural Revolution and its repression, and intended to keep using that political blueprint to govern under the Communist Party’s dictatorship. Their position linked the continuation of Cultural Revolution policies to the preservation of their own power and the party’s political control.

Conflict with Deng Xiaoping

Deng Xiaoping’s proposed direction differed sharply from the Gang of Four’s. After his rehabilitation, he supervised party documents calling for revitalized higher education, a return to material incentives in industry and agriculture, and the removal of leftists from the party. The Gang of Four blamed Deng for the protest that followed a spontaneous celebration of Zhou Enlai’s life in Tiananmen Square on April 5; Deng was again stripped of his positions and dismissed. In the book’s account, this reversal captures the immediate political contest: Deng sought to remove the leftists, but they instead removed him.

After Mao’s Death

Mao’s death in September created a power vacuum and opened a struggle among leaders with different views of change. The Gang of Four wanted to continue Cultural Revolution policies as a means of consolidating their power and the Communist Party’s. Hua Guofeng, meanwhile, advocated a more balanced version of Mao’s vision, expressed in the Two Whatevers. Deng and his supporters sought substantial economic growth without surrendering Communist Party control, and recognized that this required significant movement toward more inclusive economic institutions. Jiang Qing’s narrative role is therefore primarily factional: she represents the effort to preserve the existing political course at a moment when Mao’s departure made that course newly contestable.