Criticize Deng, Counter the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts
In 1975, while Zhou Enlai lay gravely ill, Deng Xiaoping oversaw a "comprehensive rectification" of the country under Mao's "three directives," bringing marked improvement to Party and state work. When Deng declined to chair a resolution affirming a "seventy-thirty" assessment of the Cultural Revolution, Mao's nephew and Politburo liaison Mao Yuanxin reported his refusal to Mao, who approved a "greeting meeting" on 24 November 1975 that formally launched the "Criticize Deng, Counter the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts" campaign. After Zhou Enlai's death in January 1976, Hua Guofeng was named acting Premier, and the movement to attack Deng spread nationwide. Public mourning for Zhou at Tiananmen Square in April 1976 was suppressed as the "Tiananmen Incident," after which Deng was stripped of all his posts. The campaign effectively ended with the arrest of the "Gang of Four" in October 1976, and in July 1977 the 3rd Plenum of the 10th Central Committee restored Deng to all his positions.
The 1975 Rectification and the "Three Directives as the Key Link"
After the First Session of the Fourth National People's Congress in January 1975, a gravely ill Zhou Enlai was hospitalized, and Mao Zedong entrusted Deng Xiaoping with the Party's day-to-day work. Deng immediately launched a "comprehensive rectification" across railways, steel, the military, science and technology, and education, using the resolution of railway transport bottlenecks in March as his opening breakthrough. On 4 July, at a meeting of the Central Study Class, he proposed treating Mao's "three directives" — study theory, maintain stability and unity, and develop the national economy — as the guideline for current work, effectively replacing the Cultural Revolution's "class struggle as the key link" with an emphasis on stability and economic development, and for a time producing a marked improvement in Party and state affairs.
Liu Bing's Letters and the "Greeting Meeting"
On 13 August and 13 October 1975, Tsinghua University deputy Party secretary Liu Bing and others jointly wrote to Mao Zedong twice, accusing Party secretary Chi Qun and deputy secretary Xie Jingyi of problems in teaching and conduct; both letters were forwarded by Deng Xiaoping. Mao judged the letters "impure in motive" and aimed, in effect, at himself, and saw Deng's act of forwarding them as favoring Liu Bing's side. In November, Mao asked Deng to chair the drafting of a resolution affirming a "seventy-thirty" assessment of the Cultural Revolution (seventy percent achievement, thirty percent error); Deng declined, saying it would be inappropriate for him to preside over drafting such a document. Mao's nephew Mao Yuanxin, serving as his Politburo liaison, promptly reported Deng's refusal to Mao, who, on hearing it, said grimly, "It seems I need to give everyone a heads-up." On 24 November, the Politburo convened the "greeting meeting" in Beijing, attended by more than 130 veteran Party, government, and military officials; Deng himself chaired the session and read out the Mao-approved "Key Points of the Greeting Talk," which described the Tsinghua affair as "a reflection of the current struggle between two classes, two roads, and two lines — a right-deviationist wind to reverse verdicts." The "Criticize Deng, Counter the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts" campaign was thereby formally launched.
Zhou Enlai's Death and the Tiananmen Incident
Zhou Enlai died on 8 January 1976. On 28 January, Mao proposed that Hua Guofeng take charge of the Party's day-to-day work, and on 2 February the Central Committee issued a notice naming Hua acting Premier of the State Council, effectively stripping Deng of his authority over central affairs. The "Criticize Deng" campaign then spread nationwide, with newspapers everywhere publishing articles denouncing an unnamed "unrepentant capitalist-roader within the Party" — a thinly veiled reference to Deng. Around the Qingming Festival, crowds in Beijing, Nanjing, Zhengzhou, and other major cities spontaneously gathered at monuments and Tiananmen Square to lay wreaths and poems mourning Zhou Enlai and protesting the "Gang of Four." On 5 April, the crowd gathered at Tiananmen Square clashed with the authorities; that night, militia, police, and troops were deployed to clear the square, and hundreds were arrested — the "Tiananmen Incident," officially branded at the time a "counter-revolutionary political incident." On 7 April, the Politburo, acting on Mao's proposal, passed a resolution declaring that "the nature of the Deng Xiaoping problem has turned into an antagonistic contradiction," stripping Deng of all his posts inside and outside the Party (while allowing him to keep his Party membership, pending further observation) and naming Hua Guofeng First Vice-Chairman of the Party and Premier of the State Council.
The Campaign's End and Deng's Return
On 6 October 1976, Hua Guofeng, Ye Jianying, and others acted to arrest Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, and Wang Hongwen, crushing the "Gang of Four"; the "Criticize Deng, Counter the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts" campaign effectively ended as a nationwide political movement, though Deng's own posts were not immediately restored. From 16 to 21 July 1977, the 3rd Plenum of the 10th CCP Central Committee met in Beijing; on 17 July the plenum unanimously passed the "Resolution on Restoring Comrade Deng Xiaoping's Positions," reinstating him as Central Committee member, Politburo Standing Committee member, Party Vice-Chairman, Vice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission, State Council Vice-Premier, and PLA Chief of General Staff. On 16 November 1978, the Beijing Municipal Party Committee declared the Tiananmen Incident to have been "entirely a revolutionary action," rehabilitating the officials and citizens persecuted over it — marking the definitive reversal of this chapter of history.
Narrative Comparison
| Source | Narrative |
|---|---|
| Beijing Official Account | The 1981 "Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party" characterizes "Criticize Deng, Counter the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts" as a political campaign by the Jiang Qing counter-revolutionary clique, which exploited Mao's late-life errors to deliberately attack the correct rectification Deng had led; the same resolution explicitly declares the Tiananmen Incident to have been "entirely a revolutionary mass movement," fully rehabilitating those persecuted over it, and treats Deng's 1977 restoration as a key step in setting things right. |
| Western Academic Scholarship | Scholarship by MacFarquhar, Schoenhals, and others emphasizes that the campaign's root cause was Mao's own refusal to tolerate Deng's systematic repudiation of the Cultural Revolution — Mao Yuanxin's report was the proximate trigger, but Mao's insistence on a "seventy-thirty" affirmation of the Cultural Revolution was the substantive point of rupture with Deng. This view holds that the official narrative's placement of full responsibility on the "Gang of Four" likewise understates Mao's own decisive role in driving this political reckoning. |
| Eyewitness Testimony | Tiananmen Poems collects the poems and elegiac couplets that mourners left at Tiananmen Square around the 1976 Qingming Festival, mixing grief for Zhou Enlai with direct attacks on the "Gang of Four" and open support for Deng Xiaoping. These spontaneous writings by ordinary citizens reveal a different reality from the authorities' "counter-revolutionary political incident" label — an unorganized, grassroots political expression. |
Key Milestones
- Liu Bing and others send their first letter to Mao accusing Chi Qun and Xie Jingyi
- The Politburo's "greeting meeting" formally launches the campaign
- Zhou Enlai dies
- The Central Committee names Hua Guofeng acting Premier of the State Council
- Tiananmen Incident: the square is cleared, hundreds arrested
- The Politburo resolves to strip Deng Xiaoping of all his posts
Hua Guofeng is named First Vice-Chairman of the Party and Premier.
- Hua Guofeng, Ye Jianying, and others crush the "Gang of Four"; the campaign effectively ends
- The 3rd Plenum of the 10th Central Committee restores Deng Xiaoping to all his posts
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