Great Exchange of Revolutionary Experience

{{Hatnote|See also: {{Interlanguage link|Mao Zedong's meetings with the Red Guards|zh|毛泽东接见红卫兵}}}}

After Nie Yuanzi's poster criticizing Peking University was broadcast nationwide, an event often considered the opening of the Cultural Revolution, colleges and middle schools took the lead in responding. Rebels rushed to Peking University to learn from others and to the "{{Interlanguage link|Central Cultural Revolution Reception Station|zh|中央文革接待站}}" to file complaints and seek official help. From July 29 to August 12, 710,000 people from 36,000 units went to Peking University. Mao Zedong's reply to the Red Guards of Tsinghua University High School and the "Sixteen Articles" of the 11th plenary meeting of the 8th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party had caused powerful shockwaves, but had not yet broken the attitude of local government leaders who sought to resist and control the Cultural Revolution. On August 18 and August 31, Mao Zedong met twice with crowds of Red Guards, teachers and students in the capital, publicizing his affirmation and support for the Red Guards. His personal authority and charm attracted young students from all over the country who traveled en masse to Beijing, eager to be received by Mao and eager to bring back voices of support from the Central Cultural Revolution Group that differed from local authorities' suppression of the movement.

{{Wikisourcelang|zh|中共中央、国务院关于组织外地高等院校革命学生、中等学校革命学生代表和革命职工代表来京参观文化大革命运动的通知}}

On September 5, 1966, the CCP Central Committee and State Council issued a notice to organize representatives of students and workers from colleges and secondary schools outside Beijing to visit Beijing and learn about the Cultural Revolution. Transportation and living subsidies were paid for by the state treasury. No tickets were required for bus and boat rides, and meals and accommodation were free of charge.{{Cite wikisource|title=中共中央、国务院关于组织外地高等院校革命学生、中等学校革命学生代表和革命职工代表来京参观文化大革命运动的通知|author=CCP Central Committee, State Council|wslanguage=zh|date=1966-09-05}}{{Cite web|title=1966年9月5日|url=http://hprc.cssn.cn/gsgl/dsnb/dsj/dsj1966/200907/t20090703_3952697.html|website=中华人民共和国国史网|date=2009-07-03|language=zh|author=当代中国研究所|script-title=|url-status=dead|access-date=2024-06-13|archive-date=2024-06-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240613185609/http://hprc.cssn.cn/gsgl/dsnb/dsj/dsj1966/200907/t20090703_3952697.html}} Kent Wong, in a 2021 memoir, recalled that anyone could obtain a free ride by claiming to be a Red Guard, since they had no identity cards and "[no] conductor dared question anyone’s Red Guard status".

Many people used the opportunity for red tourism and visited historical revolutionary sites. 1.6 million Red Guards had passed through Guangzhou by the end of 1966, where Mao had lectured at the Peasant Movement Training Institute twenty years earlier. Official post–Cultural Revolutionary histories note that about 1000 Red Guards from China proper (Sichuan and Beijing) even managed to enter distant Tibet. Tibetan visitors stopped arriving by mid-November 1966, partly because of difficulties caused by the oncoming winter and partly because of a new policy discouraging Han students from traveling to ethnic minority areas.{{rp|page=111|quote=By the end of 1966, 1.6 million Red Guards from all over China had passed through the southern metropolis of Canton, ostensibly to visit the KMT Peasant Movement Training Institute, where Mao had lectured forty years earlier. The truly adventurous traveled to really exotic destinations: official post–Cultural Revolutionary histories note that approximately 1,000 Red Guards from China proper (Sichuan and Beijing) managed to get to Tibet to "exchange revolutionary experiences." By mid-November 1966, in part because the winter made further travel into the region all but impossible, in part because of a hastily drawn-up policy of dissuading Han students from traveling into ethnic minority areas, their numbers grew no further.}}

Dormitories in all schools, government agencies and factories were vacated to set up reception stations. At the same time, students from all over the country traveled to Beijing, and Red Guards in Beijing traveled outside the city to agitate the situation. Red Guards in various places supported each other, setting up liaison stations, attacking party and government organs, hunting down capitalist roaders, and destroying the Four Olds.

Over time, the movement evolved from having Beijing as its single destination, and expanded to other places such as Nanjing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Wuhan, Guangzhou, and Changsha. Some workers and cadres left their posts to participate, and many people took the opportunity to visit relatives and friends and to travel. It triggered a nationwide spike in traffic: long-distance buses, inland ships, ocean ships, and trains were overloaded. Train carriages with a capacity of around 100 people were loaded with 200-300 people. Coffee tables, luggage racks, seats, and aisles were crowded with passengers. There were even people in the restrooms and on the roofs of train cars. The overcrowding caused some to avoid public transport in favor of walking directly to their destination.

Red Guards flocked to the Jinggang Mountains, an important revolutionary site known as the birthplace of the Chinese Red Army, and the number of people reached 100,000 at its peak. The closing time of the Jinggangshan Revolution Museum was postponed to 23:30. There were nearly 1,000 cooks in the 17 reception stations under its jurisdiction, and more than 1 million Red Guards were received, costing more than 2.5 million yuan.{{Citation needed|date=March 2025}}

{{Wikisourcelang|zh|中共中央、国务院关于革命师生和红卫兵进行步行串连问题的通知|中共中央关于停止全国大串联的通知}}

On February 3 and March 19, 1967, the CCP Central Committee issued two notices to stop the nationwide Great Exchange.{{cite book |date=1968 |title=CCP Documents of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, 1966-1967 |url=https://www.marxists.org/subject/china/events/cultural-revolution/1967/exchange-end.pdf |location=Hong Kong |publisher=Union Research Institute |pages=227–229 |access-date=2025-03-17 |via=Marxists Internet Archive |quote=At present, because too many revolutionary teachers and students have gone to Peking, Shaoshan, Chingkang Mountains, Juichin, Tsunyi, Luting Bridge, Yenan and other revolutionary shrines as well as Tachai, they have caused overcrowding in these places. As it is cold and it is very difficult to arrange board and lodging and means of communication for them, the production and living conditions of the masses in those places have also been affected. In some places, due to the outbreak of infectious diseases, the health of the revolutionary teachers and students has been affected. These problems must be urgently solved.}}{{cite book |date=1968 |title=CCP Documents of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, 1966-1967 |url=https://www.marxists.org/subject/china/events/cultural-revolution/1967/suspend-exchange.pdf |location=Hong Kong |publisher=Union Research Institute |page=378 |access-date=2025-03-17 |via=Marxists Internet Archive}} The February 3 notice "ordered an end to the exchange of revolutionary experience on foot and a return of all participants to their respective schools to participate in power seizures there",{{cite book |last=Singer |first=Martin |date=1971 |title=Educated Youth and the Cultural Revolution in China |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.19144.5 |publisher=University of Michigan Press |doi=10.3998/mpub.19144 |jstor=10.3998/mpub.19144 |isbn=978-0-472-03814-5 }}{{rp|33}} citing overcrowding, difficulties in arranging board and lodging, and disease. Reception stations in various places were gradually closed, and opportunities for revolutionary connection decreased. However, students were still able to ride for free and receive free food and accommodation.江沛《红卫兵狂飙》，（河南人民出版社1994年版）

According to Martin Singer, "the call to return to classes was unexpected, since classes had only recently been cancelled for the second half of the year. The cancellation of exchange of revolutionary experience was also surprising because a resumption of trips to Peking and elsewhere had been specifically promised in November".{{rp|35}} Singer adds that "The resumption of classes began very slowly. Many revolutionaries did not heed the initial calls to return. Reluctant to surrender their freedom, they saw no purpose in resuming classes until educational reforms had been enacted."{{rp|37}}

In August 1967, Mao Zedong called for people to "make revolution where they are". In October, the Central Committee issued a document requiring the "{{Interlanguage link|Resumption of Classes to Create Revolution|zh|复课闹革命}}", effectively ending the movement.{{Cite web|title=红卫兵运动|url=http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/33837/2534818.html|access-date=2021-07-05|work=People's Daily Online|language=zh|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210703024431/http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/33837/2534818.html|archive-date=2021-07-03|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|title=红卫兵|url=http://www1.rfi.fr/actucn/articles/077/article_121.asp|date=2006-05-04|work=Radio France Internationale|language=zh|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190728220304/http://www1.rfi.fr/actucn/articles/077/article_121.asp|archive-date=2019-07-28|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|title=《中国知青史》（节选）|url=http://www.cnd.org/HXWZ/ZK04/zk377.gb.html|author=刘小萌|date=2004-04-20|work=China News Digest |publisher=|language=zh|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210423120720/http://www.cnd.org/HXWZ/ZK04/zk377.gb.html|archive-date=2021-04-23|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|title=中国共产党大事记·1967年|url=http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64162/64164/4416084.html|work=People's Daily Online|publisher=中共中央党史研究室|language=zh|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220512112239/http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/64162/64164/4416084.html|archive-date=2022-05-12|url-status=live}}

The atmosphere created by the Great Exchange caused student Red Guards to break away from daily roles and behavioral norms. The sense of freedom stimulated the feeling of revolutionary rebellion and breaking from a revisionist party and government system. This was consistent with Mao Zedong's expectation at the meeting of the Politburo Standing Committee held in Hangzhou on June 10, 1966: "Students from all over the country should go to Beijing, and we should support them. It should be free. They will be happy to make a big fuss in Beijing." This move caused the normal state of operations to be disrupted nationwide. Traffic across the country was extremely congested, the social order in major and medium-sized cities fell into chaos, and production and construction were greatly affected.{{Cite book|title="文化大革命"简史|last=席宣, 金春明|publisher=中共党史出版社|year=2006|isbn=7-80199-392-6|location=北京|pages=104}}

The movement of millions in overcrowded conditions was a cause of the {{Interlanguage link|1967 Chinese epidemic of cerebrospinal meningitis|zh|1967年中国流脑大流行}}. By the end of 1967, 3.04 million cases of cerebrospinal meningitis and more than 160,000 fatalities had been recorded. Many affected were youths who had participated in the Great Exchange. Historians Roderick MacFarquhar and Michael Schoenhals noted that before 1966, "outbreaks of epidemic cerebral-spinal meningitis had been rare in China, and highly localized, in large part because of a low degree of popular mobility".{{rp|page=113|quote=Before the autumn of 1966, outbreaks of epidemic cerebral-spinal meningitis had been rare in China, and highly localized, in large part because of a low degree of popular mobility. The sudden movement under extremely cramped and unsanitary conditions—“I pretty much spent the entire journey from Urümqi crammed into the toilet together with a group of other girls,” a young woman from Shanghai recalled years later—of

millions of people from every corner of the country put an end to this situation and paved the way for a massive epidemic. By the end of 1967, 3.04 million cases of cerebral-spinal meningitis and more than 160,000 fatalities had been recorded. An official source notes that “worst affected were youths and children, a substantial number of whom were ‘Red Guard’ participants in the ‘great exchange of revolutionary experiences.’”}}

During an inspection in Tianjin in February 2024, Xi Jinping, the president of China and general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, publicly mentioned his experience of buying steamed buns on the platform of the Tianjin railway station during the Great Exchange.{{Cite web|title=習近平到天津考察突重提文革 分析：暗喻上山下鄉艱苦終守得雲開|author=淳音|url=https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/xi-02022024005544.html|publisher=Radio France Internationale|date=2024-02-04|archive-date=2024-02-29|access-date=2024-02-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240229073956/https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/xi-02022024005544.html|url-status=live}}

• {{Interlanguage link|1967 Chinese epidemic of meningococcal meningitis|zh|1967年中国流脑大流行}}
• Red August

{{reflist}}

{{Cultural Revolution}}

Category:Cultural Revolution

Category:1966 in China

Category:1967 in China