Activities and affiliations

Ideology and propaganda Communist Party of China 1917–2005 ○ Sentenced to death, commuted; released 1998

Theoretician of the Gang of Four who organized the Shanghai People's Commune and championed all-round dictatorship over the bourgeoisie

At his 1980 trial, Zhang remained silent and refused to speak until his family was permitted to visit him years later.

A core theoretician of China's Cultural Revolution and member of the Gang of Four. He joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1938 and rose as editor of Shanghai's Jiefang Daily. His 1958 article 'Destroy the Ideology of Bourgeois Right' caught Mao Zedong's attention; as a member of the Central Cultural Revolution Group, he organized the Shanghai People's Commune in 1967, overthrowing the existing municipal government. As vice premier in 1975, he authored 'On Exercising All-Round Dictatorship Over the Bourgeoisie,' formalizing the class-struggle line of the socialist transition, and remained faithful to his Maoist convictions through arrest and imprisonment until his release in 1998.

Political and party leadership Communist Party of China 1919–2005 ↓ Removed 1989 · died under house arrest

From Sichuan’s farm reforms to general secretary, the reformer who opposed martial law in 1989 and died under house arrest

Premier 1980-1987 and general secretary from 1987, in charge of political reform; he lost power over the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and lived under house arrest until his death

From Henan, he was a provincial cadre in Guangdong until purged in the Cultural Revolution, returned as Sichuan first secretary in 1975 and, with household contracting and enterprise autonomy, earned the saying “If you want to eat, look for Ziyang”. Premier from 1980 and general secretary from 1987, he pushed price reform and plans for political reform. In May 1989 he opposed martial law against the student protests, told students in the square “We have come too late”, and fell; he remained under house arrest in Beijing until his death in 2005. His secretly recorded memoirs were published posthumously in Hong Kong.

Political and party leadership Communist Party of China 1921–2008 ↓ Left office 1981 · natural causes

Mao’s designated successor — “With you in charge, I am at ease” — who arrested the Gang of Four and was eased out by Deng Xiaoping

On 6 October 1976, a month after Mao died, Hua had the Gang of Four arrested at Zhongnanhai with Ye Jianying and Wang Dongxing, and took the party and Military Commission chairmanships. He then lost power to Deng Xiaoping by 1981.

From Shanxi, he rose as a provincial cadre in Hunan, caught Mao’s attention, and in 1976 became acting premier after Zhou Enlai’s death in January and first vice-chairman and premier after the April Tiananmen incident. After Mao died he arrested the Gang of Four in October with Ye Jianying and Wang Dongxing and took the party and Military Commission chairmanships. He sought legitimacy in the “two whatevers” — uphold every decision Chairman Mao made, follow every instruction he gave — but lost the initiative to Deng Xiaoping in the 1978 debate on the criterion of truth and at the Third Plenum, giving up the premiership and party chairmanship in 1980–1981. He remained on the Central Committee until 2002.

Political and party leadership Communist Party of China 1926–2022 ○ Natural causes

The “core” plucked from Shanghai in 1989 who led post-Tiananmen China into the market economy and the “Three Represents”

The compromise leader plucked from Shanghai after the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, he became the "core" of the third generation and steered the party toward a market economy.

An electrical engineer from Jiangsu who trained at a Soviet car plant, he became mayor of Shanghai in 1985 and its party secretary in 1987. In 1989 he closed the liberal World Economic Herald and defused the Shanghai protests without major bloodshed, and in June was chosen to replace Zhao Ziyang as general secretary. After Deng Xiaoping’s southern tour in 1992 he made the “socialist market economy” the party’s goal and oversaw state-enterprise reform, WTO accession and the return of Hong Kong. Stepping down as general secretary in 2002 and Military Commission chairman in 2004, he left the “Three Represents”, which opened the party to private entrepreneurs. He died of leukaemia in 2022.

Ideology and propaganda Communist Party of China 1931–2005 ↓ Arrested 1976 · natural causes

The Gang of Four’s theorist whose attack on Hai Rui Dismissed from Office opened the Cultural Revolution; the critic nicknamed “the cudgel”

Born 1931 in Zhuji, Zhejiang. His November 10, 1965 article in Wenhui Bao, “On the New Historical Beijing Opera ‘Hai Rui Dismissed from Office’”, launched the Cultural Revolution; arrested on October 6, 1976, and sentenced to twenty years in 1981.

A Shanghai literary critic, he caught Mao’s eye with aggressive polemics during the 1957 anti-rightist campaign. At the direction of Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao he published “On the New Historical Play Hai Rui Dismissed from Office” in Wenhui Bao in November 1965, the opening of the Cultural Revolution, and as a member of the Cultural Revolution Group controlled propaganda. A Politburo member from 1969 and part of the Shanghai group, he ran campaigns such as “Criticise Lin Biao and Confucius”. Arrested with the Gang of Four in October 1976, he received twenty years in 1981, was released in 1996 and died in 2005.

Political and party leadership Communist Party of China 1935–1992 ↓ Arrested 1976 · illness

The Shanghai worker-rebel who rose “like a helicopter” to party vice-chairman, youngest of the Gang of Four

The youngest of the Gang of Four: from a Shanghai mill's militia office he led the November 1966 rebel headquarters and the 1967 Shanghai Commune, was second-ranked CCP vice-chairman by 38, and was seized in the 6 October 1976 coup.

From Jilin, he fought in the Korean War and became a security cadre at a Shanghai cotton mill. In 1966 he led the worker-rebel “Workers’ General Headquarters”, the driving force of the “January Storm” that seized the Shanghai government in 1967, and ran the Shanghai Revolutionary Committee with Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan. Picked by Mao as a successor of worker origin, he became party vice-chairman at the Tenth Congress in 1973, mocked as a “helicopter” for his rapid, inexperienced rise. Arrested with the Gang of Four in October 1976, he was sentenced to life in 1981 and died of liver disease in custody in 1992.