CCP chief theoretician and PRC Chairman (1959–68), designated successor to Mao who was purged as China's foremost 'capitalist roader'
'Fortunately, history is written by the people' — Liu's final words to his family in 1969, before being transported under guard to Kaifeng.
An early organizer of the CCP labour movement, he led the Anyuan coal miners' strike and built trade unions in Shanghai and Wuhan. His 1939 lectures 'How to Be a Good Communist' became a foundational text of Marxist party-building theory, and he was instrumental in enshrining Mao Zedong Thought in the 1945 Party Constitution. As PRC Chairman from 1959, he led post-Great Leap Forward economic adjustment with pragmatic measures including 'three freedoms and one guarantee,' which put him on a collision course with Mao. Denounced as the 'commander of the bourgeoisie headquarters' during the Cultural Revolution, he was expelled from the Party in 1968 and died in detention in 1969; Deng Xiaoping fully rehabilitated him as a 'great Marxist' in 1980.
Career Timeline
- 1922–1925Plenipotentiary representative, Anyuan miners; Executive committee, All-China Federation of Labour
- 1936Secretary, CCP North China Bureau (led anti-Japanese resistance)
- 1941–1943Political Commissar, New Fourth Army; Secretary, Central Secretariat & Vice Chairman, CMC
- 1945Delivered 'On the Party' at 7th Congress; enshrined Mao Zedong Thought in Party Constitution
- 1949Vice Chairman, Central People's Government
- 1954Chairman, NPC Standing Committee
- 1959Chairman, People's Republic of China (head of state)
- 1968Expelled from CCP and stripped of all offices