THE CHINA QUARTERLY,  no 43,  juillet septembre 1970        

La révolution culturelle chinoise, by Jean Esmein

Among the already voluminous literature on the Cultural Revolution, this book is one of the few which will rernain useful for those who, three or four decades from now, willl be able to write the complete history of the years 1966-69 in China. The author stayed in Peking as Attaché de presse at the French Embassy, from December 1965 to June 1968.

This first-hand experience, as well as a long acquaintance with the Far_East, and his knowledge of both the Chinese and Japanese languages have enabled M. Esmein to enrich his book with a variety of material seldom available to westerners, from which he draws a detailed and thoughtful picture.

After a penetrating chapter on the ideological basis of the Cultural Revolution, the author has chosen to study the phenomenon successively from the point of view of the various social or political groups involved : Party, army, students, workers, extremists. He analyses minutely the part played by each of them during every event and phase of the movernent. This kind of sociological approach is a noteworthy originality of the book. It sheds lights on the concrete daily issues of the struggle, on the dynamics of the movement and it gives a human appearance to the "masses" instead of leaving them among the abstract categories of the political scientists. But, however refreshing and enlightening on important aspects, this modern~novel technique of watching the same story through different eyes might be confusing for the uninformed reader. It leads to repetitions and flash-backs which, due to the lack of a chronological table and, above all, of an index, might make it rather difficult to follow the analysis.

Of course, one can question the reliability of the wallposters, radiobroadcasts, Red Guard literature and Japanese reports which form the basic sources of M. Esmein's account, and one can even point out a few factual errors : for example, (P. 103) it was not students but teachers who wrote the 25 May 1966 poster in Peita ; and the attacks against Liu Shao-ch'i by name (P. 133) did not start in December 1966 but had already begun in August. However, as far as it was possible, the author has checked by his own observation the information given by his sources, and, in any case, since he uses this information very shrewdly to provide clues as to the trends and issues at stake during the struggle rather than to draw any spectacular conclusions, the possible inauthenticity of some data cannot impair his analysis to any great extent.

Sometimes, what people believe happens has more impact than what really happens.

M. Esmein does not present any fullfledged theory of the Cultural Revolution ; he tries, very successfully, to explain its human rationality by looking back into the past and putting together aIl the elements he can gather on the present. Although admiring the intellectual qualities which this work shows, I would have liked the author to depart sometimes from his prudence and « objectivity », especially in his conclusion, and to stress more definitely the meaning of the Cultural Revolution in relation to the internaI problems and external pressures which China faces. But this is only a personal view on a book of really great value.

Marianne Bastid