Founding of the People's Republic of China, 1 October 1949

The founding of the People’s Republic of China took place on 1 October 1949, when Mao Zedong, chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, proclaimed the new state from the Tiananmen gate in Beijing. The ceremony marked the communists’ victory in the long Chinese Civil War and the end of Nationalist rule on the mainland. It created the state that still governs China today and reshaped the politics of Asia and the Cold War.

Background: the road to 1949

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was founded in 1921. After decades of conflict with the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang, KMT) led by Chiang Kai-shek, including the Long March of 1934–1935, the two sides formed an uneasy alliance against Japan from 1937. When Japan surrendered in 1945, talks on a coalition government collapsed and full-scale civil war resumed in 1946.

The Nationalists began with larger armies and American aid, but they were weakened by inflation, corruption and war-weariness. The communists’ People’s Liberation Army (PLA) won decisive campaigns in Manchuria, at Huaihai and around Beijing in 1948–1949 (see Chinese Civil War). Beijing, then called Beiping, surrendered peacefully in January 1949, and the PLA crossed the Yangtze River in April, taking Nanjing and then Shanghai in May.

With most of northern and eastern China under its control, the CCP moved to set up a national government before the war was fully over.

The Political Consultative Conference

From 21 to 30 September 1949 the CCP convened the first plenary session of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in Beijing. It brought together communists and allied smaller parties, mass organisations and prominent non-party figures, giving the new order a broad “united front” appearance.

In his opening speech on 21 September, Mao declared that the Chinese people had stood up, a phrase that became one of the most famous of the revolution. The conference adopted the Common Program, which served as an interim constitution, and the Organic Law of the Central People’s Government. It chose Beiping as the capital and restored its name to Beijing, adopted the Gregorian calendar, made “March of the Volunteers” the provisional national anthem and selected the Five-Starred Red Flag, designed by Zeng Liansong, as the national flag.

The CPPCC elected Mao as Chairman of the Central People’s Government. His six vice-chairmen were Zhu De, Liu Shaoqi, Soong Ching-ling (the widow of Sun Yat-sen), Li Jishen, Zhang Lan and Gao Gang.

The ceremony at Tiananmen

On the afternoon of 1 October 1949 the new leaders gathered on the rostrum of Tiananmen, the old gate to the imperial palace. Before a crowd estimated at around 300,000, Mao announced that the Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China had been established. He then pressed a button that raised the new national flag, while a band played the anthem.

Fifty-four guns fired 28 salvoes, a number said to represent the 28 years of the party’s struggle since 1921. Mao read the government’s proclamation, and Zhu De, commander-in-chief of the PLA, reviewed a military parade of infantry, cavalry, artillery and armoured units, with a fly-past of captured aircraft. Celebrations and torchlit processions continued into the night.

Consolidating control at home and abroad

The proclamation did not end the fighting. The PLA took Guangzhou on 14 October 1949 and Chongqing on 30 November, and Chiang’s government moved its seat to Taipei on Taiwan in December. Hainan Island fell in spring 1950, and the PLA advanced into Tibet from October 1950 (see Chinese Annexation of Tibet).

The country was divided into six large administrative regions, several under military administration, while local governments were rebuilt around party committees. Zhou Enlai became Premier of the Government Administration Council and Foreign Minister, and he would run day-to-day government for more than two decades.

In the cities, the party took over the institutions it inherited with surprising speed. Many officials, police and technical staff of the old government were kept on at first, and private businesses were allowed to operate under what Mao called “New Democracy”, a transitional stage in which the national bourgeoisie would cooperate with workers and peasants under party leadership. Runaway inflation, which had helped ruin the Nationalists, was brought under control in 1950 through tight control of currency, grain and cotton supplies.

The new government also signalled a break with China’s past relations with foreign powers. The Common Program stated that treaties concluded by the Nationalist government would be examined and then recognised, abrogated, revised or renegotiated, and over the next few years most foreign missionaries, businesses and journalists were expelled or forced to leave.

The Soviet Union recognised the People’s Republic on 2 October 1949. Mao travelled to Moscow in December 1949, his first trip abroad, and after long negotiations signed the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance on 14 February 1950, which brought loans and technical advisers.

The United Kingdom recognised the new government in January 1950, partly to protect Hong Kong and its trade interests. The United States continued to recognise the Republic of China on Taiwan, and the China seat at the United Nations remained with Taipei until 1971.

Chinese intervention in the Korean War from October 1950 brought the new state into direct combat with American-led UN forces and fixed it firmly in the communist camp for the next decade.

Remaking society, 1950–1954

The early years combined real reforms with violent mass campaigns. The Marriage Law of 1950 banned arranged marriages, concubinage and child marriage and allowed women to seek divorce. Campaigns against opium, prostitution and illiteracy were widely reported as successful.

The Agrarian Reform Law of June 1950 redistributed land from landlords to poor peasants across the countryside. Land reform was carried out through village “struggle sessions”, and historians estimate that somewhere between several hundred thousand and two million people classed as landlords were killed, with some estimates higher still. The Campaign to Suppress Counter-revolutionaries (1950–1951) and the Three-Anti and Five-Anti campaigns (1951–1952) against officials and businessmen brought further executions, imprisonment and suicides.

Ordinary life was reorganised around work units in the cities and peasant associations in the villages. Newspapers, publishing and education came under party control, and “thought reform” campaigns required intellectuals, teachers and professionals to criticise their past views in public meetings. For many Chinese, the early 1950s brought peace after decades of war, rising literacy and a sense of national pride; for others, they brought fear, confiscation and loss.

By 1953 the government had launched its First Five-Year Plan on the Soviet model, with heavy industry at its core. On 20 September 1954 the first National People’s Congress adopted a formal constitution, replacing the Common Program, and Mao became Chairman of the People’s Republic.

Key people

• Mao Zedong (1893–1976), party chairman, proclaimed the new state and dominated it until his death.
• Zhou Enlai (1898–1976), premier and foreign minister, managed the government and its diplomacy.
• Zhu De (1886–1976), commander-in-chief of the PLA, reviewed the founding parade.
• Liu Shaoqi (1898–1969), a leading party organiser and vice-chairman, later head of state before his purge in the Cultural Revolution.
• Soong Ching-ling (1893–1981), widow of Sun Yat-sen, whose presence linked the new state to the 1911 revolution.

Myths and facts

• Myth: Mao said “The Chinese people have stood up” from Tiananmen on 1 October. Fact: He used that phrase in his CPPCC speech of 21 September 1949; on 1 October he read a formal proclamation.
• Myth: The communists controlled all of China on 1 October 1949. Fact: Large parts of the south and west, including Guangzhou, Chongqing and Chengdu, were taken only in the following months, and Taiwan never came under PRC control.
• Myth: The famous painting of the ceremony is a faithful record. Fact: Dong Xiwen’s 1953 painting The Founding Ceremony of the Nation was repainted several times to remove leaders who had fallen from favour, such as Gao Gang and later Liu Shaoqi.

Timeline

• 1949, January: Beiping surrenders to the PLA without a battle.
• 1949, April–May: The PLA crosses the Yangtze and takes Nanjing and Shanghai.
• 1949, 21–30 September: The CPPCC adopts the Common Program and elects Mao head of government.
• 1949, 1 October: Mao proclaims the People’s Republic of China at Tiananmen.
• 1949, 2 October: The Soviet Union recognises the new state.
• 1949, December: The Republic of China government moves to Taipei.
• 1950, 14 February: The Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship is signed in Moscow.
• 1950, June: The Agrarian Reform Law launches nationwide land reform.
• 1950, October: Chinese forces enter the Korean War.
• 1954, 20 September: The first constitution of the People’s Republic is adopted.

Legacy

The founding of the People’s Republic ended more than a century in which China had been divided by civil war and foreign intervention, and it restored a strong central state over most of the former Qing territory. For the CCP, 1 October remains the starting point of “New China” and is celebrated each year as National Day, with major parades on anniversaries.

The new state’s first years also set patterns that shaped later decades: mass mobilisation campaigns, party control of all institutions and rapid state-led industrialisation. These led on to the Great Leap Forward and its devastating famine. The unresolved division between Beijing and Taipei that began in 1949 remains one of the most important questions in international politics.

Why it matters

The proclamation of 1 October 1949 brought the world’s most populous country under communist rule and created one of the most consequential states of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Understanding how it was founded helps explain China’s political system, its relations with Taiwan and its place in the Cold War and after.