People's Republic of China Founded
Mao Zedong proclaimed the People's Republic of China from Tiananmen Gate
October 01, 1949
Mao Proclaims a New China
On October 1, 1949, Mao Zedong stood in Tiananmen Square in Beijing and proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China. The proclamation marked the victory of the Chinese Communist Party in a civil war that had been fought, with an interruption for World War II, since 1927. The Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek, backed by the United States, had retreated to the island of Taiwan, where it established a rival government that claimed to be the legitimate government of all China. The victory of communist forces over the better-equipped and larger Nationalist army was seen as a massive shock in the West, where politicians demanded to know "who lost China."
The Long March and the Path to Power
The Communist Party had nearly been destroyed in 1934 when Nationalist forces surrounded their base in Jiangxi province. In what became known as the Long March, Communist forces broke through encirclement and marched approximately 5,600 miles over treacherous terrain to Yan'an in northern China. Of the roughly 86,000 who set out, only about 8,000 survived. The ordeal became a foundational myth of the Communist Party, and Mao Zedong consolidated his leadership during the march. The Japanese invasion of China in 1937 forced a temporary alliance between the Communists and Nationalists. When Japan was defeated in 1945, the civil war resumed with increased intensity.
A Revolution That Changed the World
The People's Republic of China quickly aligned with the Soviet Union and sent troops into the Korean War in 1950. Under Mao's leadership, China experienced the Great Leap Forward, an economic campaign from 1958 to 1962 that resulted in one of history's deadliest famines, killing tens of millions of people. The Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 caused further political turmoil and persecution. Mao died in 1976, and under Deng Xiaoping's subsequent leadership, China opened its economy to market forces. Today China is the world's second largest economy and a dominant global power, its trajectory shaped fundamentally by the revolution proclaimed in Tiananmen Square in 1949.