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Title:
Rethinking the Origins of Red Guard Factionalism in Beijing’s High Schools: Three Cases Studies at the First
Two Months of Cultural Revolution
Abstract:
Existing literature on the evolution of the Red Guards movement has highlighted opposing factions that violently fought against one another and produced sociological and political interpretations to explain mass factionalism. Despite significant differences, researchers generally attribute factionalism to the debates over the so-called “blood-line theory” in the late summer of 1966. However, this attribution has tended to inadvertently reproduce certain key features of the Red Guards’ own political understanding at the time. My research seeks to reconsider established interpretations of Red Guard factionalism by examining three long-neglected high schools (Beijing Normal High, Girls’ High and No. 65), which played critical roles in the early Red Guard movement. Utilizing newly available sources, this paper will focus on the role of party officials’ work teams in these schools and argue that by dividing students based on family class status and initiating antagonisms that pitted some against others, work teams had amplified fissures that already existed on campus and later exploded into factionalism in the schools. Following their abrupt withdrawal, students previously supported by work teams continued to use similar tactics for igniting the violent “blood-line” debate in the society at large. Thereby, the students activated preexisting interests and orientations rooted in entrenched social and political cleavages in China’s state-socialist regime. At the same time, Red Guard factionalism and movement developed and expanded from high school campuses to the society.
