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Peking Review – 1959

Peking Review was the weekly political and informative magazine published between 1958 and 1978. With issue No 1 of 1979 the magazine was renamed Beijing Review, the new name bringing with it a new direction in the People’s Republic of China and was an open statement of the reintroduction of capitalism in the erstwhile Socialist Republic.

Topics and issues addressed throughout 1959 included:

• development of industry, agriculture and health
• achievements in the Soviet Union (in 1959 the Communist Party of China had still not openly declared the Communist Party of the Soviet Union a Revisionist Party
• the continuing lessons of the Great Leap Forward
• developments in the rest of the ‘socialist world’
• news on world revolutionary and national liberation movements
• the strengthening of the People’s Communes
• a report on the 21st Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
• references to Sino-Soviet ‘friendship’
• China’s support for national liberation movements
• condemnation of growing United States involvement in Vietnam
• the emancipation of women
• the situation in Tibet following the reactionary rebellion
• calling for the withdrawal of US troops from South Korea
• comments on the growing conflict along the Sino-Indian border
• the 10th Anniversary of the Declaration of the People’s Republic of China

Available issues of Peking Review:

1958, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978

(In No 26 there’s an index for the articles in issues 1-26 of 1959. Likewise in No 52 there’s an index for articles in numbers 27-52.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beijing Review

From issue No. 1 of 1979 the weekly political and informative magazine Peking Review changed its name to Beijing Review. On page 3 of that number the editors made the open declaration of the change in the direction of the erstwhile ‘People’s Republic of China’.

By stating that the Communist Party of China (under the control then of Teng Hsiao-Ping/Deng Xiaoping ) sought

‘to accomplish socialist modernisation by the end of the century and turn China …. into an economically developed and fully democratic socialist country’

the CPC was openly declaring the rejection of the revolutionary path, which the country had been following since 1949, and the adoption of the road that would inevitably lead to the full scale establishment of capitalism.

For those who would like to follow this downward spiral into the murky depths of capitalism and imperialism in the issues of Beijing Review (complete for the years 1979-1990 – intermittently thereafter) you can do so by going to bannedthought – which also serves as an invaluable resource for more material about China during its revolutionary phase.

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