Hua Guofeng - Party Chairman (1976–1981)

Party Chairman (1976–1981)

During his relatively short leadership, Hua was credited for quickly ousting the Gang of Four from political power and thus became the leader whose emergence marked the end of the Cultural Revolution. Hua's economic and political programs involved the restoration of Soviet-style industrial planning and party control similar to that followed by China before the Great Leap Forward. However, this model was rejected by supporters of Deng Xiaoping, who argued for a more market-based economic system. This argument was decisively resolved in Deng's favor in late 1978, which is generally taken as the start of the era of Chinese economic reform. Hua also attempted reforming state protocol as a method of elevating his prestige. In 1978 all party meetings were to hang portraits of Mao and Hua side-by-side, including at the National People's Congress and CPC Party Congress meetings. All schools were required to hang Hua's picture next to Mao's. Hua also changed the Chinese national anthem to incorporate Mao Zedong and the Communist Party of China, switching the tone from being war-rallying to purely Communist propaganda. These lyrics were eventually rejected.

Despite all of this, Hua Guofeng himself criticized certain aspects of the Cultural Revolution, including the education reform, the revolutionary committees' activity and other excesses, blaming the Gang of Four.

On October 1979, Hua went on a European tour, the first of its kind for a Chinese leader after 1949. He travelled to West Germany and France. On 28 October Hua visited Great Britain and met with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The two engaged in friendly talks and discussed the future of Hong Kong. Hua also went to a farm in Oxfordshire and visited Oxford University.

Hua was one of the last foreigners to visit the Shah of Iran before he was overthrown in 1979.

His interpretation of the Three Worlds Theory, leading to a general rapprochement with Western powers, divided Maoist parties throughout the world. Many of them, including Shining Path, criticized him for this and accused him of being a traitor for ousting Jiang Qing.

At the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, after which Deng Xiaoping became the de facto leader of China as his idea for economic reform was adopted by the Party, Hua Guofeng was implicitly criticized for serving concurrently as Chairman of the Central Committee, Chairman of the Central Military Commission and Premier of the State Council. This was reverted between 1980 and 1981, as the three posts were assigned to three different people, but this system was re-established by Jiang Zemin as he became "paramount leader" of China.