Shaanxi’s Early Communist Movement

In many respects, the Communist movement in Shaanxi resembled that in other Chinese provinces: young men in elite schools, inspired by new ideas and motivated by a passionate patriotism, gathered with friends to share concerns and publish journals advancing an increasingly radical vision of social transformation and national regeneration. But Shaanxi was not like other provinces, and inevitably the concerns of these young men reflected the conditions of their physically isolated and culturally conservative home. To understand the long and tortuous journey traversed by the revolutionary movement in Shaanxi, we must grasp both its general and its particular characteristics. The former allowed it to join the larger revolutionary movement in China; the latter let it sink roots in the fertile soil of Shaanxi. The two tendencies persisted throughout the history of the revolution, periodically manifest in sharp conflicts between local and national leaders. Although northern Shaanxi became the center of the Communist movement from 1935 to 1948, the tension between the local party and the Center endured. To understand this dynamic, we must start with the Shaanxi party’s early history.