At a meeting of China’s State Council on July 6, a Communist Party historian announced that his organization will begin research into the deep and often-neglected annals of the regime.
But rather than a faithful documentation of the Party’s 95 years of existence, Zhang Shujun, deputy director of the Party History Research Center, intends the research to “conquer public opinion with persuasive and inspiring stories of the Party’s historical achievements,” as the state-run propaganda outlet Global Times puts it.
It is thought that in this way, the Party can shape public and intellectual views of its history—which includes the Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward campaigns that killed tens of millions of people.
Chinese youth walk past a placard showing the destruction of politically undesirable elements in February 1967 in downtown Beijing, during the "Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution". Jean Vincent/AFP/Getty Images
