The Great Leap Forward and the People's Commune Movement

The completion of the First Five-year Plan and of the three socialist transformations greatly boosted public confidence in socialist development. They believed that a strong and prosperous China could become a reality within a fairly short period of time. The CPC Central Committee also thought that given the economic and ideological success of socialist revolution and public enthusiasm, the pace of economic development could be accelerated.

In the winter of 1957, water conservancy projects gave a huge boost to agricultural production, setting the stage for a movement known as the Great Leap Forward.

In May 1958, the Second Session of the Party's Eighth National Congress was held, which adopted the general line of "going all out, aiming high and achieving greater, faster, better and more economical results in building socialism." After the meeting, the Great Leap Forward quickly spread to all parts of the country.

Driven by a blind pursuit of quick results, the movement was marked by a single-minded drive to accelerate industrial and agricultural production. The targets for steel output were set higher and higher, resulting in steel production expanding even into rural communes. In agriculture, there was a serious tendency to exaggerate grain output. During the 1958 summer harvest, a wave of "Sputnik Launch" claims (claims of new record highs in output) swept the country.

Over-ambitious targets and the tendency to boast and exaggerate output made the whole society overly eager for a transition to a "higher form" of relations of production. It was even believed that the larger the scale of agricultural cooperatives and the higher the degree of public ownership, the greater the possibility to expand production.

In July and August of 1958, rural people's communes began to spread in some regions. By the end of the year, such organizations were being established across the whole country. A total of 740,000 agricultural cooperatives were merged into 26,000 people's communes, involving over 99 percent of all peasant households.

The Great Leap Forward and the movement to establish people's communes were serious errors resulting from the Party's unrealistic expectations of how quickly China could implement socialism. Objectively, the CPC underestimated the complexities of this task, and the whole Party did not have nearly enough experience in leading large-scale economic development. Subjectively, the Chinese people also were only too eager to escape backwardness and poverty and enter a good society at one stroke.

“大躍進”和人民公社化運動

“一五”計劃的順利實施和三大改造的完成，使人們對社會主義建設信心倍增，相信中國富強的目標可能在一個較短時間內實現。中共中央認為，經濟戰線和思想戰線上的社會主義革命已經取得偉大勝利，人民群眾建設社會主義熱情高漲，經濟建設可以搞得更快一些。1957年冬，全國范圍掀起以興修水利為中心的冬季生產高潮，揭開了“大躍進”運動序幕。

1958年5月中共八大二次會議召開，通過了“鼓足干勁，力爭上游，多快好省地建設社會主義”的總路線，力圖在探索中國建設社會主義的道路上打開一個新局面。會后，“大躍進”運動迅速在全國范圍內發動起來。

“大躍進”運動在盲目求快、急于求成的思想影響下，片面追求工農業生產和建設的高速度。“大躍進”表現在工業上，首先是鋼產量指標的不斷提高，由此掀起大煉鋼運動。表現在農業上，主要是對農作物產量的估計嚴重浮夸。1958年夏收期間，各地興起放農作物高產“衛星”的高潮。生產發展上的高指標和浮夸風，推動著生產關系向所謂更高級的形式過渡。人們主觀地認為農業合作社規模越大，公有化程度越高，就越能促進生產。1958年7、8月間，人民公社開始在個別地區建立。到年底，全國基本實現人民公社化，74萬個農業社合并為2.6萬個人民公社，涵蓋了全國農戶的99%以上。

“大躍進”和人民公社化運動，是中國共產黨在探索中國自己的建設社會主義道路過程中的一次嚴重失誤。究其原因，客觀上是中國共產黨對建設社會主義的艱巨性和復雜性認識不足，全黨普遍缺乏領導大規模經濟建設的經驗；主觀上是中國人民急切盼望甩掉貧窮落后的帽子，一步跨入美好社會。