ABSTRACT
The collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1911 left a leadership vacuum that was not filled until Mao Zedong announced on October 1, 1949, at Beijing's Tiananmen Square the creation of a Chinese socialist state, thus unifying China. Different ideas for organizing China's political center had competed over this long period. But of all these competing ideas, only Mao Zedong's 'thought' successfully convinced a majority of Chinese elites that a CCP-led revolution could remove the grand obstacles - feudalism, capitalism, and imperialism - preventing China from building that 'great commonwealth of harmony, virtue, and prosperity', the datong. The power of ideas, particularly those of Mao, inspired enough Chinese from all backgrounds to participate in the revolution led by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
