Conclusion

Ideological developments in the immediate post-Mao era were comparable to and reminiscent of developments in the international Communist movement in the wake of the historic Twentieth Congress of the CPSU. Khrushchev's denunciation and exposure of (he grim realities of the Stalinist era marked a watershed, but as far as leaderships and political regimes were concerned, de-Stalinization delivered much less than one had been led to expect. For Marxist intellectuals, though, both in the East and the West, it was the beginning of a period o f creativity, inrellecmai liberation, and reconstruction, prompted by critical questioning of orthodoxy and a new interest in other non-Marxist intellectual traditions, '

Ideological reorientation in China began with an easing of restrictions on party intellecruals under the sponsorship of the new General Secretary Hu Yaobang. G iven Deng Xiaoping's limitations as a theoretician, or his lack of interest in the finer aspects of ideological discourse, the task of revitalization and of cha rtin g th e premises of the new course devolved entirely on a broad base of theoretical workers. The intellectual pluralism made possible by this was enhanced by the divisions within the leadership on the q uestions of the extent and direction of funher reform and reassessment of previous policies. The precise extent of freedom and autonomy characterizing debate and discussion varied with periods of liberalization, alternating with demands fo r conformity. Nevertheless, in the decade and a half or so after the rerum of Deng Xiaoping, the diverse and voluminous amount of theoretical activ ity that had resulted from the effort to explain the signi fi cance of the Chinese experience in constructing socialism was being compared by observers and participants alike in scale and intensity to the May Fourth Movement.