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| 1982 |
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| A census revealed that China's population had topped the 1 billion mark. The government became even more serious about population control; earlier, under Mao, the Chinese had derided Malthusianism as propaganda. Now the one-child-per-family policy was more strongly encouraged, with strong disincentives for those who bore more than one. Large-scale female infanticide, it is believed, was carried out in the mid-1980s. Even with a reduced birthrate, China continued to face an immense population problem, and as the countryside grew wealthy, fears of financial sanctions for producing more than a single child abated. Critics voiced the fear that the one-child policy would produce a new generation of spoiled and doted-upon children. | 1 |
| Communes were dismantled as the sociopolitical basis for rural life in China. They were replaced by a “responsibility system,” which afforded farmers more control over the land they were contracted to till. | 2 |
| Many foreign firms were encouraged to invest in Chinese industry, and the number of joint ventures rose appreciably. Thousands of foreign tourists began flocking to China, and countless new hotels (many of them joint ventures) were built to house them. These efforts to forge foreign ties contrasted sharply with the earlier emphasis on self-reliance at almost all costs. | 3 |
| Mao Zedong was now openly criticized in the PRC. However, the rapid changes in China over the previous few years had renewed intellectual life in the nation, raising questions about its future direction that particularly irked the leadership; also, rapid industrial and agricultural development was undermining the earlier egalitarian aims of the regime. In response to these trends, a new campaign was taking shape to eradicate “spiritual pollution,” meaning the influence of the West. Some spectacular cases of corruption within the Chinese government were exposed by the Chinese press as well. | 4 |
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| 1983–84 |
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| Premier Zhao Ziyang (b. 1919) in 1983 called for increased modernization, and this trend continued into 1984. Foreign investment continued to soar. Ever larger numbers of Chinese students were studying overseas. Accompanying the dizzying pace of economic change was a concomitant rise in crimes of theft, personal injury, and corruption. Hu Yaobang (1915–89) calmed people's fears by saying, “Do not fear prosperity.” | 5 |
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| 1985, Jan. 5 |
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| The CCP announced a new bill of rights for writers, promising greater freedom of expression. Later that month, Hu Yaobang noted that writers needed to be guided by the CCP and Marxism-Leninism. | 6 |
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| March |
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| Forty-seven thousand older officers in the PLA retired. The next month, officials announced plans to lay off some 1 million members of the Chinese armed forces and transfer them into the workforce. | 7 |
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| April |
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| Several hundred men and women, who had been sent down to do rural work some 17 years earlier and had largely been forgotten, returned illegally to Beijing, and on behalf of many thousands more they protested their ill treatment before the CCP headquarters. | 8 |
| Mikhail Gorbachev called for alleviation of Sino-Soviet tensions through greater bilateral trade and cultural exchanges; the Chinese responded warmly. | 9 |
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