On October 1, 1949, the People's Republic of China proclaimed itself the legitimate government of China, and with it, became the second major communist revolution to succeed in the twentieth century. China, one of the most populace countries in the world, had the leadership of a dramatic personality in the guise of Mao Zedong. Chairman Mao, in a speech on September 21, 1949, said that:
The Chinese have always been a great, courageous and industrious nation, it is only in modern times that they have fallen behind. And that was due entirely to oppression and exploitation by foreign imperialism and domestic reactionary government . . . ours will no longer be a nation subject to insult and humiliation. We have stood up.1
As with most revolutions, the aftermath brought down a multitude of change, suffering, and heedless tasks in order to transform the society into the ideological demands of the founders of the revolution. Within the context of the Chinese revolutionary experience, the rhetorical demands have always accorded nationalism, socialist, and economic development as the primary goals of the revolution. However, within the context of these developments, gender equality was supposed to transpire along with the rest of the revolutionary goals. In the sociological development of China, women had always born the brunt of the burden. Mao himself "spoke of women holding up half the sky and being more oppressed than men because they were subject to male domination."2 That this was the predominant pattern in Chinese society was no longer the question. The revolution, according to Mao, also had the task to eliminate gender inequality, and posited that women were to be one of the principle beneficiaries of the revolution itself. This paper will present an overview of women as the principle beneficiaries of the revolution, look at the various party policies in employment patterns, demography, education, urbanization, and indus...