I have difficultly conceiving of either the great leaps forwards or the Cultural Revolution as conservative actions. As catastrophes, they profoundly shook the social order of Chinese society, and not by accident either. The China Mao left was a profoundly different China than the one that he was born into (not to say he did this himself, obviously he was one part of a complex assemblage)
On the other hand, I feel that I am, by in large, in sympathy with the spirit of Doug's comment, which I suspect is a critique of the authoritarian nature of the state apparatus that Mao contributed considerably to, but that authoritarian structure was linked to a very radical project of social transformation, one that continually outstripped the material ability of the society to transform. (Although, the initial land reform was actually handled fairly thoughtfully, especially if you read it against the Soviet experience.)
I'm not sure where to go with this other than to note that James Scott's Seeing Like a State seems to be trying to grapple with this problem in a productive manner.
robert wood
> Yes, and among those are that once in power, he was essentially
> conservative.
>
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>
>