page_title: Propaganda in China
section_title: Propaganda in the arts
hierarchical_section_title: Propaganda in China / Propaganda in the arts
caption_attribution_description: English: A street painting taken in Guangzhou, China.
context_page_description: Propaganda in China refers to the use of propaganda by the Chinese Communist Party sway domestic and international opinion in favor of its policies. Domestically, this includes censorship of proscribed views and an active promotion of views that favor the government. Propaganda is considered central to the operation of the CPC government. The common Chinese term xuanchuan can mean "dissemination", "propaganda", or "publicity".
  Aspects of propaganda can be traced back to the earliest periods of Chinese history, but propaganda has been most effective in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries owing to mass media and an authoritarian government. China during the Mao era is known for its constant use of mass campaigns to legitimize the state and the policies of leaders. It was the first time the CCP successfully made use of modern mass propaganda techniques, adapting them to the needs of a country which had a largely rural and illiterate population.
  Today, propaganda in China is usually depicted through cultivation of the economy and Chinese nationalism.
context_section_description: As in the Soviet Union, the CCP under Mao Zedong took socialist realism as its basis for art, making clear its goal was the 'education' of the people in communist ideology. This included, as during the Cultural Revolution, transforming literature and art to serve these ends. Pre-revolutionary songs and operas were banned as a poisonous legacy of the past. Middle and high schools were targeted by one campaign because the students circulated romance and love stories among themselves.
  Maoist propaganda art has been remade and modernized for almost two decades, and old Cultural Revolution era propaganda productions have appeared in new formats such as DVDs and karaoke versions. They appear in rock and pop versions of revolutionary songs in praise of Mao, as well as T-shirts, watches, porcelain, and other memorabilia. The works of propaganda from the Cultural Revolution have been selling extremely well in recent years, largely for nostalgia, social, patriotic or entertainment purposes.
  Propaganda songs and music, such as guoyue and revolutionary opera, have a long and storied history in the PRC, featuring prominently in the popular culture of the 1950s to the 1970s. Many of these songs were collected and performed as modern rock adaptations for several albums that were released during the 1990s, including "Red Rock" and "Red Sun: Mao Zedong Praise Songs New Revolutionary Medley". The latter sold 6–10 million copies in China. Most of the older songs praise Mao, the CCP, the 1949 revolution, the Chinese Red Army and the People's Liberation Army, the unity of the ethnic groups of China, and the various ethnic groups' devotion to Mao and the CCP.
caption: An old propaganda painting in Guangzhou promoting family planning
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