Of old, enormous political significance has been
attached to earthquakes in China. Any extraordinary natural phenomenon,
whether snow in summer or droughts in spring, earthquakes or insect
plagues, was interpreted as a sign of displeasure of Heaven, indicating
that the Mandate of Heaven, which bestowed legitimacy on a Chinese
ruling group, might be withdrawn. The ability to predict an earthquake
has therefore always been very important, whether to downplay its
significance or to demonstrate that the regime of the moment was no
longer morally fit to rule. The founding of the People's Republic in
1949 brought no end to this situation. In fact, in the 1970s,
earthquake prediction efforts relied extensively on the peasants'
observation of livestock behavior, providing a true instance of mass
science, science based on the efforts of workers, peasants and
soldiers, as in the poster below.
In the early 1970s, China was struck by at least two
earthquakes per year of magnitude 6 or greater. Given the unstable
situation in the country as a result of the Cultural Revolution, great
pains were taken by the leadership to explain away any political
significance that might be attached to these expressions of cosmic
displeasure. In 1976 there were no less than six earthquakes of
magnitude greater than 6.5, including the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that
devastated Tangshan on 28 July. For many ordinary Chinese, this last
earthquake clearly indicated that important developments were about to
take place. The fact that Mao Zedong would die less than two months
later had more or less been foretold....
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As the poster below indicates, Deng Xiaoping, who at the time was at the center of a campaign to combat rightist
deviation that was engineered by Jiang Qing and the Gang of Four, was even held responsible for
the problems with relief work that occured after the Tangshan earthquake. Once Hua Guofeng succeeded Mao after his death, he took
great pains to show concern for the quake victims, thereby styling himself as the true new leader of China.
To show the Party's concern after an earthquake,
mass mobilization campaigns usually were set in motion to distribute
relief and emergency supplies. The People's Liberation Army in particular
played a major role in this. The leadership sent messages of sympathy
and dispatched delegations to express concern. In the most serious
cases, such missions would be headed by the highest leaders. In order
to show solidarity, every administrative level basically dispatched its
own delegation to oversee relief activities. These practices have not
changed: after the January 1998 earthquake in the region Northwest of
Beijing, the procedures sketched above were closely followed.
Sources:
Barry Raleigh et al., Prediction of the Haicheng Earthquake, Reprinted from EOS , 58 (5), 1977, pp. 236-272
Sigrid Schmalzer, "Labor Created Humanity: Cultural Revolution Science
on Its Own Terms", in Joseph W. Esherick, Paul G. Pickowicz, Andrew
Walder (eds), The Chinese Cultural Revolution as History (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006)
s.r.landsberger@let.leidenuniv.nl
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