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Zhu Houze

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Zhu Houze
朱厚泽
Head of Publicity Department of the Chinese Communist Party
In office
August 1985 – February 1987
General SecretaryHu Yaobang
Preceded byDeng Liqun
Succeeded byWang Renzhi
Party Secretary of Guizhou
In office
April – August 1987
Preceded byChi Biqing
Succeeded byHu Jintao
Personal details
BornJanuary 1931
Zhijin County, Guizhou, China
Died9 May 2010 (aged 79)
Beijing
Political partyChinese Communist Party
Alma materGuiyang Normal College

Zhu Houze (Chinese: 朱厚泽; January 1931 – 9 May 2010) was a Chinese politician most active in the 1980s, best known for his term as head of the Publicity Department of the Chinese Communist Party. As head of the department he presided over a period of liberalism in the Chinese press.

Biography

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Zhu was born in Zhijin County, Guizhou province. He joined the Communist Party in 1949, the year the People's Republic of China was founded. He attended Guiyang Normal College.[1] In 1964, during the Socialist Education Movement, Zhu was expelled from the Communist Party and sent to perform manual labour.[2]

Zhu was politically rehabilitated in 1978, then became head of the party organization in Guiyang, then promoted to provincial First Secretary of Guizhou. During his tenure in Guizhou he was known for the significant progress the province made in economic development; the annual increase in industrial output increased by 18%. Zhu's achievements were noted by national leaders such as Hu Yaobang.[2]

In April 1985, Zhu was named Guizhou party chief (top official of the province). In August that year, he was transferred to Beijing to serve as head of the Propaganda Department, becoming one of the top deputies of party General Secretary Hu Yaobang. During Zhu's term as propaganda department head, he spearheaded propaganda policy of "Generous, Tolerant, Relaxed" (宽厚、宽容、宽松), significantly loosening the ideological shackles of the communist state and leading to increased liberalization in the arts and in academic institutions.[2]

However, Zhu's fortunes and the policies he espoused were short-lived. Mirroring the fate of his patron Hu Yaobang, in February 1987 Zhu was dismissed from his propaganda post during the anti-bourgeois liberalization campaign.[3] Though disgraced, he was given a position at the State Council Rural Development Centre; during the 13th Party Congress held in 1987, he failed to secure election to the party's Central Committee; that is, he appeared on the candidate list but did not receive enough votes for confirmation. However, in 1988, reformist general secretary Zhao Ziyang named Zhu the first-ranked vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions.[2]

Following the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, Zhu was yet again purged for supporting the student movement. He was expelled for the second time in his life from the Chinese Communist Party.[4] He retreated from public view thereafter and died on May 9, 2010, in Beijing.[5]

References

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  1. ^ "原中共中央宣传部部长朱厚泽". 贵州师范大范学.[dead link]
  2. ^ a b c d 胡楠 (October 1, 1991). "三宽部长朱厚泽". 六四档案. Archived from the original on May 23, 2018. Retrieved September 11, 2015.
  3. ^ "何与怀:他在释放身上的历史积沉". Boxun.
  4. ^ "党员重新登记中共办理完毕 阎明复朱厚泽未获准入党". 六四档案(转载《联合报》). September 7, 1990.
  5. ^ "仁心厚泽永留人间——朱厚泽先生逝世". Boxun.
Party political offices
Preceded by Head of the
Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party

1985–1987
Succeeded by
Preceded by Communist Party Secretary of Guizhou Province
1985
Succeeded by