Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai the Chinese revolutionary, diplomat and statesman (1898-1976) who served as the first premier of the People's Republic of China and as its principal spokesman on the world stage for more than a quarter of a century. Known for his diplomatic skill and administrative ability, he played a central role in the founding of the state and in the conduct of its foreign relations during the Cold War.

Education and Revolutionary Beginnings

Zhou Enlai was born on 5 March 1898 in Huai'an, in Jiangsu province, into a family of scholar-officials that had fallen on difficult times. He was raised and educated in part by relatives, and as a boy he attended schools in Huai'an, Shenyang and Tianjin, where he excelled as a student and began to take an interest in politics. His school years coincided with the fall of the Qing dynasty and the early turbulence of the republic.

In 1917 he travelled to Japan to continue his studies, and during his time abroad he first encountered the Marxist and socialist ideas that were then spreading among Chinese students. He returned to Tianjin and became a leader of student protest during the May Fourth Movement of 1919, editing a journal and helping to organise a student union that brought him into contact with other future leaders of the communist movement.

In 1920 he went to France under a work-study programme, and there he helped to build a Chinese communist organisation among the emigre students of Europe. He travelled through Britain and Germany, and by the time he returned to China in 1924 he had become a committed revolutionary with wide experience of political organisation and a command of several languages.

Rise Within the Communist Movement

Back in China, Zhou took up a post at the military academy at Whampoa and became a leading political officer in the Nationalist-communist united front. He directed the political training of cadets and played a prominent part in the campaigns of the mid-1920s, gaining a reputation for organisation and personal courage during the Northern Expedition.

After the breakdown of the united front in 1927 he helped to organise the Nanchang Uprising, an early armed action by the communists, and became one of the senior figures of the party. He served as head of the political department and later as a member of the military commission, working closely with Mao Zedong during the long struggles of the following decade.

Zhou took part in the Long March and was a decisive figure at the Zunyi conference of 1935, where he supported Mao's leadership and helped to settle the strategic dispute that reshaped the party's command. In the years at Yan'an he became the party's chief negotiator and administrator, and he handled a series of complex talks with the Nationalists and with foreign representatives.

Premier of the People's Republic

When the People's Republic was founded in October 1949, Zhou became its first premier and minister of foreign affairs, holding the two offices together for several years. He organised the new government, directed the recovery of the economy and represented China at international gatherings, including the Geneva conference of 1954 on Indochina and the Bandung conference of 1955, where he set out the principles of peaceful coexistence.

As premier he supervised the vast machinery of the state, from economic planning and foreign trade to science, education and public health. He negotiated the treaty of friendship with the Soviet Union, managed the difficult relationship with the United States during the Korean War, and guided China's entry into the United Nations in 1971 and the beginning of a new relationship with Washington in 1972.

Among his most celebrated achievements was the diplomatic opening to the United States. Zhou received President Richard Nixon in Beijing in February 1972 and worked with him to produce the Shanghai communique, a document that acknowledged the differences between the two countries while setting out a framework for a gradual improvement in relations. The opening transformed the strategic position of China.

The Cultural Revolution and Later Years

During the Cultural Revolution that began in 1966, Zhou came under intense pressure but managed to remain in office, shielding many government functions and protecting a number of individuals from the worst excesses of the campaign. His willingness to work within the system while moderating its effects made him a figure of considerable popular affection, though it also exposed him to criticism from more radical elements.

He worked to limit damage to the economy and to keep the diplomatic and administrative apparatus of the state intact, and in the final years of his life he was a restraining influence on the radical faction that sought to seize power. Despite failing health he continued to receive foreign visitors and to direct policy, and he reported on the work of the government to the party congress shortly before his death.

Zhou Enlai died in Beijing on 8 January 1976. His death prompted a spontaneous public outpouring of grief in Tiananmen Square, and the suppression of that mourning became an episode in the political struggles that led to the fall of the radical faction later that year. He is widely remembered as one of the most able and respected statesmen of modern China.

Reputation and Legacy

Zhou's reputation rests on a rare combination of diplomatic finesse, administrative competence and personal modesty. Foreign statesmen of very different outlooks praised his intelligence and his grasp of detail, and his skill as a negotiator helped to restore China's standing in the world after decades of isolation and war. His patience and courtesy became a model for Chinese diplomacy.

Within China he is remembered as a loyal servant of the revolution who worked to soften the harshest policies of his time and to preserve the institutions of the state. Historians debate the extent to which he was able to influence events at the height of the political campaigns, but most agree that his presence at the centre limited the scale of the disruption.

The institutions of Chinese foreign policy and government administration bear the mark of his long service. The principles of peaceful coexistence that he promoted, together with the network of diplomatic relationships he built, shaped China's position in the world for generations, and his name remains closely associated with the emergence of the country as a major international actor.

See also

• Bandung Conference
• Shanghai Communique
• Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence
• Long March