The Great Trumpian Cultural Revolution – Maoist Anti-Intellectualism in the Trump Era

The Great Trumpian Cultural Revolution – ​

Maoist Anti-Intellectualism in the Trump Era​

In the summer of 1966, the PRC's Chairman Mao set in motion the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. What ensued was a decade of hysteria,

violence and chaos that pitted people against each other: rural versus urban, young versus old, common folk versus party elite, and the masses versus the intellectuals, who, as it turned out, were the very “counterrevolutionary revisionists” that the notification vehemently denounced.​

Some 50 years later, POTUS candidate Trump proudly declared on stage his love for “the poorly educated”.Coupled with his penchant to criticize policy experts, vilify the media, and belittle political institutions, Trump’s message struck a chord with a particular segment of American society. And indeed, the “poorly educated” love him back – according to the statistical post-mortem by FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver, this demographic group proved instrumental in catapulting Trump to the presidency.

The political realities of the Trump era bore striking resemblance to what Mao unleashed onto the Chinese society during the Cultural Revolution in one particular aspect: though half a century apart, both these political movements revolve around a strong current of anti-intellectualism.

1. the open abandonment of expertise in government policy-making
2. total politicization of civil society and culture at large
3. the demonization of and social mobilization against the intelligentsia has become political sport

​

the open abandonment of expertise in government policy-making.

• In Maoist China, public policies were marked by an inconsistency that matched Mao’s ideological whims. Merely a few years before the Cultural Revolution, Mao had led a disastrous attempt at mass social restructuring known as the Great Leap Forward. By instituting a series of industrialization and collectivization policies, Mao sought to radically accelerate the country’s transformation into a communist utopia. However, the result was a calamitous famine and economic devastation.
• In the Trump era, a similar disdain for detailed and thoughtful policy-making has permeated the executive branch. From the passage of the tax cuts to the attempted repealing of the Affordable Care Act, the administration is constantly at odds with the independent policy-advising bodies such as the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation.5 On trade and border security issues, the Trump administration has replaced nuances and actionable policy with hyperboles and unrealistic promises (“Mexico will pay for the wall!”). And perhaps most tellingly, the administration has appointed to top political positions people who seemingly do not possess the relevant expertise. The result in some cases is a bloodless purge – a record-shattering 34% turnover rate in the West Wing so far – and in others, a voluntary exodus in the civil service that led to a massive personnel vacuum.