Anti-Spiritual Pollution Campaign

The Anti-Spiritual Pollution Campaign (Chinese: 清除精神污染) was a political campaign spearheaded by conservative factions within the Communist Party of China that lasted from October 1983 to December 1983. In general, its advocates wanted to curb Western-inspired liberal ideas among the Chinese populace, a by-product of nascent economic reforms begun in 1978.

Spiritual Pollution has been called "a deliberately vague term that embraces every manner of bourgeois import from erotica to existentialism," and is supposed to refer to "obscene, barbarous or reactionary materials, vulgar taste in artistic performances, indulgence in individualism" and statements that "run counter to the country's social system" according to Deng Liqun, the Party's Propaganda Chief at the time of the campaign.

The campaign reached a climax in mid November 1983 and largely faded into obscurity into 1984 after intervention from Deng Xiaoping. However, elements of the campaign were rehashed during the "anti-Bourgeois liberalization" campaign of the late 1980s against liberal party general secretary Hu Yaobang.

The campaign against spiritual pollution can be said to have its origins in the Twelfth Party Congress held in September 1982, during which Deng Xiaoping stated his intention to continue China's march towards economic modernization and liberalization, a process that he initiated in 1978. Attempting to maintain balance between the conservative and moderate factions in the Party, Deng tempered his emphasis on continued economic development with a call to build up China's "socialist spiritual civilization" so as to preserve it socialist ideological orientation and protect against the unwanted societal impacts of "bourgeois liberalism," which had begun trickling in since the policy of opening up began in 1978. During the Party Congress, Hu Yaobang warned that "capitalist forces and other forces hostile to our socialist cause will seek to corrupt us and harm our country," and exhorted Party members to hold true to communist ideals and discipline.

The Twelfth Party Congress also laid the foundations for the establishment of a new constitution, approved by the National People's Congress in December of the same year. The constitution rejected ultra-left ideology of the Mao era, and provided for greater protection of citizens' dignity and civil liberties, and advocated for an orderly, institutionalized and accountable system of justice. The new constitution carried significant caveats, however; it specified, for instance that citizens' freedom of privacy and correspondence were protected, except in cases where it was of interest to the state.

...
Wikipedia