rerevised Mao and Zhou

Both as one of the founders of People’s Republic of China, Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai were two world-known political leaders. Simultaneously, Mao and Zhou were also famous for their different personalities or emotional intelligence as Chairman Mao was like a hawk, which was strong-willed, decisive and perseverant while Premier Zhou was like a pigeon, which was moderate, considerate and flexible.

Coming from two different family backgrounds, these two political figures developed their distinguished personalities at a very young age. As a son of kulak, Mao developed his sense of revolution during his struggle with his father, who was a typical Chinese small landlord with discrimination to the poor peasants. Comparably, Zhou was from a family of traditional intellects where his father, mother, uncles were all famous intellects in his hometown. In this bookish environment, Zhou developed his gentlemanship and modest characteristic.

There is one case that can show the differences of their emotional intelligence clearly. After the Great Leap and the natural disasters lasting three years from 1959 to 1961, China experienced a serious famine which caused a lot of starving. Although Chairman Mao also did some self-criticism at that time, he still believed that the policies he proposed before would eventually and non-alternatively lead the Chinese to happy lives and attributed the situation partly to the incompleteness during the execution of the policy. Meanwhile, Premier Zhou cared more about the contemporary tribulation people suffered and would like to change the policies immediately which were the ultimate causes of the suffering.

From their behavior at the foreign affairs, we can also see the difference. Chairman Mao was famous for his assertive arguments to show the independence and sovereignty of the new China, which would sometimes cause the misunderstanding of the outside. Conversely, Premier Zhou was famous for his gentleness and tact in the diplomatic stages, which earned him a great reputation as a diplomat.

Although Mao and Zhou are different in terms of their emotional intelligence, this difference does not obstruct them from being great men, which reminds me of one idiom “All roads lead to Rome”.