In this episode we discuss China's first Five Year Plan, a centralised form of economic development that encompasses elements of social engineering and which is still used in China till this day. What were the major aims of the FYP, what were the outcomes, and why did the CCP end up abandoning this system of slow but steady development in favour of a Great Leap? We discuss these questions, as well as looking at how the foundations of Mao's ideological and political dominance were laid in this period following the death of Stalin.
