Leadership in the Chinese Communist Party
From the inception of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) its constitution provided for the election of delegates to periodic congresses, which chose a supreme or Central Committee (CC). The CC itself decided when congresses should convene, but once a decade was a minimum. The GPCR interfered with plans announced to hold a Ninth Congress in 1966.
Congresses of the CCP have taken place as follows：
Founding Congress, Shanghai, June-July, 1921
2nd, Shanghai, July, 1922
3rd, Canton, June, 1923
4th, Shanghai, January, 1925
5th, Hankow, July, 1927
6th, Moscow, July, 1928
7th, Yenan, April, 1945
8th, Peking, September, 1956
The Seventh CCP Congress (1945) elected forty-four full members to the CC and the Eighth Congress (1956) elected ninety-seven full members and ninety-six alternate members. The CC chooses a Political Bureau (Politburo), the equivalent of a Party cabinet. The Eighth Congress CC elected twenty full members of the Politburo (PB) and six alternate members.
From 1921 to 1935 the CCP followed the pattern of Stalin's Party, in which the General Secretary (of the CC and the PB) held chief responsibility for leadership. The term used in Chinese for "General Secretary"was Tsung shu-chi. General secretaryship of the Party was held by the following：
| Ch'en Tu-hsiu | 1921-27 |
| Ch'u Ch'iu-pai | 1927-28 |
| Hsiang Chung-fa | 1928-31 |
| Wang Ming (Ch'en Shao-yu) | 1931-32 |
| Po Ku(Ch'in Pang-hsien) | 1932-35 |
| Lo Fu(Chang Wen-t'ien) | 1935-43 |
A change in the significance of the title "General Secretary"took place at an enlarged meeting of the PB (including CC members and army commanders) on the Long March at Tsunyi, Kweichow, in January, 1935. At that time Mao Tse-tung won majority control of the PB. The Tsunyi Conference heard and accepted Mao Tse-tung's critique of Po Ku's mistakes, and Po Ku resigned as General Secretary. Mao now held the mandate of the Red Army and the Party to lead them on the Long March. Mao was already Chairman (Chu-hsi) of the Central Soviet Government, but the latter had disintegrated. The Tsunyi Conference simply transferred top authority to the Chairman, above the General Secretary. Lo Fu was named new General Secretary, but was subordinated to Mao, who was also named Chairman of the supreme Party revolutionary military committee.
Lo Fu was still General Secretary of the PB when the author visited Pao An in 1936, but Lo Fu referred (in English) to Mao as "leader of the Party."Mao was Chu-hsi. In a conference of the PB held in Lochuan in 1937, Mao was elected Chu-hsi of the CC and the PB. Lo Fu's title remained Tsung shu-chi. He was still called that when the author again saw Lo Fu in Yenan in September, 1939. The position of General Secretary was formally abolished at the Seventh National Congress of the Party in 1945. Provision was then made for a Chairman and four Vice-Chairmen of the PB to constitute a standing committee. One of the Vice-Chairmen served as a recording secretary (mi-shu-chang). In 1956 the Eighth National Congress restored the title "General Secretary, "but the position carried less significance than formerly, although it was a job of top administrative coordination. In 1956 Teng Hsiao-p'ing was chosen General Secretary. In the official order of listing, after the Eighth CC's Eleventh Plenum (August, 1966), Teng still appeared as fifth in rank under Mao Tse-tung——but by 1967 he was under heavy attack, together with Liu Shao-ch'i, from leaders of the GPCR, and it seemed likely that his career had come to an end.
Following is the order of rank of members of the Politburo after the tenth plenary session of the Central Committee of the Eighth Congress of the CCP in 1962, and after the eleventh plenary session in August, 1966, together with notations of official and unofficial action for or against them：
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