Dr. Pete Millwood (The University of Hong Kong)

During the Cultural Revolution, the People’s Republic of China championed a revolutionary approach to science in which knowledge was to be produced and applied by the laboring masses. One particular audience was Americans, who again began to visit China beginning in 1971. Many were enthralled — some by egalitarianism, others by exoticism. Elite American scientists, though, remained skeptical and continued to argue that China lagged in global, teleological scientific development. This paper traces how these two discourses competed through the 1970s. Further, it shows how the latter ultimately won out — not only among Americans but, more consequentially, within China itself.