International Maoism had its origins in the split that developed in the 1950s, after the death of Stalin, between the Soviet and Chinese Communist parties (and regimes). The schism was perhaps as near to being inevitable as anything in human affairs.
Given the nature of Marxist-Leninist ideology, particularly as it developed after the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917, there could be only one center from which the “correct” interpretation of that ideology came. So long as the Soviet Union remained the only country governed by a Marxist-Leninist (Communist) party, it remained the place of origin of such an interpretation, and so long as he lived, Joseph Stalin continued to be the person whose interpretation was definitive.
Even the emergence of Communist regimes in most of the East European states immediately after World War II did not significantly change the situation. None of the parties in those countries controlled a nation of sufficient importance to form the basis for a major split in the International Communist Movement. This was borne out by the fact that the one schism that did take place in those years, that is, that of the Yugoslav party, did not give rise to any significant challenge to Stalin’s leadership of International Communism.
However, the advent of the Chinese Communist Party to power in 1948-1949 drastically changed this situation. China was a nation containing one quarter of the human race, and although the country remained poor and underdeveloped, it had the economic and military potential to become one of the world’s major powers. Sooner or later, it was all but inevitable that differences of opinion between the Chinese and Soviet parties would give rise to a challenge on the part of the Chinese leadership to the priority of the Soviet party leadership within the world Communist movement.
So long as Stalin lived, no such split took shape. Over many years, he had been accepted by the leaders of all the Communist (Stalinist) parties as the source of Marxist-Leninist wisdom and policy. Furthermore, although there are indications that Stalin did not particularly want the Chinese Communists to come to power, he was wise enough to extend them considerable economic and other aid once they had won the Chinese civil war.
However, the situation fundamentally changed with Stalin’s death. Thereafter, the Chinese Communists did not feel that his successors spoke with the authority they had recognized in Stalin. They had good reason to believe that their own principal leader, Mao Tse-tung, was the senior and most authoritative leader in the world Communist community. He had led his party to victory in a struggle spreading over more than two decades, and he was a “theorist” of consequence, traditionally a requirement for a major leader in International Communism. In addition, he governed the world’s most populous country.
Therefore, as disagreements emerged between Mao and his associates on the one hand and Nikita Krushchev and other post-Stalin leaders of the Soviet party and government on the other, the Chinese felt under no compulsion to accept the ideas and interpretations of events of the Soviet leaders as being inevitably correct.
Disagreements arose over a number of issues. One of the first was Krushchev’s famous “secret” speech to the twentieth Congress of the Soviet party early in 1956, in which he excoriated Stalin. The Chinese leadership felt that that speech was a major mistake, and undermined the Communist movement throughout the world. Shortly afterwards, the Chinese were very critical of the Soviet leaders’ handling of the uprising in Hungary against the Communist regime there, and the near revolt against the one in Poland.
Then, early in 1958, the Chinese launched the so-called Great Leap Forward. This was a clear break with the Soviet model of Marxist-Leninist economy and society which they had until then followed. It sought to reorganize the economy on the basis of “communes,” which they pictured as a “higher” form of society than that prevalent in the USSR and other “socialist” states. Khrushchev was reported to have regarded the Great Leap Forward as both ridiculous and disastrous.