Li Weihan

In this Chinese name, the family name is Li.

Li Weihan
李维汉
Li in 1946
Vice Chairman of the Central Advisory Commission
In office 12 September 1982 – 11 August 1984
Chairman	Deng Xiaoping
Vice Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
In office 2 July 1979 – 17 June 1983
Chairman	Deng Xiaoping
In office 25 December 1954 – 5 January 1965
Chairperson	Zhou Enlai
Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
In office 27 September 1954 – 3 January 1965
Chairman	Liu Shaoqi Zhu De
Secretary-General of Government Administration Council
In office 19 October 1949 – 18 September 1953
Premier	Zhou Enlai
Preceded by	New title
Succeeded by	Xu Bing
Head of the United Front Work Department
In office 26 September 1948 – 25 December 1964
Preceded by	Zhou Enlai
Succeeded by	Xu Bing
Head of the Organization Department of the Chinese Communist Party
In office 9 August 1927 – 23 September 1927
Preceded by	Zhang Guotao
Succeeded by	Luo Yinong
Member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party
In office 9 August 1927 – 19 June 1928
General Secretary	Chen Duxiu
Personal details
Born	(1896-06-02)2 June 1896 Changsha County, Hunan, Qing Empire
Died	11 August 1984(1984-08-11) (aged 88) Beijing, China
Political party	Chinese Communist Party
Spouse(s)	Cao Wenyu Jin Weiying Wu Jingzhi
Children	5, including Li Tieying
Alma mater	Hunan First Normal University
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese	李维汉
Traditional Chinese	李維漢
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Lǐ Wéihàn

Li Weihan (Chinese: 李维汉; 2 June 1896 – 11 August 1984) was a Chinese Communist Party politician. After pursuing his studies in France in 1919–20, he returned to China for the first National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in Shanghai in 1921. He studied at the Hunan Self-Study University founded by Mao Zedong. Li became a member of the 6th Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party in 1927 but fell out of favour shortly afterwards in the wake of the unsuccessful Autumn Harvest Uprising in junction of Hunan and Jiangxi provinces. When he sought to bring the uprising to an end, he found himself accused of cowardice. Li was eclipsed until reemerging in the early 1930s as a supporter of Li Lisan, a leading figure in the CCP at the time, and an opponent of the anti-Mao 28 Bolsheviks faction.

Li Weihan was promoted to become the first principal of the Yan'an-based Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party, the highest training center for party workers and leaders. Li served as principal from 1933 to 1935 and again from 1937 to 1938. After the Proclamation of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Li was involved in managing China's minorities and nationalities as Chairman of the State Ethnic Affairs Commission. He was also a significant player in the CCP's drive to introduce state control of the economy (Soviet-type economic planning), and in the late-1950s Anti-Rightist Campaign, in which his own brother was purged.

Li was the director between 1944 and 1964 of the United Front Department, the predecessor to the present-day United Front Work Department. He was removed from his post in 1964 and was subsequently criticised by Zhou Enlai for "capitulationism in united front work". However, he reemerged after 1978 as a supporter of the reformist Deng Xiaoping – who Li had saved from persecution years before – and as a critic of Mao and autocracy in the CCP, which Li referred to as "feudalism". Deng promoted Li in 1982 to the post of vice chairman of the Central Advisory Commission, which Deng himself chaired. Li died in office in August 1984.

See also

• Historical Museum of French-Chinese Friendship

External links

• Biographical note on Li Weihan

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