Under Mao's successors, the party began a large-scale experiment in historical crisis management. Millions of politically persecuted people were rehabilitated, compensation payments were made and perpetrators were brought to justice, above all the "gang of four" around Mao's wife Jiang Qing. The aim was to focus all energies on economic reform policies. But the shadows of the past could not be so easily dispelled, and the effects of this policy are still felt today. Based on a large number of hitherto unknown documents, the Freiburg sinologist Daniel Leese draws a broadly based panorama of Chinese politics and society during the critical phase of upheaval between 1976 and 1987.