Vladimir Grigor’evich Datsyshen,
Doctor of Historical Sciences, Institute for Demographic Research of the Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Krasnoyarsk State Pedagogical University named after V.P. Astaf’ev, Krasnoyarsk, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Children and Childhood in Soviet-Chinese Relations in the 1950s
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2021-1-11
The article is devoted to the problems of the place and role of children in the system of “people’s diplomacy” that took place in Soviet-Chinese relations in the 1950s. The research is based on sources of personal origin, as well as materials of a clerical nature, both previously published and introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. The documents were found in the fonds of the central, local and museum archives. On the basis of historical sources, a picture of participation of children and children’s organizations in the Soviet-Chinese interaction is being reconstructed. The visit to children’s institutions was included in the program of mutual visits of the delegations of the two countries. In the 1950s there were also mutual trips of children’s groups and pioneer delegations to their foreign neighbors, as well as direct ties between Soviet and Chinese schools and other educational institutions. Soviet specialists who once worked in Chinese schools kept in touch with their students for a long time. The main form of direct interaction between Soviet and Chinese children in the 1950s was friendly correspondence, which, as a rule, was established through the mediation of the Soviet authorities, the media and public organizations. In addition, Chinese children wrote en masse letters to famous Soviet statesmen and public figures. Soviet and Chinese children participated in “people’s diplomacy” until the early 1960s. The use by state and socio-political institutions of the “children’s question” played an important role in the formation of friendly relations between the two peoples and states in the 1950s, and also became an important factor in the successful restoration of Soviet-Chinese relations in the 1980s.
Publishing: 28/02/2021
The article has been received by the editor on 01.12.2020
How to cite: Datsyshen V.G. Children and Childhood in Soviet-Chinese Relations in the 1950s // Historical Courier, 2021, No. 1 (15), pp. 116–133. [Available online:] http://istkurier.ru/data/2021/ISTKURIER-2021-1-11.pdf
Links: Issue 1 2021
Keywords: Soviet-Chinese relations in the 1950s; “people’s diplomacy”; children; friendly exchanges and correspondence