# The Twelfth Plenum expels Liu Shaoqi from the party

Date: 1968

## The fact

At the enlarged Twelfth Plenary Session of the Eighth Central Committee, 13–31 October 1968, Liu Shaoqi was expelled from the CCP as a ‘renegade, traitor, and scab’ and removed from all posts. [Mao Zedong](/people/mao-zedong) set the verdict. Liu, already kidnapped from any legal process, died in custody in November 1969. This is one purge Fact, not a separate death Fact. Later museums, competitions, UNESCO lists, and translations are not this Fact. The CCP, State Council, PLA, and local cadres may share the file; they do not erase a documented decision, and they are not a licence to treat every local killing as his handwriting.

## Context

Liu had been PRC chairman and Mao’s named successor. The 1966 work-team dispute was the pretext. Jiang Qing’s special-case group produced a dossier of recycled charges. Deng was sent down but not yet expelled for life. A 1980 rehabilitation is later reception, not a 1968 instrument of Mao’s hand. Later museums, competitions, UNESCO lists, and translations are not this Fact. The CCP, State Council, PLA, and local cadres may share the file; they do not erase a documented decision, and they are not a licence to treat every local killing as his handwriting.

Confidence is stated on the impact path, not hidden in adjectives. Do not treat Liu’s 1969 death as a separate Mao twin. The purge is the instrument; death in custody is the outcome of the same row’s path. Mixed effects of The Twelfth Plenum expels Liu Shaoqi from the party are separate paths.

## Evidence and sources

The October 1968 communiqué is a published Central Committee text. Britannica independently narrates Liu’s purge and death. Central special-case materials have been described in later official rehabilitation documents. No courtroom record exists because there was no court. Later museums, competitions, UNESCO lists, and translations are not this Fact. The CCP, State Council, PLA, and local cadres may share the file; they do not erase a documented decision, and they are not a licence to treat every local killing as his handwriting.

Official or archival record: Communiqué of the Enlarged 12th Plenary Session of the 8th CCP Central Committee, October 1968 (https://www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/cpc/communique_12th.htm; Marxists Internet Archive / CCP communiqué reprint).

## Significance

Worsening justice path: the head of state was destroyed by a plenum dossier. Direct contribution. High confidence. Later museums, competitions, UNESCO lists, and translations are not this Fact. The CCP, State Council, PLA, and local cadres may share the file; they do not erase a documented decision, and they are not a licence to treat every local killing as his handwriting.

The contribution type is direct. The attached driver is justice-[judicial-independence](/drivers/justice-judicial-independence-erosion)-erosion. The welfare reading used in this dossier is worsening. That reading is an impact-path choice, not a property stored on the Fact itself.

## What is established and what is not

Established: the Twelfth Plenum in October 1968 expelled Liu under Mao’s line, and Liu died in custody the next year. Not established: that the dossier’s spy charges were true. Later museums, competitions, UNESCO lists, and translations are not this Fact. The CCP, State Council, PLA, and local cadres may share the file; they do not erase a documented decision, and they are not a licence to treat every local killing as his handwriting.

Shared responsibility is part of The Twelfth Plenum expels Liu Shaoqi from the party. Naming Mao Zedong does not delete co-authors, institutions, or later transmitters. The lag from 1968-10-31 to any measured indicator is not treated as zero. Alternative explanations — weather, other armies, later statutes, or independent cultural change — remain live where the sources do not close them.

If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here.

Later competitions, monuments, translations, UNESCO listings, museums, and adaptations are not converted into extra lifetime acts.

## People

- Mao Zedong: https://factrail.ai/people/mao-zedong

## Drivers

- Judicial independence erosion (court capture): https://factrail.ai/drivers/justice-judicial-independence-erosion

## Sources

- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Liu-Shaoqi
- https://www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/cpc/communique_12th.htm

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/cn-mao-liu-shaoqi-purge-1968