Knowing What the People Are Ready For
[Mao Zedong] was always out visiting every peasant in the place—talking to the women, talking to the young people, talking to the poor peasants, talking to the middle peasants, discussing, listening, questioning, and setting up organizations. Only when a lot of organizations had been set up and were raising hell—when the youth were raising hell, and the women were raising hell, and the poor peasants were raising hell, and the middle peasants were at least considering raising hell—only then would he come back into the meetings and say, “This is what the people are ready for.”
From page 627 of “Working Effectively in the Wide World” in The Benign Reality
(Present Time 204, July 2021)