Background
Chou was born in I-hsing hsien, located in southern Kiangsu on the western shore of Lake T’ai. He comes from a landlord family and, by his own account, led an “easy life” as a youth.
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Chou P’ei-yuan
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American-educated Chou P’ei-yuan was one of the most prominent scientists in Communist China. For many years a professor of physics at Tsinghua University, China’s leading scientific institution, he has played a major role in scientific research and the administration of science since the Communists came to power in 1949.
Education
He attended Tsinghua University in Peking, graduating in 1924 with a degree in physics. In the following year he went to the United States, where he earned a bachelor’s (1926) and a master’s degree (1927) from the University of Chicago, and then received his doctorate at the California Institute of Technology in 1928.
Career
He returned to China in 1929, taking up a post at his alma mater as a physics professor. He was again in the United States for the 1936—37 academic year as a member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, New Jersey. Returning to China he rejoined Tsinghua, which during the war years was temporarily merged with Peking and Nankai Universities and relocated in Kunming, Yunnan, under the name National Southwest Associated University. Chou remained in Kunming until the end of 1943 when he went to the United States once more. In a “confession” during an “ideological remolding” campaign in 1952, Chou stated that he arranged this trip through his contacts with Tsinghua classmates and American Consulate personnel in Kunming (whom he described as “special agents of the U.S. State Department”). He began to work on U.S. Government military projects in early 1945 and during his stay took a year-and-a-half “research course on the subject of launching torpedoes from planes” and attended a scientific conference held under U.S. Navy Department auspices. After more than three years in the United States, Chou returned to Peking and his teaching post at Tsinghua in the spring of 1947.
In the fall of 1948 Chou was in London attending an international conference on dynamics. Before the year ended he had returned to Peking, remaining there when the Communist forces marched into the city at the end of January 1949. In his 1952 “confession” he admitted that he had been deeply suspicious of the CCP and of its willingness to allow “freedom of scientific research.” Nonetheless, he quickly threw in his lot with the Communists and within a brief period held a number of important posts in the Chinese intellectual and scientific community. In mid- 1949 he was named to membership on the preparatory committee for the First All-China Conference of Scientific Circles, a year later (August 1950), at the close of the conference, the Communists established the All-China Federation of Scientific Societies (ACFSS), the national organization that oversees the activities of China’s professional scientific societies. Chou was named to the ACFSS national Council and to membership on its International Liaison Committee, and two years later he became director of its Organization Department. One of the more important societies under the ACFSS is the China Physics Society, Chou had already been president of the society since 1948 (prior to the Communist takeover), and after the Communists took power he was in effect reappointed to this position (although in the early days of the PRC he was referred to simply as the “responsible member” of the Physics Society).
When the Communists came to power Chou continued at Tsinghua as a physics professor, and in 1949 he became dean of studies. In his confession he stated that he agreed to take the latter post in return for a promise from the Communist authorities to assist in having one of his daughters return to Peking from south China. The daughter had been one of thousands of youths sent to south China in 1949 to help administer the newly conquered territories in the wake of the advancing PLA. In 1953 Chou was transferred to Peking University where he first became dean of studies and then, in November 1956, a university vice-president, a position he still retains. In 1954 he received his first governmental post, a seat in the First NPC as a representative of his native Kiangsu. He was subsequently re-elected to serve in the Second NPC (1959-1964), and again to the Third NPC, which opened in late 1964.
Politics
In addition to his numerous scientific responsibilities in China, Chou has also been called upon to represent the PRC abroad on many occasions. His travels abroad have been for two specific purposes, to attend scientific meetings and to participate in political activities sponsored by various international Communist front organizations (for example, the World Peace Council). His first two trips after the Communists came to power fell into the latter category. In October 1950 he was a member of a “friendship” delegation led by Liu Ning-i to England, and in the next month he was among the members of Kuo Mo-jo’s delegation to the Second World Peace Congress in Warsaw. Similarly, he was with Hsu Ti-hsin’s “cultural” delegation visiting Italy, England, and Switzerland in March-June 1958, in March 1961 he was in New Delhi as a member of a group led by Liu Ning-i and Liao Ch’eng-chih to a World Peace Council meeting; and in August 1961 he led the Chinese delegation to the Seventh World Conference Against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs in Tokyo. For his work in the international “peace” movement Chou was made a member of the World Peace Council in July 1958 (a position he presumably still holds) and a vice-chairman of the China Peace Committee in June 1965.
Chou’s travels abroad in the interests of science have often centered around the activities of the World Federation of Scientific Workers (WFSW). Throughout the 1950’s the WFSW was essentially a Soviet-dominated organization, but with the emergence of a large number of new African and Asian nations in the sixties (and their subsequent admission into the organization), it was gradually transformed into a more open and professional organization. And, although the political content of the Federation’s meetings is still high, it now hears serious scientific papers read before its gatherings by distinguished scientists from both Communist and non-Communist nations. Chou’s first association with the WSFW took place in September 1953 when he attended its third congress in Budapest. Immediately afterwards he was in Poland to attend meetings commemorating the 410th anniversary of the death of Copernicus. Over the next decade he attended eight other WSFW meetings held in: East Berlin, September 1955; Helsinki, August 1957; Warsaw, September 1959, Budapest, October 1960, Sofia, April 1961; Geneva, September 1961 and February 1963; and Moscow, September 1962. Chou has been an honorary secretary of the WFSW since September 1955 and a vice-president since September 1962.
Membership
Chou’s participation in the NPC has been peripheral to his continuing participation in scientific research and science administration. Thus, when the Academy of Sciences established four major academic departments in May-June 1955, he was named to the Standing Committee of the Department of Physics, Mathematics, and Chemistry, and in October of the same year he became a member of the Academy’s Scientific Awards Committee. In February 1957 he became a Council member of the newly established China Dynamics Society, and by the next year he had become a vice-president. This society, like the China Physics Society, came under the aegis of the national Federation of Scientific Societies. The latter was merged with another scientific organization in September 1958 to form the China Scientific and Technical Association (CSTA). Chou was appointed as one of the secretaries of the CSTA, but he was removed from this post and promoted to a vice-chairmanship in 1964. He held still another post in the field of science administration from 1957 to 1958, serving as a member of the State Council’s Scientific Planning Commission.
Since September 1952, Chou has been a Central Committee member of the Chiu San Society, an organization consisting mainly of intellectuals drawn from cultural, educational, and scientific circles. Although called a “society,” the organization is treated by the Chinese Communists as one of the eight “democratic” political parties that ostensibly shares political power with the CCP. (For further details about the Society, see under Hsu Te-heng, the chairman.) Chou was promoted to a vice-chairmanship in December 1958, and at the same time became director of the Society’s Organization Department, positions he still retains. Representing the Chiu San So¬ciety, he was elected to the Third and Fourth National Committees of the CPPCC that held their initial sessions in April 1959 and December 1964-January 1965, respectively, and in each case he was also named to the Standing Committee that is in charge of CPPCC affairs between National Committee meetings.
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Born
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Died
November 24, 1993 (aged 91) -
Nationality
China -
Ethnicity
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Political Party
Chinese Communist Party
Education
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1924
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1927
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1928
Career
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1949