Socialism as a goial was to be adopted in the first formal constitution of the PRC.

The 1954 Constitution

of the PRC, adopted in September 1954. This Constitution represented a first attempt by the
CPC leadership to formalize and institutionalize the administration of the state. It also continued
the moderate policy for social transformation. This policy was particularly evidenced in
advocating a step by step process for social transformation from New Democracy to socialism.
The Common Program provisions regarding the nature of the state, state power structure and
the economic system were all inherited by the 1954 Constitution. As such, Soviet influence
continued in the Constitution. Indeed, scholars now complain that too much, both in terms of
form and substance, was copied from the Soviet Union without sufficient regard to China’s own
situation, There was, however, an innovation in the creation of the office of “Chairman of the
People’s Republic of China”, an office which never existed in the Soviet Constitution.

The 1954 Constitution was not intended as permanent, but was a transitional constitution. Indeed, by
1956 the transitional period was deemed over and the COsntitutionwas seen as being out of
date. The need for constitutional revision was formally initiated by the Party at its Eighth
Congress in 1956. However, that was not to happen. The “Anti-Rights Movement” of 1957 spelt
the end of the moderate policy towards social transformation and marked a return to mass
campaigns, popular justice and political turmoil culminating in the now infamous Cultural
Revolution (1966-1977).