Mao Zedong Thought , or Maoism, is a political theory derived from the teachings of the Chinese political leader Mao Zedong (1893–1976). Its followers, known as Maoists, consider it an anti-Revisionist form of Marxism–Leninism. Developed from the 1950s until the Deng Xiaoping reforms in the 1970s, it was widely applied as the guiding political and military ideology of the Communist Party of China (CPC), and as theory guiding revolutionary movements around the world. The essential difference between Maoism and other forms of Marxism is that Mao claimed that peasants should be the essential revolutionary class in China, because, contrary to their industrial working "comrades", they were more suited to establishing a successful revolution and socialist regime in China.