Many of the complaints that Khrushchev had voiced in Moscow Mao had already considered. Stalin's reputation had come at a high cost, and Mao knew that he could use the perception of Stalin and the oppression that had resulted from it to his own advantage. In 1956, Mao gave his own speech that has come to be known as his "Hundred Flowers" address. In this speech, Mao wanted to give the intellectuals a way of expressing themselves so that they would feel like they had a say in the direction that the nation was going to take. Up to that point, Mao's focus had been on the peasants and those of lower birth. This was the first time where he seemed to seek input and opinions from an upper class of China, and he encouraged open discussion of what could be done differently or better. Mao had not shown any such willingness for discourse since the May Fourth Movement, but this speech provided justification for a more open path of communication, indicating that he was not going to be like Stalin.

During the campaign, differing views and solutions to national policy were encouraged based on the famous expression by Mao: "The policy of letting a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend is designed to promote the flourishing of the arts and the progress of science." The movement was in part a response to the demoralization of intellectuals, who felt estranged from the Communist Party. However, when the intellectuals began to question Mao himself, the reaction was quick, although he certainly should have expected it, considering how much he had criticized Stalin. Whether he felt they had betrayed his intentions of trying to give them a voice, or if he had always planned to use the speech to weed out as many dissenters as possible, by 1957, Mao had largely removed anyone who expressed opposition to his vision of a communist China.

The crackdown continued through 1957 and 1959 as an Anti-Rightist Campaign against those who were critical of the regime and its ideology. Citizens were rounded up in waves by the hundreds of thousands, publicly criticized, and condemned to prison camps for re-education through labour, or even execution. The ideological crackdown re-imposed Maoist orthodoxy in public expression, and catalysed the Anti-Rightist Movement.