[3] Purged during the Cultural Revolution, Deng emerged in the 1980s as one of the most vocal members of the hardline wing of the party in the lead-up of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre.
He left college that year for Yan'an, Shaanxi, the wartime de facto center of the CCP, to join the party and follow Mao.
Deng played a major role in the suppression of local rebellions and in enacting land reforms in the vast western region.
Seeing the situation unfold, Mao removed both Wang Zhen and Deng Liqun from their positions in Xinjiang for fear that their tactics may alienate ethnic minorities, particularly Tibetan religious leaders, who were reluctant to embrace rule by the CCP.
[6] Later, Deng returned to Beijing to serve as secretary to President Liu Shaoqi, and the deputy chief editor of the party's theory publication Red Flag.
Deng Liqun was among the Chinese leadership who contended that Reform and Opening Up made China more susceptible to the Western peaceful evolution strategy.
As a result of Deng Liqun's interventions, while market forces were being unleashed on the economy and the government began courting foreign investment, the ideological realm of the country continued to maintain a conservative tone, especially in its wariness to embrace Western-style ideas.
Deng Liqun's line quickly became dominant throughout state media, causing an intensification of the campaign in social, political and ideological fronts.
[12] During the campaign, Deng Liqun has been described as "the conservatives' primary hatchet man", reportedly stemming from his antipathy to General Secretary Hu Yaobang, the party's leading reformist at the time.
[14] Under pressure, Deng Liqun quickly accepted the limits, later delivering a speech on 7 December that the campaign was long-term and less about "men growing beards, or women perming their hair, high-heeled shoes, and lipstick" and more about "a spirit of bitter struggle".
[19] According to Zhao Ziyang's memoirs, Chen Yun intervened to safeguard Deng's salary and other compensation following his loss in the election, benefits that continued until his death.
Many of his former subordinates in the Policy Research Office were later promoted to ministerial-level positions across the party and government apparatus, increasing conservative influence in the new generation of leadership under Jiang Zemin.
[4] After Tiananmen, Deng maintained his hardline stance, and became increasingly critical of the reformist wing of the party, accusing them of pursuing an essentially capitalist line.
[22] In October 2005, Deng published an autobiographical work entitled Twelve Years (1975-1987) in limited circulation in Hong Kong, which recounted his role in the major political events during that period.
In reviewing the book, dissident journalist Gao Yu accused him of glorifying himself at the expense of Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang.
[3] In August 2014, Deng made a rare public statement in a letter to the Xinjiang Party Committee commemorating five Uyghurs who died in a plane crash in 1949 en route to Beijing.
continues to be cited by leftist and Maoist groups well into the 21st century, experiencing a mild but officially-tolerated resurgence during the ideological tightening of the Xi Jinping years.