The Cultural Revolution has reached its fortieth anniversary (1966–2006), but many questions about it remain unanswered or the answers themselves are controversial. Among the questions, why Mao and Maoist ideologists went such an extreme in seeking their political goals, and how they would justify the chaos and disasters the Chinese society suffered from 1966 to 1976, are perhaps the most fundamental one. To answer this question, Mao and China scholars have provided interpretations from political, economic, social, and cultural perspectives.