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Co-operatives and Communes in Chinese Communist Fiction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 February 2009
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In less than a decade, collectivisation has come to more than five hundred million Chinese peasants and a large portion of the urban population; it has transformed the socio-economic structure of the nation, causing general repercussions around the world and unascertainable effects in the country. The development of this massive and significant collectivisation movement is reflected, in large measure, in Chinese Communist literature. This article first presents, following a general chronological order, fictional materials reflecting the co-operative and commune movements, and then discusses summarily the artistic and social values of this literature.
- Type
- Special Survey of Chinese Communist Literature
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- Copyright © The China Quarterly 1963
References
1 Early in 1943, Mao Tse-tung asserted that the peasant masses had slaved for thousands of years under the system of individual economy—the foundation of feudal rule and poverty—and that the only way to change this state of affairs was by gradual collectivisation. Not long after the inauguration of the new régime in 1949, the drive towards collectivisation was initiated. By December 1951, the Party's Central Committee had issued to local cadres the “Draft Decisions on Agricultural Mutual Aid and Co-operation.” Not published till February 1953, this document called for a “three-stage” programme: seasonal mutual aid teams, year-round mutual aid teams, and agricultural producers' co-operatives. In a speech in July 1955 Mao Tse-tung, encouraged by the progress of the co-operative drive, dispensed with the “gradual approach” and gave the signal for rapid collectivisation. Immediately there was a nation-wide “socialist upsurge,” which led to almost total collectivisation of the countryside by 1956. Concurrently with the Great Leap Forward, the régime launched in August 1958 a drive for the establishment of communes. When 1958 began, most of the five hundred million peasants were working in 740,000 co-operatives, but by the end of the year these peasants and many city dwellers had been organised into 26,000 communes. Since the winter of 1958, there have been measures of modification and retrenchment. For more information on the development of the co-operatives and communes, see Communist China 1955–59: Policy Documents with Analysis, with a Foreword by Bowie, Robert and Fair-bank, John (Cambridge: Harvard Un. Press, 1962)Google Scholar (hereafter referred to as Policy Documents); Greene, Felix, China Awakened (London: Cape, 1961)Google Scholar; Hughes, Richard, The Chinese Communes (London: The Bodley Head, 1960).Google Scholar
2 In search of materials that reflect current developments, I examined mostly short stories in periodicals. The short stories quoted here are almost exclusively from Jen-nan Wen-hsueh (People's Literature: PL), a monthly published in Peking. Because of the semi-official nature of this periodical and because of the eminence of its editors and contributors as Communist writers, materials from this journal should provide a proper perspective for this study.
3 PL, 09 1952, p. 41.Google Scholar
4 PL, 03 1954, p. 44.Google Scholar
5 Ibid. p. 50.
6 Ibid.
7 See Shu-li, Chao, “San-li-wan Hsieh-tso Ch'ien-hou” (San-li-wan and Its Composition), Wen-yi Pao, No. 19, 10 1955, pp. 23–26.Google Scholar
8 Shu-li, Chao, San-li-wan (Peking: 1955), p. 121.Google Scholar
9 Ibid. pp. 128–129.
10 Ibid. pp. 140–141.
11 Hsi-chien, Wang, Ying-ch'un Ch'ü (Welcome-Spring Song)Google Scholar; Man-tien, Li, Shui Hsiang Tung Liu (Water Flows East)Google Scholar; Chun, Li, Ping-hua Hsueh-hsiao (When The Snow Melts).Google Scholar
12 For a description of poetry in this period, see Chen, S. H., “Multiplicity in Uniformity: Poetry and the Great Leap Forward,” The China Quarterly, No. 3, 07–09 1960, pp. 1–15.Google Scholar
13 PL, 05 1958, p. 79.Google Scholar
14 Ibid. p. 80.
15 Policy Documents, p. 490.Google Scholar
16 PL, 06 1959, p. 12.Google Scholar
17 Ibid. p. 13.
18 “Resolutions on Some Questions Concerning the People's Communes” (Wuhan Resolution), Policy Documents, p. 494.Google Scholar
19 PL, 03 1960, p. 15.Google Scholar
20 Ibid. p. 19.
21 Ibid. p. 27.
22 Chinese Literature, 05 1960, p. 16.Google Scholar
23 Ibid. p. 21.
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25 Hsin Kuan-ch'a (New Observer), 03 1960, p. 11Google Scholar. “Ssu-hua,” meaning “four transfigurations,” is “organisation militarised, work materialised, life collectivised, management democratised.” The translation of the slogan is by Hsia, T. A. in his study of the language in the communes, entitled Metaphor, Myth, and the People's Communes (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1961), p. 1.Google Scholar
26 New Observer, 03 1960, p. 11.Google Scholar
27 Mu Kuei-ying, a legendary woman warrior supposedly of the Sung Dynasty, is now singled out by the Chinese Communists to symbolise the fighting spirit of the female sex. The woman production leader in “The Contest” is also referred to as Mu Kuei-ying (PL, 10 1960, p. 14).Google Scholar
28 New Observer, 03 1960, pp. 12–13.Google Scholar
29 PL (04 1962), p. 9.Google Scholar
30 Ibid. p. 15.
31 PL (06 1953), p. 34.Google Scholar
32 Li-po, Chou, Shan-hsiang Chü-pien (Great Changes in a Mountain Village) (Peking: 1958), pp. 163–164.Google Scholar
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34 See Borowitz, Albert, Fiction in Communist China 1949–53 (mimeo) (Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1954).Google Scholar
35 Dated February 27, 1957, in Policy Documents, p. 283.Google Scholar
36 PL, 10 1960, p. 12.Google Scholar