Abstract
Using archival data of a North Zhejiang village (Taiping), we examine two important issues of land reform in China in the early 1950s, namely the determinants of class status and the criteria of land redistribution. Our analysis based on the bootstrap estimation of the ordered logit models and tobit models yields two important findings. First, despite the emphasis on “preserving the Rich Peasant Economy”, class status was determined by whether a household had committed “exploitation”—specifically whether it had rented out land to other households—and by the amount of land which a household owned. Second, not every household classified as belonging to the “underclass” benefited from land redistribution. In addition to considering the amount of land owned, the beneficiaries had to be those who rented in land from only the landlords and rich peasants; those who rented land from other social classes were unable to benefit. These findings suggest that land reform was a complex social process, with the Marxian concept of “exploitation” figured importantly both in class determination and land redistribution.
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Notes
“Liberated area” refers to the area controlled by CCP. Therefore, in this paper, “Old Liberated Area” refers to the area where land reform was completed before 30 June 1950 when the Central People’s Government promulgated “the Land Reform Law of the People’s Republic of China”, whereas “Newly-Liberated Area” refers to the area where land reform was not completed before 30 June 1950. In general, OLA is mainly located in north and north-east China and part of east China. On the other hand, NLA is mainly located in south and south-west China and part of east China.
In the next chapter, we will discuss in detail the differences in economic features and government policies between the NLA and the OLA.
Therefore, we will explore the migration of Taiping Village in detail below.
In the NLA, the subject of the public appraisal was the members of the Peasant Association.
Per mu yield in Haining County in the 1940s was about 300 catties of paddy rice.
After exploring the incomes from agricultural and non-agricultural sectors, Cao also drew the same conclusion (Cao 1996).
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Acknowledgements
Bingdao Zheng received financial support from Ministry of Education in China (15YJC630189) and “Chenguang Program” cosponsored by Shanghai Education Development Foundation and Shanghai Municipal Education Commission.
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Gu, Y., Zheng, B. Putting Marxism into Action: The Role of “Exploitation” in Land Reform in a North Zhejiang Village. Chin. Polit. Sci. Rev. 3, 430–463 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41111-018-0103-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41111-018-0103-5