Abstract
The People’s Republic of China is, quite rightly, thought of as a rural country, but it has a numerically large urban population and is governed by a Party which, according to its constitution, represents the interests of the working class. However, the practical experience of revolution led Mao in particular to see the city as a corrupting influence while the countryside was seen as embodying the ‘revolutionary virtues’ of thrift and hard work. This anti-urban bias was evident during the Cultural Revolution and, as Bergère has written, ‘although the birth of a “new class” was not an exclusively urban phenomenon, it was closely associated with an élitist urban culture’.1 In the countryside the communists have been able to realise their policy of combining work and living places but in the cities this has not been possible. Accommodation for workers and their families has been built on or near the workplace to try to solve this problem. The most extensive experiment to combine work and living space was the introduction of the urban commune in 1958 as an extension of the rural communisation launched in the Great Leap Forward.2
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References
M.-C. Bergère, ‘China’s Urban Society After Mao’ in J. Domes (ed.), Chinese Politics After Mao (University College Cardiff Press, 1979), p. 156.
For a discussion of urban communes, see F. Schurmann, Ideology and Organisation in Communist China (University of California Press, 1968), pp. 382–99,
and J. W. Salaff, ‘The Urban Communes and Anti-City Experiment in Communist China’ in China Quarterly (CQ), no. 29 (January–March 1967), pp. 82–110.
Beijing Review (BR), no. 35 (1979), p. 12.
The thirteen cities are: Harbin, Changchun, Shenyang, Beijing, Tianjin, Taiyuan, Xian, Nanjing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuhan and Guangzhou.
BR, no. 11 (1980), pp. 6–7.
On 19 January 1980 People’s Daily (Renmin Ribao RMRB) published four regulations from the fifties on urban organisation.
See ‘The Organic Regulations of the Sub-District Office (December 31, 1954)’ in RMRB (19 January 1980). Sometimes the Chinese phrase for Sub-District Office (jiedao banshichu) is translated as Street Office.
The sub-district office has a chairperson and if necessary vice-chairpersons and secretaries. Also, they can have from three to seven full-time cadres, of whom one should be concerned with women’s work.
RMRB (19 January 1980).
The original document refers to people’s councils not people’s governments. I have used the term people’s government throughout because they have the same functions as the former people’s councils.
RMRB (19 January 1980). The Provisional Organic Regulations of the People’s Mediation Committee were first published on 22 March 1954. The Provisional Organic Regulations of the Social Order and Security Committee were made public on 11 August 1952.
These committees also operate in the countryside.
See F. Schurmann, Ideology and Organisation in Communist China, p. 226.
B. M. Richman, Industrial Society in Communist China (Vintage Books, 1969), pp. 46–57.
J. Gray, ‘The Two Roads: Alternative Strategies of Social Change and Economic Growth in China’ in S. R. Schram (ed.), Authority, Participatioṇ and Cultural Change in China (Cambridge University Press, 1973).
RMRB (8 October 1971).
Peking Review (PR), no. 42 (1978).
Ibid.
The number of members depends on the size of the factory. For example, the Shanghai Bicycle Plant, with 4200 workers, has 2 deputy secretaries and 8 committee members.
The Shoudu Iron and Steel Factory and the Shanghai Bicycle Plants have 4 deputy directors.
The sizes of these cannot be generalised as they entirely depend on the size of the enterprise itself and this can vary greatly. For example, in smaller factories and offices there may only be groups.
In 1979 the Shanghai Film Factory held three such congresses, see BR, no. 2 (1980), p. 6. The 1978 workers’ congress of the Tianjin Clock and Watch Factory was attended by 246 representatives (8.6 per cent of those on the payroll). Of these 66 per cent were workers, 26 per cent cadres and 8 per cent technicians, see PR, no. 49 (1978).
BR, no. 45 (1979), p. 7.
Ibid., pp. 6–7.
These workers’ congresses should not be confused with the present workers’ congresses.
BR, no. 41 (1979), p. 4.
BR, no. 11 (1979), p. 4.
Ibid.
BR, no. 18 (1980).
BR, no. 11 (1979), p. 4.
BR, no, 23 (1979), p. 19.
This kind of contest was held at the Shanghai Bicycle Plant, see BR, no. 11 (1980), p. 22.
BR, no. 23 (1979), p. 18.
See, for example, BR, no. 35 (1979), p. 9.
Ibid.
BR, no. 6 (1980), p. 19.
BR, no. 35 (1979), p. 11.
Ibid. In Beijing 140000 of those looking for employment found it in small collectively owned enterprises, BR, no. 6 (1980), p. 17.
Ibid.
Ibid., pp. 18–19. Wages in this collective had been as high as 150 yuan a month but these wages were earned by more skilled workers who have now left.
BR, no. 38 (1979), pp. 8–9.
BR, no. 22 (1980), p. 5.
BR, no. 6 (1980), p. 16.
Summary of World Broadcasts: the Far East (SWB FE) W1069.
BR, no. 48 (1979), p. 18.
Ibid.
BR, no. 32 (1979), p. 21.
BR, no. 48 (1979), p. 18.
Ibid., p. 27.
SWB FE/6401.
BR, no. 32 (1979), p. 23.
BR, no. 45 (1979), p. 24.
Selected further reading
M.-C. Bergère, ‘China’s Urban Society After Mao in J. Domes (ed.), Chinese Politics After Mao (Cardiff: University College Cardiff Press, 1979), pp. 155–74.
B. Brugger, Democracy and Organisation in the Chinese Industrial Enterprise 1948–1953 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976).
J. W. Lewis (ed.), The City in Communist China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1971).
B. Richman, Industrial Society in Communist China (New York: Random House, 1969).
J. W. Salaff, ‘The Urban Communes and Anti-City Experiment in Communist China’ in China Quarterly, no. 29, pp. 82–110.
E. Vogel, Canton Under Communism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969).
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© 1981 Tony Saich
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Saich, T. (1981). Urban China. In: China: Politics and Government. China in Focus series. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-16590-2_9
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