An Evaluation Of The Rural Living Conditions During The Period Of Republic Of China

This paper aims to do some research of rural living conditions by making use of economic surveys during Republic of China.Between the 1920s and 1930s with the research method of survey and statistics was introduced to China, different bodies such as universities, research institutions, government agencies, social groups from different parties, etc. initiated many investigations to study the growing rural problems and intended to find out a good way to solve the predicament.About the rural living standards for Republic of China in 1927-1936, the scholars at least had two very different perspectives. One thought that there was great improvement in the living standards of farmers. The other thought that the rural economy was about to collapse. The actual situation is exactly what has been a hot topic in academic world.How are the rural economic conditions during those years? With the before and after comparison, it should be a dynamic process of conditions which can not be simply a certain improvement or no improvement. Moreover, China has a vast territory with different local conditions. It is difficult to summarize with a simple judgment. So this paper aims to compare to different periods of statistics as well as the economic surveys and compare to the different periods of time and the different regions to lead to a relatively objective understanding of the rural economic conditions. The paper has seven chapters.Chapter one is the introduction of the history and status of the research topics, the research methods and materials, the architecture, innovations and shortcomings of this paper.Chapter two discusses the comparison viewpoints of the modern and Republic of China’s scholars about the topic that the rural living conditions bankrupted or improved. Whether the rural living conditions bankrupted or improved is always the hot topic of academic world. Every time period has its own distinctive character of research by using the method of class analysis, or using the economic analysis methods, or concerning about the macroeconomic area, or examining the microscopic livelihood of the people. This chapter is to understand the views of scholars of from macroeconomic area.Chapter three divides sub-economic areas to discuss the balance of incomes and payments of the rural areas from the economic survey to study the balance of incomes and payments and people’s behaviors from the microscopic view. To make comparison to Buck’s survey more conveniently, according to Buck’s method, this paper divides China into two regions and eight areas, such as wheat region, rice region. Wheat region is made up of spring wheat area, winter wheat-millet area, and winter wheat-kaoliang area. Rice region is made up of Yangtze rice-wheat area, rice-tea area, Szechwan rice area, double cropping rice area, and southwestern rice area. This chapter is to do some descriptions of the economic survey and make some contrasts.Chapter four is to discuss the similarities and differences between the different regions of the same period from the whole, or the changes of the different periods of the same region, as well as the differences between all kinds of surveys or statistical data of the same area of the same period by comparing to such statistical data as "agricultural condition report", "Statistics Monthly", "Statistics Summary", "Statistics Yearbook" and population, yields, prices, revenues, expenses in Buck’s survey, and tries to reveal the real situation at that time.Chapter five further discusses how the decelopment of railway has an effect on the farming yields as well as on the country’s economy on the basis of above analysis. Chapter six uses Lewis model to verify the rural-city dual economy phenomenon, and explores the path of China’s economic development. Chapter seven concludes how the rural living conditions are.The innovation of this paper is to use statistics softwares such as SPSS, ArcGIS, GeoDa to lead to clear contrasts in different regions or different periods, use economic survey data to do macro and micro analyses to get closer to that time’s real conditions and arrive at a more credible conclusion.The shortcoming of this paper is that the survey data is large and complex, academic predecessors have too many fruits, and it is difficult to get all of the information in a short period of time. Due to my horizon and methods, it is difficult to fully achieve the results I want to express.