| This dissertation examines the making of a Communist revolution in three provinces of Eastern and Central China--Kiangsu, Anhwei and Hupei. It is divided into three sections, each comprising several chapters. Part I deals with the three-cornered struggle between the KMT, the Japanese and the CCP. The intention in this section is to establish a correct perspective on Party activities at the grass-roots level. Peasants joined the CCP not simply because they perceived concrete benefits in so doing, but also because the Party was able to minimize their perception of risks involved such that benefits became even more attractive. This latter phenomenon entailed CCP development of base areas wherein an independent state apparatus and an independent military could operate and withstand attack from hostile forces.; Part II, the most important section of the study, considers various aspects of peasant mobilization. I will discuss peasant mobilization and the accompanying rural change under wartime CCP rule in terms of class struggle between the "basic masses" and the "feudal forces," the terms used by the CCP in its documents. The two terms, "basic masses" and "feudal forces," are ambiguous, connoting approval and condemnation, respectively. To those familiar with the Party's unpublicized views, however, the terminology includes two additional sets of meaning which are by no means identical in connotation. On one hand, ideologically, the two terms denote two classes--poor peasants, hired hands and middle peasants versus landlords. The rigidity of these definitions compelled the Party to adopt an additional operational understanding and usage of the terms whereby they referred to people who opposed a particular CCP policy in a particular place at a particular time and those who did not oppose it. Within the Party, all the conflict generated by the two different sets of criteria was ignored consistently in theory but not in practice. Thus, the Party could maintain the integrity of its Marxist point of view, while retaining the advantages of flexibility in planning strategy and tactics.; All vehicles of mass mobilization, be they economic reform, anti-Japanese resistance or democratization, were designed to effect a change of power relations between the basic masses and the feudal forces, two terms I use for lack of a better alternative. The Party calculated peasant power according to the degree of success achieved in organizing the mass associations, rural administration, militia and Party branches at the grass-roots level. The first four chapters of Part II are devoted to the development and operation of each of these organizations. A fifth chapter deals with military recruitment and tax requisition in order to consider how peasant support was transformed into army manpower and tax revenues. These five chapters occupy a central place in my study of the Communist movement in Eastern and Central China from 1937 through 1945.; Part III contains the corollary of peasant mobilization--the dislocation of the old elite from their peasant base. It aims to show how the traditional elite, including anyone regarded as a rival of the CCP in securing the undivided allegiance of the peasants, were divided and dominated through the united front strategy adopted by the Communists. In this section, I approach the old elite in terms of identifiable sub-categories such as landlord-gentry, rich peasants, bandit leaders and secret society leaders. I hope to illuminate how each group weathered rebellion by former social inferiors and adjusted to the transformation of power relations in rural China. |
