Land Reform And Rural Society In The Early Stage Of The Founding Of P.R.C

This paper, taking Guilin (a district in Guangxi Autonomous Region) as an example, illustrates that early in the founding of the PRC. Great changes have taken place in rural areas thanks to the land reform, which cover a wide variety of fields including economy, politics, culture, education etc. thus changing the traditional socio-economic structure and having far-reaching impact on rural villages for decades. This paper conducts the analysis from the perspective of social and economic history, abiding by the principle of seeking truth from facts and sticking to the combination of macro and micro aspects.The geographical outlook of Guilin is typical of karst topography with mountains and plains coexisting. Although before the land reform capitalism earned its development to some extent, yet the rural economy was still typical of the feudal economic relations, including the possession of means of production, tenancy, employment, loan sharking and taxes. The cruel feudal exploitation led to the extreme depression of rural economy and poverty of peasants, making land reform necessary and practical. Social conditions include the social structure, social organizations, social order, culture and education as well. In traditional social structure country gentleman acted as a link between peasants and the government, and the representative of political power in the rural area. Among social organizations, organizations composed of peasants occupied a very important place as not only a military organization but also a political one. Before the liberation, Guilin was in a great disorder due to rampant banditry. Unprecedented famine in 1946-1947 made the rural situation worse. Peasants'low literacy, educational backwardness, ignorance and feudality, and a variety of bad habits in rural villages make the society conservative and backward, all these factors made land reform necessary in rural areas.Early in 1950 preparatory work for land reform began, including wiping out bandits and bullying, reducing and refunding rent for tenants, forming the Peasants Association, establishing commission for land reform at all levels, training core workers, and piloting land reform, to name but a few. The campaign for wiping out bandits and bullying achieved its goal, making the society in order, creating a stable environment for land reform; the struggle against bandits stroke the landlords'political power and prestige heavily, supporting the campaign for wiping out bandits and bullying effectively, initially raising the political awareness of the peasants; the campaign for reducing and refunding rent for tenants gave the landlords a host of heavy economic and political strike, peasants benefited a lot, solving the famine, at the same time it further enhanced the class awareness of the peasants; establishing the Peasants Associations, which became the immediate leading institutions of land reform; the establishment of the Peasants Associations promoted the rural social movement, combated the influence of landlords in the aspects of politics and economy, consolidated the Peasants Commission, and the establishment of the militia led to the stability of social order, meanwhile enacting a series of policies and laws, setting up the Land Reform Commission and organizing a team of cadres for land reform, piloting land reform projects, all these factors created a series of favorable conditions for land reform.From the end of 1950 to the first half of 1951, land reform was carried out in eight counties in Guilin in sequence, land reform was generally carried out following six stages, First, to improve people's political awareness by mobilizing the mass, educating them by reminding them of the hardships they experienced before, and vigorously promoted the policies for land reform, so that they knew some basic ones. Second, to fight against landlord violating the laws, and ensure the smooth progress of land reform by holding general assembly for persuading them and thoroughly crash the landlords'class political power and prestige. Third, to classify people according to the policy of defining class, the classification of landlord is of utmost importance, in particular. Fourth, to confiscate and distribute property and land owned by landlords, satisfying the needs of the poor. Fifth, revision work was implemented for land reform from the end of 1951 to 1952 to solve the problems left over from the land reform. Six, to issue certificates for land ownership and recognize peasants'land ownership, which symbolized the smooth fulfillment of land reform.The land reform was a great success, rural areas have undergone tremendous changes after the land reform, First of all, in economy agriculture achieved recovery and development. Peasants owning land enjoyed high enthusiasm and initiatives, they generally carried out land reclamation, fertilization, building of dams making food production a 10% increase than previous years, with the resumption of agricultural production, the purchasing power of farmers have gradually improved, their living standards have improved significantly. Land reform not only brought out the economic recovery and development, but also led to the integration of rural society, securing the authority of the Peasants Mission, resulting in the political superiority of the poor, the Peasants Associations performed not only as the immediate leading institutions during the Land Reform in rural areas, but also the elementary government agency, playing the role of grass-roots democracy. Strengthening militia actively to defend the victory gained in land reform, to prevent the destruction and counterattack of the landlords, monitoring and supervising the landlords, thus supported the land reform and political stability in rural areas. Consolidated the new government by absorbing members into the Youth League and the Party, establishing the state power at the rural grassroots level, implementing the liberation of women, the movement implemented during the land reform was the most complete one in 20th century. The promotion and implementation of the Marriage Law promoted the land reform and entitled women equal rights with men in the economy, politics, society, marriage and family affairs gradually. The development of the cause in rural education changed in its educational backwardness preliminarily, and reformed bad habits. Peasants set new values, new ways of life, and fostered a healthy and progressive new social fashions and greatly impacted the rural areas for the following decades.Although the land reform achieved a great victory, various problems still remained to be solved. For example, in some places the mobilization of the mass was inadequate, landowners didn't receive their well-deserved attack, in some places peasants still led a poor life and working conditions were terrible, fruits achieved from land reform were wasted, deforestation was prevalent, the actions taken by the remnants of banditry was rampant and society was unstable, even there were some landlords counteracted. The reasons for these phenomena are as follows: First, some cadres were not able to carry out policies with regard to land reform, in-depth work was not conducted and the policies were not implemented fully; Second, in some places the relationship between land reform and production was not correctly handled, attention was not paid to production and the development of production is not enough; Third, the peasants'awareness of small-scale production played a negative role, which reflects that the transformation of small-scale economy is a long-term and arduous task. After the land reform we can get some useful insights: the development of agricultural production is the center of social reform, which should not be shaken, priority should be given to peasants'living standards, problems in their life should be solved properly.