1928-1937:Study On The Peasants’ Bank Of Jiangsu

Since the early twentieth century the rural areas in Jiangsu Province had become involved in the development of urban commodity economy, yet the backwardness in production and lack of sufficient money impeded the growth of rural economy. The Nanjing National Government, founded in 1927, made efforts to tackle this problem by launching the cooperative movement in the countryside. Jiangsu Province, which was the central area under the control of the National Government, also sought to revitalize rural economy, hence the establishment of the Peasants’Bank of Jiangsu.Based on archival documents, this thesis focuses on the Peasants’Bank of Jiangsu between 1928 and 1937 and tries to shed light on 1) what the Bank did to facilitate the development of rural economy; 2) how the Bank interacted with the government; 3) how the Bank and government impacted on the economic well-being in the countryside of Jiangsu Province. The reasons why the Bank and the government did not reach their goal of transforming Jiangsu’s rural areas will also be identified in this thesis.At the very beginning of the bank’s running, in order to find out the right way of operation under the condition of lacking experiences, the Jiangsu government conducted strict control over the Peasants’Bank.As the west was suffering from the severe economic crisis, Peasants’Bank chose conservative strategies, such as offering loans to cooperative societies exclusively. It also loaned individual peasants for a short period, but soon ceased. Under the pressure of declines in rural area, Peasants’ Bank of Jiangsu began to change by 1)regulating the management system and expanding the scope of service,2)getting involved in local agricultural development more deeply by establishing more crop warehouses, thus the scale of shipping and marketing was enlarged,3) facilitating the improvement of agricultural products. Along this process, Peasants’ Bank of Jiangsu combined professional with commercial, evolving into a comprehensive bank focusing on rural finance.From its establishment to the war, Peasants’Bank of Jiangsu witnessed a decade of its numerous influence on local economy and outstanding status in agricultural financial development of this district. To some extent, Peasants’Bank broke through the traditional forms of agricultural finance, and promoted the cooperative movement in the countryside, therefore leading to the development of rural economy and revival of agriculture. Nevertheless, limited by the given backgrounds of cooperative movement, this activity was not widely spread enough. The government failed in enhancing practical knowledge or skills among the peasants, and so did the Peasants’ Bank of Jiangsu in setting up a new financial structure. As a conclusion, the economic situation and rural living condition were not effectively bettered by all these efforts, indicating only limited achievements by the interference of government in rural social economy.