Understanding Communist China: Five Years of Rule and Its Impact, Notas de estudo de Bioquímica

Baixe Understanding Communist China: Five Years of Rule and Its Impact e outras Notas de estudo em PDF para Bioquímica, somente na Docsity! PAGES MISSING IN THE BOOK KANSAS CITY, MO PUBLIC LIBRARY D DDD1 DBSTSID ^ 955,05 Hi s5=gao8l Walker 5º O one SM - Guina under 1955 NA UNDERCHI COMMUNISM THE FIRST FIVE YEARS by RICHARD L. WALKER New Haven: YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1955 Copyright, 7955, by Yale University Press. Printed in the United States of America by Vail-Ballou Press, Inc., Binghamton, N.Y, All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form (except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publishers. Library of Congress catalog card number: 55-6422 CONTENTS Introduction ix 1. Five Years of Communism in China 1 2. How China Is Ruled 24 3. Psychological Control 50 4. The Role of the Drive 77 It/Economic Control 101 6. The Peasants 128 7. The Workers 154 8. Culture and the Intellectuals 177 9. Terror 214 10. The Conduct of Foreign Relations JJ13, 11. China and the Soviet Union 271 12. China and the United States ,30 1^ 13. The Challenge of Communist China 322 Bibliographic Note 329 Notes 337 Index 389 ILLUSTRATIONS Chains of Command in Communist China 27 A Selection of Posters and Comic Books following 198 vii INTRODUCTION It Is obviously impossible to compress all the complicated and di- verse events of the first five years of Communist rule in mainland China into a single volume. Further, most historians would rightly affirm that we are much too close to those events to be able to write about them with either perspective or balance. Yet what has happened to China and to the Chinese people is of such im- portance for all men everywhere that some attempt must be made to tell the story in broad outline, and much of the outline is already clear. The whole of Chinese society together with its long cultural traditions and great legacy of art and learning is being systematically transformed into a modern totalitarian state in which human values are subordinated to a mechanistic philoso- phy which holds that economic environment and economically determined class relationships are solely responsible for man's thought patterns and concepts of truth. Because all the great changes in China from 1949 to 1954 can- not be covered exhaustively, I have felt it advisable to concentrate on a few key areas where the apeing of the Soviet "big brother" can be brought clearly into focus and which can serve as an indi- cation of the direction in which the Chinese people are being pushed by their new masters. In almost every case the parallel with the Soviet experience is too obvious to necessitate calling attention to it. Mao Tse-lung and the Chinese Communist party make no secret of their intentions to follow the path blazed by the USSR under Stalin as closely as conditions in China permit, being sure, of course, to avoid some of the Soviet mistakes which later had to be rectified. In this way they believe they can swiftly trans- form China into an industrialized nation which can be a co- partner with the Soviet Union in bringing about a Communist victory throughout the world. They believe that the pace in China can be faster because of the advantage of the Soviet experience Xii CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM analyze events within the land which once hailed Confucius as its great teacher. It is important to understand that the changes brought about by the Communists reach far down into the thought patterns and speech habits of the people. New terms have been introduced, and the Chinese Communist intelligentsia phrase and reorder their thoughts in these terms as the former Confucian gentry molded traditional Chinese thought patterns and speech habits with a specialized set of terms. For this reason it is possible that the Chinese of 1960 may well seem "inscrutable" to a fellow countryman who left his country in 1940. Indeed the Chinese refugee of the 1940's may become as ill equipped to explain his country to the outside world as the White Russian refugee of the 1920's is to explain the Soviet Union of today. Let us hope this may prove to be exaggeration. Underestimat- ing the extent of the transformation would be to err far more gravely. To deal with the current regime in China in terms of former ideas and a static interpretation of Chinese social patterns would be wholly unrealistic. For this reason I have tried to select some aspects of the Communist rule which will point up the man- ner in which all social life in mainland China is being permeated by the philosophy and values of the Soviet system. The cost of the tremendous task of remaking China in the Soviet image has been unbelievable in terms both of human and of cultural destruction. It is for this reason that many feel such a regime can never survive for long. Yet it must be remembered that the very changes already accomplished testify to the ruthless efficiency and the techniques of control developed by the Com- munists. The manner in which they have reorganized patterns of thought and conduct within the area of their control in itself gives great staying power to their regime. Thus while many resi- dents of the Middle Kingdom, and especially the older ones, may realize that they have been subjected to a form of exploitation and oppression harsher than their country has ever known, these people are rapidly being eliminated and replaced by a generation INTRODUCTION xiii which will know only that they must submit abjectly to total con- trol. The Communists have of course been able to utilize some of the great transformations which were already apparent in modern Chinese society in their attempt to create a Soviet type state. Many of the policies and actions of the Mao regime over the past five years are intimately related to recent trends in Chinese history as well as to the whole story of the Communist surge to power. But because there is already a rather extensive literature devoted to the historical background of Communist rule in China, I have decided to concentrate as heavily as possible on the 1949-54 period and to supplement brief background sketches with refer- ences to the pertinent literature in the notes. Despite Communist attempts to curtail the amount of informa- tion coming from mainland China, there is a wealth of data to be gathered on a day to day basis. There is in fact so much informa- tion that it is impossible for one person to keep up with it. Al- though I have devoted a great proportion of my time and energy over the past five years to following the developments under the Mao regime, I am well aware that I have missed much. Add to this the exclusions involved in the attempt to compress so much information into the confines of one volume, and the chances for omission of important material or lack of balance are tre- mendous. The inclusion of one quotation to illustrate a point has in some cases necessitated omitting another point altogether. Thanks, however, to several pioneering studies and the advice and help of many friends closely familiar with the China scene, I hope that I have been able to cover most of the important aspects of China under Communism. The major source has been the published documents of the Chinese Communists themselves. I realize, of course, that most of their claims and statistics must be subjected to close scrutiny and analysis. For preliminary analysis as well as screening of the great quantities of Communist material I am deeply indebted to the pioneering work of the staff of the United States Consulate Xiv CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM General in Hong Kong, and the work of Howard L. Boorman must be singled out for special mention. Their English language productions of important Chinese Communist documents con- stitute a basic collection for any study of the Mao regime, and in many cases first-rate scholarly analysis is added. Although I have supplemented these materials by regularly following im- portant Chinese language publications of the Peking regime, I freely acknowledge that this volume could not have been written in its present form without the consulate materials. With the ex- ception of items in the text which are obviously my own interpre- tations, I believe that, thanks mostly to this great store of ma- terials, every major point made in this book concerning the Mao regime has been documented from the Communists' own state- ments and publications. Some of my interpretations are tentative, and I have tried to indicate this. Readers may differ with them: students of China have not been noted in the past for unanimity of opinion. On the other hand these interpretations represent for the most part the result of some years of concentration on the problem of Chinese Communism, and most of them fit into an over-all picture of the regime which I believe is an accurate likeness. Although I have benefited from the assistance and advice of numerous friends, I would like to single out a few who played a vital role in helping me. I am indebted first of all to Frederick C. Barghoorn and Ralph T. Fisher of Yale University for many stimulating hours of discussion of problems concerning Soviet society. Their knowledge of the history of Soviet Russia has helped me to compare and understand differences and likenesses of Communism as practiced in China and in Russia. W. W. Rostow, Frank Kierman, and Richard Hatch of the Center for International Studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology contributed hours of fruitful discussion of the problems of under- standing Communist China. The penetrating insights of Karl A. Wittfogel have offered much inspiration in interpreting Mao's regime. A group of friends, James T. Ivy, Howard L. Boorman, i. FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM IN CHINA On 1 July 1949 Mao Tse-tung, the chairman of the Chinese Com- munist party, published his pamphlet On People's Democratic Dictatorship, In which he laid down the general policy which the Communists would follow in ruling China. July 1 five years later Chou En-lai, premier and foreign minister of Communist China, was on his way back to China during a break in the Geneva con- ference on Korea and Indo-China. He had met with the chiefs of state of India and Burma and was soon to have a three-day con- ference with Ho Chi-minh, the Indo-Chinese Communist premier. The contrast in China's world position and internal conditions on these two dates represents a change so great and so important that the implications have only begun to be apparent in the rest of the world. In 1 949 China was divided and involved in a bitter civil war. In 1954 she was united under one effective rule, both civil and military. In 1949 China was militarily at low ebb and economi- cally weak, with industrial and food production together reach- ing hardly more than 70 per cent of the prewar high. 1 Today China, with prewar production mostly restored, has fought a United Nations coalition to a standstill in a major war In Korea, has aided the Indo-Chinese Communists against the French, and is currently speaking in a very threatening manner to the United States over numerous Far Eastern Issues. Again, in 1949 China was still open to the West, and some Western nations hoped to play a part in her reconstruction. Now China and her people are separated from the rest of the world by an effective iron curtain. l 2 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM All of these achievements are a testimonial to the amazing energy of Mao, Chou, and their colleagues. They have accom- plished what they successfully prevented the Nationalist govern- ment from doing. They have extended one effective rule over al- most 600,000,000 people, more than have ever been controlled by one government in the history of the world. They have turned China into a world power which, because of its military force in being, is causing grave worries in many capitals of the world, and especially in some of the smaller nations of Southeast Asia. One other contrast points up the methods by which the Com- munists have achieved these results. In 1949 they were at the pinnacle of their popularity the "mandate of heaven" had fallen to them. Five years later they were probably feared and hated by most of the Chinese people, who found themselves in the grip of a new type of despotism they were unable to control. 2 At the time of the Communists' rise to power in China, many Chinese and foreigners thought them little more than country bumpkins who would fall down helplessly on the complicated job of handling China's cities. And, indeed, some of their early be- havior seemed to bear out these predictions. One Communist, sent to balance the books in a bank, is reported to have asked for a pair of scales and begun to weigh them. In a Hankow hospital Red cadres (the term is used by the Communists to describe trained activists), distrusting the former "reactionaries," tore off labels and rearranged all the medicines in the storeroom by size of bottle and color of contents. 3 But such items were hardly a firm basis for predicting failure. The Communists learned quickly and acted quickly. They seized foreign assets and expelled most foreigners, with the excep- tion of citizens of Communist states. They carried out China's first thoroughgoing modern census. They established a regime which possessed a powerful mechanism for total control of the people. By 14 June 1954 they were so confident of that control that they published the text of a new constitution and at the same FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 3 time concluded Soviet-style elections at the lowest administrative level in preparation for a national congress which convened in Peking * later in the year. The Mao regime might seem to have realized Chinese na- tionalistic ambitions. The goals of power and prestige abroad and unity at home have been in large measure achieved. But any at- tempt to appraise the Chinese Communist rule must be made with caution, and the actual conditions behind the world propaganda emanating from Peking must be discovered before a judgment can be reached. The changes wrought between 1949 and 1954 are at the very least testimony to the ability of the Chinese Communist govern- ment to organize and control human beings. The Mao regime has demonstrated that it has a plan for China, and to date that plan has proved workable. In essence it is the application of the suc- cessful past experience of the Soviet Union to the Chinese scene. In On People's Democratic Dictatorship Mao said, "The Com- munist party of the U.S.S.R. is our very best teacher, and we must learn from it." 4 In applying the Soviet experience as a model, the Chinese Com- munists have used ruthless force and have shown a remarkable amount of energy. They have been attempting to capsule over two decades of Soviet history into a few years. The result has been cataclysmic changes in the Chinese mode of life and great de- struction of traditional Chinese values. It may be safely asserted that never before have the lives of so many people been so drasti- cally changed in so short a time. The present rulers of mainland China have extended their control into every walk of life. Internal state power has grown to the point of total power. * The Communists established the seat of their government in Peiping (northern peace), which they then renamed Peking (northern capital), as the city had been called under the imperial government. The Chinese Na- tionalist government, of course, still uses the name Peiping to refer to the city, and by general agreement newspapers in the United States use the "Peiping" spelling. 6 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM ing state power also meant that the Communist regime must some- how solve the problem of minority nationalities in Chinese terri- tory a matter unsolved by Chinese rulers through many cen- turies. 13 A third goal emerged from the second. This was to eliminate "the enemy" internally and externally. All the major spokesmen of the Chinese Communist party made it very plain that they viewed their battle to rule China as a bitter class struggle in which no quarter would be given. For any remnants of the Nationalist government on the mainland and their supporters they promised annihilation. The external enemy was "imperialism." The former rights of the "imperialist powers" in China were to be abolished. The Peking regime was very open about its fourth general goal too. It shared Stalin's appreciation of military power in being and saw in military strength a means of winning prestige abroad. The People's Daily, official organ of the Chinese Communist party in Peking, stated the aim succinctly for the Chinese: "By con- scientious effort China can become a first class world military power like the Soviet Union." 14 A final general goal involved the completion of agrarian re- form, the program which had helped the Communists to power among the peasantry and which was a part of their over-all pro- gram for transforming what they called the "semifeudal and semi- colonial" old society of China. They sought to transform the thoughts, habits, and value patterns of traditional Chinese society and even launched a direct attack on the Chinese family. All hu- man life should, they felt, be channeled into support of their monolithic and all-embracing philosophy. The Communists faced many difficulties in addition to the im- mediate postwar situation referred to above. They came to power in a vast country. China is one-sixth again as large as the United States and far more divided by natural barriers, A very small percentage of the people were literate, and the language is cum- bersome and difficult. Even the reading of simple texts requires more time than the peasants can spare. Again, much of the tradi- FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM tional Chinese social order in the countryside remained unaffected by the changes of the last century, and the suddenness of the Com- munist victory left the party without the trained manpower to operate the administration at the level of the peasant villages, On the other hand, the Communists possessed advantages which many of those who predicted failure did not take into account. The first of these was a unified doctrine which taught no com- promise with the old society. Although they gave lip service to the preservation of some of the culture of the past, the Reds never had to pretend that they wanted to preserve any of the basic struc- ture of old China. Through three decades their doctrine had been permeating Chinese literature, and much of their program had struck roots in intellectual circles. 15 They had also gained more than three years' experience in Manchuria, the industrial heart of China, and when victory came suddenly in 1949 were not en- tirely naive about problems of urban control. In Manchuria they had mastered many of the techniques of propaganda which were to prove invaluable to them later. They had many supporters and high-ranking members in the Kuomintang administration and in the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong. 16 An invaluable asset was the support of the Chinese youth, especially the organized student groups. And lastly they had the advantage of Soviet back- ing and experience. Let us examine in detail some of the major aspects of the first five years of the Communists' rule, analyze where they have suc- ceeded and where they have failed, and finally attempt to discover some of the effects of their control upon the Chinese people. A brief historical survey of these five important years will provide the general setting. The first five years of Communist rule in China may be divided into two periods according to the timetable Mao laid out in his speech of 6 June 1950. The period of "Reconstruction" was to take about three years. 17 At the end of that time the regime de- clared that the damage of the second World War and the civil war had been repaired and China was ready to start on its first 8 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM five-year plan for "national construction," with the accent on building heavy industry. 18 Although this division of these first years of Communist rule does have some meaning, it can also prove misleading, for it tends to obscure Peking's continuous and consistent policies of building military power and consolidating internal state power in order to control every facet of Chinese life. Nevertheless, there is real value in attempting to characterize the outstanding features of a period by some identifying phrase. In the chronological review which follows, the designation for each of the five years is an attempt to grasp the prevailing tone of the year. 19 1949-50. THE FLUSH OF VICTORY On 1 October 1949 Mao Tse-tung, as chairman of the Chinese Communist party and chairman of the "Chinese People's Govern- ment," read a proclamation before a cheering crowd of more than 200,000 in Peking in which he announced the formation of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China and declared it to be the "sole legal government representing all the people of the People's Republic of China." 20 This proclama- tion followed on the heels of the meeting of 662 delegates of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), 21-29 September. The CPPCC had passed three basic pieces of legislation which were to serve as the Constitution of the Chinese Communist government until the convening of a duly elected peo- ple's congress in September 1954. These documents, the Common Program, the Organic Law of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China, and the Organic Law of the CPPCC, followed the line which Mao had spelled out in On People's Democratic Dictatorship. On the surface the CPPCC body was a united front group representing the various groups and political parties in China, with the exception of those parties closely associated with the Kuomintang. In actuality it was a Communist- controlled group. The Communist leaders exuded confidence. During 1949 their FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 11 part of 1950 foreign missionaries remained optimistic about chances for getting along with the new government, but by sum- mer the situation had changed drastically. They were beginning to be subjected to persecution, and members of their congrega- tions began to avoid them. 24 The People's Daily, in a 26 December 1950 editorial entitled "The deviation of 'generous policy' must be radically corrected," indicated that former concepts of law would be abandoned. It stated that some of the cadres "have funny theories which they apply to counterrevolutionaries. They speak of an 'attempt' when the counterrevolutionary failed to execute his plan; they release such a person on the plea of 'self-defense.' They soften their hearts when the delinquent is a minor." 1951. THE YEAR OF VIOLENCE Until 1951 the Chinese Communist party had always claimed that it learned from the masses, but the decision announced on New Year's Day 1951 to establish a Party Propaganda Network indi- cated that from that time on the party would not attempt to con- ceal the fact that it was doing the teaching and the masses must learn. 25 Refugees who streamed from China in late 1950 and during 1951 revealed that far more coercion had been applied during the seemingly welcome flush of victory period than out- side observers had realized, but in 1951 the totalitarian terror in China was manifest to everyone. 26 Two of the most drastic aspects of the shift to violence were the activities of the "people's tribunals," set up to carry out the Land Reform program in the newly won areas, and the "people's courts," which carried out the party-directed Campaign against Counterrevolutionaries. Evidently by this time the Communist leaders felt they had learned sufficiently well the jobs of the mem- bers of the former administration whom they had kept in office, and were now prepared to eradicate all traces of the Nationalist government. Under the Regulations for the Punishment of Coun- terrevolutionaries passed on 7 February by the Government Ad- 12 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM ministration Council, the highest executive body of the Mao regime, and promulgated 21 February, mass trials were staged throughout the country and thousands were sentenced to death each day. In a statement before the United Nations in Paris on 12 November, Dr. T. F. Tsiang quoted Communist sources to show that more than a million and a half Chinese had been executed in the previous twelve months. 27 Those "counterrevolutionaries" who were not executed were subjected to "reform through labor," a euphemism for slave labor, and participated in the intensive work which began on railway and road construction and water conser- vation schemes. The most important of the latter was the vaunted Huai River flood control project, which has been the subject of praise in all the accounts of fellow travelers who have visited China. The Campaign against Counterrevolutionaries was linked with an intensive program to subordinate religion to the state. In March a ruthless drive against Taoist societies was launched. 28 Christian missionaries became the target of fantastic charges. Mission hos- pitals and orphanages were accused of planned murder of thou- sands of Chinese children. 29 On 2 December, for example, at a mass rally held in Canton two French Catholic nuns were given five-year jail sentences and three others ordered deported for "willfully murdering" 2,1 16 Chinese babies at Canton's Holy In- fant Orphanage. 30 Peasants' associations in the rural areas and security forces in the cities kept the populace stirred up in a con- stant state of fear and high tension. There was little time to attend to the serious famine which P'eng Chen, vice-chairman of the Government Administration Council, acknowledged in a speech on 11 May. 31 The inexorable extension of the power of the state wa<$ partly obscured by the violence. In his report of the first two years* progress on 1 October, Tung Pi-wu, vice-premier, indicated that four-fifths of heavy industry was state-operated, that state control of foreign trade had been centralized, that state banks and trad- ing companies had "become a powerful instrument for state con- FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 13 trol," and that the control of the Communist government ex- tended into all phases of Chinese cultural life. 32 In its conduct of foreign relations also Communist China dis- played an intensification of violence. A Hate America Campaign was linked with the Korean War, Charges of bestiality and even cannibalism were launched against the United States, which be- came "the most deadly enemy of the peace-loving people of the world." General Wu Hsiu-ch'uan had laid down the general line for rewriting the history of Chinese relations with the United States in his speech at the United Nations on 28 November 1950, which pictured "American imperialism" as the enemy of the whole world. Inside China almost eveiy execution or mass meeting linked the activities of the counterrevolutionaries with American "special agents." America and other Western powers were accused of "cultural aggression" against China. The Communists accused the Westerners of having forced the Chinese to learn Western languages and in the next breath demanded that more energy be devoted to the study of Russian. The Korean War occupied the center of attention in interna- tional events. On 2 February the United Nations declared Com- munist China an aggressor in Korea and trade restrictions were imposed. Trace talks were started 8 July, but it was soon apparent that the Communist side was using them mainly for propaganda purposes and to get a breathing spell. Although the Korean War went against the Communist side in 1951, the Chinese were able with Soviet help to achieve a real modernization of their armed forces. In early September Chinese troops entered Lhasa and the 'liberation" of Tibet was proclaimed. There was also violence in other aspects of China's foreign relations. During 1951 the prac- tice of extorting ransom from Chinese living overseas to prevent the torture and killing of relatives on the mainland reached its peak. Millions of dollars poured into China every month In this hopeless cause despite attempts by the outside governments to prevent it. 83 16 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM Meanwhile, in anticipation of what was to come, a government reorganization was carried out. A State Planning Commission with the leader of the Northeast Regional Administration, Kao Kang, at its head was established and the government ministries were reformed to correspond more closely to the Soviet model. On 15 November reforms were carried out in the organization of the regional groupings of provinces in order to bring them more closely under the supervision of the central government. 41 In retro- spect It is easy to see that everything was being prepared for Chou En-lai's 24 December announcement of China's first five- year plan. This was to start heavy industrialization and lay the basis for modern military power. Chou also declared that 1953 would witness the convening of the first duly elected All China People's Congress. In foreign relations the former trend continued. The USSR and the European satellites now accounted for more than 70 per cent of China's foreign trade. Chou En-lai went to Moscow for several days in September for negotiations which resulted in a statement that contrary to the 1950 agreement the Soviets would continue to hold their extraterritorial rights in Port Arthur and Dairen but would turn the Chinese Changchun Railroad over to the Peking government at the end of the year. The accusation and expulsion of foreigners continued, and an economic squeeze forced most of the Western powers to abandon their assets in China. The British gave up over $800,000,000 of assets and closed out some of their oldest firms. The Chinese attitude of hostility and hatred toward the United States was stepped up with the launching of the "germ warfare" campaign, which was also designed to alienate the neutral and Asian states from the United States and to support the Soviet position on how to deal with the weapons of mass destruction. 42 In the war against the United Nations forces in Korea the Chinese troops showed Impressive improvement in training and equip- ment. In fact, the army's advancement in mechanization and improve- FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 17 ment In discipline was but a reflection of the regimentation of the whole population, Little wonder, then, that the leaders de- cided they were ready to start a five-year plan on the Soviet model. 1953. THE YEAR OF RETRENCHMENT 43 The previous optimism quickly abated in 1953, which was not a good year for Communist China. This was the year of Stalin's death, of floods, famines, typhoons, late frosts, blights, and natural disasters on an unprecedented scale. By October the food situa- tion was so serious that the government cut down on famine relief and told the people they would have to work their own way out of the problem. Some observers estimated that ten million people were starving by the middle of the year. 44 The rulers launched a drive for economy, austerity, and cutting expenditures and com- bined it with a drive against "bureaucratism," making an exam- ple of the case of Huang Yi-feng, a high-ranking party member who was purged. 45 Despite the tightened controls of the year be- fore, there were evidently such intense signs of passive resistance that in July the "5-too-many" Drive was launched against too many meetings, too many tasks, too many organizations, concur- rent posts, and official documents and forms. Quite obviously there was still some slack to be taken up in the matter of control, and there was a pause while the Communists reassessed the situation. The five-year plan was reduced on 7 May by as much as 34 per cent in some items. It suffered further re- duction in mid-September following Minister of Heavy Industry Li Fu-ch'un's return from Moscow with details on the limited amount of economic aid the Soviets were actually prepared to give. Nevertheless, the cadres of the party continued intensive study of the documents connected with the period of economic con- struction in the USSR, especially Chapters 9-12 of the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolshevik). As part of the program for retrenchment and tightening con- trol practically every major Communist mass organization held a congress in the nation's capital during the summer and fall, and 18 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM most of their constitutions were revised to give more centraliza- tion and more direct control by the party. The All China Federa- tion of Trade Unions met from 2 to 1 1 May; the New Democratic Youth League held its second national congress from 23 June to 2 July; and numerous other groups met to discuss their roles in the urgent task of economic construction. A hush-hush Civil Af- fairs Conference was held from 22 October until 13 November. Its decisions called upon the civil affairs committees to exert closer control of the masses. There were other aspects of the regime's attempt to intensify control of the people. A decree by the Ministry of Public Security of 30 July set out the regulations for the appointment of "people's supervision correspondents." This elevated spying into citizen's private affairs to the level of state policy. As a part of the increas- ing financial centralization the Customs Administration was brought under the control of the Foreign Trade Ministry. The other major undertakings of the Mao government were continued. By the beginning of 1953, 15,048 miles of railroad were in operation, with almost 400 more miles scheduled to be opened before the end of the year. Water conservation and road building (including a military road into Tibet), items for which the major resource needed was manpower in the mass, were con- tinued. Retrenchment did not affect the armed forces either. By the end of the year the modernization program had been carried out and China was estimated to have at least five million mobilized men, including the secret police. In three of the major programs for the year the Communists were forced to pause and delay completion. On 1 March Mao issued a proclamation calling for national elections which were to be completed by September. These elections, which were linked by decree with the national census on 3 April, were postponed again and again. Even Mao Tse-tung and his old comrades did not get around to casting their own votes until 8 December. 48 The election decree itself provided for a further means of organizing control over the people and accounting for every citizen. As in FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 21 party purge in order to restore unity and eliminate centrifugal tendencies. Liu Shao-ch'i announced the decision in a speech be- fore the meeting of the Fourth Plenary Session of the Central Committee of the party 6 to 10 February, when he presided in Mao's absence. Implicit in this decision was the abolishing of the great administrative areas, for Liu talked of divisions and factions inside the party and of some high leaders who looked upon their own departments or regions as personal property or an inde- pendent kingdom. Those who would not reform were to be sub- jected to severe punitive action. 51 On 19 June the Government Council decreed the abolition of the regional administrations and reduced the number of provinces from thirty to twenty-six. The provinces are now the unit immediately under the central govern- ment at Peking. This third major action spelled the end to certain tendencies toward autonomy which were the result of the separa- tion of areas of Communist control during the second World War. The Chinese completed their local elections and census count sometime in the spring, but the results were not announced until the same meeting of the Government Council which abolished the administrative areas. 52 Teng Hsiao-p'ing, secretary of the Election Committee, announced that China's population (including Tai- wan, which he estimated as having 7,000,000, and the overseas Chinese with 12,327,532) was 601,912,371 as of midnight 30 June-1 July 1953. This figure, which at once necessitated a re- appraisal of the ratio of land (and food) to population, threw into doubt many of the previously published Communist statistics and indicated that some serious rethinking of plans might be in order. It confirmed the population estimate made many years earlier by J. L. Buck. 53 The party's chief ideological journal had prepared the party cadres for this tremendous figure in its March issue, the contents of which indicate that the Election Committee had the results for more than three and a half months before making them public. 54 One of the many possible explanations for the delay may have been that the government wanted to wait for an opportunity to use the figure to advance its power position at the Geneva conference. 12 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM The completion of the elections at the local level meant that the major preparations could be made for summoning the Peo- ple's Congress which had been postponed from 1953; it con- vened in Peking on 15 September. Prior to this, however, the Chinese Communist party published the draft of the New Con- stitution on 14 June, The issuing of this constitution was yet an- other important decision. Like the other decisions of 1954, it represented the consummation of all previous trends toward copy- ing the Soviet model. Although the constitution does not provide for direct elections like the 1936 Stalin constitution, many of its articles are taken word for word from the Soviet counterpart. A distinction formerly possible between China and the European satellites of the Soviet Union is in part eliminated by a passage which equates the system of the People's Democracy with the New Democracy. 55 Implicit in the summoning of the People's Congress which adopted the constitution on 20 September is the virtual abandonment of the united front of various parties. Al- though the constitution makes provisions for parties other than the Communist party, and a few non-Communist political parrots were elected, it was obvious that the Communist party has the only local level organization capable of putting forth candidates. To parallel the political decisions which marked the movement to a transitional stage between the original government proclaimed in 1949 and a socialist state, the Peking masters moved rapidly in the economic field in 1954. On 1 March they published the Order for Planned Food Buying and Supply, and a Temporary Ordinance on the Management of Food Markets. These decisions nationalized all major food materials. They were followed by a decision on 23 March by the Committee on Financial and Eco- nomic Affairs for advance purchase of eight major agricultural products used in industry. A concerted effort was made to con- vert such private enterprise as remained to the temporary joint public-private form which the Communists had evolved. The high points of the year in international news were Chou En-lai's performance at the Geneva conference, his joint state- FIVE YEARS OF COMMUNISM 23 ment with Nehru on 28 June 56 (a magnificent world propaganda move), his success in driving deeper a wedge between the Amer- ican and British allies, and finally the Indo-China truce of 20 July which guaranteed the Communists complete control of northern Viet Nam and offered them a good possibility for ex- tending control over all French Indo-China within a few years. There was general agreement that the Chinese Communist premier had scored a major victory against his hated enemy, the United States. Nineteen fifty-four was the year of consummation of many of the goals which Mao had announced in 1949 and of crucial decisions to follow the path blazed by Stalin regardless of the cost. Of course, Taiwan had yet to be "liberated," but Communist China was a major military power with probably the second largest standing army in the world. In their methods for bringing about this tremendous change in China during their first five years the Chinese Reds have con- scientiously tried to follow the teachings of Lenin and Stalin and the experiences of the USSR. There have, to be sure, been dif- ferences because of the special characteristics of the Chinese scene, and many of the measures would be typical of any totalitarian regime; but in general the pattern of rule in China bears strong resemblances to the Soviet pattern. It is probably not an exaggera- tion to say that it is the pattern which is closely associated in the eyes of the world with "Stalinism" as a particular brand of Com- munism: it resembles the latter in the increasingly bureaucratic and hierarchical nature of the regime, the type of constitution, the methods of election, in collectivization, thought control and recantations, slave labor, iron curtain, five-year plan designed for forced industrialization and militarization, labor heroes, emula- tion drives, and so on. 57 These are the measures we must examine in order to appreciate the significance of Communist rule in China, and must understand if we are to appraise what Communism has done for China and what continued Stalinist Communism means for China's future. 26 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM body cemented into unity above all by their respect for their leader Mao Tse-tung. 2 Mao is revered as one of the leading theoreticians of world Communism and has shown a remarkable ability to hold together the top leadership. Since his assumption of undisputed leadership of the party during the period 1932-34 there have not been the open schisms which have marked the Communist party of the Soviet Union. 3 Mao is both respected and powerful, and his popularity among many of the Chinese people, who frequently tend to disassociate him from the harsh measures of the regime, has remained high. 4 Mao's close associates during the first five years, who con- stituted the Politburo, are Liu Shao-ch'i, the austere party theo- retician and disciplinary specialist; Chu Teh, long-time comrade in arms and head of the Communist armies; Chou En-lai, ver- satile international public relations man; P'eng Chen, a party or- ganization leader; Ch'en Yiin, the economics authority; Kao Kang, former head of the Manchurian region (now probably no longer a Politburo member); and two of the party elders, Tung Pi-wu and Lin Tsu-han. These men and their colleagues who constitute the seventy-two regular and alternate members of the Central Committee have shown a remarkable amount of stamina and energy. For all their long years of struggle and desperation they do not seem, as do many of their past opponents, to be tired or listless. In discipline, unity, and direction they reflect the posi- tion recently adopted from the Soviet Union following the death of Stalin, that "Collective leadership is the highest principle of party leadership." 5 These are the men who sit on top of the whole structure of political control in China today. They occupy every major posi- tion. All basic policy decisions are handed down by them to ad- ministrative or military organs. For example, these leaders of the Communist party presented the draft of the New Constitution for acceptance in 1954; they issued the Agrarian Reform Law; they promulgated the Decision on Agricultural Collectivization, CHAINS OF COMMAND IN COMMUNIST CHINA This graph attempts to convey in rough form how the decisions and control emanating from the Communist leaders in Peking make themselves felt by the individual Chinese. The arrows indicate supervision, pressure, and control CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY M 28 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM Beneath this central decision-making body are five separate chains of command, including the Communist party, all of which are organized on a hierarchical basis along the lines of democratic centralism. 6 These five chains of command are the formal gov- ernment organization, the party, the military, the mass media of communications, and the mass support organizations. In carry- ing out the policies set by the leadership all these chains of com- mand tend to reinforce each other so that a unified process Is carried down to the lowest level, where activities are coordinated and supervised by basic control organizations. This structure is at once thorough and strong. A sixth chain of command probably exists in the secret police and security forces, but since these nominally operate within the formal government-military-party structure they are not treated separately here, The top brass of the Chinese Communist party control these chains of command by virtue of their concurrent holding of the key offices in each. A few examples will point this up. During the first five years of the regime Mao Tse-tung, in addition to holding numerous other posts, was party chairman, chairman of the Cen- tral People's Government and at the same time head of the supreme military body, the People's Revolutionary Military Council (PRMC). Liu Shao-ch'i was at the same time vice- chairman of the Central Committee of the party and of the Polit- buro, one of the six vice-chairmen of the Central People's Gov- ernment, one of the vice-chairmen of the People's Revolutionary Military Council, honorary chairman of the All China Federation of Trade Unions, president of the Sino-Soviet Friendship Associa- tion, one of the party's chief publicists, and a leader in many other organs and associations such as the Committee on National Elec- tions and the Committee on the Drafting of the Constitution. Or to take one of the lesser but still important lights among the top party leaders during the first five years of the regime Teng Tzu- hui was concurrently a member of the party Central Committee, of the Central People's Government Council, and of the People's Revolutionary Military Council, vice-chairman of the Committee HOW CHINA IS RULED 31 Hsieh Cfaiiefa-tsai put it tersely in 1951, the duties of the local conferences or congresses are "to transmit orders, to report re- sults and to guide the work." 7 In many respects the military chain of command in Communist China has been more powerful and important than the formal administration. Nominally, of course, the People's Revolutionary 7 Military Council was subordinate to the Central People's Govern- ment Council; but since in most areas of China military control by the so-called People's Liberation Army (PLA) came first, the military actually retained their predominance. The system of "great administrative areas" or regions established in 1949 was but a reflection of this fact. Indeed, many of the early administra- tive arrangements in Communist China stemmed from the long civil war period. For example, Ping-yuan, a new province estab- lished in 1949 and abolished late in 1952, was a carry-over of an independent wartime guerrilla base. The decision to abolish the great administrative areas on 19 June 1954, was one of the most important indications of the Communist ability to centralize and control. Until a government decision of 15 November 1952 began the process of elimination, the executive organs in these six great groupings of provinces were known as administrative areas' people's governments. They had their own ministries and were in many respects independent of the central authority in Peking. After November 1952 the civil governments in the regions were known as councils. The top leaders in these regions were the great military leaders who had led the Communist armies to victory over the Nationalist govern- ment. In some cases the boundaries of the administrative areas seemed to coincide with the areas assigned to the field armies of the Communist war machine. Thus, the extinction of the regional level administration was a step designed to shift the weight of authority in the central government toward the economic planners and away from the military, and at the same time a method of eliminating the traditional Chinese tendencies toward local and regional autonomy. The most important of the regional groupings 32 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM of provinces had been the Northeast (Manchuria). Here the Soviet advisers were most numerous and most of the policies which were later applied in the rest of the country were tested, 8 The military chain of command played a vital role in the carry- ing out of the decisions of the Chinese Communists during the first five years of the regime. The PLA units aided in the Agrarian Reform, they have supervised some of the great mass labor con- struction works, and they continue to be the main components of government in the more remote areas such as Tibet, Sinkiang, and Sikang. The PRMC (now the National Defense Council under the New Constitution) is in charge of a system that extends down to the militia units which are being organized in all the villages of China, and its commanders are also the leaders of the public security troops. The aim is to develop the present militia forces, which number more than five million (in addition to the regular army of more than five million), into a force which will constitute more than 5 per cent of the population. 9 * The regime has been very successful in its program of mod- ernizing and developing the Chinese Communist array into one of the major fighting forces in the world today. Not only docs the garrisoning of the more than five million troops, a large propor- tion of whom now possess modern weapons, throughout the Chinese countryside serve as a reminder of the strength of the regime among the people, but the members of the armed forces participate in propaganda and leadership activities in the localities where they are stationed. They constitute the second largest com- ponent of the membership of the Communist party. The third chain of command., extending down to the lowest level throughout the country, is the party. At the level of the factory, office, or village there is a party branch composed of three or more members. The party is organized in almost every detail along the lines of the Communist party of the Soviet Union. It insists on discipline, obedience, and conscientious activity from its members. It is actually the basic power organization in China today, for individual loyalty is given above all to the party, Be- HOW CHINA IS RULED 33 cause of the complete Integration In all of these three major chains of command government., military, and party made possible by the concurrent holding of posts, many of the complica- tions of command channels are avoided: at most levels one man holds the top post in all three. 10 According to Liu Shao-chTs speech at the Fourth Plenary Ses- sion of the Central Committee of the party (6-10 February 1954) the Chinese Communist party now has 6,500,000 mem- bers. 11 As in the Soviet Union, about 10 per cent of the members are women. Since the Communist seizure of power, there has been a concentrated effort on the part of the top leadership to make the party correspond more closely to Communist theory; that is, to make it the party of the urban "working class." Party purges and drives resulted in reducing the rural component from 90 to 80 per cent by 1951, but the peasants are still predominant. 12 This fact has worried the leaders greatly. Many of the peasant party members have slipped from party discipline and have relapsed into habits of independence and abuse of power (see Chapter 4). During the 3 -anti Movement, one of the many campaigns of 1952, the year of regimentation (see p. 14), the party attempted to reorganize its more than 180,000 rural branches. An Tzu-wen, one of the rising young lights of the party and deputy director of the Organization Department of the Central Committee, revealed in February 1953 that the process had been very slow and that a very small proportion of the rural branches had been affected. In branches where reorganization had been carried out, An re- ported that 10 per cent of the members had failed to qualify for continued membership and were read out of the party. 13 The Chinese Communist party, like any highly disciplined or- ganization, is extremely rank-conscious. The higher the rank, the more comprehensive and absolute the power. This leads to abuse of power and occasionally to poor morale. The method for avoid- ing this is the process of criticism, and self-criticism developed in the Soviet system and insisted upon constantly in China. Stalin and Malenkov are quoted in detail on the necessity for maintain- 36 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM flick work. For example, In reviewing the propaganda work which had been carried out to celebrate the occasion of the thirtieth an- niversary of the party. Study had many critical comments to make about numerous publications. The editors stated: All portraits and photographs of chairman Mao used by the news- papers and periodicals should undergo strict selection. On July 2, the Northwest Masses Daily printed a painting by Liu Kuang with the cap- tion "Chairman Mao in the Self-Defence Battle of North Shensi." This is a very poor painting, as a reader's critical letter published in the newspaper half a month later pointed out: "What angers one most is the representation by the painter of Chairman Mao as a man with an expressionless and melancholy face, disproportioned stature and leaning as if about to fall and gazing helplessly at the grayish sky." Such hasty and careless printing of portraits of comrade Mao should be strictly avoided. The propagandizing of the leader of the party is a necessity, but the propaganda must be consistent with the facts and have high ideological and educational content. In no case should it be incorrect, vulgar, hasty, and careless. 17 The fifth chain of command linking the top Communist leaders with the people they control consists of the many mass support organizations. These serve as sounding boards for intensifying support for government and party policies. All are under the leadership and direction of the party. They arc organized in most cases along the lines of democratic centralism, which in eflcct means that the lower organs give unified and unwavering obedi- ence to dictates passed down from the top. 18 There is a mass support organization tailored to fit almost every possible social grouping. This is, of course, an* effective means for the party to supervise the many social activities which in a non- Communist state would not be considered political These or- ganizations also serve to absorb the energies and time of people who might otherwise be directing their attention to matters out- side of the narrowly prescribed area, and thus be, to a Commu- nist regime, suspect. It is safe to say that practically everyone in China today belongs to one of these organizations. 19 HOW CHINA IS RULED 37 During 1953, when internal problems were causing a great amount of soul-searching among the Communist leaders, every one of the major mass support organizations held a congress. These congresses revised constitutions so as to provide even tighter control by the central organs and to accent duties and responsibilities of members rather than rights and privileges. The series of congresses also served to emphasize the common goals of all the organizations and reinforce their interlocking nature. In order to gain some idea of the great numbers of people involved in these organizations, it is perhaps desirable to list some of them. Undoubtedly one of the most important of the mass organiza- tions is the highly disciplined New Democratic Youth League (NDYL) which Liu Shao-ch'i has termed the "reserve force of the party." 20 This group, which held its Second National Con- gress from 23 to 28 June 1953, revised its constitution to tie it more centrally to the party and bring it more closely into line with its Soviet model, the Komsomol. Like the Komsomol, Its membership is open to all young people, male and female, between the ages of fourteen and twenty-five. Its higher officers, including all of the central committee, must be members of the Communist party. It has its own publications, which frequently carry elaborate articles on the work of the youth and its relationship to the work of the party. 21 According to the People's Daily of 5 May 1954, the membership of the league was more than 12,000,000. These members are scattered in more than 470,000 cells or branches, which exist wherever there are three or more members in the same block, school, village, factory, or other location. 22 Like its Soviet counterpart, the NDYL also sponsors a junior organiza- tion, the Young Pioneers. This is for children from nine to four- teen years of age who show leadership qualities. By May 1953 there were already 8,000,000 in this organization. 23 The Chinese Young Pioneers' Journal is issued for this group and its contents are de- voted to the same general themes as all of the mass media in the country. In appraising this journal the People's Daily said: During the 3-anti and 5-anti campaigns, the journal contrasted the good characters to bad characters, thus arousing the children's strong 38 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM love and hatred. The children love the Chinese People's Volunteers, love the Korean people and army and hate American imperialism. The revolutionary heroism of the CPV influences the children's thoughts and feelings. The stories of how Lo Sheng-chiao saved a Korean child by sacrificing his own life and how CPVs practice auster- ity on the front exert great effects on their daily life. 24 The members of the Youth League and the Young Pioneers have been inspired with the "five loves": love for fatherland, people, labor, science, and public property. As one Indian observer adds, there Is no mention of love for parents. 25 The Important point about these youth organizations Is that they aid the regime in enlisting the enthusiastic devotion of those young people who early show capacities for leadership. The net result is that after a few years these youngsters find that their own interests, by the sheer amount of time invested, are wholly bound up with the future of the party. They come to lean heavily on the party for moral support and to expect, and as they grow older de- mand, discipline. Little wonder then that Hu Yao-pang, the newly selected head of the Youth League in 1953, stressed the party's concern for the youth of China: "Comrades, the youth movement in modern China has always developed under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, The Communist Party of China and Chairman Mao always show extraordinaiy concern for the Chinese youth movement. Our Party and Chairman Mao consider the Chinese youths to be "an important front army' in the revolu- tionary struggle of our country ever since the May Fourth Move- ment." * 2Q Hu went on to say that "the past four years' experience tells us that the subordination of the NDYL to party leadership has decisive significance for the NDYL work." He proceeded to lay out such future tasks for the Youth League as "to rally the whole body of young workers to labor emulations," "to mobilize young * A movement of protest against the concessions to Japan, by the Paris peace conference in 1919, led by the students and a few young teachers and hailed by the CCP as one of the great forerunners of its development. HOW CHINA IS RULED 41 to 11 May 1953, at which time the revised constitution was adopted by the 813 representatives present. The ACFTU is now run by a presidium of 24 members and an eight-man secretariat. 35 It sponsors emulation and Stakhanovite campaigns among the workers, selects labor heroes, and attempts to enforce labor dis- cipline in the interests of the policies of the party and the state. Its members are assured that they are indeed the true leaders of the Chinese people. Undoubtedly some of them find this a little hard to believe when they are told in the next breath that their duty is to heighten labor discipline, cease overemphasis on the welfare of the workers, and practice austerity. 36 Part of the activity of the Federation of Trade Unions is probably reflected in a Christmas Day 1953 letter from the workers at the Anshan Iron and Steel Company to comrade Mao: Beloved Chairman Mao: We know that the beginning of produc- tion in the Heavy Rolling Mill, the Seamless Tubing Mill and the No. 7 Blast Furnace is but a start in our country's first five-year plan. Ahead of us lie still more complex and bigger tasks. We will resolutely follow your teachings, eagerly learn from the Soviet Union and try our best to raise our technical level and political consciousness to strive for the successful realization of Anshan's five-year plan and China's first five-year plan. We pledge to you that in order to carry out the general line to build our country into a mighty and prosperous Socialist society, we will fulfill all the tasks given to us by our motherland. We will answer your call by achieving greater and more successes in our production and construction. 37 Another one of the mass support organizations of the regime is the All China Federation of Industrial and Commercial Circles, which was set up at a congress in Peking from 23 October to 12 November 1953. Its purpose was to bring the remaining sectors of the private economy under the control and supervision of the Communist party and prepare them for their elimination. The leaders at the congress made no bones about their purpose in urging China's few remaining independent commercial and in- 42 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM dustrial leaders to accept the new "general line of the state." 38 Mass organizations in Communist China are legion. There is an organization for almost every conceivable social interest: ac- ademic groups, artists, actors, authors, and various religious groups. 39 Through direction from the Central Committee of the Communist party, whose members hold key positions in them although In many cases the figure-head officers are nonparty members the mass support organizations can develop regi- mented support for the various drives and programs launched in China. For example, they compete with each other to organize the most effective displays and best disciplined marching units in Red China's interminable series of parades and demonstrations. Two other organizations which develop mass participation on a large scale are the "cooperatives" and peasants' associations. The cooperatives, which in September 1953, according to Communist figures, boasted a membership of 141,000,000, are actually state- run monopolies in which little choice remains to the peasant with regard to membership. 40 The peasants' associations boast a mem- bership as high or higher. 41 The Communist regime also organizes its own functionaries or cadres into groups according to function in order to make the work of controlling the people more efficient. At the periodic con- ferences and congresses of these cadres shortcomings and dif- ficulties being encountered are frequently revealed to the outside world. There is always a speech of harsh criticism in addition to the long speeches on great achievements which serve as window dressing. For example at the Second National Conference on Procurators* Work held at Peking from 17 March to 10 April 1954, the government authorities revealed that public prosecutors' offices had been established in only one-third of the administrative units of county or higher level. 42 At the Civil Affairs Conference held from 22 October to 13 November 1953 representatives of the Ministry of the Interior were urged to get the masses mobilized. It was quite apparent that affairs were not going well in the villages. An unusual aspect of HOW CHINA IS RULED 43 the meeting was an address by the Soviet expert Runev, who ex- plained "the advanced Soviet technique" for building state power at the local level.43 Resentment and resistance were plainly grow- ing, and the penetration of the whole apparatus of control still left much to be desired from the point of view of local control. 44 The People's Daily editorialized on the day that news of the conference broke: "The building of state power in cities and factory and mining areas does not mean relaxation of the building of state power in the countryside. The state power in the country is con- fronted with an ocean of individual small peasants farming with about 100,000,000 farms. These individual small peasants, if not organized and guided, will spontaneously take the capitalist path." 45 Thus there continue to be indications that there are many areas where the control process at the lowest levels has yet to be consolidated by the Mao regime. On the other hand, achieve- ments in the first five years were remarkable, and the Communists are aware of the tasks ahead. With each passing day the coordina- tion of the various chains of command improves in efficiency at the lowest level At the base of the pyramid constituted by the five chains of command in those areas where the organs of Communist power have already been consolidated, the "fearsome Orwellian State glares through the whole fagade." 46 Force, supervision, spying, and propaganda are integrated in such a way as to bear out Trotsky's grim description of the Soviet system as a "hitherto un- heard-of apparatus of compulsion." 47 The real meaning of the whole political structure is not clear without examination of its relation to the individual Chinese in the village or city where it is imposed. At the level of the individual, force is very apparent. The regime swiftly adopted Mao's injunction to strengthen the army, police, and courts. Garrisoned troops of the People's Liberation Army are quartered in almost every county, where in cooperation with the Ministry of Public Security they help to organize militia forces. In addition to the militia there are the public security (kung-an) 46 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM Another method for checking on and controlling every in- dividual in Communist China was provided by the combined elec- tions and census conducted in 1953-54. Under the regulations established by the party all those who were to vote had first to be screened, and only the reliable were given cards entitling them to vote. There were four classes of unreliables: 1) the still unre- formed landlords (although they were supposed to have been completely eliminated in 1952); 2) counterrevolutionaries; 3) those deprived of their rights as citizens; and 4) the insane. 50 The combining of the census with the election gave the regime a fine opportunity to penetrate every household in order to determine political reliability. In connection with the election campaign, once again special people's courts were formed to punish the politically unreliable who were discovered. The census-election also gave the party an opportunity to check up on the local cadres and bring them under the strict discipline of the organization if they had strayed out of line. 57 Despite the careful screening, which revealed more than 9,000,- 000 unreliables, the election system still provided for open voting by show of hands at the lowest levels, and at higher levels a slate of candidates was presented by the party, with one candidate for each office. In the usual "people's democracy" style the voters had an opportunity to vote "yes" or a no." 5S Teng Tzu-hui in giving the figures for the election and census indicated that 2,570,000 specially trained cadres had guided the process in which some 278,000,000 people had voted. He gave the following figures for the population of China: 50 Direct investigation 573,876,670 Estimated National minorities excluded from election 8,708,169 Taiwan 7,000,000 Overseas Chinese 12,327,532 Total 60U91237T Exercising control over a population of this size from a cen- tralized headquarters of necessity involves careful supervision over HOW CHINA IS RULED 47 those actively engaged in administration. In addition to the in- filtration of the secret police through the whole administrative structure, the regime has also established a system of supervision which has roots deep in the Chinese past political system: the Censorate. 60 The Communist leadership has employed the system on a mass basis by setting up people's supervision committees at the county level and above and appointing people's supervision correspondents at all levels in the administration. The job of super- vision is to encourage criticism from "the masses" and to aid the regime in keeping some of its active members under restraint. Actually, the system has not always worked out too well, as one careful observer has noted. The supervisory organs do not have sufficient power, their decisions are frequently not respected, and there is a general reluctance to expose the shortcomings of the party except for specific party purposes. 61 Nevertheless, the system of people's supervision correspondents provides a system for mass mutual spying on both the people and the lower level leaders. For example, if a village party member failed to punish an old man caught in an "anti-state" act, an enemy of the old man could de- nounce him for neglect of duty to a correspondent who in turn would denounce him to the higher level of the party. In addition to the above methods of supervision and spying at the local level, there are the manifold activities of the party cell and the mass support organizations. All people of like occupa- tions or with like interests are called together for regular discussion meetings under the leadership of the party cadres. Discussion groups of ten to twenty people are constantly engaged in political studies, including Communist theory and current events. They discuss their work and their contributions to the drives of the gov- ernment. At these small discussion sessions of all sorts of people, the party leaders are able to check further upon the political reli- ability of all of the people. The individual peasant or urban dweller, having observed the methods of force in action, easily decides in favor of enthusiasm; apathy toward the policies of the regime is considered a sign of noncooperation. Buttressing the whole structure of control at the level of the 48 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM Individual is the propaganda and organization framework. The party has its local propagandist, newspapers and magazines, wired radio system, motion pictures, lantern slides, and song and dance groups. An important aspect of control here is the fact that county and provincial news is localized and only a limited number of centrally supervised publications are permitted to circulate freely through or out of the country. 02 The activities of the children, the women, and the town leaders are all directed toward discovering more persuasive means to bend everyone to the will of the Com- munist party. At the local level the individual finds himself en- meshed in an intricate network of controls and bombarded by a strange-sounding jargon which remains a mystery to him and which seems to be the key to promotion only for party members. The Propaganda Handbook for 21 July 1951 gives its readers a sample of an approved method for whooping up enthusiasm and organizing the village populace: After attending the meeting of representatives of all propaganda workers throughout the county, propaganda worker Wu Ch'i-hai of Tung-t'ai Hsien laid down his own plan as to how to respond to the June 1 appeal of the Resist America, Aid Korea Headquarters. This is his scheme: 1. I pledge to make use of the evenings, asking Hsii to play his Chinese violin to attract a crowd, and then I will sing and speak, alter- nately, and in this way thoroughly publish the three great appeals of Resist America, Aid Korea Headquarters. 2. I can organize two small administrative groups, 14 families in all, to help people draw up Patriotic Pacts definitely to be completed before the 10th (my own household included). From wages I will earn by repairing other people's stoves, I pledge to contribute 10,000 in two instalments of 5,000 during the period July 30 to August 30. I shall also persuade the masses to increase production for the purpose of contributing. 3. Regarding care for soldiers' families 1 pledge to go regularly to their homes and comfort them and also to supervise the group in charge of working for them. I shall myself check the cultivation of their fields, which is to be done for them by others. ROLE OF THE DRIVE 79 1 1 March that the Government Administration Council issued the formal measures for disposing of such cases of graft and corrup- tion as were uncovered. The drive then continues until a formal halt is called or until the party organs cease to mention it. The tapering off of publicity without calling a formal halt usually indicates that the rulers plan to revive the campaign at some future date. After a formal halt has been called, there comes a period during which the party leaders appraise their efforts. Those local leaders and organs which have contributed enthusiastically are praised, the mistakes of others are pointed out. The party's ideological journal, Study, usually makes the most thoroughgoing appraisal of the contributions and shortcomings of the cadres. Actually the movement may go on for some time after the formal halt. One reason for this is that most of the big drives move geographically from north to south, and frequently the work of the drive is not so expeditiously handled in south China, where the regime's hold on the people is not yet as effective as in other areas. 6 By way of illustration, although the 5-anti Campaign was called off in mid- 1952, the termination and appraisal meeting was not held in Canton until 8 February 1953. 7 A final aspect of the pattern established for the various drives is the constant emphasis on the relationship of each drive to others simultaneously in progress or subsequently initiated. The Com- munist dialectic is used to show how all are really part of the same process of consolidation of the "people's state power** or of the same class struggle. Thus, the peace campaign is linked with the Korean War, Sino-Soviet Friendship is linked to Hate America, the Cam- paign for the Implementation of the Marriage Law is linked with Ideological Remolding, and they all are regarded as a part of the over-all goal of moving toward "socialism," The major movements in progress at a particular moment are always linked to the re- gime's over-all goals, and the leaders indicate that they are quite aware of the importance of these great campaigns for achieving 80 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM these goals. Thus Mao Tse-tung in his report to the Third Session of the National Committee of the CPPCC on 23 October 1951 stated: The three great movements which were developed in our country during the past year resistance to American aggression and aid to Korea, land reform, and suppression of counterrevolutionaries have achieved great victories. The remaining counterrevolutionaries on the mainland will shortly be in the main eliminated. Land reform will be completed in 1952, except for a few areas where national minorities live. ... As a result of the victories already achieved by these great movements . . . our country has attained a unification that is un- precedented. 8 Perhaps full understanding of the important role played by the various drives in Communist China can best be grasped by follow- ing one of them through and seeing how the various chains of command swing into action, how the drive itself is also an impor- tant part of the explanation of how China is ruled. As an example let us choose a campaign which has received relatively little atten- tion as yet in the outside world: the 1953 Campaign against Bureaucratism, Commandism, and Violation of Laws and Disci- pline. This drive constitutes a valuable example not alone because it was one of the important major drives but also because it illus- trates the extreme emphasis which the top leaders place upon con- stant self-criticism and the maintenance of discipline within the administration. It also indicates how much we can learn about the problems and shortcomings of the regime through one of these internally focused movements. During 1953, the year of retrenchment, as a part of taking up slack, enlisting the support of the people where possible, and striv- ing toward efficiency, the Communist authorities decided to launch this all-out campaign against their chronic problems. "Commandism" is defined as the blind use of compulsion on the masses, and it is viewed as a manifestation of "bureaucratism." Mao pointed out that the latter consisted of failure to a gct down to the masses" by cadres who were "satisfied with sitting in their ROLE OF THE DRIVE 81 offices, writing out decisions and issuing directives." The cam- paign was designed to enable the regime to check up on the func- tioning of various local officials and carry on where the former 3 -anti Campaign of 1952 (anti-corruption, anti-waste, and anti- bureaucratism) had left off. The sequence of events indicated from the beginning that the strategy had been well planned by the party leaders. The way was prepared by the publication in the People's Daily of 23 January 1953 of materials on the case of Huang Yi-feng, a high-ranking Communist cadre in the East China Regional Ad- ministration in Shanghai. He had suppressed criticism in the De- partment of Communications, of which he was the director, and had exhibited the worst of "bureaucratic tendencies" by retaliating against those who had dared to criticize him. Huang was eventu- ally relieved of his posts and expelled from the party, and his name became a by-word in all propaganda in the drive which followed. The printing of the details of this case in the organ of the Central Committee of the Communist party was followed on 7 February by a speech in which Mao Tse-tung called for a cam- paign against bureaucratism. 9 Mao's speech, before no less im- portant a body than the National Committee of the CPPCC, was timed to coincide with a report by An Tzu-wen, party organization specialist, calling for a nationwide struggle against these three worst sins within the administration and party. 10 Thus both party and government organs were prepared for the new drive. The army was for the most part to escape participation, because it was still deeply engaged in the Korean War. But An Tzu-wen gave notice that the mass organizations were to partici- pate and that the press should not only publicize the campaign with fanfare but also check up on its own work. The general strategy for the campaign he laid out as follows: During 1953, we shall first start such tasks as dealing with letters from the people, inspection of work, education of universal cadres, and further development of criticism and self-criticism through the medium of the press, and coordinating these works with the franchise, 84 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM The China Import-Export Company has found out that several kinds of supplies purchased in May 1951 have not been sold even now, thereby incurring a loss of over 210 billion in payment for storage, interest, and depreciation. In 1952, owing to the overstock- ing, the China Animal Products Company incurred a loss of 123 billion in payment for interest alone. . . . The China Industrial Chemicals Import Company has found out that in March 1952 the rubber-vulcanizing materials ordered by the East China Department of Industry were incorrectly allocated to the Northeast Regional Com- pany, and the dyestuffs ordered by the Ministry of Textile Industry were incorrectly allocated to the China Supplies Company, thereby directly influencing the supplies for production organs and wasting much freightage. ... A letter from the people was held up for seven months. It was a letter from a merchant . . . requesting assistance in the export of fresh eggs. Arriving in the Ministry of Commerce, the letter passed through nine units, gave birth to 16 documents, which altogether were handled by 400 people, yet no reply has till now been made. 16 Such revelations might well leave some doubts in the minds of the Chinese audience as to whether bureaucracy, inefficiency, and oppression were evils of the old society alone! Further, if such irregularities were uncovered at the highest levels, where presum- ably the most capable party cadres were in power, it is not difficult to understand Mao's insistence that the campaign "reach right to the bottom," where some of the cadres were somewhat less ca- pable. Interestingly enough, in few of the revelations coming from the top government ministries was there any suggestion that any- thing more than bureaucratism was involved. It is difficult to avoid speculating that the more subtle methods of passive resistance may have come into the picture. By April 1953 the various regional administrations had organ- ized teams for checkup work; and the drive began to make itself felt at most of the lower levels of government. Checkup teams began to report back on their work and draw up reports at the regional level before the end of the month. 17 ROLE OF THE DRIVE 85 An Tzu-wen had of course indicated that the party was to be included in the drive, and party cadres were quickly alerted to the necessity for carrying out thorough criticism and self-criticism at the meetings from branch level on up. Top leaders of the regional party bureaus met within two or three weeks after Mao's call and drew up plans for mobilizing all party members to conduct the drive with utmost intensity. For example, top members of the Northeast Bureau met in Mukden on 21 February, and on 26 February the Northwest Bureau of the party called a meeting in Sian to carry on the process of criticism and self-criticism. 18 The mass support organizations were expected to contribute their part to the drive too. In fact, some of them such as the All China Federation of Trade Unions were called upon to attack the three new evils in their own structure as well as contribute to cleaning up the formal administration of the government. 19 The Youth League especially was called upon to launch a drive to clear out the evils of bureaucratism, commandism, and viola- tion of laws and discipline. The 1 February 1953 issue of China Youth argued: "As masters of the country, the youth of China should manifest a high degree of political initiative and responsi- bility and should show concern for various kinds of work involving national interests." But, it pointed out: "As everybody knows, mistakes and defects at present exist at various levels of Youth League committees and basic-level organizations as well as league cadres at various places." 20 One month later the same Youth League journal began to re- veal some of the results of investigations. Once again it became evident that some of the statistics coming out of Communist China on such matters as periodical circulation might not be entirely meaningful. In an article entitled "Practice of Commandism to- ward the Masses is a Criminal Act" China Youth stated: The working style of commandism expresses itself in two forms. In one, cadres in undertaking any work resort to compulsion, cheat- ing, and arbitrary allocation of tasks. In another, they pretend to be 86 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM democratic and hold meetings with the masses but they reject public opinion and restrict free expression of views. They have everything fixed up beforehand and want the masses to do what they are told. Here it is possible to sense the frustration which must seize some of the younger cadres who are given impossible assignments in the various drives and competitions and must bear the brunt of criti- cism from both directions, since the top authorities will never admit to using or advising methods of compulsion. Yet the back- ground of the cadre training sponsored by the same top authorities shows through in some of the examples of commandism which follow in the article. About one group of cadres it states: They had to resort to forcible methods in order to fulfill their tasks. Consequently, they forced the aged to subscribe to the China Youth journal and the illiterate to buy Hsileh-hsi (Study). They even com- pelled a factory with only 161 workers to subscribe to 443 copies of newspapers. In order to push the sale of stamps, they popularized the insurance value of registered mail This made the public believe that the post office was just a "merchandizing house run by bureaucrats." 2l By the time government, party, and mass support organizations began to get down to the local level, it was apparent that there was ample reason for the drive. A total power structure such as the Mao regime is bound to feel the corrupting influence of its power. The People's Daily began to publish such accounts as the follow- ing about some lower level cadres who manipulated the village government and the people's militia, cruelly oppressed the masses, fined the farmers at will, raped women and even young girls at the point of a bayonet, and beat up, insulted, detained, put under surveillance and assaulted the families of servicemen and workers. As a result, seventeen families were detained and put under control, two persons were forced to commit suicide, and four persons died of injuries resulting from beatings. 22 Even the mass media of communication and especially the newspapers were subjected to extensive criticism and investigation during the campaign. Correspondents had been instructed to write ROLE OF THE DRIVE 89 land evoked temporary enthusiasm and support from many within the rural segment of the population. Those peasants who would be most likely to lead in resisting the Communist attempt to trans- form the whole of Chinese society into the Stalinist pattern were effectively eliminated. Those who were not executed by the peo- ple's tribunals called together by the cadres were subjected to "control and reform," with forced labor sentences up to five years and sometimes more. 29 Another important Communist drive, which up to the present has probably been as unsuccessful from the point of view of Mao and his colleagues as the Land Reform Movement was successful, has been the campaign to implement the Marriage Law. 30 This was the first important law passed by the Mao regime it even preceded the formal passage of the Agrarian Reform Law and constituted an attempt to revise the basis of Chinese society by an attack on the family system. It was advanced, to be sure, in the name of eliminating the feudal status of women and promoting their economic and political equality and free marriage. 31 Yet the Peking government allowed no doubts to remain in the minds of the cadres as to what was to be involved. By the end of 1950 certain irregularities were beginning to appear in the application of the law, and the following year the Government Administration Council launched an investigation into its implementation. The instruction read in part: marriage reform is not merely the task of the Courts and the local women's associations; every organization must cooperate in it. There is work to be done in schools, youth organizations, workers' unions, and cultural organizations. The people must be brought together at public accusation meetings to expose those who have failed to live up to the standard of the new law. There must be huge mass trials. The marriage reform is to go hand in hand with land reform. The same technique is to be used for both. 32 The ostensible purposes of the law were to eliminate the Chi- nese custom of arranged marriages, do away with concubinage and prostitution, make divorce easy, and raise women's status. It 90 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM was also an appeal for the support of China's women and an attempt to make them give first loyalty to the party and state rather than the family. The cadres were urged to take up the task of marriage reform with enthusiasm and vigor. The result was a wave of divorces, suicides, and violent deaths. The People's Daily re- ported the sharp rise In divorce rates: 186,000 for 1950, 409,000 for 1951, and 396,000 for the first six months of 1952; the people on the mainland began calling the Marriage Law the "Divorce Law." 33 Meanwhile the parallel development of violent deaths required explanation. At first they were blamed on the feudal attitude and marriage system. For example, the New China News Agency released the following story: "In Minchu village in the 13th district of Shaotung county, Hunan, a woman activist Ch'en Tuan-hslu was killed by her husband with a spear because she dared to pledge to overfulfill the task of accumulating 1 000 catties of night soil [human excrement used as fertilizer] at the village production conference." 34 However, on 11 October 1951 the People's Daily apologized for not having previously reported abuses by the Communist cadres themselves. Some had maintained the former attitude of male superiority and others had taken ad- vantage of their power positions. It also appeared that China's women were not as anxious for equality and marriage reform as their Communist leaders. One capable analyst summarizes as follows the results of the Investigations into the implementation of the law by lower ranking cadres: What these little despots in the villages did with the women was so low and contemptible that it shocked the not-oversensitive leaders in Peking. Party members ordered husbands and wives to separate, and if any resisted, they were sent to jail as counterrevolutioaists, or were handed over to the village militia, which soon became notorious for its licentious behavior. . . . Those not themselves philanderers indulged in the nation-wide sport of "fornicator catching," confessions being extracted from women by physical torture. No wonder suicides and violent deaths amongst women showed a rapid increase- Enquiry into family sex-life, abhorrent anywhere, is intolerable in ROLE OF THE DRIVE 91 China, where tradition of domestic and sexual reserve is extremely strong. Thus the publicly organized mob trials of those who resisted the new Law, created not only terror, but also resentment amongst the people. In the city of Chungking, 40,000 people were obliged to at- tend one such meeting. 35 In February 1953 the Communists stated that the Marriage Reform was of quite a different character from the Land Reform and that no violence should be involved. 36 They decided to launch another all-out campaign, this time with the stress on education. The campaign was to last through the month of March, but Stalin's death on 5 March disrupted the schedule, and it was May before the New China News Agency could state that the publicity cam- paign had been "basically concluded." 37 However, the summary report on the "Movement for the Thorough Implementation of the Marriage Law," delivered to the Government Administration Council on 11 November 1953 by Liu Ching-fan, indicated that only 15 per cent of China's population have accepted the Com- munist version of what marriage and the family should be. 38 Family and social ethics have not yet succumbed entirely to Marx- ism. Because their doctrine allows no social grouping to take precedence over the party's wishes, it can be anticipated that the Communist leaders will persist in their attempt to implement the Marriage Law. A third major drive has been the Resist America, Aid Korea Campaign, which got under way on 4 November 1950, as soon as it was officially known that Chinese Communist troops were fighting in Korea. This campaign illustrates one of the methods used by the regime to draw off any dissatisfactions and at the same time stir up Chinese nationalism. As has so frequently happened in world history, the creation of an external threat served as an excuse for strengthening not only military power but internal state power as well. The Mao regime has used this campaign to great advantage on many scores. The Resist America, Aid Korea Movement became one of the major methods for dissolving all ties with the West. It was used 94 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM of the development of the campaign, and won a great victory in stamp- ing out large numbers of counterrevolutionaries. ... the broad masses of the people of town and country have set up millions of se- curity organizations and are now applying their rich experience gained in the campaign for suppression of counterrevolutionaries to the pro- tection of production and construction. 43 If the Land Reform and the behavior of the cadres in connec- tion with the Implementation of the Marriage Law had not succeeded in striking terror in the hearts of the Chinese people, this campaign did. Refugees poured into Hong Kong during 1951 with stories of brutality, torture, and murder. 44 Although the Campaign for the Suppression of Counterrevolutionaries carried over into 1952, like the Land Reform most of its violent aspects were felt in 1951. Minister Lo warned that the campaign would continue as long as counterrevolutionaries existed, which meant of course so long as there was opposition to the regime. It was not surprising, therefore, that toward the end of 1953 and during the first months of 1954 there was an increasing number of re- ports in the press on the suppression of counterrevolutionaries. The People's Daily of 9 March 1954 reported the elimination of more than forty members of the Green Lance Society in Canton, a secret society which like all former Chinese secret societies is by definition accused of being counterrevolutionary. Yet another drive of major proportions was the Ideological Remolding or Thought Reform Movement, which although aimed at only a small segment of the population, the intellectuals, was considered by the regime to be vital to its whole program. The movement was launched with a five-hour speech by Chou En-lai on 29 September 1951. Soon afterward some of the foremost scholars and writers of China were writing public confessions and criticizing each other in public view. The movement brought about the regimentation of the intellectuals and persuaded them of the wisdom of severing connections with the "bourgeois ideol- ogies" of the West. It was, in effect, "a thorough-going attempt to implement party control in the field of the creative arts rather ROLE OF THE DRIVE 95 than a mere attempt on the part of the regime to force liberal writers' into step." 45 Since the party is viewed as possessing a monopoly of all that is good and progressive, Chinese intellectuals were called upon to denounce former affiliations with the non-Communist world. A special attack was made against Hu Shih, former ambassador to the United States; many of his colleagues and friends and even his son were forced to denounce him. Hu stood as a symbol of non-Communist liberalism in modern China, and the Communist leaders (especially Mao, a former student of Hu's) felt called upon to demolish the symbol. 46 Another famous Chinese liberal intellectual, Ch'ien Mu, was also the center of attack. Of course, a major leader in this whole movement was Ai Ssu-ch'i, now professor of Communist ideology. In an article published in Study in 1952, when the Ideological Remolding Campaign was in full swing, Ai pointed out that criticism of the "ideology of the bour- geois class" was the basic program of the movement. 47 The cam- paign was designed to lay the basis for acceptance of the "ad- vanced" Soviet ideology and scholarship and guarantee that no deviationist ideas would be implanted in the heads of the new rulers of China the youth. Although Ideological Remolding reached its zenith in 1952, the year of regimentation, it has con- tinued and will continue. Independent thought, as the Soviet masters have found out, is hard to eliminate. Mao and his col- leagues follow the Soviet example, however, and maintain the effort. For instance, in July 1953 more than 6,500 professors and staff members of universities and colleges in Peking under- went another new course in "thought change" under the direction of Professor Ai, whose works many of them used to characterize as "trash." 48 A sixth major movement which demonstrated the ability of the Communist regime to consolidate control over every facet of life was the much publicized 3 -anti 5-anti Movement. 40 This was really a combination of two drives and was essentially urban in character. The 3 -anti Drive (anti-corruption, anti-waste, and anti- 96 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM bureaucratism) was launched to clean up government and party organs and businesses. The 5-anti Drive (anti-bribery, -tax evasion, -fraud, -stealing state property, and -theft of state eco- nomic secrets) was directed against the business and commercial groups In China. Like the Land Reform and many other move- ments, it started in Manchuria and moved south, lasting officially from October 1951 until 13 June 1952, when the Government Administration Council issued instructions to bring it to a close. This movement had all the trappings of the other major move- ments: accusation meetings, confessions, recantations, and peo- ple's tribunals. It was designed to remake Chinese industry and commerce in the Communist-approved form and extend state con- trol over them. Inspection teams were organized to examine the books of companies as well as of individual businessmen. Po I-po, minister of finance in 1952, reported that in nine cities alone more than 450,000 industrial and commercial establishments had been investigated and more than 76 per cent of them found guilty of malpractices. 50 As a result of these investigations the Communists were able to gain virtually a complete understanding of the inner workings and trade secrets of the nation's private enterprises. Old Chinese methods of doing business were brought to trial and found unworthy. Squeeze, carelessness, bribery: all these were judged acts against the state, and their pcrpetuators were punished. Actually, it was not until 11 March 1952 that the gov- ernment got around to issuing formal measures for disposal of the cases uncovered. Under these, merchants fared worse than in- dustrialists, but all were subjected to fines, imprisonment, and sometimes death. During the intense part of the drive business ground to a halt, many urban leaders fled China, and there was a wave of suicides. 51 The real motives of the regime for launching the 3-anti 5-anti Movement have been appraised in various ways, but there seems to be general agreement on several items. The movement was probably most significant in terms of its economic implications, As a result of the denunciations by employees and children of its ROLE OF THE DRIVE 99 ings according to their nature, such as regular meetings, irregular meetings, extension meetings, discussion-of-living-conditions meet- ings, informal discussion meetings, joint representative meetings, "Come and meet people" meetings, reports compilation meetings, work planning meetings, change of shift meetings, etc. For instance, Li Yu-lin, chief of the East Freight Yard, attended altogether 17 meetings in the 5 days from May 11 to May 15. The meetings take up an average of about 7 hours each day. 56 Despite such obvious disadvantages, however, the drives which the Communists have used to carry on their rule in China have aided the regime in many ways. In the first place, they have served to integrate the whole apparatus of state compulsion. All the various chains of command and the means that link them have been kept in constant operation. Thus the regime has been able to flex its muscles, so to speak, and keep in trim. Again, these mass campaigns have tended to discourage the growth of opposition to the Communist rule. The sheer weight of the bandwagon tactics is enough to convince the psychologically isolated Chinese that his resistance would be useless when so many people are support- ing the efforts of the leaders. Third, the drives have proved one of the most effective methods for meeting the current needs and demands of the state. Financial, military, production, and social programs of seemingly impossible dimensions have been laid out and apparently met by means of mass mobilization and mass hypnotism. The regime has been able to extract even greater sacrifices from the people it rules. Fourth, the drives have enabled the party to approach achievement of its goals of perfecting unity, conformity, discipline, power, and intel- lectual monism. And fifth, they have served and continue to serve as the most effective means both of weeding out any individuals or groups within the population who are opposed or indifferent and of turning up promising new activists. The drive has enabled Mao and his colleagues to follow the injunction laid down by Saint-Just and the Jacobins in the French Revolution: "You must punish not only the traitors but also those who are indifferent; 100 CHINA UNDER COMMUNISM you must punish all who are passive in the Republic and do noth- ing for it." 57 A sixth function of the drives has been to maintain a high emotional pitch among the people. To this the violence of the class struggle, the many people's tribunals, the mass parades, mass demonstrations, and violent language of the controlled media of communication have all contributed. And finally, these great movements with their tactics of mass participation have served to undermine personal human values and extend the regime's control into every reach of human activity. On the other hand, the mass drives of the Chinese Communists have served to expose the nature of the regime to the outside world. While self-criticism and self-examination keep the huge bureaucracy active and alert, many of the facts brought to light during the drives bear out Lord Acton's warning of the corrup- tion inherent in absolute power. s . ECONOMIC CONTROL Given the basic thesis of economic determinism which under- lies all Marxist theory, and the very doctrinaire approach of the Chinese Communists, it is understandable that they view economic matters as of vital interest and economic control as the key to all control. It is impossible in a general treatment of the Chinese Communist regime to cover all the major aspects of economic development, but the measures for economic control taken by Mao and his colleagues are such an important part of their program of Sovietization for China that some attempt at summary, however inadequate, must be made. 1 On 24 December 1952 Chou En-lai announced to the meeting of the National Committee of the CPPCC that China's first five- year plan for economic construction would start in 1953. This did not come as a surprise to the Chinese people, who had been pre- pared all through 1952 for the start of "capital construction." In fact on 9 January of that year, the cabinet's Committee on Finan- cial and Economic Affairs had promulgated Provisional Measures for Capital Construction Work, in which it carefully defined just what capital construction was and the methods to be followed for drawing up plans. Included under the term "capital construction" were such items as building schools and geological exploration as well as the projects usually considered as falling within that field. 2 In August 1952 six new economic ministries were formed and on 15 November a State Planning Commission was named, with Kao Kang, the head of the Manchurian Region, as chairman. This made the governmental setup for launching the plan correspond almost exactly to that of the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, throughout the year various plants in China had been making out plans to be "fulfilled and overfulfilled." The basis for the plan was faithful to the teachings of Stalin throughout, although on the surface there seemed to be one slight 101