Chapter 21 Section 2 The Flourishing Cause of Chronicle Compilation in New China

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, ancient local chronicles, together with ancient China, have rejuvenated. At that time, during the anti-Japanese war, in Yan'an, the holy land of revolution, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued the "Decision on Investigation and Research" on August 1, 1941, stating: "Systematic and thorough social investigation is the basis for policy decisions. The "Decision" listed local chronicles as one of the basic materials for investigation and research, and required "to collect county chronicles, prefectural chronicles, provincial chronicles, and genealogy, and to study them."However, although the value of local chronicles had already been fully understood, it was impossible to organize and compile new local chronicles on a large scale at that time.With the founding of the People's Republic of China, the compilation of new journals was quickly put on the agenda.

In 1956, the Scientific Planning Committee of the State Council listed the compilation of new local chronicles as one of the 20 key projects in the "Twenty-Year Philosophy and Social Science Planning Plan", and then formed a national local chronicles group to lead this work, setting off the first revision of local chronicles in New China climax.By 1960, more than 20 provinces and regions and more than 500 counties across the country had carried out revision.Most of the first batch of new local chronicles are unfinalized, and only the brief chronicles of Xishui, Xianning, Xiaogan, Hanchuan, Guangji, and Yingcheng counties in Hubei, Huailai Xinzhi in Hebei, and Shuicheng County Chronicles in Guizhou are officially published. ", "Zhenning New Records" and a few others.The provincial annals only published two volumes of "Chronicles of Events" and one volume of "Geographical Chronicles" of "Hunan Provincial Chronicles".

After 10 years of the "Cultural Revolution", the country and the people once again painfully experienced a truth: To build China, we must first understand China. In 1977, Shouyang County, Shanxi Province took the lead in establishing the County Chronicle Compilation Committee. In 1978, Hunan Province decided to resume the compilation of provincial annals.Beginning in the 1980s, the second upsurge in the revision of official records in New China was set off in an all-round way. In 1981, the China Local History Association was established. In 1983, the Chinese Local Chronicles Steering Group was resumed. In 1985, the "Provisional Regulations on the New Compilation of Local Chronicles" was promulgated, which stipulated that "the compilation of new socialist local chronicles must be guided by Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought."For a time, like a storm, all provinces, cities, and counties generally established institutions for compiling chronicles.It is planned that by the end of this century, in addition to the annals of provinces and municipalities directly under the central government, 3,782 county and city annals will be completed.After year after year of hard work, it has now entered the harvest period of new local chronicles, and hundreds of new local chronicles are published every year.

The editors of the new local chronicles strive to use new viewpoints, new methods, and new materials to compile the local chronicles.They not only inherited the excellent tradition of compiling annals of past dynasties, but also insisted on reform and made great efforts to innovate, arranging content and setting categories completely according to the actual conditions of modern nature and society, in order to truly reflect the characteristics of the times.The development and transformation of production activities, economic activities, productivity, and production relations that were neglected by the old annals of the past dynasties have been given full attention in the new local annals.Emperors and officials are no longer the main characters in the local chronicles, and they are replaced by the creative spirit and historical achievements of the people.People's efforts have achieved gratifying results.The local chronicles of new China present a brand-new style different from any previous era in terms of both content and style.

Another notable change in modern local chronicles is that Xiuzhi has stepped out of the circle of a few literati and bachelors, and is making great strides towards the whole society, forming a large-scale systematic project.Record editing institutions at all levels have assembled a strong professional record editing team.According to statistics in 1994, there are more than 110,000 full-time and part-time staff in provincial, municipal, and county-level editorial institutions.With this team as the center, the whole society will be mobilized to conduct an in-depth investigation of national conditions and collect and sort out local documents.

In the process of compiling the local records, various methods have been adopted to attract experts from various fields to participate in the discussion of major issues in the development of the region.For example, the local chronicles organization in Shanghai and Fudan University jointly established the "Shanghai Research Center", and invited scholars from home and abroad to hold a series of academic seminars: "Shanghai Macro Research Seminar", "Shanghai Concession Seminar", "Modern Shanghai Urban Research International Symposium", "Shanghai Culture Seminar", "Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in Shanghai Seminar", "Opium War in Shanghai Seminar" and so on.And published "Shanghai Research Papers", publish the research results of professionals, to provide a field for more people to participate in the seminar.This kind of brainstorming has deepened the understanding of the problem and provided literature information, which is extremely helpful for improving the scientific level of local chronicles.In Pinghu, Haiyan, Zhejiang, and Jinshan, Shanghai, the "Seminar on the History and Evolution of Ancient Haiyan" was held with the participation of editors, experts and scholars of the county annals of the three counties. problem, and corrected several major mistakes in the old records.

In order to cooperate with the compilation of provincial, city, and county annals, many grassroots units such as townships, streets, factories, mines, and schools have started to compile their own annals.There are a total of 12 counties in the Wenjiang prefecture of Sichuan. The compilation of local chronicles starts with the general compilation of "small chronicles" in all townships and departments under the county.For example, the "Dujiangyan Chronicle" was compiled by Guanxian County, and the "People's Canal Chronicle" was compiled by the regional water conservancy bureau.For a period of time, notices soliciting materials could be seen everywhere in the region, and there were broadcasts and posters everywhere promoting the revision of the journal.Each grassroots unit has a data officer or a liaison officer responsible for collecting and disseminating information.Each county has a "Zhizhi Xiu Association" composed of people from all walks of life to provide information and make suggestions.The compilation of "Xiaozhi" not only promotes grassroots units to review and think about their own growth process, but also lays a solid data foundation for compiling county chronicles.

Among these grassroots annals, it is especially worth noting the township annals.If it is said that the compilation of township annals was mainly to prepare materials for the county annals at first, then the situation was different later. From the late 1980s to the early 1990s, my country's township economy has become half of the local economy.In particular, a group of star towns with a long history, early opening up and fast development, their history, current situation and development experience have aroused interest and attention from all over the world.Township chronicles are a window to understand the development of our country's townships, and naturally have a different meaning from the past.In particular, the economic growth in the southern coastal areas is rapid, and provinces such as Jiangsu and Zhejiang, which have a tradition of compiling township annals, have officially published a number of famous township annals. Put more power into it.

The monographs compiled by industry also had unprecedented development in New China.Today, with the rapid development of science and technology, all-encompassing local chronicles involve the expertise of many disciplines and industries. The editors of local chronicles cannot be omnipotent doctors who know everything. How can we ensure the scientific nature of chronicles?Before compiling provincial, city, and county annals, various localities often organize various industries to write monographs, such as landscape annals, scenic spot annals, industrial annals, agricultural annals, commercial annals, financial annals, educational annals, medical and health annals, and science and technology annals. And so on, as the basis for future chronicles.In addition, there are also monographs edited under the auspices of national professional departments. For example, the Ministry of Culture, the National Ethnic Affairs Commission and the Chinese Dramatists Association jointly initiated the sub-regional compilation of "Chinese Opera Records"; The Ministry of Communications organizes the compilation of transportation histories in various regions; the Ministry of Water Resources organizes the compilation of "Jianghe Water Conservancy Chronicles" and so on.Large water systems such as the Yangtze River, Yellow River, Huaihe River, Haihe River, and Pearl River all have institutions for revision. "Annals of the Yangtze River", "Annals of the Yellow River", and "Annals of the Pearl River" have all been published in separate volumes.The editors of the monograph are all experts in the field. They have brought new knowledge, new methods, and new perspectives to the local chronicles, which is an important guarantee for the quality of the local chronicles.

According to the "Chinese New Local Chronicles Catalogue" published in 1993, by the end of 1992, more than 8,000 grassroots chronicles and monographs had been published formally and informally.Grass-roots chronicles and monographs have existed since ancient times, but the development to this scale today is a major new landscape in the history of local chronicles.Together with local chronicles above the county level, they criss-cross and reflect the real process of our country's social history at multiple levels and from multiple angles.The momentum and depth of this collection of materials, and the scale of this compilation of records, were unimaginable in any era in the past.

The functions of modern chronicle editing organizations are also changing, and are developing into multi-functional regional information centers.Historically, most of the chronicle compilation organizations were impromptu groups, which only focused on compiling the chronicles, regardless of other matters, and were disbanded after the compilation of the chronicles.Now, in addition to editing new local chronicles, local chronicles compilation committees in many provinces, cities, and counties are also collation and research institutions for local literature, and rely on the advantages of data to edit a large number of data books, including yearbooks, regional overviews, travel guides, local textbooks, and Compilation of various academic materials.They play the role of consulting agencies and even think tanks in local economic development and cultural construction.For example, when discussing economic development strategies in Wuhan City, the editorial committee of the City Chronicle provided it with systematic reference materials; the County Chronicle Office of Qianxi County, Hebei Province, based on the results of the product census, suggested using the rich wild jujube resources in the county to establish Jinsixiaozao base is listed as a key project for the development of mountain economy in this county; a large number of traditional famous products that are gradually declining or even on the verge of extinction, such as Guanxi Pomelo, which is known as the "Pomelo King" in Pinghe County, Fujian Province, The 800-year-old Xianghu water shield in Xiaoshan County, Zhejiang, the sun-cured tobacco in Shifang County, Sichuan, and the tin inlay craft in Weihai City, Shandong, etc., are all persuasive materials excavated and sorted out by local chroniclers, which aroused the attention of the government and the government. With the attention of professionals, it has regained its vitality and become an important pillar of the local economy again.The journal editing organization also cooperated with newspapers, radio stations, and TV stations to develop a local "Today in History" column, and held knowledge contests with the theme of revitalizing China and understanding hometown.These new functions of them not only brought into play the social benefits of materials, but also expanded the social influence of local chronicles, and attracted more people to contribute to the collection and arrangement of local documents. The cause of local chronicles in New China can be said to be still in its inaugural period, just like the rising sun in the east and the brilliant spring flowers, thriving and flourishing.The vast number of local chronicles workers are still practicing, summarizing, and improving, and continue to write a new chapter in the history of local chronicles with their hard work and wisdom. On the other side of the Taiwan Strait, after returning to the motherland after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War in 1945, the Taiwan General Archives was established, which was later renamed the Taiwan Documentation Committee.It compiled and published a large number of Taiwan documents, and began to compile "Taiwan Province General Annals" in 1948, and completed the publication in 1973.During the same period, all cities and counties in Taiwan also compiled new chronicles.Some compatriots in Taiwan who were originally from the mainland were deeply attached to their homeland, and they organized themselves to collect and sort out the documents of their hometown, and did their best to compile an anecdote for their hometown.For example, the Anhui Jixi Lutai fellow compiled the "Jixi County Chronicle", the Anhui Shucheng Fellow Township Association compiled the "Shucheng County Chronicle", and the Zhejiang Qingtian Fellow Township Association compiled the "Qingtian County Chronicle (Continued Edition)".Of course, when the two places were isolated, they could only rely on incomplete documents and fragmentary memories, but each of these chronicles entrusted their strong homesickness.With the increasing exchanges between the two sides of the strait, the two sides often exchange information, send materials, and exchange results in the compilation of chronicles, which shows the unparalleled cohesion of the excellent cultural tradition of local chronicles to the Chinese nation.Once the artificial barriers are removed and the two sides of the Taiwan Strait join hands, the cause of Zhizhi will have a different scene.