Chapter 34 The Joy of Farmers: Rent Reduction and Mutual Aid and Cooperation

In the anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines led by the Communist Party, there was a public economy of the government, troops, government agencies, and schools; there was a cooperative economy;In order to unite all forces that could be united to fight against Japan, the Communist Party stopped the policy of confiscating landlords' land and redistributing it, and decided to reduce rent and interest as the basic policy to solve the peasant problem during the War of Resistance Against Japan. After the severe economic difficulties in the anti-Japanese base areas, the party focused on mobilizing all positive factors to develop production and develop the economy.

On January 28, 1942, the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued a statement on land policy, which was the "Decision of the Central Committee on the Policy of Anti-Japanese Base Areas" drafted by Mao Zedong.It emphasizes two basic principles: The first article proposes to reduce the feudal exploitation of landlords and reduce rent and interest.The second is to recognize that the capitalist mode of production is a relatively advanced mode of production in China at present, and that the bourgeoisie, especially the petty bourgeoisie and the national bourgeoisie, are currently a relatively progressive social factor and political force.The party's policy is not to weaken capitalism and the bourgeoisie, nor to weaken the rich peasant class and their productivity, but to reward rich peasant production and unite rich peasants under appropriate conditions for improving workers' production.

This resolution can be said to be a restrained land policy. The party hopes to improve the lives of farmers and stimulate their enthusiasm for production through rent reduction. At the beginning of 1942, the Border Region conducted a census of rural land ownership, mainly to understand the violation and evasion of land laws and regulations. Through investigation, it was found that many landowners who returned to the border area in 1937 illegally restored the land property that had been confiscated and distributed to farmers, or took public land as their own. The rent reduction movement was first demonstrated in Suide and promoted in 1942. The border area carried out rent reduction movements in about 10 areas, most of which were Suide and Longdong New Area.

In the border areas, tenants paid as much as 50% of the land rent to the landlord.The clear goal of the rent reduction movement is to reduce rent by 25%, and the maximum limit of land rent is determined to be 375% of the total harvest.Rent reduction is an indispensable driving force for liberating farmers and developing the economy.Because "farmers are realists all over the world", farmers who can get more than half of the harvest can increase their enthusiasm for production, and they will work harder to increase their harvest; and more income allows farmers to buy better farm tools and seeds , fertilizer, livestock, and increase production input, thereby further increasing production and income.

In the early days of the movement, the party made great efforts to win the voluntary support of the landlords.Some prominent gentlemen such as An Wenqin, a wealthy Suide landowner and vice-chairman of the border district council, issued statements calling for cooperation in the rent reduction campaign.Many landowners reportedly responded. From the second half of 1942 to after the autumn harvest in 1943, the rent reduction movement reached its climax. However, in order to develop the economy in the anti-Japanese base areas, the policy of reducing rent and interest is not enough, as Mao Zedong pointed out in a speech in October 1943:

"In the past, it was the feudal exploitation relations in the border regions that constrained the productivity of the border regions and prevented them from developing. After half of the regions underwent rent and interest reductions, the feudal constraints were weakened. In this way, more than half of the feudal exploitation relations in the entire border regions were destroyed. is the first revolution. "However, if the mode of production is not transferred from individual labor to collective labor, the productivity cannot be further developed. Therefore, mutual aid organizations built on the basis of individual economy (without destroying the basis of individual private property), that is, farmers Agricultural production cooperatives are very much needed. Only in this way can productivity be greatly improved."

To organize and implement collective mutual aid has become an important policy in the mass production movement. With regard to cooperatives, as early as more than ten years ago, the CCP had various types of cooperative organizations in the Soviet Area of ​​Jiangxi, including farming teams or labor cooperatives, consumption and transportation cooperatives.After the Red Army marched to northern Shaanxi, they established cooperatives for consumption and transportation.However, these cooperatives are almost all organized and led by party and government cadres, and they have actually become part of government agencies, and the effect is not very satisfactory.

Since the early 1940s, in order to raise funds and invigorate the economy, the Party Central Committee has actively advocated the establishment of cooperatives with individual shares.This new type of cooperative has changed the practice of relying solely on administrative orders and implemented economic management. These cooperatives are characterized by: (1) Implement "group office assistance" to absorb funds from multiple parties.The source of funds mainly depends on the absorption of hot money, individual shares, and unit investment is also welcome.The profits obtained, in addition to extracting a certain amount of accumulation and handing over tasks, regularly distribute dividends according to the amount of share capital.

(2) Rely on mass management and democratically elect leaders.The constitution stipulates: "Every member and shareholder engaged in handicraft and agricultural production is a member." The members' meeting is the highest authority, and the meeting is held every six months.During the closing period of the General Assembly, there is a democratically elected management board and a co-op director, the Prime Minister Social Affairs. (3) To expand business, both agriculture, industry and commerce are involved.Cooperatives undertake the dual tasks of organizing the production and consumption of members and supplying production supplies.

(4) Promoting individual production in various ways, combining supply and marketing. Such cooperatives not only promote the development of production, but also increase personal income. Among the peasants, there are mainly agricultural production cooperations of collective mutual assistance.At that time, China's rural areas were poor and backward, with a lack of production tools and many droughts and floods. Individual farmers were unable to resist, and farmers had a strong desire for production cooperation. Farmers in northern Shaanxi used to have two basic forms of mutual assistance, namely "changing jobs" and "working together".

"Changing work" is a form of cooperative labor among farmers who own land. Usually, during the busy farming season, two or three farm families exchange labor, and even exchange livestock and tools.This relies on personal relationships, often limited to relatives. "Zagong" refers to collective hired labor in organized labor.Usually 10 to 12 farmers are organized by the foreman and are employed together. Mao Zedong pointed out that the previous cooperative labor movement organized by higher authorities did not achieve satisfactory results, and did not mobilize the peasant masses to participate widely; while the mutual aid forms of "changing jobs" and "working together" relied on personal relationships and exploited factors in the other.We must eliminate the bad features of traditional cooperation, and improve labor efficiency by organizing new small mutual aid groups.The development of the cooperative economy depends on the active participation of all the people. "Those who have manpower contribute manpower, those who have animal power produce animal power, those who have more produce more, and those who have less produce less, so that manpower and animal power can be adjusted. Only in this way can we not violate the farming season, Only in this way can we plow the land, plant seeds, weed and harvest in time.” Beginning in early 1943, the party organized agricultural mutual aid groups on an unprecedented scale.According to government reports, before the spring plowing in 1943, 15% of the 300,000 workers in the Border Region organized mutual aid groups.By summer, 25% to 40% of the labor force in various places participated in mutual aid groups. Farm work such as weeding is generally done by mutual aid groups, because this kind of work is not as complicated as exchanging livestock and is particularly easy to organize. In 1944, 50% to 75% of farmers in the border areas participated in mutual aid activities. In 1945, the period of contraction and consolidation of mutual aid groups, the number of people participating in mutual aid groups accounted for 28% to 45%. That is to say, from 1943 to 1945, thousands of peasants in the border areas used cooperative methods to adjust their economic life. In order to do a good job in mutual aid in agricultural production, the party has given timely guidance, such as emphasizing that labor mutual aid organizations must be established on the basis of the voluntariness of the masses, and prevent any form of forced orders or formalism of "copying lists".Point out that if some people who do not understand the benefits of mutual assistance are forced to be organized into a "work change" or "job labor" team, or make a list, thinking that everything will be fine, then not only will the production efficiency and labor mood not be improved, but will be reversed. will decrease. The party also pointed out that the scale of mutual aid units should not be blindly expanded, such as the "work change" team should not use townships and administrative villages as production units.Because the organization is huge, it will waste manpower and time. In order to attract the masses to participate and achieve good results, it is required that the leaders of labor mutual aid must be carefully selected by the masses, and those who have prestige among the masses, are active in production, and have methods are publicly selected to lead. We have also explored a set of experience in income distribution.In the past, labor remuneration was calculated on the basis of labor days without considering technology and production capacity.In order to encourage rich peasants who own land and livestock to join the mutual aid group, the mutual aid group calculates income based on the dual basis of labor and investment in land, livestock and tools, which encourages both rich and poor peasants and increases their enthusiasm for production , which fully embodies the principle of voluntariness and mutual benefit. On this basis, a new type of "changing jobs" group is formed. With the leadership of the public, it breaks through the restrictions of friends and relatives to develop members, and implements the complementarity of manpower and animal power. Not only "changing jobs" during the farming and harvest seasons, but also during Play an increasingly important role in the whole process of production. However, in the changed form of "job work", there is no exploitation by foremen and employers, and they often work for themselves, and the enthusiasm of farmers for production is unprecedentedly high.Moreover, even the poor can get loans from cooperatives or the government, and hire "workers" to farm, which is conducive to economic development. In short, the organization of mutual aid groups not only adjusted the traditional basic economic structure with one household as the production unit, created conditions for the development of the border economy, but also created conditions for the transformation of rural society and rural politics. On November 29, 1943, Mao Zedong gave a speech in honor of the Labor Heroes Conference of the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, pointing out: To organize means to mobilize all the forces of the common people, all the forces of the military, government agencies and schools, all the labor force and semi labor force of all men, women, old and young, as long as possible, and organize them into a large labor force for production. In the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, in addition to agricultural production cooperatives, there are transportation cooperatives, handicraft cooperatives and comprehensive cooperatives that combine production, consumption, transportation and credit.Mao Zedong said: "We have these four kinds of cooperatives for the people, and the cooperatives for collective labor in military organs and schools, and we can organize the power of the masses into a labor force. This is the only way for the people to be liberated, and the only way for the people to become rich from poverty , is also the only way to victory in the War of Resistance.”