Name: Tingyi Li
Instructor: Erin McDonald
Paper rough draft
Topic: Great Leap Forward The Great Leap Forward was a socioeconomic plan held from 1958 to 1961 by Communist party of China. As a result of successful economic reconstruction that had taken place in the early 1950s, the First Five Year Plan, Mao Zedong wanted to launch the second Five Year Plan, which was the Great Leap Forward. It was aimed to change China’s agrarian economy into an industrialized and socialist society. Mao had a vision of surpassing the Soviet Union and the United States in a short period of time. The two primary tasks that Mao thought was the most important were industry and agriculture. In order to allow this plan take in action, Mao created
However because Mao continually increased the quota due to early bountiful yield of production, the communes started to run out of materials for producing steels. As a solution, they began to melt down scraps, farming tools and utensils. The mixture of impure metals made the steel too brittle to be used in construction, so many construction of buildings did not last long. If the communes lacked machinery, the workers used their bare hands. Thousands of workers were injured after long time work. Some peasants were so tired that fell asleep at their
It created a large undernourished population during these three years. Malnutrition and exposure to famine-related disease affected the health of the survivors. In the article, The long-term health and economic consequences of the 1959–1961 famine in China, the author and his research group used a cross section sample of Chinese rural people born between 1954 and 1967 to estimate what extent the attained height of rural cohorts in adulthood was reduced by the exposure to famine in their early childhood, and how the resulting adverse health consequences impaired their labor supply behavior. (p.s. also will be talked about more in detail.) In Heinan, a province, committed the worst crimes of armed robbery, rape and murder during the Great Leap Forward. At same period of time, Frank Dikötter estimates that at least 2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death and 1 to 3 million committed suicide. (Dikötter, 2010. pp.298 & 304) The Great Leap also led to a great economic crisis. In 1959 and 1960, the gross value of agricultural output dropped by 12% and 26%, respectively. Since the diet of Chinese is mainly grains, the major calories and protein intakes are from the grains. Lack of food supply caused Malnutrition. Two other measurements that indicated food shortage in China were 1) per capita grain availability, 2) per capita grain output. (p.s. will be talked about later) The great Leap also caused huge
Following the Chinese Revolution of 1949, China’s economy was in ruin. The new leader, Mao Zedong, was responsible for pulling the economy out of the economic depression. The problems he faced included the low gross domestic product, high inflation, high unemployment, and high prices on goods. In order to solve these issues, Mao sought to follow a more Marxist model, similar to that of the Soviet Union. This was to use government intervention to develop industry in China. In Jan Wong’s Red China Blues, discusses Maoism and how Mao’s policies changed China’s economy for the worse. While some of Mao’s early domestic policies had some positive effects on China’s economy, many of his later policies caused China’s economy to regress.
One direct effect of poverty during the Great Famine was homelessness. “The total number of people who had to leave their property was around a half million” (Kinealy Calamity 218). Those who could not afford to pay rent to their landlords were evicted and had their homes destroyed (Kinealy Calamity 190). These people often resorted to “begging in the streets, wandering from house to house, or burrowing in bogs or behind ditches, till broken down by privation and exposure to the elements [such as cold and disease], they seek the workhouse, or die by the roadside” (Litton 98). Public ass...
William Hinton, a US born member of a Chinese Communist land reform task force in 1948, noted that the peasants were challenging the landlords and money lenders in regards to overcharges and restoration of lands and property seized in default of debts (Doc 4). This was due to the newly found confidence in themselves through the defeat of the Japanese. Although Hinton was born into the communist party, his recount of the actions he saw concerning the peasants was simply from a look from the outside in. He personally did not experience this sudden upsurge of challenges, which gives the public a view of what the communist party thought of what looked like a move towards social equality. Although Hinton’s recount may not have been thoroughly verified, the communist party did indeed aid in fueling what was known as a struggle meeting, where Chinese peasants humiliated and tortured landlords, as seen in the picture, organized by the Communist Party as part of the land reform process, of a group of peasants at a meeting where in the center a woman is with her former landlord (Doc 7). Alongside the destruction of the landowning infrastructure that was previously followed, the Communist party also aided the peasants in a form of social reform. One important law that granted specifically women more freedom in their social life was the creation of the Marriage Law of the People’s Republic of China in 1950, where it states that the “supremacy of man over woman, and in disregard of the interest of the children, is abolished” (Doc 5). The newly introduced concepts of free choice in partners, abortion, and monogamy that derived from this law changed the societal position on women and peasants which greatly expresses the amount of new social mobility
Meng, Xin, and Nancy Qian. The Institutional Causes of China's Great Famine, 1959-61. Cambridge, Mass: National Bureau of Economic Research, 2010.
The working conditions at the time for the majority of laborers was deplorable. Businessmen would take advantage of the laborers and force them to work long hours with severely little
Instead, they were kicked out of their job. If a machine caught fire, they didn’t have safety measures such as fire drills or emergency exits that make the exit of the building such an easy task. Most food factories, didn’t force their employees to wear gloves, masks and hair nets while they were working and manipulating the products. This lack of hygiene measures brought a large amount of diseases that easily spread out around the country through the food these factories sold. Sometimes customers could find hair or even eat meat where someone had sneezed on it.
The working class faced conditions in the factory that wealthier skill workers did not have deal with. These men were not in a comfortable financial situation at home, and could not find comfort in hazardous working conditions with the dangerous machines they had to operate. Workers were harmed daily and among these injured employees were children (Shi 62). Many of these children were as young as nine years old, and due to financial reasons their families sent them away to work in workshops, mines, and even in factories surrounded by dangerous machinery. Realistically, these children were doomed to working in a factory for their entire lives. They did not attended school and worked to help provide for their families. With no education, they would not be able to find a more prestigious job with higher pay. The waged for factory workers were low, but they were not always guaranteed. The Knights of Labor pushed for a federal law that would force employers to “pay employees weekly, in full, for labor performed during the preceding week” (Shi 62). These people were only working in harmful conditions to survive but were not guaranteed enough money to feed their families. Charity handouts did not necessarily help feed a poor family, but aimed to “... produce most beneficial results to [the] community” (Shi 60). This meant that the wealthy didn’t directly give citizens money, but
China's Economy and Society in the Late 1940's and 1950's. In 1945, the war with Japan ended. It left China's economy and society in a ruins. The country is divided into two.
One of Mao Zedong’s motivations for beginning the Cultural Revolution was his view that a cutting-edge bureaucratic ruling class had surfaced because of the centralized authoritarian nature of the political system, which had little hope for popular participation in the process of economic development (The Chinese Cultural Revolution revisited). The motivations of Fidel Castro, on the other hand, were different in that he wanted all people of all classes to be equal. The notion that the poverty-stricken could live a life equal to all other humans was an immense sense of happiness and alteration. In China, Mao Zedong developed many things to entice people.
Many farmers and craftsmen left rural areas, and moved to cities to work as an industrial worker. While many farmers and craftsmen left rural areas the city 's population had doubled. There was also improved medical knowledge which lead to the conclusion that less people died during their childhood and the average length of life was much longer than in the past. When the new industrial life started, major changes came about for industrial workers. Most of the workers weren’t to pleased about the changes. The workers couldn’t do as they pleased, they had to abide by the policy of the factories and textiles. The new industrial workers had to work long hours, they also had to in work the same pace as the machine that they were operating. The longer hours and hard work made the workers suffer severely, the women and children suffered the
While in China a similar problem became evident, the farmers of China began to notice the deterioration of agriculture and while they had no money because the lack of food they were also being pushed off their lands by the Qing (Bulliet, Crossley, Hedrick, Hirsch, Johnson, and Northrup).... ... middle of paper ... ... Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2007.
The second major movement began in 1958 and lasted through 1959. It was the "Great Leap Forward." This movement was one of the most destructive to China. It was a movement that w...
This essay has critically analysed and examined the effect of Communism on the Chinese Society during the period of 1946-1964. The overall conclusion that can be drawn is that the Chinese Communist Party managed to defeat the Kuomintang (Nationalist) Party and achieve victory in the Civil War, in spite of alienation by the Soviet Union and opposition from the U.S. This was primarily because of the superior military strategy employed by the Communists and the economic and political reforms introduced by this party which brought more equality to the peasants in the form of land ownership and better public services. This increased China’s production and manufacturing which not only boosted the country’s economy but also provided a more sustainable supply of food, goods and services for the Chinese people.
... then five more, one after another… they allowed themselves to eat those bodies… They said, ‘it was the great unbearable famine that did it.’” The struggle to find food was real. It was a heavy burden for people to bear. The need to stay a live became a daily struggle many civilian and soldiers.
Industrialization caused population migration from rural areas to urban areas. Cities expanded rapidly to provide homes for workers being employed in the factories. Workers faced harsh conditions everywhere. Living conditions were cramped, unsafe and unclean. Men, women and children labored long hours for minimal wages in dangerous conditions and no job security. The working class was financially and physically unprotected by the government as the middle and upper class grew wealthier and more powerful. (Riane Eisler (2007)).