Exploring one of the most dynamic and contested regions of the world, this series includes works on political, economic, cultural, and social changes in modern and contemporary Asia and the Pacific. The leading specialist on China's twentieth century peasant resistance reexamines, in bold and original ways, the question: Was the Chinese peasantry a revolutionary force? Where most scholarly attention has focused on Communist-led peasant movements, Bianco's story is one of peasant thought and action largely unmediated by modern political parties. This volume pays particular attention to the firs
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China underwent its most murderous famine between 1958 and 1962. Although a demographic transition from the countryside to the cities was in its early stage and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita was among the lowest in the world, objective conditions were far less decisive than Chinese Communist Party (CCP) policies in bringing about the famine. A development strategy copied on the Soviet model favoured quick industrialization at the expense of rural dwellers. Such novelties as people's communes, communal canteens, and backyard furnaces further aggravated the famine. Though ethnic minorities represented only 6 percent of China's population, compared to forty-seven percent in the Soviet Union, Soviet nationality policies heavily influenced those of China. Initially mild, especially for Tibetans, Chinese nationality policies became more authoritarian with the advent of the Great Leap Forward in 1958. Qinghai Tibetans resisted the closure of many monasteries; then the same policies, and famine itself, caused a more important rebellion in 1959 in Xizang (Tibet). Repression and the flight of the Dalai Lama to northern India coincided with the end of Tibet's special status in China.
Internal colonialism did not, however, aggravate the impact of famine on national minorities in China. Their rate of population growth between the first two censuses (1953 and 1982) exceeded that of Han Chinese. Among the provinces most severely affected by famine, only Qinghai was largely inhabited by ethnic minorities. Within Qinghai the same pattern prevailed as in Han populated provinces: the highest toll in famine deaths was concentrated in easily accessible grain surplus areas. The overwhelming majority of victims of the Chinese famine were Han peasants. At most, 5 percent were members of ethnic minorities, compared to eighty percent of victims in the Soviet Union in the period between 1930 and 1933.
La Révolution chinoise a maltraité ses paysans, bien qu'elle fût plus proche d'eux et mieux disposée à leur égard que les bolcheviks. La réforme agraire illustre le contraste avec la révolution bolchevique : les communistes donnent la terre des riches aux paysans, alors que les paysans russes s'en étaient emparés eux-mêmes en 1917. Cette réforme agraire n'en est pas moins une véritable révolution agraire, qui polarise une société rurale qui se percevait comme solidaire face à la ville plutôt que divisée en classes hostiles. En multipliant les micro-exploitations non viables, la réforme agraire hâte le passage aux étapes suivantes. De la collectivisation au Grand Bond en avant, celles-ci ramènent la politique agraire des révolutionnaires chinois dans le rang : ils imitent leur modèle, lors même qu'ils prétendent s'en affranchir. La marche à la collectivisation est cependant plus progressive qu'en URSS. De la collectivisation à la communisation ou mise en commun des biens dans les communes populaires, telle apparaît l'ambition du Grand Bond de 1958. Tout n'est pas utopique dans la stratégie du Grand Bond, qui s'inspire de considérations pragmatiques, à commencer par le souci de mieux utiliser une main-d'œuvre rurale surabondante. La nature du régime est largement responsable des désordres et désastres de son application, qui a provoqué une des famines les plus meurtrières de l'histoire de l'humanité. Afin de la juguler, des autorités locales et régionales introduisent des innovations qui seront systématisées après la mort de Mao. Au début des années 1980, la décollectivisation liquide l'héritage socialiste et les paysans deviennent des fermiers exploitant à leur guise la parcelle de propriété collective du village qui leur a été allouée.
The Soviet (1931-33) and Chinese (1958-62) famines were man-made catastrophes that occurred in underdeveloped states with growing populations during peacetime and affected traditional surplus areas. Both are marked by overly ambitious industrialization strategies at the expense of the rural economy in which central authorities failed to lower grain quotas once famine broke out and even increased them. The famines also had differences, notably regarding the nationality or ethnic question, which played a key role in Ukraine and was present in the Kazakh famine, but was absent in the Chinese famine. Also, Chinese Communist Party leaders, notwithstanding the cruelty of their policies, were much better disposed towards peasants than were the Soviet Bolsheviks. One cannot ascribe murderous intent on Mao's part, but rather an incoherency of policy and unwillingness to recognize and correct his errors.
