State and Peasant in Contemporary China: the Politics of Grain Procurement.

Abstract

The state grain extraction process in the Chinese countryside was a major source of political contention from 1955 to 1978. The complex interplay among state and local officials and peasants in the non-market, bureaucratic system of Chinese agriculture replaced the traditional struggle among state, gentry, and peasant. The state created an alleged "surplus" at its comm and by limiting the portion of the harvest which teams and the individual peasants legally retained. In theory, the extractive process was designed to operate harmoniously, with the state setting reasonable grain delivery quotas which the peasants voluntarily pledged to meet. In reality, the process was conflict-ridden, and induced clientilist politics. The state imposed high quotas, and local cadres and peasants reduced their burden through the hiding of production, falsification of reports, underreporting of productive capacity, and cultivation of pliable patrons at higher levels. Since local leaders and peasants diverted grain from the state's coffers, the state established a local reserve system to regulate the use of excess grain it failed to extract. The evolution of this system illustrates the local conflicts over grain. The state stipulated that the reserves were to be used for welfare, national defense, and emergency relief purposes. Subverting these objectives, local cadres treated the reserves as a cushion against the excessive dem and s pressing upon them from above and below. The peasants considered the reserves as a slush fund which cadres abused and which inadequately benefited them. Rather than direct intervention, the state primarily relied on reporting requirements and routine investigations by commune and brigade officials to deter team officials from increasing their share of the harvest. These mechanisms were not totally effective. The monitored team leaders and the brigade cadres who undertook the monitoring were all local peasants and frequently were close friends, which facilitated their collusion against the state or against peasants whom they disliked. Local level cadres simultaneously were agents of the state, representatives of their collective units, and individual political actors. Their conflicting interests and obligations as well as personal considerations shaped their political behavior and generated a grain extraction system which was politically costly and subject to abuse. This helps explain why the state's share of the harvest declined from 1955 to 1978 and why the state sought to reform the extractive process and the local granary system after 1978.