Changes under Mao: 1949-1963

Learning Objectives:

To examine how the agricultural and industrial reforms altered China

between 1949-1957

Key Words:

Common Programme

Agrarian Reform Law

Peoples Courts

Speak Bitterness Meetings

Mutual Aid Teams

Co-Operatives

Collectives

Five Year Plan

What problems did Mao & the CCP face in 1949?

Starter: Discuss with the people on your table the

Economic, Social, Political and Foreign issues that Mao

would have faced after the end of the civil war?

Mao’s Problems in

1949

Economic?Industrial? Agricultural?

Political?

Foreign?

Social?

How did the communist flag differ from the

Republican flag?

A new start meant

a new flag for

China and the

CCP

The

Party

workers

peasants

Lower

middle

class

‘patriotic’capitalists

Agricultural ReformLO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Stealing of harvests

Forcible conscription of

peasants for military service

Massive numbers

of refugees

Much destruction and use of terror.

Maurding armies in the Japanes and Civil Wars had

caused widespread destruction

What caused the reduction in agricultural

productivity during the wars?

We communists are now in power.

But China is weak after 20 years of

war and civil war. We need to build

up China’s strength to protect its

borders from our enemies.

We need a strong army!

But most of our factories

have been destroyed and

China has few arms

factories anyway.

We can buy weapons from

our friends the Russians!

China has few resources available

to sell to the Russians to buy

weapons. We also need to buy

machines for our factories.

China has lots of

land and millions

of peasants. We

will sell FOOD!

The purpose of

agricultural reform?

• In 1950 Mao introduced an

Agrarian Reform Law. He

sent CCP workers into each

village to review social

class of each person.

• They took the land from

landlords and shared it out

amongst village peasants

(2.5 acres each).

• They also got peasants to

put landlords on trial in so-

called ‘People’s Courts’.

How did agriculture

change?

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• At these trials (Speak Bitterness

Meetings) the landlords were

accused of charging high rents

or mistreating their tenants

(Review poster on pg.30 – Qu.C)

• Some were let off, but many

landlords were imprisoned or

executed. Party workers set up

the courts but peasants ran

them. Why?

• Between 700,000 – 3 million

landlords were executed. This

further increased support and

faith in Mao. Why?

Peoples Courts?

Mao wanted the executions

to have maximum impact

by involving peasants in the

killing and having

executions in public:

“Peasants who killed with

their bare hands the

landlords who oppressed

them were wedded to the

new revolutionary order in a

way that passive spectators could never be.”

From P. Short, Mao: A Life,

1999

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• Land reform made Mao

popular but in the short-term it

only decreased productivity.

WHY?

• Mao eventually planned to

‘collectivise’ farming to raise

productivity, but this would

only anger peasants who has

just won their own land.

• The population was growing

and to avoid famine, Mao

slowly tried to persuade

peasants to work together to

raise food production.

Population ↑, Food

Production ↓ = ?

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• His first step was to introduce

Mutual Aid Teams.

• Peasants worked on each

other’s land, fertilising, killing

pests or harvesting so that each

family’s plot would become

more productive.

• Government supplied extra

fertiliser & tools to reward

hardworking families but it did

not raise productivity enough.

• Fear that peasants would

become a new class society

concerned with profits.

Mutual Aid Teams?

How effective do you feel

this would be?

“In 1951 we set up a Mutual Aid Team. The work went

well, but there were lots of

quarrels about whose land

should be worked on first. It

was difficult to solve all

these problems. Some said

‘Why should his field be

taken first? I’ve got a bigger crop.’ Whatever we did this went on. So we then began

to talk about forming a

peasant’s co-operative.”

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• From 1953, Mao encouraged

peasants to form co-

operatives.

• This meant land was jointly

owned so one large crop

could be grown efficiently.

Resources could be pooled

to buy equipment, fertilisers &

seeds.

• Some peasants opposed this

(Why?) but by 1955, over 90%

of China’s peasants

belonged to co-operatives.

The Co-OperativesLO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

1955 - The ‘co-operatives’ were

gathered into larger units called

‘collectives’, consisting of 200-300

families (ie. several villages). By 1956

95% of peasants were in collectives.

The Communist

Party further

increased its control over the

peasants by:

- All peasant land had to be handed

over to the collective.

- Private ownership, except for small

garden plots, ceased to exist.

- Peasants had to give up the title

deeds to their land, surrender their

animals

- Families now received a wage and

were no longer paid a rent for use of

their land.

- Peasants were allowed to keep only

a few small square metres of land for

growing vegetables, etc.

The Collectives

Qu. D – Pg. 33

f

0

50

100

150

200

250

1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957

Food Production in China: Billions of Kg of Food Produced 1949-1957

1950 -Agrarian

Land Reform

1951 –Mutual

Aid Teams set up

1953 – All peasants

encourage to join co-operatives

1957 – Over 90% of peasants now in

co-operatives

How did Agriculture

Change?

Use your text books (pg.30-33) and your own knowledge

to answer the below questions.

1. What was Chinese farming like before 1949?

2. Why did Mao introduce the Peoples Courts?

3. How did farming methods change?

4. What were the aims of the PRC in introducing Co-

operatives?

5. Did peasants attitudes to reforms change over time?

6. Were the changes in farming successful?

7. Did this achieve the stated purpose of the Common

Programme?

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Industrial ReformLO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

How did Industry

Change?

• When the CCP

took over the

economy was in

ruins. Industry

had been

destroyed and

inflation was over

1000%.

• Mao introduced

a series of

measures to deal

with this chaos:

1. Mao ordered prices and wages to be

fixed at a low rate. He punished black

marketeers severely. Inflation was down to

15% within a year.

2. He increased the taxes paid by business

and in 1953 took over all businesses.

Government planned and organised what

should be produced.

3. He took over private banks and

introduced the ‘People’s Bank’ in 1951 and

a new currency the Yuan introduced. This

helped to stabilise the currency.

4. Railway links were repaired and taken over

by government so that industries could be

supplied with coal.

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• By 1953 the economy had

stabilised and Mao began

the first 5 Year Plan.

• With the help of the USSR he

began an ambitious

programme to build new

industries.

• Thousands of Russian

scientists and engineers

supervised millions of

Chinese on over 700 major

projects.

The Five Year Plan 1953-

1957

What does the above

poster tell us?

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Nanjing Bridge over the Yangzi River

Steel -bridge spars

Girders –Steel

Steel -Deiselengine

Steel –railway lines

Steel -pipes

Iron -Railings

Steel - Motor Vehicles

Iron –lamp posts

Ships

IRON COAL CEMENT OIL RUBBER

Why did Mao want to develop

Heavy Industries first?

LO: To examine how the agricultural and industrial reforms altered China between 1949-1957

The idea for Five Year Plans was borrowed from Stalin’s Russia.

It involved the ideas of:

• NATIONALISATION - Private businesses and industries are

taken over and run by the national government – state

control.

• CENTRAL PLANNING - All decisions about the economy are

decided by the central [national] government.

• TARGETS / QUOTAS - To increase output the government sets

production ‘targets’ which have to be met within a 5 year

time span.

• INCENTIVES - To encourage workers [and supervisors] to

work harder to reach the targets set, ‘incentives’ are

offered eg. bigger food ration, better apartment, better

schooling for their children.

How was the 5 Year Plan

organised?

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

• The plan achieved

astounding results. Motivated

Chinese workers surpassed all

the targets.

• In five years, China was criss-

crossed with railways which

moved vital goods over vast

distances.

• The population of cities

soared as peasants moved to

the jobs created in the new

industries.

The Five Year Plan 1953-

1957

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Production figures

before the start of

the 1st Five Year

Plan.

Expected production figures

at end of 1st Five Year Plan.

Compare 1957 figures with

1952 figures.

SS

S

F???F???S

Were these

failures?

How successful was the first

Five Year Plan?

LO: To examine how the agricultural and industrial reforms altered China between 1949-1957

• PRIDE - in helping to build a strong, modern and

industrialised China with a 9% growth rate.

• CONCERN - due to increasing shortages both of food and

luxury and consumer goods. Why were there shortages?

• FOOD - Most surplus farm produce was being sent overseas

to buy machinery for China’s industries.

• LUXURY AND CONSUMER GOODS - The Chinese economy

was focused on developing heavy industries, there were

few resources available for consumer products - soap,

clothing, etc.

• CONCERN - movement of peasants from countryside into

the cities to work in the new industries. More mouths had to

be fed. (1949-57 went from 57 to 100 million)

The Five Year Plan 1953-

1957

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Use your text books (pg.30-33) and your own knowledge to answer

the below questions.

The Five Year Plan 1953-

1957

Reasons for the

plan

Industries

Success and

failures

Soviet Help

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957

Review Pgs. 34-37 in Brooman and the associated website in

the workbook. Complete the questions in the workbook from

there.

Homework: The Great

Leap Forward

LO: To examine how

the agricultural and

industrial reforms

altered China

between 1949-1957