Poor and lower-middle peasants
Poor and lower-middle peasants (simplified Chinese: 贫下中农; traditional Chinese: 貧下中農; pinyin: pín xià-zhōng nóng) include Poor peasants and Lower-middle peasants. This term was first used by Mao Zedong in 1955.[1]
During the early years of the People's Republic, people in China were classified into different classes according to their economic conditions. The class system played a significant role in their lives. In the countryside, the members of the classes of Poor and Lower-middle peasants were the majority. They belonged to the Five Red Categories and were favored and supported by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).[2]
Poor peasants
[edit]Poor peasants (Chinese: 贫农) owned limited or no land and incomplete tools. Generally, they rented land for farming and were subject to land rent, debt interest, and a small amount of hired labor.[2]
Lower-middle peasants
[edit]Middle peasants normally owned small plots of land and had tools, which allowed them to be somewhat self-sufficient. They generally neither hired workers people nor worked for others.
Lower-middle peasants (Chinese: 下中农) are the poorer part of this group. Some supplemented their income by renting land or worked as part-time laborers.[2]
Five red categories
[edit]The Five Red Categories (Chinese: 红五类; pinyin: Hóngwǔlèi) during the Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) were social classes favored by the CCP, as opposed to the Five Black Categories that were classified as potential threats. In the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Red Guards were allowed to come only from the Five Red Categories, which included:
- Poor and lower-middle peasants (Chinese: 贫下中农)
- Workers (Chinese: 工人)
- Revolutionary soldiers (Chinese: 革命军人) within the People's Liberation Army
- Revolutionary cadres (Chinese: 革命干部)[3][4] who are active members of the CCP in good standing
- Revolutionary martyrs (Chinese: 革命烈士), including immediate family, children, grandchildren (if any) and relatives of deceased CCP members and PLA service personnel killed in action[3][5]
Down to the countryside movement
[edit]The Down to the Countryside Movement was a policy instituted in the People's Republic of China between mid-1950s and 1978. In total, approximately 17 million youths were sent to mountainous areas or farming villages for re-education by the poor and lower-middle peasants there.[6]
Many fresh high school graduates, the so-called sent-down youth, were forced out of the cities and effectively exiled to remote areas of China. Many of them lived there for years. Some commentators considered these people, many of whom lost the opportunity to attend university, "China's Lost Generation". CCP general secretary Xi Jinping was among the sent-down youth..[7][8]
Poor and lower-middle peasants' association
[edit]The Chinese National Poor and Lower-Middle Peasants' Association (Chinese: 中华全国贫下中农协会) was created in 1964 as a successor of Chinese Peasants' Association, and dissolved de facto in 1986.[9][10]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Mao (1955). "RELY ON PARTY AND LEAGUE MEMBERS AND POOR AND LOWER-MIDDLE PEASANTS IN THE CO-OPERATIVE TRANSFORMATION OF AGRICULTURE".
- ^ a b c State Council (政务院), 新华网 (1950). "Decision of the Government Affairs Council on Classification of Rural Classes (政务院关于划分农村阶级成分的决定)".
- ^ a b Cao, Pei. "文革中的我和我家". Chinese University of Hong Kong. Retrieved 2020-06-30.
- ^ Luo, Weinian (2016-05-16). 红墙: 文革五十周年纪实文集 (in Chinese). 世界华语出版社. ISBN 978-1-940266-10-7.
- ^ Yang, Jishen (2017-07-04). 天地翻覆: 中国文化大革命历史 (in Chinese). 天地图书.
- ^ Ebrey, Patricia Buckley (2005). China: A Cultural, Social, and Political History (1st ed.). Wadsworth Publishing. p. 294. ISBN 978-0618133871.
- ^ McLaren, Anne (1979). "The Educated Youth Return: The Poster Campaign in Shanghai from November 1978 to March 1979". The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs. 2 (2): 1–20. doi:10.2307/2158728. ISSN 0156-7365. JSTOR 2158728. S2CID 131104421.
- ^ Thornber, Karen Laura (2012). Ecoambiguity: Environmental Crises and East Asian Literatures (e-book). Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. p. 147. doi:10.3998/mpub.3867115. hdl:2027/fulcrum.qn59q491p. ISBN 978-0-472-11806-9. Retrieved 2020-07-29.
Some were sent to rural villages to join production teams and establish residence (chadui luohu). These individuals did not significantly change environments.
- ^ "中共中央关于印发《中华人民共和国贫农下中农协会组织条例（草案）》的指示". 建国以来重要文献选编·第十八册. Retrieved 2014-11-23.
- ^ 郭圣福 (2005). "贫下中农协会述论". 中共党史研究. 06: 89–96.