Pub Date : 2020-09-21DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01702001
Philip C. C. Huang
Today, thirty-five years after this author first wrote about involution, and at a time when that term and concept have come to be commonly used by many people, this article revisits that term to explain more clearly and succinctly its meaning and also to add to it contributions made by other scholars as well as by this author’s own further research, including new research on the de-involution of the past few decades in China, and analyses of the mechanisms and theoretical logics contained therein. Because China’s peasant economy has been the longest-lasting and largest in the world, perhaps also the most highly involuted, and its recent changes, including de-involution, make up the most dramatic example of the modernization of a peasant economy, it serves to explain most clearly the principles and mechanisms of change, and shows just how different those are from the Western historical experience of transition from feudalism to capitalism. Furthermore, peasant economy, not just in China but also in many other developing countries, has been the source most recently of the rise globally of an enormous informal economy—of labor that has little or no legal protection or benefits, according to the definition of the International Labor Organization—now reaching one-half to three-quarters of all urban employment in many developing countries, and more in China than anywhere else. That too is directly connected to the peasant economy and its background of involution and de-involution. At the moment, China’s future direction on this matter is at once full of uncertainties and of exciting promises.
{"title":"The Theory of Peasant Economy and Involution and De-involution","authors":"Philip C. C. Huang","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01702001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01702001","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Today, thirty-five years after this author first wrote about involution, and at a time when that term and concept have come to be commonly used by many people, this article revisits that term to explain more clearly and succinctly its meaning and also to add to it contributions made by other scholars as well as by this author’s own further research, including new research on the de-involution of the past few decades in China, and analyses of the mechanisms and theoretical logics contained therein. Because China’s peasant economy has been the longest-lasting and largest in the world, perhaps also the most highly involuted, and its recent changes, including de-involution, make up the most dramatic example of the modernization of a peasant economy, it serves to explain most clearly the principles and mechanisms of change, and shows just how different those are from the Western historical experience of transition from feudalism to capitalism. Furthermore, peasant economy, not just in China but also in many other developing countries, has been the source most recently of the rise globally of an enormous informal economy—of labor that has little or no legal protection or benefits, according to the definition of the International Labor Organization—now reaching one-half to three-quarters of all urban employment in many developing countries, and more in China than anywhere else. That too is directly connected to the peasant economy and its background of involution and de-involution. At the moment, China’s future direction on this matter is at once full of uncertainties and of exciting promises.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"173-193"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-09-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46049384","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-09-21DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01702003
Aiming Zhang
Mixed occupations are a prominent feature of China’s smallholder peasant economy. For poor peasant households with little land, working in multiple occupations is a survival strategy that represents a more rational or efficient allocation of household labor. In central Shanxi in the 1930s and 1940s, the growth of the commercial economy encouraged peasant households to dedicate their surplus labor to small-scale commercial activities (including itinerant trade and shopkeeping apprenticeship), thus leading to the formation of a mixed “part-peasant, part-trader” 半耕半商 economy. This economy was characterized by the following practices: First, many young, able-bodied men farmed during the busy seasons and peddled goods in the slack seasons. Second, other able-bodied men engaged in off-farm commercial activities year-round, while female and elderly dependents did the farming—often with the help of relatives and neighbors. This represented a rational gendered and intergenerational allocation of labor that undercut labor market prices to maximize household income. Third, any surplus income from commerce, after satisfying basic consumption needs, was used to purchase more land as subsistence insurance against the vagaries of the commercial economy. These mixed practices of mutually supporting agriculture and commerce developed into a robust and competitive part-peasant, part-trader economic system.
{"title":"Part-Peasant, Part-Trader: A Study of the Rural Poor in Republican Shanxi","authors":"Aiming Zhang","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01702003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01702003","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Mixed occupations are a prominent feature of China’s smallholder peasant economy. For poor peasant households with little land, working in multiple occupations is a survival strategy that represents a more rational or efficient allocation of household labor. In central Shanxi in the 1930s and 1940s, the growth of the commercial economy encouraged peasant households to dedicate their surplus labor to small-scale commercial activities (including itinerant trade and shopkeeping apprenticeship), thus leading to the formation of a mixed “part-peasant, part-trader” 半耕半商 economy. This economy was characterized by the following practices: First, many young, able-bodied men farmed during the busy seasons and peddled goods in the slack seasons. Second, other able-bodied men engaged in off-farm commercial activities year-round, while female and elderly dependents did the farming—often with the help of relatives and neighbors. This represented a rational gendered and intergenerational allocation of labor that undercut labor market prices to maximize household income. Third, any surplus income from commerce, after satisfying basic consumption needs, was used to purchase more land as subsistence insurance against the vagaries of the commercial economy. These mixed practices of mutually supporting agriculture and commerce developed into a robust and competitive part-peasant, part-trader economic system.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"262-290"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-09-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47733484","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-09-21DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01702005
Changquan Jiao, Chenxi Xu
Local fiscal autonomy has a great influence on government behavior. However, there are substantial regional gaps and hierarchical differences in local fiscal autonomy in China. On the whole, although for many years most of China’s counties have enjoyed little fiscal autonomy, counties in the east have gradually won increased autonomy. Counties in the central and western regions, however, have continued to lose fiscal autonomy. Some have even lost the most basic level and now rely on transfer payments from higher-level governments for most of their local public expenditures. County expenditures make up the majority of national expenditures. Therefore, a low level of county fiscal autonomy impedes China’s county-based fiscal system reform and has a marked impact on government behavior and local governance.
{"title":"Local Fiscal Autonomy in China: Historical Evolution and Hierarchical Differences, 1990–2014","authors":"Changquan Jiao, Chenxi Xu","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01702005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01702005","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Local fiscal autonomy has a great influence on government behavior. However, there are substantial regional gaps and hierarchical differences in local fiscal autonomy in China. On the whole, although for many years most of China’s counties have enjoyed little fiscal autonomy, counties in the east have gradually won increased autonomy. Counties in the central and western regions, however, have continued to lose fiscal autonomy. Some have even lost the most basic level and now rely on transfer payments from higher-level governments for most of their local public expenditures. County expenditures make up the majority of national expenditures. Therefore, a low level of county fiscal autonomy impedes China’s county-based fiscal system reform and has a marked impact on government behavior and local governance.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"319-348"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-09-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1163/22136746-01702005","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45606092","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701007
Jiayan Zhang
Swan Islet, located in the old course of the Yangzi River in Shishou, Hubei, central China, was chosen as a nature reserve first to conserve milu 麋鹿 (Père David’s deer) in 1987 and white-fin dolphins 白鱀豚 in 1992. The local government then built dikes to protect this area from the annual high water of the Yangzi River, which turned a considerable amount of riverside wasteland into reclaimable land attractive to the local farmers. At the same time, more land was needed to feed the fast-growing herds of milu. In the river, dolphins and fisherfolk compete for resources. Different interests have caused conflicts between the government, farmers, and fisherfolk. Conflicts between governmental bureaus has made things even more complicated. With the increasing appeal of wetland preservation, the local government added wetland preservation to its agenda and applied for financial support from upper-level governments. Attempting to lure tourists with milu—a “national treasure”—and original wetlands, the local government is hoping to promote eco-tourism and eventually to boost local economic growth, all in the name of protecting the environment.
{"title":"Economic Development in the Name of Protecting the Environment in Rural China: The Case of the Swan Islet National Nature Reserves","authors":"Jiayan Zhang","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701007","url":null,"abstract":"Swan Islet, located in the old course of the Yangzi River in Shishou, Hubei, central China, was chosen as a nature reserve first to conserve milu 麋鹿 (Père David’s deer) in 1987 and white-fin dolphins 白鱀豚 in 1992. The local government then built dikes to protect this area from the annual high water of the Yangzi River, which turned a considerable amount of riverside wasteland into reclaimable land attractive to the local farmers. At the same time, more land was needed to feed the fast-growing herds of milu. In the river, dolphins and fisherfolk compete for resources. Different interests have caused conflicts between the government, farmers, and fisherfolk. Conflicts between governmental bureaus has made things even more complicated. With the increasing appeal of wetland preservation, the local government added wetland preservation to its agenda and applied for financial support from upper-level governments. Attempting to lure tourists with milu—a “national treasure”—and original wetlands, the local government is hoping to promote eco-tourism and eventually to boost local economic growth, all in the name of protecting the environment.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"135-150"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49137125","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701002
Q. Zheng
While the overall pattern of peasant economic activities in Ding county has remained largely unchanged since the Republican years, in which farming as the major source of income was supplemented with sidelines, this article finds constant changes in the ways in which this pattern continues and in the nature of supplementary sidelines. Specifically, there have been four types of peasant households: completely farming; farming combined with sidelines; non-farming combined with sidelines; completely non-farming, with the “combined households” being the dominant type and undergoing a transition from the farming-based to the non-farming-based. The farming household-based managerial pattern currently remains and will continue to be an optimal choice in the long run.
{"title":"The Evolution and Dynamics of Managerial Economic Activities of Peasant Families: Ding County since the Republican Era","authors":"Q. Zheng","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701002","url":null,"abstract":"While the overall pattern of peasant economic activities in Ding county has remained largely unchanged since the Republican years, in which farming as the major source of income was supplemented with sidelines, this article finds constant changes in the ways in which this pattern continues and in the nature of supplementary sidelines. Specifically, there have been four types of peasant households: completely farming; farming combined with sidelines; non-farming combined with sidelines; completely non-farming, with the “combined households” being the dominant type and undergoing a transition from the farming-based to the non-farming-based. The farming household-based managerial pattern currently remains and will continue to be an optimal choice in the long run.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"26-41"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48979195","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701006
Peng Du
This article explores the process and mechanism of the politicization of the land in order to understand the operational logic of the collective land system and the deep structure of the rural political order. The actual process of land politics functions to facilitate the political integration of rural communities and reshape the mode of resource allocation between the state and the rural population. While the politicization of the land manifests the autonomy of rural collective organizations, the rights-based attributes of the land function to undermine the autonomy and disrupt the political links among the state, the collective, and rural residents, hence the depoliticization of the land. The effective governance of rural society entails more room for experiments in the rural collective land system.
{"title":"Collective Autonomy and the Politicization of the Land: The Practices of the Land System under Rural Collective Ownership","authors":"Peng Du","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701006","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the process and mechanism of the politicization of the land in order to understand the operational logic of the collective land system and the deep structure of the rural political order. The actual process of land politics functions to facilitate the political integration of rural communities and reshape the mode of resource allocation between the state and the rural population. While the politicization of the land manifests the autonomy of rural collective organizations, the rights-based attributes of the land function to undermine the autonomy and disrupt the political links among the state, the collective, and rural residents, hence the depoliticization of the land. The effective governance of rural society entails more room for experiments in the rural collective land system.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"111-134"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1163/22136746-01701006","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46107352","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701001
G. Lin
This article challenges the view that land transactions in China from the Song to the late Qing periods became increasingly marketized and effective in resource allocation. In traditional China, the land was never a commodity in the ordinary sense; it served as the very basic means of survival and production for peasants while functioning as the most critical determinant shaping the sustainability of the environment for the survival of humankind. Neither market transactions nor any means external or internal to the state were effective enough in regulating either the total demand or the total supply of the land in China and alleviating the tension in man-to-land relations. Land transactions in imperial China were very different by nature and in terms of their social and economic impact from the received wisdom in Western economic theories, which assumes the decisive roles of supply and demand in shaping market prices and the patterns of production in the commodity economy.
{"title":"Land Transaction and Its Impact on Society and Economy in Imperial China: An Exchange with “Dian and the System of Land-Rights Transaction under the Qing” by Long Denggao et al.","authors":"G. Lin","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701001","url":null,"abstract":"This article challenges the view that land transactions in China from the Song to the late Qing periods became increasingly marketized and effective in resource allocation. In traditional China, the land was never a commodity in the ordinary sense; it served as the very basic means of survival and production for peasants while functioning as the most critical determinant shaping the sustainability of the environment for the survival of humankind. Neither market transactions nor any means external or internal to the state were effective enough in regulating either the total demand or the total supply of the land in China and alleviating the tension in man-to-land relations. Land transactions in imperial China were very different by nature and in terms of their social and economic impact from the received wisdom in Western economic theories, which assumes the decisive roles of supply and demand in shaping market prices and the patterns of production in the commodity economy.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"1-25"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43002622","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701003
Huangbao Gui
Unlike past studies that have focused on the economic issues about rural collectives, this article reexamines the economic management of rural collectives by paying attention to both their economic and political attributes. Because of the land reform and the rebuilding of grassroots social structures under the leadership of the CCP, the intermediary organization connecting the state and the rural population underwent a transition from village/lineage communities (“the enlarged private”) to rural collectives (“the enlarged public”), hence the transformation of the “third realm” from the private to the public spheres at the grassroots level. The reform era since the 1980s, however, has witnessed the dual weakening of both the “enlarged private” and the “reduced public” in the third realm because of reforms in rural management and land systems. The “two-in-one” formation of state-society relations will be maintained in rural governance in the next two or three decades, which necessitates the reconstruction of the rural governance system through the rebuilding of the collective economy.
{"title":"The State, Village Communities, and Peasants: The “Third Realm” in Socialist China","authors":"Huangbao Gui","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701003","url":null,"abstract":"Unlike past studies that have focused on the economic issues about rural collectives, this article reexamines the economic management of rural collectives by paying attention to both their economic and political attributes. Because of the land reform and the rebuilding of grassroots social structures under the leadership of the CCP, the intermediary organization connecting the state and the rural population underwent a transition from village/lineage communities (“the enlarged private”) to rural collectives (“the enlarged public”), hence the transformation of the “third realm” from the private to the public spheres at the grassroots level. The reform era since the 1980s, however, has witnessed the dual weakening of both the “enlarged private” and the “reduced public” in the third realm because of reforms in rural management and land systems. The “two-in-one” formation of state-society relations will be maintained in rural governance in the next two or three decades, which necessitates the reconstruction of the rural governance system through the rebuilding of the collective economy.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"42-64"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44288723","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-05-12DOI: 10.1163/22136746-01701008
Z. Gao
Chen Zhongshi’s novel, White Deer Plain, is a complex text revealing the social, political, economic, and cultural dimensions of a community in transformation in which multiple public spaces coexist and struggle to survive. As a reinterpretation of the novel, this article examines three types of public spaces: the popular, the political, and the cultural-educational, respectively. Focusing on the forms of depiction, the inner workings of the public spaces, the overlapping between different spaces and their expansion, this article aims to delineate the trajectories of the rise and fall of such public spaces and explore their entangling and association with modernity.
{"title":"The Literary Depiction of the “Public Space”: Chen Zhongshi’s White Deer Plain Revisited","authors":"Z. Gao","doi":"10.1163/22136746-01701008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22136746-01701008","url":null,"abstract":"Chen Zhongshi’s novel, White Deer Plain, is a complex text revealing the social, political, economic, and cultural dimensions of a community in transformation in which multiple public spaces coexist and struggle to survive. As a reinterpretation of the novel, this article examines three types of public spaces: the popular, the political, and the cultural-educational, respectively. Focusing on the forms of depiction, the inner workings of the public spaces, the overlapping between different spaces and their expansion, this article aims to delineate the trajectories of the rise and fall of such public spaces and explore their entangling and association with modernity.","PeriodicalId":37171,"journal":{"name":"Rural China","volume":"17 1","pages":"151-171"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41452404","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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