August 20, 1933

[This speech was delivered at the economic construction conference of seventeen
counties in southern Kiangsi in August 1933.]


The growing intensity of the revolutionary war makes it imperative for us
to mobilize the masses in order to launch an immediate campaign on the economic
front and undertake all possible and necessary tasks of economic construction.
Why? Because all our present efforts should be directed towards gaining victory
in the revolutionary war and, first and foremost, towards gaining complete
victory in the fight to smash the enemy's fifth "encirclement and suppression"
campaign[1] they should be directed towards securing the
material conditions which will guarantee food and other supplies for the
Red Army, towards bettering the life of the people and so stimulating their
more active participation in the revolutionary war, towards organizing the
masses on the economic front and educating them so as to provide fresh mass
strength for the war, and towards consolidating the worker-peasant alliance
and the democratic dictatorship of workers and peasants and strengthening
proletarian leadership by building up the economy. Such economic construction
is essential for the attainment of all these objectives. This must be clearly
understood by everyone engaged in revolutionary work. Some comrades have
thought it impossible to spare time for economic construction because the
revolutionary war keeps people busy enough, and they have condemned anyone
arguing for it as a "Right deviationist". In their opinion economic construction
is impossible in the midst of a revolutionary war and is possible only in
the peaceful, tranquil conditions prevailing after final victory. Comrades,
such views are wrong. Whoever holds them fails to realize that without building
up the economy it is impossible to secure the material prerequisites for
the revolutionary war, and the people will become exhausted in the course
of a long war. Just consider! The enemy is enforcing an economic blockade,
unscrupulous merchants and reactionaries are disrupting our finance and commerce,
and the trade of our Red areas with the outside is seriously hampered. Will
not the revolutionary war be seriously affected unless these difficulties
are overcome? Salt is very dear, and sometimes even unobtainable. Rice is
cheap in the autumn and winter, but it becomes terribly dear in spring and
summer. All this directly affects the life of the workers and peasants and
prevents any improvement. And does it not affect our basic line--the alliance
of workers and peasants? If the workers and peasants become dissatisfied
with their living conditions, will it not affect the expansion of our Red
Army and the mobilization of the masses for the revolutionary war? Therefore
it is utterly wrong to think that no economic construction should be undertaken
in the midst of the revolutionary war. Those who think this way often say
that everything should be subordinated to the war effort, but they fail to
understand that to dispense with economic construction would weaken the war
effort rather than subordinate everything to it. Only by extending the work
on the economic front and building the economy of the Red areas can we provide
an adequate material basis for the revolutionary war, proceed smoothly with
our military offensives and strike effective blows at the enemy's "encirclement
and suppression" campaigns; only thus can we acquire the resources to enlarge
the Red Army and push our front outwards to points thousands of li
away, so that when the circumstances prove favourable, the Red Army will
be able to attack Nanchang and Kiukiang free from all anxiety and, thus relieved
of much of the task of provisioning itself, give its undivided attention
to fighting; and only thus can we to a certain extent satisfy the material
needs of the people so that they will join the Red Army or undertake other
revolutionary tasks with even greater enthusiasm. Subordinating everything
to the war effort means just this. Among those engaged in revolutionary work
in various places, many do not yet understand the importance of economic
construction in the revolutionary war, and there are many local governments
which give little attention to discussing the problems of economic construction.
The economic departments of the local governments are not yet well organized,
and some are still without a director; in others some incompetent has been
assigned simply to kill the post. The formation of co-operatives is still
in the initial stage, and only in a few places has the work of regulating
food supplies been started. There has been no propaganda among the people
for the work of economic construction (though such propaganda is very important),
and mass enthusiasm for it has not been aroused. All this is due to the failure
to recognize the importance of economic construction. Through the discussions
at this conference and through the reports you will make when you return
to your posts, we must create mass enthusiasm for economic construction among
all government personnel and among all workers and peasants. The importance
of economic construction for the revolutionary war should be made clear to
everyone, so that they will do their best to promote the sale of economic
construction bonds, develop the co-operative movement, and set up public
granaries and storehouses for famine relief everywhere. Each county must
establish a sub-department for the regulation of food supplies, with branch
offices in important districts and market centres. On the one hand, within
our Red areas we should send grain from places with a surplus to those with
a deficit, so that it will not pile up in one place and become unobtainable
in another and its price will not be too low in one place and too high in
another; on the other hand, we should send our grain surplus out of the Red
areas in a planned way (i.e., not in unlimited quantities) and bring
in necessities from the White areas, thus avoiding exploitation by unscrupulous
merchants. We must all do our best to develop agriculture and handicrafts
and increase the output of farm implements and lime in order to ensure a
bigger crop next year, and we must restore the output of such local products
as wolfram, timber, camphor, paper, tobacco, linen, dried mushrooms and
peppermint oil to former levels, and market them in the White areas in quantity.

Judged by volume, grain ranks first among the principal outgoing commodities
in our trade with the outside areas. About three million piculs of unhusked
rice are sent out yearly in exchange for necessary consumer goods, or an
average of one picul a head of the three million population; it cannot, surely,
be less than this. But who is handling this trade? It is handled entirely
by the merchants who exploit us ruthlessly in the process. Last year they
bought unhusked rice from the peasants in Wanan and Taiho Counties at fifty
cents a picul and sold it in Kanchow for four yuan, making a sevenfold profit.
Take another instance. Every year our three million people need about nine
million yuan worth of salt and six million yuan worth of cotton cloth. Needless
to say, this fifteen million yuan trade in salt and cloth has been entirely
in the hands of the merchants; we have done nothing about it. The exploitation
by the merchants is really enormous. For instance, they go to Meihsien and
buy salt at one yuan for seven catties, and then sell it in our areas at
one yuan for twelve ounces. Is this not shocking profiteering? We can no
longer ignore such a state of affairs, and from now on we must handle this
trade ourselves. Our department of trade with outside areas must make a great
effort in this connection.

How shall we use the three million yuan from economic construction bonds?
We plan to use it in the following way. One million will be allotted for
the Red Army's war expenses, and two million will be loaned as capital to
the co-operatives, the Bureau for the Regulation of Food Supplies and the
Bureau of External Trade. Of the latter amount, the greater part will be
used for expanding our external trade and the rest for expanding production.
Our objective is not only to expand production but also to sell our products
at fair prices to the White areas and then purchase salt and cloth cheaply
for distribution among our people, so as to break the enemy's blockade and
check the merchants' exploitation. We must bring about the continued growth
of the people's economy, greatly improve the livelihood of the masses and
substantially increase our public revenue, thus laying firm material foundations
for the revolutionary war and for economic construction.

This is a great task, a great class struggle. But we should ask ourselves,
can it be accomplished in the midst of fierce fighting? I think it can. We
are not talking about building a railway to Lungyen or, for the time being,
even about building a motor road to Kanchow. We are not saying that there
should be a complete monopoly of the sale of grain, or that the government
should handle all the salt and cloth trade, valued at fifteen million yuan,
to the total exclusion of the merchants. This is not the point we are making
or what we are trying to do. What we are talking about and trying to do is
to develop agriculture and the handicrafts, and send out grain and wolfram
in exchange for salt and cloth, starting temporarily with a fund of two million
yuan plus the money invested by the people. Is there anything here that we
should not undertake, or that we cannot undertake and achieve? We have already
started this work and achieved some results. This year's autumn harvest is
between 20 and 25 per cent larger than last year's, or more than our original
estimate of a 20 per cent increase. In the handicraft industries the production
of farm implements and lime is being restored, and we are beginning to restore
wolfram production. The output of tobacco, paper and timber is recovering.
Much has been accomplished this year in the regulation of food supplies.
A start has been made on importing salt. It is on these achievements that
we base our firm belief in the possibility of further progress. Is it not
clearly wrong to say that economic construction is impossible now and has
to wait until the war is over?

It is thus clear that, at the present stage, economic construction must revolve
around our central task, the revolutionary war. Today the revolutionary war
is our central task, which economic construction should serve, centre on
and be subordinated to. It would likewise be wrong to regard economic
construction as the centre of all our present work to the neglect of the
revolutionary war, or to conduct it apart from the revolutionary war. Not
until the civil war is over will it be possible and necessary to regard economic
construction as the centre of all our work. In the midst of a civil war,
it is sheer delusion to try to carry out such peace-time economic construction
as can and should be done in the future but not at present. The tasks for
the present are those urgently demanded by the war. Every one of them should
serve the war; none is a peace-time undertaking separate from the war. If
any comrade entertains the idea of carrying out economic construction apart
from the war, he should correct this mistake at once.

It will be impossible to get a rapid campaign going on the economic front
without a correct style of leadership and correct methods of work. This,
too, presents an important problem which this conference must solve. For
the comrades here will have a great deal to do as soon as they return, and
will have to give guidance to the many people who will be working with them.
In particular, the comrades who are working at the township and city levels
and in the co-operatives, the food departments, the trade departments and
the purchasing offices, are personally engaged in the practical work of
mobilizing the people to organize co-operatives, regulating and transporting
food supplies, and managing our trade with the outside areas. If their style
of leadership is wrong and if they do not employ correct and efficient methods,
the work will be immediately affected, we shall fail to win mass support
for the various tasks, and during the coming autumn and winter and next spring
and summer we shall be unable to carry out the whole of the Central Government's
plan for economic construction. For these reasons I want to direct our comrades'
attention to the following.


Firstly, mobilize the masses by various organizational means. In the first
place, comrades on the presidiums and in the economic and finance departments
of the government bodies at all levels must regularly put on their agenda
and discuss, supervise and check up on such items of work as the sale of
bonds, the formation of co-operatives, the regulation of food supplies and
the promotion of production and trade. Next, the mass organizations, chiefly
the trade unions and poor peasant leagues, must be moved into action. The
trade unions should mobilize all their members to join these economic struggles.
The poor peasant leagues are powerful bases for mobilizing the masses to
build up co-operatives and subscribe to bonds, and they should be given vigorous
leadership by district and township governments. Furthermore, we must conduct
propaganda for economic construction at village or household meetings, explaining
clearly how it is related to the revolutionary war and discussing in the
most practical terms how to improve the livelihood of the masses and increase
our strength for the struggle. We should appeal to the people to subscribe
to bonds, develop co-operatives, regulate food supplies, consolidate finances
and promote trade; we should call upon them to fight for these slogans and
should heighten their enthusiasm. Our objectives cannot be attained unless
we use various organizational means to mobilize the masses and conduct propaganda
among them in the manner described, that is to say, unless the presidiums
and the economic and finance departments of the government bodies at all
levels actively attend to discussing and checking up on the work of economic
construction, unless they spur the mass organizations into action and hold
mass propaganda meetings.

Secondly, we must not be bureaucratic in our methods of mobilizing the masses.
Bureaucratic leadership cannot be tolerated in economic construction any
more than in any other branch of our revolutionary work. The ugly evil of
bureaucracy, which no comrade likes, must be thrown into the cesspit. The
methods which all comrades should prefer are those that appeal to the masses,
i.e., those which are welcomed by all workers and peasants. One
manifestation of bureaucracy is slacking at work due to indifference or
perfunctoriness. We must wage a stern struggle against this phenomenon.
Commandism is another manifestation. To all appearances, persons given to
commandism are not slackers; they give the impression of being hard workers.
But in fact co-operatives set up by commandist methods will not succeed,
and even if they appear to grow for a time, they cannot be consolidated.
In the end the masses will lose faith in them, which will hamper their
development. To push the sales of bonds in a commandist way and impose arbitrary
quotas, regardless of whether people understand what the bonds are for and
of how much they can afford, will ultimately arouse the people's displeasure
and make it impossible to achieve good sales. We must reject commandism;
what we need is energetic propaganda to convince the masses, and we should
develop the co-operatives, promote the sales of bonds and do all the work
of economic mobilization in accordance with the actual conditions and the
real feelings of the masses.

Thirdly, large numbers of cadres are needed to extend the campaign of economic
construction. This is not a matter of scores or hundreds of people, but of
thousands and tens of thousands whom we must organize, train and send to
the economic construction front. They will be the commanders and the broad
masses the soldiers on the economic front. People often sigh over the shortage
of cadres. Comrades, is there really a shortage? Innumerable cadres have
come to the fore from among the masses who have been steeled in the agrarian
struggles, the economic struggles and the revolutionary war. How can we say
there is a shortage of cadres? Discard this mistaken view and you will see
cadres all around you.

Fourthly, economic construction today is inseparable not only from the general
task of the war but from other tasks as well. Only if there is a thorough
check-up on land distribution [2] will it be possible
to abolish feudal and semi-feudal ownership of land completely, enhance the
peasants' enthusiasm for production and swiftly draw the peasant masses into
economic construction. Only if the labour laws are resolutely enforced will
it be possible to better the life of the workers, bring them speedily into
active participation in economic construction and strengthen their leadership
of the peasants. Only if there is correct leadership in the elections and
in the exposure campaigns [3] which accompany the check-up
on land distribution will it be possible to strengthen our government bodies
so that they can give more vigorous leadership in the revolutionary war and
in all our work, including economic work. The raising of the political and
cultural level of the people through cultural and educational work is also
a most important task in the development of the economy. That the expansion
of the Red Army must not be neglected for a single day goes without saying.
Everybody understands that without Red Army victories the economic blockade
would be still tighter. On the other hand, economic growth and a better life
for the masses will undoubtedly be of great help to the work of expanding
the Red Army and inspiring the masses to march eagerly to the front. To sum
up, if we achieve all the above tasks, including the very important new one
of economic construction, and if we make them all serve the revolutionary
war, then victory in the revolutionary war will undoubtedly be ours.


NOTES


1. Between 1930 and 1934 Chiang Kai-shek launched five
large-scale onslaughts against the Red area centred on Juichin, Kiangsi;
they were called "encirclement and suppression" campaigns. The fifth of such
campaigns began in October 1 though Chiang Kai-shek had been making active
preparations for it since the summer.
2. A campaign to check up land distribution was carried
out in the Red area after the agrarian reform to ascertain whether the land
had been properly redistributed.
3. Exposure campaigns were democratic campaigns in which
the people were encouraged to expose misdeeds by the functionaries of the
democratic government.


Transcription by the Maoist Documentation Project.