November 29, 1943

[Comrade Mao Tse-tung made this speech at a reception in honour of the labour
heroes of the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region.]


On behalf of the Central Committee of the Communist Party I would like to
say a few words at this reception it is giving for the labour heroes and
heroines and other model workers in production elected from the villages,
the factories, the armed forces, the government and other organizations and
the schools in the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region. What I want to say
can be summed up in the words, "Get organized!" This year the peasant masses
and the people in the army, the government and other organizations, the schools
and the factories of the Border Region have been conducting a production
campaign in accordance with the resolutions of the meeting of senior cadres
convened last winter by the Northwest Bureau of the Central Committee. Great
achievements and advances have been scored in every field of production this
year and the Border Region has taken on a new look. Facts have fully borne
out the correctness of the policy adopted by the conference of senior cadres.
The gist of this policy is to organize the masses, to mobilize and organize
into a great army of labour all the available forces without exception--the
people, the army, the government and other organizations and the schools--all
men and women, young and old, who can contribute their labour power on a
part-time or full-time basis. We have an army for fighting as well as an
army for labour. For fighting we have the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies;
but even they do a dual job, warfare and production. With these two kinds
of armies, and with a fighting army skilled in these two tasks and in mass
work, we can overcome our difficulties and defeat Japanese imperialism. If
the achievements of our production campaign in the Border Region in recent
years were not great or remarkable enough to prove this conclusively, our
achievements this year have really done so, as we have all seen with our
own eyes.

In all the armed units of the Border Region that have been allotted land
this year, the soldiers have on the average cultivated eighteen mou
per person; and they can produce or make practically everything--food
(vegetables, meat and cooking oil), clothing (cotton-padded clothes, woollen
knitwear and footwear), shelter (cave-dwellings, houses and meeting halls),
articles of daily use (tables, chairs, benches and stationery), and fuel
(firewood, charcoal and coal). By using our own hands we have attained the
objective of "ample food and clothing". Every soldier needs to spend only
three months of the year in production and can devote the remaining nine
months to training and fighting. Our troops depend for their pay neither
on the Kuomintang government, nor on the Border Region Government, nor on
the people, but can fully provide for themselves. What a vitally important
innovation for our cause of national liberation! During the last six and
a half years of the War of Resistance, the anti-Japanese base areas have
been subjected to the enemy's policy of "burn all, kill all, loot all", the
Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region has been tightly blockaded by the Kuomintang
and we were reduced to the direst straits financially and economically; if
our troops had been able to do nothing except fight, we would never have
solved our problems. Now our troops in the Border Region have learned to
produce, and so have some of the troops at the front, while others are learning.
If every man in our heroic and combat-worthy Eighth Route and New Fourth
Armies becomes able not only to fight and do mass work but also to produce,
we need fear no difficulty and shall be "invincible under heaven",
[1] to use the words of Mencius. Our organizations
and schools have also taken a big step forward this year. Only a small part
of their expenditure has come from the government, most of it being covered
by their own production; they have grown 100 per cent of the vegetables they
consume as compared with 50 per cent last year, considerably increased their
consumption of meat by raising pigs and sheep, and established many workshops
for making simple necessities. As the army, the organizations and the schools
now meet their own material needs fully or for the most part, less is taken
in taxation from the people, who can therefore enjoy more of the fruits of
their labour. As soldiers and civilians are alike increasing production,
all have ample food and clothing and are happy. In our factories, too, production
has been stepped up, secret agents have been combed out and productivity
has risen greatly. Throughout the Border Region, labour heroes have come
forward in great numbers in agriculture and industry, in the organizations
and the schools, and also in the army; we can say that production in the
Border Region has been set on the right path. All this comes from organizing
the strength of the masses.

To organize the strength of the masses is one policy. Is there a contrary
policy? Yes, there is. It is one that lacks the mass viewpoint, fails to
rely on the masses or organize them, and gives exclusive attention to organizing
the small number of people working in the financial, supply or trading
organizations, while paying no attention to organizing the masses in the
villages, the army, the government and other organizations, the schools and
factories; it treats economic work not as a broad movement or as an extensive
front, but only as an expedient for meeting financial deficits. That is the
other policy, the wrong policy. Such a policy formerly existed in the
Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region, but after the correct guidance given
over these years, and especially after the senior cadres' conference last
year and the mass movement this year, the number of people who still think
this way is probably small. In the base areas in northern and central China,
where fighting is intense and the leading bodies have not given it enough
attention, the production campaign of the masses has not yet become widespread.
However, since the Central Committee's directive of October 1
[2] this year, preparations are being made everywhere
for a production campaign next year. Conditions at the front are more difficult
than in the Border Region; not only is there heavy fighting, but natural
disasters have occurred in some places. Nevertheless, we must mobilize the
entire Party, the government and the army and the civilian population both
to fight against the enemy and to engage in production, in order to support
the war, to cope with the enemy's policy of "burn all, kill all, loot all"
and to provide disaster relief. With the experience already gained in the
last few years in production at the front, and with the ideological,
organizational and material preparations this winter, an extensive campaign
can be and must be launched next year. In the front-line areas where fighting
is going on, it is not yet possible to have "ample food and clothing" but
quite possible and, indeed, imperative to "use our own hands and overcome
difficulties".

The co-operatives are now the most important form of mass organization in
the economic field. Although it is unnecessary to insist on attaching the
label co-operative to the productive activities of the masses in our army,
our government and other organizations and our schools, these activities
are of a co-operative nature, being carried on under centralized leadership
to meet the material needs of various departments, units and individuals
through mutual help and joint labour. They are co-operatives of a sort.

Among the peasant masses a system of individual economy has prevailed for
thousands of years, with each family or household forming a productive unit.
This scattered, individual form of production is the economic foundation
of feudal rule and keeps the peasants in perpetual poverty. The only way
to change it is gradual collectivization, and the only way to bring about
collectivization, according to Lenin, is through co-operatives.
[3] We have already organized many peasant
co-operatives in the Border Region, but at present they are only of a rudimentary
type and must go through several stages of development before they can become
co-operatives of the Soviet type known as collective farms. Ours is a
new-democratic economy, and our co-operatives are still organizations for
collective labour based on an individual economy (on private property).
Furthermore, they are of several types. One type is the organization of
agricultural labour for mutual aid, such as the "teams for the exchange of
labour" and "teams for the exchange and hire of labour";
[4] this kind of organization was known as the
"mutual-aid working group" or "ploughing team"
[5] in the Red areas in Kiangsi and is now called
the "mutual-aid group" in some places at the front. So long as they are
collective mutual-aid organizations which the people join voluntarily (compulsion
must never be used), all of them are good, no matter how they are named,
no matter whether they are each composed of a few, a few dozen or hundreds
of people, or whether they are composed entirely or partly of people who
can contribute full-time labour; no matter whether the members render each
other mutual aid in terms of manpower, animal power or implements, or they
live and eat together during the busy farming season; and no matter whether
the organizations are temporary or permanent. These methods of collective
mutual aid are the inventions of the masses themselves. In the past we summed
up such experience among the masses in Kiangsi, and now we are summing it
up in northern Shensi. In the Border Region mutual aid in labour has become
much more systematic and better developed, after being encouraged by the
meeting of senior cadres last year and put into practice all through the
current year. Many labour-exchange teams in the Border Region have done their
ploughing, planting, weeding and reaping collectively, and the harvest this
year is double that of last. Now that the masses have seen these substantial
results, undoubtedly more and more people will adopt the practice next year.
We do not expect to organize into co-operatives in one year all the hundreds
of thousands of people in the Border Region who can contribute full-time
or part-time labour, but this objective can be realized within a few years.
All women, too, should be mobilized to do a certain amount of productive
work. All loafers must be reformed into good citizens through participation
in production. Such collective mutual-aid producers' co-operatives should
be extensively and voluntarily organized in all the anti-Japanese base areas
in northern and central China.

Besides the collective mutual-aid co-operative for agricultural production,
there are three other varieties: the multi-purpose cooperative like the Southern
District Co-operative of Yenan, which combines the functions of producers',
consumers', transport (salt transport) and credit co-operatives; the transport
co-operative (salt transport team); and the handicraft co-operative.

With these four kinds of co-operatives among the masses and the collective
labour co-operatives in the army, the schools and the government and other
organizations, we can organize all the forces of the people into a great
army of labour. This is the only road to liberation for the people, the only
road from poverty to prosperity and the only road to victory in the War of
Resistance. Every Communist must learn to organize the labour of the masses.
Communists with an intellectual background must also learn to do so; once
they have set their minds on it, they can learn in six months or a year.
They can help the masses to organize production and to sum up experience.
When our comrades have learned, among other skills, to organize the labour
of the masses--to help the peasants draw up their household production plans,
to set up labour-exchange teams, salt transport teams and multi-purpose
co-operatives, to organize production in the army, the schools and the government
and other organizations, to organize production in the factories, develop
emulation in production, encourage and reward labour heroes, and arrange
production exhibitions--when our comrades have learned to bring the creative
power and initiative of the masses into play, we shall certainly be able
to drive out the Japanese imperialists and, together with the whole people,
build up a new China.

We Communists must be able to integrate ourselves with the masses in all
things. If our Party members spend their whole lives sitting indoors and
never go out to face the world and brave the storm, what good will they be
to the Chinese people? None at all, and we do not need such people as Party
members. We Communists ought to face the world and brave the storm, the great
world of mass struggle and the mighty storm of mass struggle. "Three cobblers
with their wits combined equal Chukeh Liang the master mind."
[6] In other words, the masses have great creative
power. In fact there are thousands upon thousands of Chukeh Liangs among
the Chinese people; every village, every town has its own. We should go to
the masses and learn from them, synthesize their experience into better,
articulated principles and methods, then do propaganda among the masses,
and call upon them to put these principles and methods into practice so as
to solve their problems and help them achieve liberation and happiness. If
our comrades doing local work are isolated from the masses, fail to understand
their feelings and to help them organize their production and improve their
livelihood, and if they confine themselves to collecting "public grain for
national salvation" without realizing that 10 per cent of their energy is
quite enough for this purpose provided they first devote 90 per cent to helping
the masses solve the problem of "private grain for the people's own salvation",
then these comrades are contaminated with the Kuomintang style of work and
covered with the dust of bureaucracy. The Kuomintang only demands things
from the people and gives them nothing in return. If a member of our Party
acts in this way, his style of work is that of the Kuomintang, and his face,
caked with the dust of bureaucracy, needs a good wash in a basin of hot water.
In my opinion, this bureaucratic style is to be found in local work in all
our anti-Japanese base areas, and there are comrades who are isolated from
the masses because they lack the mass viewpoint. We must firmly do away with
this style of work before we can have close ties with the masses.

In addition, a kind of warlord style is to be found in our army work, a style
also characteristic of the Kuomintang whose army is divorced from the masses.
Our troops must observe the correct principles that govern relations between
the army and the people, between the army and the government, between the
army and the Party, between officers and men, and between military work and
political work, and relations among the cadres, and must never commit the
errors of warlordism. Officers must cherish their men and must not be indifferent
to their well-being or resort to corporal punishment; the army must cherish
the people and never encroach upon their interests; the army must respect
the government and the Party and never "assert independence". Our Eighth
Route and New Fourth Armies are the armed forces of the people; they have
always been very good, and are indeed the best in the country. But it is
true that in recent years errors of warlordism of a certain kind have arisen,
and some comrades in the army have become arrogant and high-handed in their
behaviour towards the soldiers, the people, the government and the Party,
always blaming the comrades doing local work but never themselves, always
seeing their own achievements but never their own shortcomings, and always
welcoming flattery but never criticism. Such phenomena are to be found, for
example, in the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region. The tendency has been
basically overcome as a result of the conference of senior cadres and the
meeting of military and political cadres last year and of the campaigns to
"support the government and cherish the people" and "support the army" during
the Spring Festival [7] this year, but there is
still a residue which we must make further efforts to eradicate. These faults
are also to be found in the base areas in northern and central China, and
the Party organizations and the army there must endeavour to eradicate them.

Whether it is the tendency towards bureaucracy in local work or towards
warlordism in army work, the fault is of the same nature, namely, isolation
from the masses. The overwhelming majority of our comrades are good comrades.
Those who have this fault can correct it once they have been criticized and
their mistakes pointed out. But self-criticism is imperative and wrong tendencies
must be squarely faced and conscientiously corrected. If anyone fails to
criticize the tendency towards bureaucracy in local work or towards warlordism
in army work, it means that he wants to retain the Kuomintang style and keep
the dust of bureaucracy or warlordism on his otherwise clean face, and he
is not a good Communist. If these two tendencies are eliminated, all our
work, including, of course, the production campaign, will proceed smoothly.

Our Border Region has taken on a totally different look because great results
have been achieved here in production, whether among the peasant masses,
or in the government and other organizations, the schools, the army or in
the factories, and the relations between the army and the people have greatly
improved. All this indicates that our comrades have a stronger mass viewpoint
and have made great progress in becoming one with the masses. Nevertheless,
we must not be complacent but continue our self-criticism and strive for
further progress. We must strive for further progress in production, too.
As our faces are apt to get dirty, we must wash them every day; as the floor
is apt to gather dust, we must sweep it every day. Even though the tendencies
towards bureaucracy in local work and warlordism in army work have been basically
overcome, these bad tendencies may arise again. We are surrounded by the
serried forces of Japanese imperialism and Chinese reaction, and we live
in the midst of the undisciplined petty bourgeoisie, and hence great gusts
of dirt of bureaucracy and warlordism blow in our faces daily. Therefore,
we must not become complacent over every success. We should check our complacency
and constantly criticize our shortcomings, just as we should wash our faces
or sweep the floor every day to remove the dirt and keep them clean.

Labour heroes and model workers in production! You are leaders of the people,
you have been very successful in your work, and I hope you, too, will not
grow complacent. I hope that when you get back to the counties in the sub-regions
of Kuanchung, Lungtung, Sanpien, Suiteh and Yenan,
[8] when you get back to your organizations, schools,
army units or factories, you will lead the people, lead the masses and work
still better, and first of all get the masses organized on a voluntary basis
into co-operatives, get them even better organized and in even greater numbers.
I hope that, when you go back, you will do this work and propagate it, so
that by next year's conference of labour heroes we shall have achieved still
greater results.
NOTES

1. From Mencius Book III, "Kungsun Chou", Part
I, Chapter 5.

2. The Central Committee's directive of October 1 was "Spread
the Campaigns to Reduce Rent, Increase Production and 'Support the Government
and Cherish the People' in the Base Areas", pp. 131-35 of this volume.

3. See V. I. Lenin, "On Cooperation", Selected Works,
Eng. ed., FLPH, Moscow, 1952, Vol. II, Part 2, pp. 715-23.

4. "Teams for the exchange of labour" and "teams for the
exchange and hire of labour" were both labour organizations for collective
mutual aid in agriculture in the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region.
Labour-exchange is a means by which the peasants adjust labour power among
themselves. Man-workdays were exchanged for man-workdays, ox-workdays for
ox-workdays, man-workdays for ox-workdays etc. Peasants who joined
labour-exchange teams contributed their labour power or animal power to cultivate
the land of each member-family collectively and in rotation. In settling
accounts, the workday was taken as the unit of exchange those who contributed
more man-workdays or animal-workdays were paid for the difference by those
who contributed less. "Teams for the exchange and hire of labour" were usually
formed by peasants with insufficient land. Besides exchanging work among
themselves for mutual aid, their members also hired themselves out collectively
to families which were short of labour power.

5. Mutual-aid working groups and ploughing teams, based
on individual farming, were formed by peasants in the Red areas to facilitate
production through a better organization of labour power. On the principle
of voluntary participation and mutual benefit, the members did an equal amount
of work for each other, or if one could not give another as much help as
he received he made up the difference in cash. Apart from helping each other,
the teams gave preferential treatment to the families of Red Army soldiers
and worked for bereaved old folk without any pay except for meals during
the work. As these measures of mutual aid were of great help to production
and were carried out on a reasonable basis they won the warm support of the
masses.

6. Chukeh Liang was a statesman and strategist in the period
of the Three Kingdoms (221-265), who became a symbol of resourcefulness and
wisdom in Chinese folklore.

7. The Spring Festival is New Year's Day in the Chinese
lunar calendar.

8. The Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region was divided into
these five sub-regions.


Transcription by the Maoist Documentation Project.