CO-OPERATIVE TRANSFORMATION OF AGRICULTURE

September 7, 1955

[Inner-Party directive drafted for the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist
Party.]


At present, the slogan "Rely on the poor peasants (including all the new
middle peasants who were formerly poor peasants) and firmly unite with the
middle peasants" remains basically correct. However, (1) well-to-do middle
peasants (that is, upper-middle peasants) have emerged from among the new
middle peasants, and, except for some with a higher political consciousness,
they are unwilling to join the co-operatives for the time being; (2)
the lower-middle peasants among the old middle peasants are generally
interested in joining the co-operatives, because in economic status they
are more or less similar to the lower-middle peasants among the new middle
peasants, as they were not well off to start with and the interests of some
were improperly encroached upon at the time of the agrarian reform. For these
two reasons, in all places where co-operation has not yet reached high tide
and the well-to-do middle peasants are lacking in political consciousness,
it is proper first to draw into the co-operatives the following three sections
of people (in batches according to the level of their political consciousness,
beginning with those with a higher consciousness): (1) the poor peasants;
(2) the lower-middle peasants among the new middle peasants (In
the revised version of Comrade Mao Tsetung's report the middle peasants are
divided into two sections only, the upper- and the lower-middle peasants,
and no mention is made of the intermediate-middle peasants so as to avoid
a classification too fine for drawing distinctions. The lower-middle peasants
as now defined actually cover the originally defined lower- and
intermediate-middle peasants among the new middle peasants.); and (3) the
lower-middle peasants among the old middle peasants. All those well-to-do
middle peasants, that is, the upper-middle peasants among both the new and
old middle peasants, who are as yet unwilling to join the co-operatives,
should not be dragged in against their will. At present, in many places there
are cases of forcing the well-to-do middle peasants into the co-operatives
with an eye to obtaining their draught animals and farm implements (at too
low a price and with payments over too long a period). This is actually an
encroachment on their interests and a violation of the principle of "firmly
uniting with the middle peasants". And we must never go against this Marxist
principle. At present, in all places where co-operatives have just been set
up or are not yet in a dominant position, it would be most disadvantageous
if those well-to-do middle peasants with deep-seated bourgeois ideas are
dragged in, or if, by their own efforts, they worm their way in to seize
the leadership (rather than join out of genuine political consciousness)
or form such co-operatives of poor quality as those found in Shuangcheng
County, Heilungkiang Province. This would be most disadvantageous to the
establishment of the leadership of the poor and lower-middle peasants, whereas
it is imperative to establish this leadership in all co-operatives. (Of course
exceptions should be made of a few well-to-do middle peasants who are fair-minded
and competent and have a higher political consciousness.) Some say that the
slogan "Rely on the poor peasants and firmly unite with the middle peasants"
seems to have been discarded in our present formulation; this is not true.
We have not discarded the slogan but rather made it more specific in the
light of the new conditions, that is, we count the lower-middle peasants
among the old middle peasants as a section of the people on whom to rely,
but not those new middle peasants who have risen to become well-to-do middle
peasants. This distinction is made according to their economic status and
to whether they take an active attitude towards the co-operative movement.
In other words, we take the poor peasants and the two sections of lower-middle
peasants, who correspond to the old poor peasants, as people to rely on,
and the two sections of upper-middle peasants who correspond to the old middle
peasants as people firmly to unite with, and at present one way of uniting
with them is to refrain from forcing them to join the co-operatives and
encroaching on their interests.

Some additional points must be made clear with regard to the question of
whom to rely on in the rural areas. First of all, we should rely on Party
and League members. It is wrong for our Party committees from the district
level up or for cadres sent to direct work in the rural areas not to rely
primarily on the Party and League members there but to lump them together
with the non-Party and non-League people. Second, we should rely on the more
active elements among the non-Party people, who should account for some 5
per cent of the rural population (for example, there should be some 125 such
activists in a township of about 2,500 people). We should do our best to
cultivate a group of such activists, and we should not lump them together
with the masses either. Third, we should then rely on the masses, on the
poor peasants and the two sections of lower-middle peasants. Failure to be
clear about whom to rely on and how to rely on them will lead to mistakes
in the co-operative movement.

Transcription by the Maoist Documentation Project.