Jim Washington’s pamphlet contains many factual errors in regard to the size and growth of national capital after 1949. He distorts the size of the national capitalist enterprises and gives no documentation for his claims of unrestricted growth of the private sector. In addition he fails to place the modern industrial sector in perspective compared to agriculture and handicrafts. We will begin this section by looking at the facts on the size and relative importance of national capital.
The modern industrial sector in China was extremely small relative to individual commodity production (agriculture and handicrafts) located mainly in the countryside. Figures given by Richman indicate that the percentage of net national product from the modern industrial sector was about 11% in 1949.[1] Truly, modern industry and the proletariat were swamped in a sea of small producers. This is an important point which we shall later examine as we consider a correct approach to the roots of revisionism in China.
The strategic sectors of modern industry were dominated by imperialism and bureaucrat capital. Eighty per cent of the fixed capital assets in manufacturing and transportation were owned by bureaucrat capital.[2] The confiscation of enterprises owned by the big bourgeoisie placed the ’commanding heights’ of the economy under control of the state. Prybyla estimates that the state controlled 90% of iron and steel output, 100% of petroleum, non-ferrous metals, rail and truck transportation, 67% of electric power, and 45% of cement output.[3] After 1949, the national capitalists were concentrated mainly in light industry and retail trade sectors. The size of these enterprises was very small. Of the 123,000 factories owned by the national bourgeoisie, only 164 had more than 500 workers. Seventy percent had fewer than 10.[4]
The most reliable sources among Chinese and Western scholars estimate that the percentage of gross output value of modern industry and retail/wholesale trade accounted for by private capitalist production was 55% in 1949 – by 1952 this had dropped to 17%.[5] These figures, which were confirmed by virtually every source we looked at, support our main contention: contrary to Jim Washington’s and the Albanians’ undocumented claims, the development of private production within the industrial (as well as agricultural/handicraft) sector was tightly controlled and restricted by the state. It is true that the state encouraged a limited expansion of private production in the first few years after liberation; this, however, was drastically curtailed after 1952, and the state sector became the dominant force within the Chinese economy.
In addition to his errors of fact, Jim Washington also holds to several erroneous theses on the question of what happened to the national bourgeoisie and the direction of the revolution after 1949. For example, Jim Washington claims that the Rightists were able to earn hegemony within the party and state by 1956. From this perspective it is “obvious” that there was no restriction of national capital.[6] But these views are refuted by the evidence.
Our view is that from 1949 onward two roads emerged on the question of socialist construction and the dictatorship of the proletariat in China. These two roads, however, were not so visible in the early 50’s as the exaggerated claims of the Cultural Revolution would lead us to believe. In the early years the Communist Party of China relied heavily on the Soviet model of socialist construction. Mao and others within the Left of the party did initially oppose a number of features of the Soviet model which dovetailed with the development of a revisionist line within the Communist Party of China (for example: mechanisation must precede collectivisation). It was not until ’56-’57 when the effects of the first five year plan were evident and the Communist Party of China was beginning to struggle internationally with revisionism that two roads clearly emerged.[7] By this time, the Left within the Communist Party of China had made an initial summation of the Soviet experience and attempted to chart a course which would avoid the errors of socialist construction made in the USSR. The outline of this summation was contained in Mao’s work, “On the Ten Great Relationships” and Critique of Soviet Economics. These principles were later elaborated in the Textbook of Political Economy published in 1974. After 1957 Mao was self-critical for his agreement with a number of revisionist ideas (for example: Liu’s thesis at the Eighth Congress of the “dying out of class struggle”)[8] which he came to understand in summing up the first five year plan and the Soviet experience.
Contrary to Jim Washington’s claim, we were not able to find any evidence of a Liu-Teng grouping or faction which was organized on a national basis and put forward a definite program. On many occasions in the early fifties individuals who were later targeted as leaders of the Chinese Right defended positions of the Left.[9] Our research shows that it was not until after the Great Leap Forward that a Rightist faction was consolidated within the Communist Party of China and a defined program elaborated in opposition to the Left.[10]
We believe that the political line of the Communist Party of China and the policies of the state revealed that the Left within the party was firmly in command during the period of 1949-60. We do think the Right had temporarily dominated at the Eighth Congress in 1956 and then again later for a brief period of time during 1960-62. We intend to show in this section how the proletarian line was manifest in practice and resulted in the state vigorously restricting the development of capitalism in China.
The steps taken by the Chinese Communists to restrict the development of capitalism were similar to those taken by the Bolsheviks in the USSR.[11] Once the “commanding heights” of the economy had been secured through the confiscation of foreign and bureaucrat capital, the Communist Party of China instituted various mechanisms to simultaneously utilize private production in the reconstruction of the economy and prepare the conditions for its elimination.
Some of the methods used by the Communist Party of China to restrict and control the development of national capital included: l)taxation policies; 2) the access to credit and capital through the state banks; 3)competition from state enterprises; 4)control of raw materials; 5)control of wholesale and retail trade; 6)union demands and workers’ control from below. We will examine a few of these mechanisms in greater detail.
1) Control of the Banks: Lenin referred to the banks as the “principal nerve centers of the whole capitalist economic system,”[12] and placed the utmost priority on the nationalisation of the banks by the Soviet state as he said:
Without big banks socialism would be impossible. The big banks are the ’State apparatus’ which we need to bring about socialism ... A single State bank, the biggest of the big, with branches in every rural district, in every factory, will constitute as much as nine-tenths of the socialist apparatus.[13]
In 1949 the state nationalised those banks which were controlled by bureaucrat and foreign capital. This meant that 59% of all capital in the banks was placed under control of the People’s Bank.[14] Government funds previously deposited with the private banking system were placed in the People’s Bank. This led to the collapse of about half of the remaining private banks. Over the next three years the remaining private banks (which were mainly owned and controlled by the national bourgeoisie) were taken over by the state and amalgamated into the People Bank. By 1952 private banks no longer existed in China.[15] The state became the main source of credit and capital for the national bourgeoisie, who were only able to retain 20% of their profits and whose savings and concealed assets were largely liquidated during the WuFan campaign.[16] If the national capitalists were dependent on the state for capital, and loans were made only if the capitalists’ production plans corresponded to the needs of the state and the people, how was it possible for the national bourgeoisie to accumulate capital, “flourish” and expand production in an unrestricted manner as Jim Washington asserts?
2) Control of Marketing Products Produced by the National Capitalists Control of Sources of Raw Materials by the State: The state set up state wholesale bureaus and trading corporations in 1949. Within two years these organisations controlled about 60% of wholesale and 18% of retail sales;[17] by 1953 private commerce accounted for only 4% of wholesale commerce and 17% of retail.[18] Foreign trade was rapidly monopolized by the state sector and in 1952 private commerce netted but 8% of all foreign trade.[19] Through the nationalisation of bureaucrat capital (particularly mining and primary agricultural products like cotton), the state became the sole supplier of raw materials for industrial production.[20] If the national bourgeoisie was dependent on the state for marketing its products and the only source of raw materials, again we ask, how was it possible for the national bourgeoisie to expand production in an unrestricted manner?
3) Trade Union Demands and Workers’ Control: Unlike the Soviet Union, the Chinese Communists were not totally dependent on the technicians and administrators from the old regime to run industry. A core of 20% of all cadre in industry after 1949 had been trained in the base areas under Party leadership.[21] Nonetheless it was extremely important for the People’s Government to utilize the skills of the petty-bourgeoisie and the national bourgeoisie.
In 1949 only 46% of all employees within the modern industrial sector were literate,[22] many members of the national bourgeoisie had acquired special skills given their position within industry prior to 1949.[23] The development of various forms for the participation of workers in the management of the enterprises was one of the principal mechanisms implemented by the state to simultaneously utilize the managerial and technical skills of the national bourgeoisie while restricting their political influence.
Soon after liberation, the East Shanghai system of collective management became dominant in most of China’s modern industrial sector. Under this system the Party organized committees of skilled workers, technicians and administrators to run various enterprises. The five Anti’s (WuFan) Campaign in ’52 resulted in a much greater level of participation of workers within these Party Committees. This form of collective management persisted throughout China even after 1953 when the Soviet system of “one man management” was officially instituted in China’s industry.[24]
“One man management” concentrated great authority within the hands of the factory managers. Schurmann describes it this way:
In the early 1950’s the Chinese, emulating the Soviet experiences, sought to place great power in the hands of the managers. The Party’s role was to be limited to that of moral leadership. The commands that counted came from higher echelons in the administrative system. Management commanded and the worker had to obey. Everyone was responsible individually for the fulfillment of his production tasks and the maintenance of his work post. One man management was predicated on the assumption that Stakhanovism would be universally introduced at the production level. Time wages and forms of collective payments would be replaced by piece rates. The factory, under one-man management, was conceived of as a coldly rational arrangement of individual workers commanded by an authoritarian manager.[25]
This form of organization was part of the Soviet model which the Chinese adopted in 1953. However, as with other aspects of the Soviet experience, by the mid-fifties the Chinese began to reject the Soviet prescription for economic development. One man management was targeted as an important factor in the emergence of an elite, privileged stratum of administrative and technical personnel whose world view constituted a serious threat to the development of socialist relations of production within industry and the narrowing of the differences between mental and manual labor. Mao and the Left within the Communist Party of China were later to target this stratum as the social basis for the development of a new bourgeoisie. The Textbook of Political Economy published in 1974 stated:
The revisionist “one-head system” championed by the Soviet revisionists is an institutionalization of this viewpoint. Facts have demonstrated that this is a chloroform spread by the bourgeoisie and its agents in order to usurp leadership. Engels once pointed out: “The inevitable result of individual management of industries is private ownership.”(15) If the leadership of the enterprise under the socialist ownership system is not in the hands of the workers, poor and lower-middle peasants, and other laborers, the revisionist “one-head system” will proliferate. Under the revisionist “one-head system,” the laboring masses are in effect separated from the means of production. They listen to the orders from the “head.” Without leadership over the enterprise, they are no longer masters of the enterprise. If this develops, they will be treated as pure labor power in the production process by the “head.” The laboring masses will no longer have the right to question whether this production process serves the interests of the proletariat and the laboring people. This way, socialist enterprises will gradually slide into the mudhole of capitalism.[26]
This critique related to one of the most important conclusions drawn by Mao in summing up the Soviet model: the dynamic between the productive forces and relations of production. Mao contended that major development of the productive forces often comes after changes in the productive relations.[27] The emergence of a technical and administrative bureaucracy was serving as a brake to the continued transformation of the productive forces.
To sum up, socialist relations of production have been established and are in correspondence with the growth of the productive forces. Apart from correspondence as well as contradiction between the relations of production and the growth of the productive forces, there is correspondence as well as contradiction between the superstructure and the economic base. The superstructure, comprising the state system and laws of the people’s democratic dictatorship and the socialist ideology guided by Marxism-Leninism, plays a positive role in facilitating the victory of socialist transformation and the socialist way of organizing labour; it is in correspondence with the socialist economic base, that is, with socialist relations of production. But the existence of bourgeois ideology, a certain bureaucratic style of work in our state organs and defects in some of the links in our state institutions are in contradiction with the socialist economic base. We must continue to resolve all such contradictions in light of our specific conditions.[28]
The attack on Kao Kang and his downfall in 1954 signalled the beginning of this struggle to transform the relations of production in industry. Throughout China “one man management” had come into conflict with the existing forms of collective management; it had taken hold most strongly in Manchuria where most of China’s heavy industry was concentrated. Kao Kang’s removal as First Party Secretary in Manchuria and head of the State Planning Commission led to the overthrow of one man management and the promulgation in ’57 of new regulations designed to institutionalize collective forms of management within industry. The factory managers were now subordinated to the party committees. The party committees were responsible for decisions regarding all personnel, the relationship between the enterprise and the State Plan, and use of financial resources of the enterprise not controlled by the state.[29] The managers were given the authority to make decisions only of a technical or operational nature. The problem with this system was that members of the party tended to lack the necessary expertise to make important decisions about the overall plans and performance of the enterprise. This is one of the origins of the Great Leap Forward (in industry).
A major goal of the Great Leap Forward was to develop “red and expert” workers by raising the technical and managerial skills of the workers and party cadre. The Leap also focused on the transformation of the attitudes of the technical and administrative cadre, who were predominantly from bourgeois origins and were trained prior to 1949 under the old regime. A number of different mechanisms were used during the Great Leap to accomplish these goals.
1) Part-time colleges were established in most enterprises to teach workers basic skills like the accounting and statistics needed to manage industry; intensive technical training was given to production team leaders in secondary schools.
2) A drastic cutback was made in middle level cadre and many of the administrative tasks of these cadre were taken over by production teams on the shop floor.
3) Triple combinations of administrators, technicians and workers were developed to promote workers’ direct involvement in making innovations and changes in the production process. This served to transfer technical skills from the technicians to the workers and at the same time gave the administrative and technical cadre a better understanding of production realities on the shop floor. The triple combinations were part of a broader movement to institutionalize the regular participation of cadre in the production process. The movement was designed to facilitate the supervision of technical cadre by the workers and transform the attitudes of “mental” workers towards manual labor.
4) During the Leap an attack was made on piece work and bonuses, particularly those material incentives paid to the administrative and technical personnel.
The trade unions were also undergoing change during the ’50’s, and the struggle within the unions reflected the class struggle which was occurring throughout Chinese society. Jim Washington correctly points out the dominance of the rightist elements of the Communist Party of China in the trade unions prior to 1949. He neglects the counter tendency which arose after ’49 and became dominant during the Great Leap Forward.
This revolutionary tendency sought to transform the unions into instruments for what Lenin termed “national accounting and control.” For instance, during the WuFan campaign in Shanghai (China’s largest industrial center), the shop workers trade union set up organizations at all levels of private industry and recruited more than 20,000 workers to collect back taxes and uncover tax evasion by the national bourgeoisie.[30] The unions also waged an intense struggle against the paternalistic relations which existed in much of Chinese industry (particularly the smaller shops more frequently owned by the national bourgeoisie) and urged the workers to “speak bitterness” against the corruption and crimes of their employers.[31] The revolutionary tendency within the unions also struggled against former Kuomintang agents and other reactionaries who had dominated many of the “company” unions prior to 1949. This period in Shanghai also saw a great expansion of trade union membership. As one author observed, “More and more workers began to take the attitude of being the master.”[32]
This tremendous upheaval and transformation of the relations of production in industry has been conveniently overlooked or “forgotten” by Jim Washington and the Party of Labour of Albania. It is true that many of these changes were incomplete and the same struggles would again arise during the Cultural Revolution. However, the emergence of workers’ control and the development of a revolutionary tendency within the trade unions was developed enough to serve as a powerful instrument in the restriction of the national bourgeoisie, particularly those ex-capitalists who continued to function as administrators or managers within joint private-state enterprises. Mao’s claim that the “capitalists have no real managerial rights over the enterprise”[33] is corroborated by another specialist in the Chinese economy who states that in these enterprises after 1957 “the former owners were usually retained as managers working alongside state-appointed managers. Although having little say in final decisions they did exert a teaching influence on their State partners insofar as technique.”[34]V
All of these mechanisms resulted in the gradual restriction of the national bourgeoisie and the absorption of private industry into the state sector by 1956-57.[35] The national bourgeoisie was given 5% interest payments on their capital, a practice which was phased out during the Cultural Revolution, but later revived. These assets could not be transferred out of the country and all investment was tightly regulated by the state. The former capitalists were allowed to invest mainly in state bonds.[36] One commentator concluded of the national bourgeoisie:
As a social class they had been liquidated by 1955...a few showcase capitalists were officially exhibited to Western tourists as late as 1967. Their usefulness to the Communist was purely historical; their social, economic, and political influence was nill.[37]
Another bourgeois scholar, in a chapter entitled “The Rise and Fall of National Capitalism”, stated:
The era of “national capitalism” reached its peak in 1952-1953 and declined rapidly thereafter, as private industrial and commercial firms were nationalized outright, or more typically, reorganized as “joint private-state enterprises.” In the latter case, the state assumed a controlling, and eventually complete, interest in the firms by government capital investments, with the former private owners usually staying on in managerial roles and receiving dividends of 5 percent on what the government calculated to be their remaining share of capital. In fact, if not in name, the firms became state-owned as well as state-managed. By 1956 the private sector of the urban economy had ceased to exist, and all industrial and commercial enterprises of any significant size had been effectively nationalized. What little remained of private enterprise was confined to a still numerically large, but an increasingly obsolete and economically insignificant, group of self-employed handicraftsmen and artisans, petty shopkeepers and peddlers. “National capitalism” survived only as a vestige – in the form of a tiny bourgeoisie receiving quarterly dividends on what the government determined to be their “capital investments” in the factories and commercial establishments they once owned, or receiving interest on nonredeemable government bonds they had received in compensation. Although they continued to enjoy a relatively high standard of living in the cities, the national bourgeoisie was a dying class since their dividends and bonds could not be passed on to their heirs. But if national capitalism had enjoyed only a brief life in the history of the People’s Republic, it had fulfilled the economic role assigned to it; by 1952 the urban economy and industrial production were flourishing.[38]
Finally, a note on agriculture. Jim Washington admits as an afterthought that “industry and agriculture are not isolated but interconnected” and that one of the weaknesses of his paper is that it does not analyze class relations in the countryside. The Party of Labor of Albania does little better, devoting all of two paragraphs to agriculture in their article on Chinese revisionism.[39] Jim Washington and the Party of Labor of Albania did not investigate agriculture, because to do so would in itself refute their thesis that socialism never existed in China. It is well known that the collectivization of agriculture and the complete destruction of semi-feudalism in the countryside in China dealt a crushing blow to the landlords and rich peasants. Due to the concrete conditions in China and the ability of the Communist Party of China to draw on the experience in the Soviet Union, the CPC was able to collectivize agriculture by 1957-58 and win over the middle peasantry while politically and economically defeating the rich peasants. In contrast, collectivization of agriculture did not occur in the USSR until the early 1930’s – by 1927 only 2% of agricultural production was from collective or state farms.[40] Due to the particular conditions in the USSR, as well as certain ideological and political weaknesses of the CPSU,[41] a rich peasant stratum was able to consolidate itself and many middle peasants were driven into alliance with the upper peasantry when agricultural collectivization was begun. In the USSR the antagonistic contradiction with the upper peasantry and remnants of the landlords was only resolved through the use of tremendous force and revolutionary violence. In China, the contradiction was resolved in a relatively peaceful manner, and this had important political ramifications in strengthening the worker-peasant alliance. An economic historian summed up the differences this way:
In contrast, land reform in China went so far that very few “rich peasants” were left. At the same time, by launching the collectivisation campaign as soon as the land redistribution program was completed, the Chinese Communists proceeded with the more advanced stages of their agrarian program before the new and old owner-operators could consolidate their economic position, extend their landholding through purchase or renting, and accumulate wealth. Thus the potential development of a “rich peasant” or kulak class was nipped in the bud so that both the incentive and the power to resist collectivisation was minimized. This was reinforced by the reliance apparently placed upon persuasion, economic incentive and disincentive, rather than force.[42]
We ask Jim Washington: how could collectivization have taken place if the national bourgeoisie led the democratic revolution in China? To say that collectivization and a thorough democratic revolution as occurred in China is in the interests of the national bourgeoisie violates one of the most elementary principles of Marxism. It is only the proletariat which can lead the democratic revolution which will completely clear away the obstacles to satisfying the demands of the peasantry. Moreover, it is only when the proletariat leads that the peasantry is able to become a “bulwark of revolution”. Lenin explains in his famous work on this topic, Two Tactics of Social-Democracy:
The very position the bourgeoisie occupies as a class in capitalist society inevitably causes it to be inconsistent in a democratic revolution. The very position the proletariat occupies as a class compels it to be consistently democratic. The bourgeoisie looks backward, fearing democratic progress, which threatens to strengthen the proletariat. The proletariat has nothing to lose but its chains, but with the aid of democracy it has the whole world to gain. That is why the more consistent the bourgeois revolution is in its democratic changes, the less will it limit itself to what is of advantage exclusively to the bourgeoisie. The more consistent the bourgeois revolution, the more does it guarantee the proletariat and the peasantry the benefits accruing from the democratic revolution.
It is to the advantage of the bourgeoisie (Lenin wrote) to rely on certain remnants of the past as against the proletariat, for instance, on the monarchy, the standing army, etc. It is to the advantage of the bourgeoisie if the bourgeois revolution does not too resolutely sweep away all the remnants of the past, but leaves some of them, i.e., if this revolution is not fully consistent, if it is not complete and if it is not determined and relentless.... It is of greater advantage to the bourgeoisie if the necessary changes in the direction of bourgeois democracy take place more slowly, more gradually, more cautiously, less resolutely, by means of reforms and not by means of revolution...if these changes develop as little as possible the independent revolutionary activity, initiative and energy of the common people, i.e., the peasantry and especially the workers, for otherwise it will be easier for the workers, as the French say, “to hitch the rifle from one shoulder to the other,” i.e., to turn against the bourgeoisie the guns which the bourgeois revolution will place in their hands, the liberty which the revolution will bring, the democratic institutions which will spring up on the ground that is cleared of serfdom. On the other hand, it is more advantageous for the working class if the necessary changes in the direction of bourgeois democracy take place by way of revolution and not by way of reform; for the way of reform is the way of delay, of procrastination, of the painfully slow decomposition of the putrid parts of the national organism. It is the proletariat and the peasantry that suffer first of all and most of all from their putrefaction. The revolutionary way is the way of quick amputation, which is the least painful to the proletariat, the way of the direct removal of the decomposing parts, the way of fewest concessions to and least consideration for the monarchy and the disgusting, vile, rotten and contaminating institutions which go with it.
That (Lenin continues) is why the proletariat fights in the front ranks for a republic and contemptuously rejects silly and unworthy advice to take care not to frighten away the bourgeoisie.[43]
[1] Richman, Industrial Society in Communist China, p. 618.
[2] Textbook of Political Economy, p. 255.
[3] Prybyla, The Political Economy of Communist China, p. 60.
[4] Suyin, Wind in the Tower, p. 41; Richman, p. 899.
[5] Wheelwright and McFarlane, The Chinese Road to Socialism, p. 33; State Statistical Bureau, quoted in Prybyla, p. 67.
[6] Compare the article, “The Process of Capitalist Development of the Chinese Economy” in Albania Today, #2, 1980.
[7] For the best account of the emergence of the political struggle within the Communist Party of China see Authority, Participation and Cultural Change in China, edited by Stuart Schram, particularly the articles “The Cultural Revolution in Historical Perspective” by Schram and “The Two Roads” by Jack Gray.
[8] Schram, Authority, Participation and Cultural Change in China, p. 46.
[9] For instance, Teng defended Mao at the 8th Congress against charges by Liu and others that Mao had attempted to develop a “personality cult” and subvert democratic centralism. See MacFarquhar, Origins of the Cultural Revolution, pp. 104-5. While opposition did exist to the Great Leap and Mao’s strategy for economic development, many Party leaders who were later overthrown during the Cultural Revolution did not oppose the Great Leap Forward. See Schram, p. 136. Teng Hsiao-Ping was the principal spokesman for the Communist Party of China at the meeting of 81 communist parties in Moscow in 1960. At this meeting, the polemics against Khrushchevite revisionism were begun. See Han Suyin, Wind in the Tower, p. 191.
[10] In 1961 Liu issued his “Seventy Articles of Industrial Planning” which was the first programmatic declaration by the Chinese Right. Mao in response developed the “Anshan Constitution for Socialist Industry”. See Suyin, pp. 179-80.
[11] Jim Washington’s paper suffers from an almost complete lack of comparative analysis of the Soviet and Chinese experiences. An important historical note is that the Chinese were in a much more favorable position to restrict the development of capitalism than the Soviets. When the Bolsheviks seized state power in 1917, they were almost immediately faced with imperialist intervention and civil war; most of the resources of the Soviet state were devoted to the war effort and a drastic deproletarianization of the population resulted from the demand for the most class-conscious workers to lead the Red Army. Subsequently, the economy was left in shambles and the young Soviet state suffered a serious lack of literate and trained working class cadre to run industry and commerce. Finally, the weaknesses of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the countryside meant a consolidation of the Kulaks and a reliance on this stratum to provide foodstuffs to the cities. In contrast, the Communist Party of China after seizing state power was not faced with imperialist intervention, though a certain amount of resources was diverted to the Korean War effort. The Communist Party of China had for over a decade organized production and administered Soviet power in base areas with millions of people. A core of trained cadre with years of administrative and production experience was developed. The CPC was rooted in the peasantry and had already completed many of the democratic tasks in the countryside by 1949; collectivization was well under way prior to the transition to the socialist stage and, as a result, a rich peasant stratum was not allowed to expand in the countryside. Finally, the existence of the Soviet Union meant China was able to receive an immediate infusion of capital and technical assistance from a fraternal socialist country. All of these factors meant that, relatively speaking, China was not so dependent an private production and the technicians, engineers and administrators from the old regime as the Soviets; overall these conditions were much more conducive to the restriction of private capital than those confronted by the Soviets.
[12] Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 25, p. 239; Vol. 27, pp. 237-57.
[13] LCW 26.106. In retrospect, Lenin overstated the point.
[14] Suyin, p. 40.
[15] Prybyla, p. 84.
[16] See page 27 of this document.
[17] Prybyla, p. 63.
[18] Ibid., p. 176.
[19] Ibid., p. 67.
[20] Ibid., p. 67 and Eckstein, China’s Economic Development.
[21] S. Andors, China’s Industrial Revolution, p. 49.
[22] Ibid., p. 481.
[23] Franz Schurmann, Ideology and Organization in Communist China, p. 94.
[24] Andors, pp. 50-52.
[25] Schurmann, p. 256.
[26] Textbook of Political Economy, p. 278.
[27] Contrary to the view which holds that the productive forces always rupture the relations of production and surge ahead, Mao held that under socialism the relations of production could be altered so as to heighten the productive forces. He also argued that the superstructure (e.g. laws, ideology) under socialism could be utilized so as to liberate the productive forces. He viewed the relationships among the forces of production, the relations of production, and the superstructure in terms of uneven development. As he put it, it is “possible to control and consciously utilize the objective laws of imbalance to create many temporary balances.” (Critique of Soviet Economics, p. 81.)
[28] Mao, Selected Works, Vol. 5, pp. 393-395.
[29] Andors, pp. 61-2, 93. Some of the party committees were Rightist.
[30] A. Doak Barnett, Chinese Communist Politics in Action, p. 497.
[31] Ibid., pp. 518-19.
[32] Ibid., p. 532.
[33] Mao, Critique of Soviet Economics, p. 64.
[34] Prybyla, p. 182.
[35] See Appendix 2.
[36] Guillermaz, The Chinese Communist Party in Power 1949-1976.
[37] Prybyla, p. 66.
[38] Meisner, Mao’s China: A History of the People’s Republic, pp. 93-94.
[39] Albania Today #2 (51). This article is grossly deficient from beginning to end. Like many other recent Albanian writings, the article is full of a priori reasoning, a refusal to examine the concrete conditions in China, quoting out of context, lack of any substantial documentation, etc. What’s amazing is that the Party of Labor of Albania, which claims that for years it didn’t “knew enough” about the Chinese revolution – yet it praised Mao, the Communist Party of China, and the People’s Republic to the skies – relies almost exclusively for “documentation” on pre-1960 Chinese sources (virtually none of which are available in the US).
[40] Prybyla, pp. 146-174, gives statistics and a good comparative summation of the rate and extent of agricultural collectivization in different periods of the Chinese and Soviet revolutions.
[41] See Charles Bettleheim, Class Struggles in the USSR, Vols. I and II. A. Green and XMLC have not collectively studied these works and we do not have a position on his conclusions.
[42] Eckstein, China’s Economic Development, p. 254.
[43] Lenin, Two Tactics, FLP edition, p. 46; and, Lenin quoted in History of the CPSU, pp. 66-67.