Name: Tingyi Li
Instructor: Erin McDonald
Paper rough draft
Topic: Great Leap Forward The Great Leap Forward was a socioeconomic plan held from 1958 to 1961 by Communist party of China. As a result of successful economic reconstruction that had taken place in the early 1950s, the First Five Year Plan, Mao Zedong wanted to launch the second Five Year Plan, which was the Great Leap Forward. It was aimed to change China’s agrarian economy into an industrialized and socialist society. Mao had a vision of surpassing the Soviet Union and the United States in a short period of time. The two primary tasks that Mao thought was the most important were industry and agriculture. In order to allow this plan take in action, Mao created
However because Mao continually increased the quota due to early bountiful yield of production, the communes started to run out of materials for producing steels. As a solution, they began to melt down scraps, farming tools and utensils. The mixture of impure metals made the steel too brittle to be used in construction, so many construction of buildings did not last long. If the communes lacked machinery, the workers used their bare hands. Thousands of workers were injured after long time work. Some peasants were so tired that fell asleep at their
It created a large undernourished population during these three years. Malnutrition and exposure to famine-related disease affected the health of the survivors. In the article, The long-term health and economic consequences of the 1959–1961 famine in China, the author and his research group used a cross section sample of Chinese rural people born between 1954 and 1967 to estimate what extent the attained height of rural cohorts in adulthood was reduced by the exposure to famine in their early childhood, and how the resulting adverse health consequences impaired their labor supply behavior. (p.s. also will be talked about more in detail.) In Heinan, a province, committed the worst crimes of armed robbery, rape and murder during the Great Leap Forward. At same period of time, Frank Dikötter estimates that at least 2.5 million people were beaten or tortured to death and 1 to 3 million committed suicide. (Dikötter, 2010. pp.298 & 304) The Great Leap also led to a great economic crisis. In 1959 and 1960, the gross value of agricultural output dropped by 12% and 26%, respectively. Since the diet of Chinese is mainly grains, the major calories and protein intakes are from the grains. Lack of food supply caused Malnutrition. Two other measurements that indicated food shortage in China were 1) per capita grain availability, 2) per capita grain output. (p.s. will be talked about later) The great Leap also caused huge
Following the Chinese Revolution of 1949, China’s economy was in ruin. The new leader, Mao Zedong, was responsible for pulling the economy out of the economic depression. The problems he faced included the low gross domestic product, high inflation, high unemployment, and high prices on goods. In order to solve these issues, Mao sought to follow a more Marxist model, similar to that of the Soviet Union. This was to use government intervention to develop industry in China. In Jan Wong’s Red China Blues, discusses Maoism and how Mao’s policies changed China’s economy for the worse. While some of Mao’s early domestic policies had some positive effects on China’s economy, many of his later policies caused China’s economy to regress.
One may argue that the Qing Dynasty were unlucky to experince a series of natural catastrophes like drought and famine that hit China in the late 19th century and led to rebellions breaking out against the government. For instance, the Northern Chinese Famine of 1876–1879 killed about 10 percent, about 10 million people, of the population of several northern provinces.15 The great disaster and little aid provided by the Qing government made the people even more discontented with the Qing Dynasty.
The negative circumstances surrounding China in the 19th century were critical in driving masses out of the country. For one thing, China is no stranger to droughts, in fact “The four famines of 1810, 1811, 1846 & 1849 are reported to have killed no fewer than 45 million people in China over a 39-year period” (Barnes, 2011). The droughts across parts of the mainland during the 1840’s had left farmlands badly infertile and arid. Lack of rain caused provinces such as Guangxi and Henen to suffer crippling famines, leaving many malnourished and/or dead. The unpreparedness ...
The working class faced conditions in the factory that wealthier skill workers did not have deal with. These men were not in a comfortable financial situation at home, and could not find comfort in hazardous working conditions with the dangerous machines they had to operate. Workers were harmed daily and among these injured employees were children (Shi 62). Many of these children were as young as nine years old, and due to financial reasons their families sent them away to work in workshops, mines, and even in factories surrounded by dangerous machinery. Realistically, these children were doomed to working in a factory for their entire lives. They did not attended school and worked to help provide for their families. With no education, they would not be able to find a more prestigious job with higher pay. The waged for factory workers were low, but they were not always guaranteed. The Knights of Labor pushed for a federal law that would force employers to “pay employees weekly, in full, for labor performed during the preceding week” (Shi 62). These people were only working in harmful conditions to survive but were not guaranteed enough money to feed their families. Charity handouts did not necessarily help feed a poor family, but aimed to “... produce most beneficial results to [the] community” (Shi 60). This meant that the wealthy didn’t directly give citizens money, but
Mao's period of communal reform and the establishment of the Communist party from 1949-1976 was needed in order for Deng's individual oriented, capitalist society to thrive. Mao's period encompassed the structure of a true dictatorial communist government. It strove to concentrate on unifying communities to create a strong political backbone while being economically self-sufficient and socially literate and educated in Maoist propaganda. Under Mao's leadership individual wealth was seen as a hindrance to community goals in meeting production quotas and was crushed by such policies as collectivization, land reformation, and movements such as The Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. Under his rule, modeled under the Stalinist USSR archetype, China raised its masses from poverty and starvation to a standard of living that was considered a substantial upgrade.
production of goods and foods decreased drastically and this ultimately led to starvation as people were
...rphans also started to work in factories, since they had no one to care for or about them. They also had no one to complain, making it easy to exploit these children, knowing that there was no one to regulate safety and conditions. Since population kept increasing, unemployment was on the rise so many people had to work in factories for long days and in brutal conditions.
Which in order to accelerate his plan he had to turn China into a modern sized industrialized state. Because of this Mao decided to launch what was known as the "Great Leap Forward". “Which began the mass mobilization of the people into collectives and many communities were assigned production of a single “commodity steel”” (Keynes 46). He wanted to increase agriculture by this and only made it worse with bad weather, chaos, and exports of food necessary to secure hard currency (Keynes 32). This resulted in the Great Chinese Famine which made food short and production fell dramatically. This caused the deaths of millions which didn 't make Mao so popular and some began to hate him as a ruler. In 1959, Mao resigned as the State Chairman and this was continued by Liu Shaoqi (Keynes
Many farmers and craftsmen left rural areas, and moved to cities to work as an industrial worker. While many farmers and craftsmen left rural areas the city 's population had doubled. There was also improved medical knowledge which lead to the conclusion that less people died during their childhood and the average length of life was much longer than in the past. When the new industrial life started, major changes came about for industrial workers. Most of the workers weren’t to pleased about the changes. The workers couldn’t do as they pleased, they had to abide by the policy of the factories and textiles. The new industrial workers had to work long hours, they also had to in work the same pace as the machine that they were operating. The longer hours and hard work made the workers suffer severely, the women and children suffered the
First and foremost, overpopulation is the main obstacle of the economic development in China. The limited natural resources in China can hardly support the excessively large population. Developing of our national economy, especially industry, needs great amount of natural resources, such as land, water, oil, coal, gas and iron. However, the natural resources are limited and decline very quickly when a large population exploits them everyday. Take fresh water as an example, in 1990, 58% of Chinese cities (http://www.cass.net.cn/y_sjr/y_cn_sjr_334.htm) were suffered from the insufficiency of water. It not only birngs great disadvantages to people's daily life, but also has a passive influence on the economic development. Released by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the economic lost caused by the insufficiency of water is 250 billion RMB per year, including 230 billion lost of industrial value of output and 20 billion agricultural lost. As a result, the insufficiency of natural resources somewhat slows down the economic development in china.
As it’s known around the world, Chinese political system is Communism. Some may say that communism is good and bad. Well it all began when Mao Zedong came into power, his ideas influenced Chinese people and how the true way of living is. The introduction of communism into China changed how people perceived each other. One of his first ideas was “The Great Leap Forward,” which a lot of historians considered as a failure because its initial goals were never met. The Chinese society was losing faith in Mao, and not loyal to him. In desperate needs, Mao came up with the “Cultural Revolution” or also known was “The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution”. Mao main goal was to turn all people to follow the idea of communism, but not in the way like Russia did. Even though a huge amount of people died and harmed the future image of China. Mao did whatever it took to make people to follow his ideas, he didn’t matter what the consequences were, and he was willing to kill anybody who was a “counter revolutionary.” Well, was his idea successful? it mostly depends on your point of view. According to Dictionary.com, successful mean achieving or having success. This revolution has impacted everybody, with witnessed accounts during the Mao’s rule. At last, did it work? In the following essay, Mao’s ideas how people view communism as a form of a government than the abuse of power.
When the new Chinese Government was set up in 1949, the new government faced a lot of problems. First on their agenda was how to re-build the country. As Communist Party of China (CPC) is a socialist party, their policies at the time were similar to that of the Soviet Union’s. Consequently, the CPC used a centrally planned strategy as its economic strategy when it first began. For a long time, the Chinese economy was a centrally planned economy in which none other than the state owned all companies. In fact, there were absolutely no entrepreneurs. As time went on, the problems of a centrally planned economy started to appear, such as low productivity, which was the key reason for restricting the development of China. With the population growing, the limitations of the centrally planned economy were clear. In 1978 China started its economic reform whose goal was to generate sufficient surplus value to finance the modernization of the Chinese economy. In the beginning, in the late 1970s and early 19...
Mao resigned as president of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) in April 1959 , after the Great Leap Forward, planning for Chinese production to “overtake Britain in 15 years”, failed and caused a widespread famine in China, where 20-30 million people starved. President Liu and General Secretary Deng began to restore China , while Mao remained ceremonial head of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Liu and Deng introduced many liberal and effective policies , which involved stepping back from communist ideals. Collectivisation and communal cafeterias were abandoned and peasants recommenced private, “capitalist” farming. They even rehabi...
During the Mao era, agriculture was seen as an inferior part of development. Mao based his economic system off of the Soviet Union’s economic policy in the 1950s, which focused on the development and growth of industry (Huang, 17). During the period of Mao’s rule, lack of incentives and absence of markets constrained increases in agricultural output (Brandt 469). The majority of agricultural production was centered on food to sustain China’s growing population. However, most citizens were still unable to obtain food security and barely consumed 2,300 Calories a day (Brandt 471).
Industrialization caused population migration from rural areas to urban areas. Cities expanded rapidly to provide homes for workers being employed in the factories. Workers faced harsh conditions everywhere. Living conditions were cramped, unsafe and unclean. Men, women and children labored long hours for minimal wages in dangerous conditions and no job security. The working class was financially and physically unprotected by the government as the middle and upper class grew wealthier and more powerful. (Riane Eisler (2007)).