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Decades after Sun Yat-sen had proclaimed the goals of "land to the tiller" and "equalization of land ownership," it seemed that the Republic of China was finally getting serious about land reform. Journals, newspapers, and public meetings provided forums for specialists who were offering suggestions to solve the rural crisis. The Legislative Yuan, beginning in July, undertook a major discussion of the agrarian problem. In September, 86 members of the Yuan finally presented a bill that would abolish the system of tenancy and make every farmer an owner of his own land. Proponents of the bill explained that the land problem was so serious that it was "the source of all disasters and the key to the nation's survival."

Within the administrative organs of the government, too, there was a feeling that something had to be done for the peasants. First, in the "pacification areas"--areas recovered from the Communists or close to the Communist base areas--the central government ordered that rents would be reduced by one-third. "It also formulated plans to buy up landlord holdings and distribute the land to the cultivators. Next, the government ordered the National Land Administration to draw up plans to nationalize all land in the country. Landlordism would thus finally be eliminated...In addition, several provincial governments--from Manchuria to Kwangtung--in rapid succession proclaimed rent-reduction and other agrarian reform measures." Lloyd E. Eastman, *Seeds of Destruction: Nationalist China in War and Revolution 1937-1949* (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984), p. 84 https://books.google.com/books?id=OTasAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA84 (unless otherwise indicated, this post is based on Eastman's book).

There was one problem with all this flurry of activity: it happened in *1948.*

Obviously, this was too late to make a difference, with the Communists on the verge of victory. Moreover, even in 1948 land reform ran into opposition. Some opponents resorted to sophistry--e.g., "Dr. Sun advocated 'land to the tiller' but he never said that *non*-tillers could not also own land" etc. "More responsible critics, like Tung Shih-chin, director of the China Peasant Union, argued that the root of China's rural crisis was not landlordism at all, but the general process of rural impoverishment that had resulted from primitive methods of production, political insecurity, exploitative taxes, natural calamities, and excess population." (Eastman, p. 84) Even if that is true, one might observe that if the peasants *thought* that landlordism was the cause (or at least *a* major cause) of their problems, land reform could be vital in winning their allegiance.

In the end, all that came of the 1948 debate on land reform was the creation in 1948 of the Sino-American Joint Commission on Rural Reconstruction, "which subsequently played a leading role in the agricultural renascence of Taiwan." Eastman, p. 84 (One is tempted to look at land reform in Taiwan as proof that the KMT could indeed do effective land reform--and do so in a way much more humane than that used by the Communists. But of course in Taiwan, there was a much smaller population to work with, the Taiwan Straits meant that the experiment could be conducted in peace, and it was politically much easier, not only because the loss of the Mainland had provided a lesson, but also because the people who held the most land *in Taiwan* had little or no influence in the KMT...[1])

So the big question is: What if the KMT had turned to land reform earlier? Even after it moved to the Right after breaking with the Communists in 1927 (and subsequently, though less violently, purging its own "leftists") it never repudiated land reform as a goal:

"In 1930 the recently established National Government promulgated a Land Law sufficiently progressive and practical for the Communists to adopt it substantially unchanged during the New Democracy period. It also provided the model for the land-reform program in Taiwan in the early 1950's. Yet during most of its tenure on the mainland, the National Government had rarely acted on its commitments to the farmers. As Chiang Kai-shek admitted in 1946, land reform had not been carried out because there had been 'insufficient administrative push.' Although he did not say so, an important reason for that lack of push was that he himself had consistently placed a low priority on the rural problem." Eastman, p. 82. https://books.google.com/books?id=OTasAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA82

There were those within the KMT who took land reform seriously, though. In May of 1945, a group of youngish KMT "radicals" even successfully agitated for a party resolution calling for the distribution of all farm land to the tillers and for an end to landlordism. Immediately after the war, too, the government ordered that all rents be reduced by 25 percent. Once again, however, hopes of reform were frustrated. Under the influence of conservatives associated with the CC Clique, the Central Executive Committee in March 1947 abandoned the plank of immediate land distribution in favor of more moderate reform. At the local level, reform ran into even more opposition; in Hunan, for example, one land reformer was assassinated. "And everywhere landlords frustrated attempts to reduce rents or otherwise encroach on their prerogatives. Two years after the war, therefore, the Nationalist had not perceptibly advanced toward their stated goal of agricultural reform." Eastman, p. 83. https://books.google.com/books?id=OTasAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA83 The revived interest in land reform in 1948, mentioned above, was a product of the desperate military situation, and came far too late.

What difference did the lack of land reform make? Peasant discontent was deep, manifesting itself in riots, banditry, and flight from the villages. But in China, peasant revolts never in themselves threatened to overturn the old order in the countryside, as they did in the French and Russian revolutions. "Indeed, Chinese peasants rarely attacked the existing socioeconomic institutions until the Communists' military or political presence assured them of protection from the retribution of the former elites." (Eastman, p. 85) https://books.google.com/books?id=OTasAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA85 Yet even in the Nationalist areas peasants' contribution to the revolutionary outcome in 1949 was real--perhaps even decisive--though indirect: it consisted first and foremost of depriving the National Government of grain, money, and men. In the Communist areas, by contrast, although most of the peasants probably remained essentially apolitical [2] they tended to cooperate with the insurgent regime, and some--especially the youth--actively supported the Communists.

So what if Chiang in, say, 1945, had really insisted on a serious land reform program? Chiang never seemed to have his heart in economics. When he tried to explain his loss of the mainland, he put more emphasis on moral than economic factors. Yet he was not opposed to land reform in principle, and if he had been more insistent, he might have gotten it enacted despite opposition from KMT conservatives--though admittedly implementation in the face of landlord obstructionism would be harder. It seems to me that this could have worked but only if he had done it as part of what General Wedemeyer urged: that instead of sending large numbers of troops to Manchuria, where they became bogged down and overextended, Chiang should (with US aid) seek to consolidate his rule south of the Great Wall and introduce a broad program of reforms there. [3] The huge expense of the Manchurian campaign mandated impossibly high taxes and requisitions from the peasants, and when these failed, the regime resorted to finance by hyperinflation, which made things worse...

Thoughts?

[1] George Kerr's *Formosa Betrayed* is biased but he does have a point when he writes:

"On the mainland an abusive traditional Chinese landlord system had long been recognized as a prime source of peasant discontent. The Nationalists had talked of reform but for years had done nothing on a significant scale. The Communists exploited these unfulfilled promises to woo support among the landless peasants. Very late - after World War II - American advisors in China had persuaded the Nationalist Government to organize a Sino-American Joint Commission on Rural Reconstruction. It made little headway on the mainland, for its reform program disturbed too many great landholders who were influential members of the Nationalist Party, Army and Government. They would not tolerate change. The JCRR, as it was called, was transferred to Formosa during the great retreat.

"In Formosa it could surge ahead with its land redistribution plans. The Formosan landholders were fair game; no one in the Government or Party hierarchy was hurt by land reform except perhaps those who had acquired extensive property under the Chen Yi and Wei administrations..." http://homepage.usask.ca/~llr130/taiwanlibrary/kerr/chap20.htm

[2] A joke among peasants who had lived under both KMT and CCP rule: "Under the Nationalists--too many taxes. Under the Communists--too many meetings." http://books.google.com/books?id=GN2cXHxg_6oC&pg=PA41

[3] OTOH, it has been argued by Matrin Bernal that Chiang "*had* to send troops to Manchuria. In war-devastated China the relatively undamaged plant in Manchuria probably made up over 80 percent of Chinese heavy industrial capacity. He was also convinced-—wrongly—-that the Russians who were occupying Manchuria were working hand in glove with the Chinese Communists. Finally, and in my view this was crucial, Chiang had to be a national leader or he was nothing. If he failed in this he would be seen by China and the world to be a mere warlord. As 'leader of China' it was essential he assert himself in Manchuria which foreigners had been trying to prize away from China for the previous fifty years. If he was to stake a claim in Manchuria only his best American trained troops could make good use of the American air transport provided and only these could hope to withstand the Communists..." http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1971/feb/25/how-mao-won/
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