Change in Contemporary China - Case Study Example

Change in Contemporary China Name: University: Instructor: Course Title: Date of Submission: Abstract China has a long history of government system from Shang Dynasty in 1766-1122 BC to Nationalist revolution of 1911 and the 1949 Communist revolution that has had immense influence on modern day China. The happening at the earlier years of revolution led by Mao Zedong has had profound effect on the country. Scholars have analysed Mao rule in two perspectives which elicits mixed reactions. Some see his rule as having success while others see it a rule full of witch hunt and phobia of capitalism. The earlier rule of the chairman Mao was more detrimental as compared to his successor Deng Xiaoping who opened up China. However, despite of his shortcomings, the intentions that he had have had some positive influence on current China. The communist government that came in is accredited with the creation of land reforms. In order to attain this they did land redistribution between landlords and peasants through 1950 Agrarian law. The second reformation was in the social sector. This was achieved through removal of distinction between landowners and peasants, and new marriage laws. Third was the reform towards thought by changing entire population psychology. This was done through a four year program to eradicate old habits in form of corruption, cultural imperialism among others. The fourth was adoption of economic planning through five year plans and planned economy approach like great leap. The approach aimed at enhancing China’s position in terms of economy, technology and industry which never was, but created that sense for future leaders. These earlier happening have given China a unique identity at national and global arena even though they were failures at initial. Presently, Chinese believe they can do whatever other industrialised countries can do and this is majorly informed by the great leap dream. Moreover, the belief of being unique has made them have the national psyche of working towards common goal and now China is the second largest economy. Thus, the contexts set in 1950s have had massive impact on the present social, economic and political system. However, the programmes by then did not have that much success as seen during the misfortunes under great leap policy and The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Change in Contemporary China 1.0 Introduction The significant and unique outstanding observation about china is the broad and extended cultural history. The Chinese people ranks as one of the societies that have long cultural ties. The governance history of a country influences their current trends (Dillion and Dillon, 2008, p.10). Self (2010) note that the governance system of a country in terms of influence can be analysed in the context of social, technological and economic change. Government just the same as management in private organisations create the vision for a country that will influence its internal operations and international relations. After the fall of dynasty system in 1911, China has had two major revolutions. The first is the 1911 Nationalist revolution, the second being 1949 revolution. Others include Cultural Revolution by workers and students from 1966 to 1977.this revolution continued the international isolation of Chinese people until 1979 towards 1990s that they decided to open up. Each revolution has its own leadership traits that they would like to be the overriding theme in their government structures based on their political convictions. The turning point of China in terms of Governance was in 1949 during the Mao Zedong Revolution (Yu, Zhong and Liao, 2010, p.333). This has had a long term impact up to now and the foundation laid by then still informs how this country operates. This paper examines how the Chinese Communist Party tried to alter Chinese society after coming to power in 1949 and how successful were their attempts at changing China as a state and society. To answer the above thesis statement, the paper’s discourse is presented in the framework of social change, economic change and technological change. In this paradigm, governance/ government and politics are seen to be interlocking factors and have a bearing over other societal dynamics thus, acts as an avenue of creating a nations vision and identity at local, national and global arena. 2.0 Post Dynasty Rule and 1949 Revolution In brief, to give an historical development in the post dynasty we first look at the first Chinese revolution by nationalist in 1911 which marked the end of Manchu dynasty after 267 years, and 2,000 year of imperial rule. The first leader under new system was Yuan Shih Kai who developed republic of china. The seat of his power was at Beijing. He adopted a republican state with a premier, cabinet, draft constitution and plan for parliamentary elections. After the death of Shi in 1916 various revolutions occurred. The main goal of the nationalist party was to unite China after years of imperial rule by foreign powers. Prominent amongst these revolutions was the one by Sun-yat Sen (1866-1925). The nationalist revolution lasted from 1912-1949 (Byrne, 2007, p.18). After the death of Sun Chiang Kai Shek an ally of Mao Tse Tsung in earlier years took over the reins (p.21). However, by 1921 these people had a widening rift with Mao adopting communism and forming China Communist Party supported by Russia. Their parting point was in 1927 when Chiang attacked the Communist sympathisers (p.21 & 22). The next to follow this was the second Chinese revolution by communist faction. The revolution of 1949 started back in 1920s, but gained momentum when Mao Tse Tsung and Zhu De, a former warlord formed a military of 80, 00 in Southeastern China. This later became known as red army as it was based on their colours (Byrne, 2007, p.24 & 25). The fall of Nationalist government was after the long march where Mao emerged as the undisputed leader. The final straw started in 1930 when Japan attacked china followed by full rolled out war in 1937. By this time, the Nationalist party were focusing on defeating communist party while the country was under siege from Japan (Byrne, 2007, p.26, 27 & 28). The leadership form entrenched by this government has remained largely the source of influence up to the present (Reuvid, 2011, p.8). The second revolution was based on Karl Marx theories as advanced by Mao Zedong on agricultural society by then. By then, China Communist party redistributed lands they had acquired from the landlords and aristocrats to feudal. This made them popular (Byrne, 2007, p.32). These policies have continued to guide both the party and the subsequent governments. The approach taken was a total control of subjects where drawing line between party and government activities is very thin. Secondly, prior to 1982 it was based on concentration of power at the top (Dillion and Dillon, 2008, p.12 and 13; Yu, Zhong and Liao, 2010, p.333). In a nutshell the revolution was driven by the idea of egalitarian, communist, and socialist society. 3.0 How China Communist Party Tried Transforming China and their Success 3.1 The 1st 5 Year Plan and Great Leap Forward Policy (1958-1961) After the revolution, the communist party under their chairman Mao embarked on five year economic plans that were to make the country a centrally planned economy. The first plan was done in 1953-1957 (Palese, 2009, p.6 & 7). One of the changes that the Communist Party tried to enforce in China after the revolution is the great leap forward policy instituted in 1958. It was the second 5 year plan. This policy was meant to break away from Russia’s model of communism and make the country developed like Britain and US in the areas of technology and agriculture so as to ensure self sufficiency. While starting the programme, they had the slogan of “struggle hard for three years. Change the face of china. Catch up with Britain and Catch up with America.” This policy created what were known as communes. These communes controlled their own means of production. Moreover, the spirit of this document was outlined in what was termed as “the sixty articles on working methods” (Palese, 2009, p.11). The challenge was that the local farmers didn’t understand the process. Consequently, the policy is blamed for the famine that claimed lives in China from 1959-1961. As a result of this consequences Mao withdrew the policy (Houser and Sands, 2000, p.2). Apart from agriculture and industrialisation, this policy advocated for water conservation, steel and iron campaign (Palese, 2009, p.14 & 15). While in the initial years the centrally planned economy had negative impact on the citizens as epitomised in the 159-61 famine, from late 70s the country has emerged strong after embracing market economy. The success of this approach was the introduction of five year plan. Currently, the country is in its 12th 5 year plan after the revolution. The amazing is the communist government of the people’s republic of china has seen significant and continual growth of the republic in terms of world economic power and political affairs. In a nutshell china has grown stronger than witnessed before (Yu, Zhong and Liao, 2010, p.343). One of the pillars that have seen China rise from underdeveloped world to the second largest economy in the world is the planning articulated in these five year plans by the government. The plans outline road maps of attaining various development goals of the country (Delloite China, 2011). While millions of people suffered under this policy, it also contributed to some positive aspects were like learning lessons. The one factor that the revolution epitomised is the need to be independent from the mainstream world thinking. Whereby, Chinese people for long time have hard the belief of being of their own by developing home grown solutions to their problems. This entrenched self reliance in all aspects. This dream has enabled the country to push for policies that allows for self reliance without much outside help. In addition, the observation relates to the urge of the rulers and people of not conforming to other people culture (Killion, 2006, p.25, 26 and 27). This national psyche has revolutionised this country whereby the belief that they can do it has seen them send man into the moon, have the fifth largest military in the world, develop super highways, improve agriculture, develop academic research married with indigenous knowledge, succeed in business and gain respected powerful position in the world. 3.2 Land Reforms China has had two major land reforms. The first is during 1947 to 1952 when the people’s liberation army took land from landlords, temples& lineages, and land rented out by rich peasants and then re-distributed to middle and poor peasants, and to landless labourers (Bramal, 2004, p.107). In order to attain this they did land redistribution between landlords and peasants through 1950 Agrarian law (Yu, Zhong and Liao, 2010, p.342). In the earlier years before revolution, China had one of the unequal societies with land parcels being at the hands of few rich people. Most of the peasants were farm workers who were employed on casual basis. To address this imbalance and create an egalitarian society, Mao tried to redistribute land to the poor and landless from the capitalist land holders. This created a small scale family farming units. This had little impact to the poor. Moreover, it interfered with the system of food production as the peasants were not equipped with the skills and capacity of running these firms. By around 1955-1956, this reform came to halt with the new policy of collectivisation. The second reform was in 1981-1983. This was designed to enable these farms run effectively. To achieve this, material incentives were restored, the size of the unit of account from production teams to work groups were reduced. This was indirect transfer of land back to households/ decollectivisation (Bramall, 2004, p.108). While the first land reform process was meant to reduce inequality in the society, various literatures gauges the effect of these two reforms in different perspectives. The first group are those who offer a discourse that it actually contributed to Income inequality and poverty reduction, and output growth acceleration. The study notes that reform positively influenced growth because post-reform small farms generated higher yields than larger, pre-reform farms, an outcome that – they argue – reflected the existence of an inverse relationship between farm size and land productivity (GKI cited in Bramall, 2004, p.109 & 113). On the other hand, Bramall, (2004, p.118) offers an interesting discourse that the reforms never had any impact. 3.3 The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966 to 1976) This ranks as one of the most draw backs that happened during Mao rule. This kind of thinking made millions suffer in the hands of Red Guards. The need to initiate this policy was based on the feeling by Mao and Maoist that elements of capitalism were creeping in. Moreover, Mao wanted to use it as a means of redeeming himself after the failure of his great leap policy. The goal of this socio-political process was to entrench socialism. The process highly embraced violent class struggle. The aftermath of all this was humiliation to the opponents, seizure of properties, imprisonment and torture, destruction of historical artefacts and forced displacement (Chang, 1999, p.32). This policy made China suffer as it was international secluded and thus, did not have that much success. The reason for this is that policies should be able to uplift people from poverty and make them less vulnerable, but this did the exactly opposite. The only success story that can be spoken of this process was the emergence of artistry works (Cushing and Tompkins, 2007, p.143) 4.0 Conclusion From the above discussions, the earlier attempt by China’s Communist Party to transform China was a catastrophic encounter. Many people suffered at the hand of the Red Army since any dissent was treated with suspicion. The conclusion that one can build is that under Mao Zedong, there were more harm than good as the country was isolated even though this was subject to international geo-political dynamics. However, apart from the harm of creating controlled economy governed with iron fists, there are precedents that he set which have become of present modern china legacy. The best of this is the initiation of five year plans in that country. The only dent under this programme was the collectivisation process that resulted in famine. Otherwise it laid a foundation for economic planning. On the other hand issues of land reforms have been treated with mixed reaction and point the exact success is difficult. References Bramall, C. 2004. Chinese land reforms in long-run perspective and in the wider East Asian context. Journal of agrarian change, Vol. 4, pp. 107-141 Byrne, P. 2007. The Chinese revolution: the triumph of communism. Minneapolis: Compass Point Book Cushing, L. and Tompkins, A. 2007. Chinese Posters: Art from the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. San Fransisco, Carlifonia: Chronicle Books LLC. Delloite China 2011. Measuring value: the 12th 5 year plan: what it is, how it works and its impacts. Delloite China Research and Insight Centre Dillion, M. and Dillon, M. 2008. Contemporary China: an introduction. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge Houser, D and Sands, B. 2000. How centrally planned was China’s great leap forward demographic disaster? Department of Economics University of Arizona Killion, U. (2006). A modern Chinese journey to the west: economic globalization and dualism. New York: Nova Science Publishers Palese, A. 2009. The great leap forward (1958-1961): historical events and causes of one of the biggest tragedies in People’s Republic of China’s history.Lunds University. Reuvid, J. 2011 ed. Political risks within China in Business insights: China: practical advice on operational strategy and risks management. London: Kogan Page Self, P. 2010. Political theories of modern government: its role and reform. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. Yu, C.T., Zhong, X. and Liao, K. (2010). Culture and social transformations in reform era China. Leiden: Brill, NV. Read More