The Land Question in China: Agrarian Capitalism, Industrious Revolution, and East Asian Development (Routledge Contemporary China Series)

This book interrogates the inevitability and practicability of full-scale, land-intensive capitalist agriculture in China, whilst analyzing the labor-intensive industrious revolution as an alternative rural development path. It presents a critical account of the recent rise of agrarian capitalism as a force that would undermine hundreds of millions of people's livelihoods in the populous country.The Land Question in China traces the roots of the industrious revolution in China back to the eighteenth century, drawing comparisons between contemporary rural development and economic prosperity in the mid-Qing dynasty. In the context of neoliberal restructuring, it argues that vigorous rural development with broad access to land offers a solution to mitigate precarious urban employment and population pressure, while the transfer of land from villagers to large producers and urban investors will exacerbate these problems. Comparisons with South Africa and the East Asian economies of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan further illustrate this and help to develop a new interpretation of the industrious revolution and its contemporary relevance. Providing a critical examination of the'new land reform'in China from a world historical perspective, this book will be useful to students and scholars of sociology, economics, and development, as well as Chinese Studies. Cover 1 Half Title 2 Series Page 3 Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Dedication 6 Table of Contents 8 List of illustrations 10 Figures 10 Tables 10 Preface 11 Introduction 14 Industrious revolution, agrarian capitalism, and argument of the book 17 State, market, and community: conditions for an industrious revolution 20 The East Asian development path and Chinese experience 24 Notes 28 Part I: Historical perspective 30 Chapter 1: The Ming–Qing transition, land, and China’s first industrious revolution 32 Changing status of smallholders: 1550–1800 33 Expanding serfdom and elite power in the late Ming dynasty 34 Land relations and the market in the eighteenth century 35 1.2 The role of the Qing state 37 Political will 38 State capacity 39 Supportive policies for smallholders 40 The unraveling and legacy of China’s first industrious revolution 45 Notes 48 Chapter 2: Socialism, market reform, and the long road to the second industrious revolution 49 Land reform, collectivization, and market reform 51 Rural industry in Wujin: 1949–90 54 Agriculture and environment in Aohan 58 Socialism and the industrious revolution 62 Socialist developmental state 62 Cadres and collective organizations 64 Market, community, and the importance of land 66 Community-based market dynamics 67 Land rights and small-scale farming 69 Notes 71 Part II: Undermining forces 72 Chapter 3: Urban bias and rural crisis: The land question beyond the countryside 74 Impacts of urban bias on rural areas in the hinterland 75 Growing taxes and fees 77 Insufficient infrastructure investment 78 Drying up of rural credit 79 Marketization of education and health care 80 Underuse of farmland and rise of a migration-dependent economy 81 From privatization to land expropriation: rural enterprises in Wujin 84 Urbanization, landless peasants, and land struggles 87 Notes 91 Chapter 4: The rise of agrarian capitalism and the future of the industrious revolution 92 Agricultural modernization and the problematization of “small” 93 Grain security: the Sword of Damocles 96 Building the new socialist countryside, but for whom? 100 Land transfer and the discourse of “who will cultivate the land?” 103 The rise of agrarian capitalism and the future of the industrious revolution 108 Notes 111 Part III: Comparative perspective 114 Chapter 5: South Africa in comparison: Dispossession, agrarian capitalism, and struggles for land 116 Successive dispossessions: colonialism, segregation, and apartheid 119 Agrarian capitalism and the surplus population 122 Struggles for land: land reform, precarious livelihood, and protest 126 Conclusion: the land question in South Africa and China 130 Notes 131 Chapter 6: Land, welfare, and the East Asian development path revisited 132 Agrarian reform and industrial transformation 133 Economic slowdown and the rising precarity 137 The productivist welfare regime and the crisis of welfare 140 Land, welfare, and livelihood security 144 China and East Asian development 147 Notes 148 Conclusion 149 The Chinese land question in world-historical perspective 151 Multifunctionality of land and varieties of industrious revolution 153 Rural revitalization: a new East Asian development path? 153 Appendix: List of key land policy documents since the market reform 155 Rural land policy documents 155 Urban land policy documents 157 References 160 Index 183 This book interrogates the inevitability and practicability of full-scale, land-intensive capitalist agriculture in China, whilst analyzing the labor-intensive industrious revolution as an alternative rural development path. It presents acritical account of the recent rise of agrarian capitalism as a force that would undermine hundreds of millions of people's livelihoods in the populous country. The Land Question in China traces the roots of the industrious revolution in China back to theeighteenth century, drawing comparisons between contemporary rural development and economic prosperity in the mid-Qing dynasty. In the context of neoliberal restructuring, it argues that vigorous rural development with broad access to land offers a solution to mitigate precarious urban employment and population pressure, while the transfer of land from villagers to large producers and urban investors will exacerbate these problems. Comparisons with South Africa and the East Asian economies of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan further illustrate this and help to develop a new interpretation of the industrious revolution and its contemporary relevance. Providing a critical examination of the "new land reform" in China from a world historical perspective, this book will be useful to students and scholars of sociology, economics, and development, as well as Chinese Studies This book examines the inevitability of full-scale, land-intensive capitalist agriculture in China, whilst analysing the labour-intensive path of the industrious revolution. Exploring these two rural development paths, it presents a detailed account of the rise of agrarian capitalism.