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Rural Violence in Socialist China*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Elizabeth J. Perry
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Have state policies under socialism radically and irrevocably transformed the Chinese countryside? Or do traditional attitudes and behaviour persist, fuelled by rural social structures that remain tenaciously vigorous despite new socialist imperatives? These questions have shaped much of the inquiry and debate on contemporary China over the past few decades. More recently, however, another promising line of argument has gained some currency. This approach does not pose the relationship between state control and traditional social structure as a “zero-sum conflict” in which the ascendancy of one is necessarily a loss for the other. Rather, it sees state and society as interacting in a more complex manner; a manner which is not always conflictual, and sometimes even quite complementary. By this view, certain policies of the Chinese state have contributed (albeit often unwittingly) to the survival and strengthening of traditional patterns of activity.

Type
Research Article
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 103 , September 1985 , pp. 414 - 440
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1985

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References

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3. The principal sources for this article are provincial newspapers and radio broadcasts. There is of course a serious question to be raised about the reliability of the Chinese media in reporting rural violence: How much accuracy can we expect in the description of what are often explicitly denounced as counter-revolutionary incidents? The same problem occurs in research on “heterodox” groups in traditional China, and is an almost unavoidable occupational hazard in the study of any dissident activities for which the documentation from the government side greatly outweighs that from the rebels themselves. Still, although exaggeration and embellishment is to be anticipated, I believe that the general picture presented is most probably credible. Informal interviews conducted in China in 1979–84 further convinced me of the veracity of press reports about rural violence under socialism.

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14. Allegiance to Guan Gong (the “God of War”) was not uncommon among these groups. In May 1951, for example, an Yiguan Dao sect in Shanghai was reported to have changed its name to the “Guan Gong Society.” See Xinhua (Shanghai), 3 05 1951Google Scholar, in SCMP, No. 102, p. 49.

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29. Ibid., 6 July 1955.

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37. Changjiang ribao, 27 09 1958Google Scholar, in SCMP, No. 1,915, pp. 13–14.Google Scholar

38. For the religious appeal of the sects in an earlier period of Chinese history, see Overmyer, Daniel L., Folk Buddhist Religion: Dissenting Sects in Late Traditional China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1976).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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40. Changjiang ribao, 15 03 1952Google Scholar; Qunzhong ribao, 19 12 1957.Google Scholar

41. Jiangxi ribao (Jiangxi Daily) (Nanchang), 16 06 1958Google Scholar, in SCMP, No. 1,875, p. 17.Google Scholar

42. Guangming ribao, 9 09 1957.Google Scholar

43. Ibid.

44. Ibid. 4 July 1955.

45. Shanxi ribao (Shanxi Daily) (Taiyuan), 6 01 1955Google Scholar, in SCMP, No. 985, pp. 2–3.Google Scholar

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47. For more on the social composition of “traditional” sectarian groups, see Naquin, Susan, Millenarian Rebellion in China: The Eight Trigrams Uprising of 1813 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), pp. 38–39Google Scholar; and Shantung Rebellion: The Wang Lun Uprising of 1774 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), pp. 43–45.Google Scholar

48. For an example of an alliance between members of the rural elite and local “riff-raff” in what the Qing state pronounced a “heterodox rebellion,” see Perry, Elizabeth J. and Chang, Tom, “The mystery of Yellow Cliff: a controversial ‘rebellion’ in the late Qing,” Modern China (04 1980), pp. 123–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

49. On the Red Spears, see Perry, Elizabeth J., Rebels and Revolutionaries in North China, 1845–1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1980), Ch. 5.Google Scholar An interesting account of Red Spear resistance in the early months of the People's Republic appears in British Foreign Office records FO371, piece No. 83271, document No. FC101020/5. The Red Spears are described as having “decided to join hands with the landlords in an attempt to upset the communist agrarian policy.” My thanks to Bruce Cumings for sharing this report with me.

50. For a secret society based on marketing networks, see Hsieh, Winston, “Triads, salt smugglers and local uprisings,” in Chesneaux, Jean (ed.), Popular Movements and Secret Societies in China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1972), pp. 145–64.Google Scholar For village-based cases, see Hofheinz, Roy Jr., The Broken Wave (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1977), pp. 203–206CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Bianco, Lucien, “Secret societies and peasant self-defense, 1921–23,”Google Scholar in Chesneaux, , (ed.). Popular Movements, pp. 213–24.Google Scholar For a lineage-based case, see Marks, Robert, “Class relations and the origins of the rural revolution in a South China county,” Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, Vol. 15, No. 1 (01–02 1983), pp. 36–49.Google Scholar

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57. Ibid. p. 110.

58. Nanfang ribao (Guangzhou), 18 04 1964.Google Scholar

59. See, e.g. Wen, Chung, China Tames Her Rivers (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1972), pp. 29–30.Google Scholar

60. Chen, (ed.), Rural People's Communes, p. 110Google Scholar

61. Certainly there were exceptions to this picture of loyal cadres. A 1961 military investigation in Xiayi, Henan revealed, for example, that, virtually all the local militia leaders were descended from “ruffians, bandits, puppet troops and rightists.” In Shangcheng county, 84% of the heads of commune armed forces, 73% of militia regiment commanders and 74% of militia battalion commanders were found to have committed “seriously unlawful acts.” See Cheng, J. Chester (ed.). The Politics of the Chinese Red Army (Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1966), p. 119.Google Scholar However, the majority of incidents reported in this highly classified document, the Gongzuo tongxun (Work Bulletin) depict local cadres who duly enforced state policies in the face of restive peasants. (See ibid. pp. 431–32).

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63. Ningxia ribao (Ningxia Daily) (Yinchuan), 10 05 1982, p. 3 in FBIS, 25 May 1982, pp. T3–4.Google Scholar

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65. Ibid. 25 August 1981 in FBIS, 26 August 1981, p. K2.

66. Field work in Anhui and Jiangsu, summer of 1984.

67. Gui-hou Provincial Service (Guiyang), 24 04 1981, in FBIS, 27 04 1981, p. Q1.Google Scholar

68. For examples of traditional Huaibei feuds, see Perry, , Rebels and Revolutionaries, pp. 74–80.Google Scholar

69. Anhui Provincial Service (Hefei), 23 08 1979Google Scholar, in FBIS, 27 08 1979, p. O1Google Scholar. A similar case was reported in Hong'an county, Hubei in late 1983. A newly-wed woman, surnamed “He,” fought with her husband and then committed suicide. Her family amassed more than 100 He's who marched to the husband's home and caused more than 4,700 yuan in damages. See Zhongguo nongmin bao (Chinese Peasant Gazette), 20 10 1983, p. 1.Google Scholar

70. Anhui Provincial Service, 3 02 1980Google Scholar, in FBIS, 5 02 1980, p. O3.Google Scholar

71. Shandong Provincial Service (Jinan), 7 11 1979Google Scholar, in FBIS, 14 11 1979, p. O3Google Scholar; Guangdong Provincial Service (Guangzhou), 26 10 1980Google Scholar, in FBIS, 27 10 1980, p. P2Google Scholar; Anhui Provincial Service, 14 12 1980Google Scholar, in FBIS, 19 12 1980, p. O3 and 3 February 1980Google Scholar, in FBIS, 5 02 1980, pp. O2–3Google Scholar; Hunan Provincial Service (Changsha), 14 12 1981Google Scholar, in FBIS, 17 12 1981, pp. K16–18Google Scholar; Shanxi Provincial Service (Taiyuan), 12 11 1982Google Scholar, in Joint Publications Research Service: Agriculture, No. 244, pp. 152–53.Google Scholar

72. Renmin ribao, 5 03 1983, p. 2.Google Scholar

73. A further discussion of cadre discontent can be found in Latham, Richard, “The implications of rural reforms for grassroots cadres,” in Perry, Elizabeth J. and Wong, Christine (eds.), The Political Economy of Reform in Post-Mao China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1985).Google Scholar

74. On traditional armed feuds, see Lamley, Harry J., “Hsieh-tou: the pathology of violence in Southeastern China,” Ch'ing-shih Wen-t'i, Vol. 3, No. 7 (1977), pp. 1–39.Google Scholar

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76. Hainan ribao (Haikou), 18 09 1980, p. 1Google Scholar in FBIS, 15 10 1980, pp. P4–5.Google Scholar

77. Hainan Island Service, 11 09 1981Google Scholar, in FBIS, 14 09 1981, p. P4.Google Scholar

78. Hunan Provincial Service, 5 04 1981Google Scholar, in FBIS, 8 04 1981, p. P14.Google Scholar

79. Hainan Island Service, 19 10 1981Google Scholar, in FBIS, 23 10 1981, pp. P1–2.Google Scholar

80. Nanfang ribao (Guangzhou), 5 11 1981, p. 2.Google Scholar

81. Zhongguo nongmin bao, 18 10 1983, p. 3Google Scholar; 20 October 1983, p. 1.

82. Nanfang ribao, 26 01 1983, p. 2Google Scholar. My thanks to Graham Johnson for bringing this article to my attention.

83. Zhongguo nongmin bao, 18 10 1983, p. 3.Google Scholar

84. On 19 August 1981, an Anhui radio broadcast reported a Daoist priest on Mt Jiuhua who claimed to be a 123 year-old immortal “sent by the Jade Emperor to heal the sick.” His promises attracted a sizeable crowd. Similarly, on 14 December 1980, a Zhejiang broadcast reported that a production team head in Yiwu county, claiming to be a demi-god, had set up a formal healing practice. After a patient lit three sticks of incense, the team head would have visions and draw spells on paper. Then he would burn the paper and give his patients the ashes as a cure. See Inside China Mainland, 12 1981, p. 10.Google Scholar

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90. Ibid. p. P2.

91. Zhongguo nongmin bao, 20 10 1983, p. 1.Google Scholar

92. Ban yue tan, 25 12 1982.Google Scholar

93. Renmin ribao, 12 07 1982Google Scholar; also cited in Wen Hui Bao (Shanghai), 11 10 1982, p. 3.Google Scholar

94. Xinhua (Beijing), 2 09 1983Google Scholar in FBIS, 16 09 1983, p. K12.Google Scholar

95. Beijing Review, 23 04 1984, pp. 19–21.Google Scholar

96. Renmin ribao, 24 04 1984, p. 2.Google Scholar

97. Fujian ribao (Fujian Daily) 2 04 1984Google Scholar. My thanks to Stephen Averill for showing me this article.

98. See Tilly, Charles, “Rural collective action.” An earlier version of the analysis appears in Tilly, “Collective violence in European perspective,” in Graham, Hugh Davis and Gurr, Ted Robert (eds.), The History of Violence in America (New York: Bantam, 1969), pp. 28–38.Google Scholar

99. The threat of such a possibility was seen in the winter of 1979 when thousands of peasants demonstrated in the streets of Beijing, carrying banners and shouting slogans calling for an end to hunger and injustice. On 14 January a group of 100 or so angry peasants yelling “We're tired of being hungry” and “Down with oppression” tried to storm the residence of then Party Chairman Hua Guofeng in an unsuccessful attempt to present their grievances directly to him. See the reports by Agence France Presse correspondents Georges Biannic and Deron, Francis in FBIS, 9 01 1979, p. E1Google Scholar, 15 January 1979, p. E1, 22 January 1979, p. E1, 23 January 1979, p. E2, 25 January 1979, p. E2.