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A Necessary Evil: Conceptualizing the Socialist Commodity under Mao

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 December 2018

Laurence Coderre
Laurence Coderre*
Affiliation:
New York University, Department of East Asian Studies
*
[email protected]
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Abstract

This article traces the conceptual lineage of a statement, made by Mao Zedong and published in 1975, describing the contemporary economic system in the People's Republic of China as a commodity economy. Any surprise we might feel in the face of this verdict says more about our own narrow understanding of the (capitalist) commodity than it does about the political economy of the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). As I detail in this study, the continued existence and necessity of commodities under socialism had long been an important topic of conversation in Communist circles, with important ramifications for economic planning and political movements. This article focuses on the impact of Stalin's theory of the socialist commodity, as articulated in 1952, on Chinese political economy in the 1950s; Mao's particular engagement with Stalin's work in the context of the Great Leap Forward (1958–1960); and the emergence of a new, less benign view of the socialist commodity in the 1970s. I argue that political economic theory and its study were in fact critical to the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution as mass mobilization campaigns, calling into question much of what we think we know about modern Chinese history and Chinese socialism. The essay is intended to unsettle enduring and uncritical associations between the commodity-form and capitalism. How might we, following on the heels of the theorists I discuss, imagine the commodity otherwise?

Keywords

commoditysocialismpolitical economytheoryMao ZedongJoseph StalinChinaCultural Revolution
Type
The Proletariat and the Commodity, in Comparison
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 61 , Issue 1 , January 2019 , pp. 23 - 49
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 2018 

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References

1 My translation. “Makesi, Engesi, Liening lun wuchanjieji zhuanzheng” [Marx, Engels, and Lenin on the Dictatorship of the Proletariat]. Renmin ribao [People's Daily], 22 Feb. 1975: 1–4. For a slightly different translation of this quotation and its original context, see Peking Review 18, 9 (1975): 5–12Google Scholar.

2 “Makesi, Engesi, Liening lun wuchanjieji zhuanzheng” [Marx, Engels, and Lenin on the dictatorship of the proletariat], Hongqi [Red flag] 3 (1975): 3–19.

3 Although it did not make reference to this new directive, the effort to study the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat appears to have been initiated some weeks earlier with an essay attributed to “Chi Heng,” a well-known penname used by the editorial group of Hongqi. See Chi Heng, “Renzhen xuexi wuchanjieji zhuanzheng de lilun” [Conscientiously study the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat], Renmin ribao [People's daily], 2 Feb. 1975: 1, 4; translated in Peking Review 18, 7 (1975): 6–10Google Scholar. A week later, another editorial, this time in Renmin ribao, did refer to some of Mao's recent pronouncements, although not the one I have included here. See “Xue hao wuchanjieji zhuanzheng de lilun” [Study well the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat]. Renmin ribao [People's daily], 9 Feb. 1975: 1; translated in Peking Review 18, 7 (1975): 4–5Google Scholar.

4 Mao had also raised these issues with Danish Prime Minister Poul Hartling (1914–2000) in their meeting of 20 October 1974. In Zhou Enlai's account of the 26 December conversation, Mao makes explicit reference to these earlier remarks. Zedong, Mao, Jian guo yilai Mao Zedong wengao [Post-1949 manuscripts of Mao Zedong], vol. 13 (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1998), 413–16Google Scholar.

5 Roderick MacFarquhar and Michael Schoenhals, Mao's Last Revolution (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2006), 379.

6 This is Frederick C. Teiwes and Warren Sun's rendering of the term, in The End of the Maoist Era: Chinese Politics during the Twilight of the Cultural Revolution, 1972–1976 (London: Routledge, 2015)Google Scholar.

7 Mao, Jian guo yilai, 413.

8 Wenyuan, Yao, “Lun Lin Biao fan dang jituan de shehui jichu” [On the social basis of the Lin Biao anti-party clique], Hongqi 3 (1975): 20–29Google Scholar; translated in Peking Review 18, 10 (1975): 5–10Google Scholar; and Chunqiao, Zhang, “Lun dui zichanjieji de quanmian zhuanzheng” [On exercising all-round dictatorship over the bourgeoisie], Hongqi 4 (1975): 3–12Google Scholar; translated in Peking Review 18, 14 (1975): 5–11Google Scholar.

9 This view is upheld even in recent, more nuanced scholarship on the topic, including Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era.

10 Russo, Alessandro, “How Did the Cultural Revolution End? The Last Dispute between Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, 1975,” Modern China 39, 3 (2013): 239–79, 240CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Ibid., 245.

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13 Many of the American scholars cited herein—Carl Riskin, Mark Selden, Richard Levy, Moss Roberts—appear in Fabio Lanza's recent look at Asian Studies in the United States in the context of the Cultural Revolution and its aftermath. See The End of Concern: Maoist China, Activism, and Asian Studies (Durham: Duke University Press, 2017)Google Scholar. Also featured prominently are a significant cluster of Australian scholars and their writings, including Bill Brugger, Steve Reglar, Graham Young, and Dennis Woodward.

14 As Carl Riskin notes, these institutional mechanisms had been hollowed out by this time. See “Neither Plan nor Market: Mao's Political Economy,” in Joseph, William A., Wong, Christine P. W., and Zweig, David, eds., New Perspectives on the Cultural Revolution (Cambridge: Council on East Asian Studies and Harvard University, 1991), 133–52Google Scholar.

15 This distinction is taken from Francis Seton's work on the Soviet system. See “The Question of Ideological Obstacles to Rational Price Setting in Communist Countries,” in Abouchar, Alan, ed., The Socialist Price Mechanism (Durham: Duke University Press, 1977), 10–39Google Scholar.

16 Lin, Cyril Chihren, “The Reinstatement of Economics in China Today,” China Quarterly 85 (1981): 1–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 6.

17 It may even, on occasion, be deemed un-Marxian, as in Steve Reglar's critique of Mao, “Mao Zedong as a Marxist Political Economist: A Critique,” Journal of Contemporary Asia 17, 2 (1987): 208–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

18 This is in marked contrast to the work of anthropologist Mayfair Mei-Hui Yang, for example. See “The Gift Economy and State Power in China,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 31, 1 (1989): 25–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Gifts, Favors, and Banquets: The Art of Social Relationships in China (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994)Google Scholar.

19 My translation; Xu, He, ed. Zhengzhi jingjixue mingci jieshi [Explanation of terms in political economy] (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1974), 46–47Google Scholar.

20 Faced with this same silence on Marx's part themselves, the Bolsheviks appear to have turned to Germany and the work of Latvian economist Carl Ballod (Kārlis Balodis) (1864–1931). Smolinski, Leon, “Planning without Theory 1917–1967,” Survey 64 (1967): 108–28Google Scholar, 117–20.

21 For a concise overview of these, see ibid.

22 For the former, see Arvatov, Boris, “Everyday Life and the Culture of the Thing (Toward the Formulation of the Question),” October 81 (1997): 119–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For the latter, see Kiaer, Christina, Imagine no Possessions: The Socialist Objects of Russian Constructivism (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005)Google Scholar.

23 Significantly, this text comprises Stalin's last economic pronouncements prior to his death; that is, it is an indication of where his thinking on economic questions ended up, not where it began. There does not seem to have been any interest on the part of Chinese economists in exploring his earlier writings.

24 The eponymous discussion refers to a conference organized by the central Soviet government, attended by hundreds of economists, during which time a draft version of a socialist political economy textbook became a topic of debate. Publishing “Remarks,” together with Stalin's scathing rebuke of diverging positions, in both the late-September 1952 issue (no. 18) of the journal Bol'shevik (Bolshevik) and as a stand-alone volume simultaneously, effectively put an end to the discussion, such as it was. For the latter, see Joseph Stalin, Ėkonomicheskie problemy sot͡sializma v SSSR (Moskva: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel'stvo politicheskoĭ literatury, 1952). Hailed as a “great contribution to Marxist-Leninist theory,” “Economic problems of socialism in the USSR” was also reprinted, in full, in Pravda on 3 and 4 October 1952, the eve of the XIX Party Congress. See “Velikiĭ vklad v teorii͡u Marksizma-Leninizma,” Pravda, 3 Oct. 1952: 1.

25 Stalin's pronouncements were quickly translated into the languages of the various Communist states. The Chinese version, which appeared under the title Sulian shehuizhuyi jingji wenti, was released by People's Press (Renmin chubanshe) less than two months after the text's initial Russian publication, and the Chinese academic journal Xuexi (Study) also included the complete text in its November 1952 issue. See Stalin, Joseph, Sulian shehuizhuyi jingji wenti [Economic problems of socialism in the USSR] (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1952)Google Scholar. Also in Xuexi 8 (1952): 3–27Google Scholar.

26 The CCP did have experience dealing with economic issues in the base areas, however. Mao addressed some of these in 1942, as reproduced in Jingji wenti yu caizheng wenti [Economic and financial problems] (Subei xinhua shudian, 1949); available in English as Mao Zedong and the Political Economy of the Border Region: A Translation of Mao's Economic and Financial Problems, Watson, Andrew, trans. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980)Google Scholar. For an overview of the economic lessons learned from the base areas, see Selden, Mark, “Mao Zedong and the Political Economy of Chinese Development,” in Dirlik, Arif and Meisner, Maurice, eds., Marxism and the Chinese Experience: Issues in Contemporary Chinese Socialism (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1989), 43–58Google Scholar.

27 Emphasis in the English translation. Stalin, Joseph, Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R. (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1972), 16Google Scholar.

28 Ibid., 13.

29 The issue of social relations is particularly crucial in establishing the purportedly non-commodity status of labor in nationalized industries and the appropriate classification of wages therein, not as the exchange-value of that labor but as an apportionment of collectively created surplus value. Similar questions arose with regard to the status of work points in communes. While of considerable importance, the back-and-forth elicited by the problem of labor as a non-commodity is beyond the scope of this paper. Suffice it for our purposes to say that, like the paradox of the socialist commodity itself, the non-commodified status of labor was not really resolved, except perhaps by axiomatic fiat.

30 Very few of Marx's and Engels's writings offer detailed accounts of the political economy of communism or the transitional period that was to precede it; that is, socialism. The notable, oft quoted exceptions are Marx's “Critique of the Gotha Program” and Engels's Anti-Dühring, both of which criticize other, nominally socialist theories. For the complete English translation of the latter, see Engels, Frederick, Herr Eugen Dühring's Revolution in Science, Burns, Emile, trans. (London: Lawrence & Wishart Limited, 1936)Google Scholar.

31 Stalin, Economic Problems, 15.

32 Chuntao, Xie. “Mao Zedong de shehuizhuyi shangpin shengchan sixiang” [Mao Zedong's thoughts on commodity production], Jiaoxue yu yanjiu [Teaching and research] 6 (1993): 66–70Google Scholar, 67.

33 He would go on to head the Cultural Revolution Small Group in 1966.

34 For a detailed account of the elite political meetings during this period, see Teiwes, Frederick C. and Sun, Warren, China's Road to Disaster: Mao, Central Politicians, and Provincial Leaders in the Unfolding of the Great Leap Forward, 1955–1959 (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1999), 119–76Google Scholar.

35 Ibid., 128.

36 MacFarquhar, Roderick, Cheek, Timothy, and Wu, Eugene, eds., The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao: From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward (Cambridge: Council on East Asian Studies and Harvard University, 1989), 456–57Google Scholar.

37 Ibid., 465.

38 At the same time that Mao was holding forth on Stalin and the continued need for commodity production with his colleagues at Zhengzhou in 1958, for example, a letter, dated 9 November, entitled “Suggested reading” (Guanyu dushu de jianyi), was disseminated to Party cadres at the central, provincial, prefectural, and county levels calling for the organized study of political economy in order to clarify the correct, Marxist path forward: “I write to you for one reason only: to suggest that you read two books. One is Stalin's Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR; the other is Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin on Communist Society (Ma En Lie Si lun gongchanzhuyi shehui). Everyone should read each volume three times with care, reading and thinking, and analyzing which points are correct (zhengquede) (I believe this to be the majority) and which points are not correct or not wholly correct or give a muddled impression of what the author is trying to say. In such cases, he may not be clear on this himself. We must connect these two works to the Chinese socialist economic revolution and economic construction, using them to clear our minds and direct our great economic work. Now there are many people with chaotic thinking (hunluan sixiang). Reading these two books may clear things up. There are some comrades, calling themselves Marxist economists, who, in the past few months, are like this. When they read Marxist political economy they are Marxists, but when it comes to the practical questions of current economic practice, their Marxism falls short. This requirement to read and debate will benefit all comrades.” Mao ended his missive with a further suggestion: “In the future, you may also read another book: Textbook on Political Economy, edited by our Soviet comrades.” My translation; Mao Zedong, “Guanyu dushu jianyi” [Suggested reading], in Deng Liqun, ed., Mao Zedong du shehuizhuyi zhengzhi jingjixue pizhu he tanhua (jianben) [Mao Zedong's notes and talks on reading socialist political economy (abridged)] (Beijing: Zhonghua renmin gongheguo guoshi xuehui, 1998), 3–6.

39 When discussing these comments, scholars have tended to emphasize these areas of critique, rather than the many instances of agreement and/or adaptation. See, for example, Levy, Richard, “New Light on Mao 2: His Views on the Soviet Union's Political Economy,” China Quarterly 61 (1975): 95–117CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Reglar, “Mao Zedong.”

40 MacFarquhar, Cheek, and Wu, Secret Speeches, 494.

41 MacFarquhar, Roderick, The Origins of the Cultural Revolution, Volume 2: The Great Leap Forward, 1958–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1974), 295Google Scholar.

42 Mao says as much in this statement made at Wuchang: “We here, me included, have in the past not paid attention to the political economy of socialism, and have not studied the texts, and at present a few hundred thousand people throughout the country are discussing it vigorously; ten different people have ten different theories, one hundred different people have one hundred different theories. It's time to study the text again; those one has not read should be read, and those one has read should be reread; and furthermore Textbook on Political Economy should be read. Have you done so or not? Everybody should be issued a copy of this textbook. First read the section on socialism…” (MacFarquhar, Cheek, and Wu, Secret Speeches, 494).

43 Sulian kexueyuan jingji yanjiusuo, ed., Zhengzhi jingjixue jiaokeshu [Textbook on political economy] (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1955)Google Scholar.

44 For Wang's early and sometimes idiosyncratic work, see Karl, Rebecca E., The Magic of Concepts: History and the Economic in Twentieth-Century China (Durham: Duke University Press, 2017)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

45 For his part, Wang classifies the economic principles introduced in Zhengzhi jingjixue jiaokeshu into four groups: some belong to the capitalist mode of production, some to the socialist mode of production, some are characteristic of all economic activity, and some are specifically connected with commodity production.

46 My translation; Ya'nan, Wang, “Zhengzhi jingjixue de jiechu gongxian” [The heroic contribution of Textbook on Political Economy]. Xin jianshe [New construction] 5 (1955): 21–25Google Scholar, 25.

47 For what little is known about the Hainan Seminar, see MacFarquhar, Origins of the Cultural Revolution, 293–95.

48 The term “xiucai” refers to one who has passed the prefectural imperial service examination, but it was used in this context to denote a “loose category” of “intellectuals with access to Mao. The most important individuals in this group were the Chairman's secretaries and the term was sometimes used as synonymous with them, but others were included who had virtual secretarial status.” Teiwes and Sun, China's Road to Disaster, 123–24n18.

49 See Hu Sheng. “Mao Zedong du Sulian Zhengzhi jingjixue jiaokeshu de youguan huiyi” [Recollections of Mao Zedong reading the Soviet Union's Textbook on political economy], Zhonggong dangshi yanjiu [Journal of Chinese Communist Party history studies] 5 (2002): 8–10, 51. The notes are available in English, as circulated in the Cultural Revolution, in Zedong, Mao, A Critique of Soviet Economics, Roberts, Moss, trans. (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1977)Google Scholar.

50 For a comprehensive bibliography of such articles appearing in academic, Party, and popular publications from 1950 to 1978, see Wenmin, Zhang, Zhuoyuan, Zhang, and Jinglian, Wu, eds., Jian guo yilai shehuizhuyi shangpin shengchan he jiazhi guilü lunwen xuan [Selected essays on socialist commodity production and the law of value since the founding of the PRC] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1979), 1244–308Google Scholar.

51 Discussions of these three topics regularly bled into one another. Questions of pricing often had the most direct impact on policy, moving quite easily into the realm of “functional” economics. By contrast, what are commonly known as the Law of Value debates of this period remained largely in the “diagnostic” vein. For a sense of the range of positions held on the latter subject, see, among others, Lin, “Reinstatement of Economics.”

52 Zhongguo kexueyuan jingji yanjiusuo ziliaoshi, ed., Wo guo jingji xuejie guanyu shehuizhuyi zhiduxia shangpin, jiazhi he jiage wenti lunwen xuanji (di er ji) [Selected essays on commodities, value, and price under the socialist system from the Chinese field of economics (second collection)] (Beijing: Kexue chubanshe, 1959)Google Scholar.

53 Noted economist Gu Zhun (1915–1974), for example, ran into trouble with a 1957 treatise, in which he argued that socialist commodities were a product of accounting practices and the planned economy could only function by incorporating something uncomfortably close to a market. While he might have been forgiven for the former, the latter proved too difficult to swallow, especially in light of Gu's “rightist” tendencies in the early 1950s. He was briefly rehabilitated in the early 1960s. For the “poisonous weed” (ducao) in question, see Zhun, Gu, “Shilun shehuizhuyi zhiduxia de shangpin shengchan he jiazhi guilü” [On commodity production and the law of value under the socialist system]. Jingji yanjiu [Economic research] 3 (1957): 21–53Google Scholar. For additional examples of economists who ran afoul of the new political consensus, see Lin, “Reinstatement of Economics.”

54 MacFarquhar, Cheek, and Wu, Secret Speeches, 493.

55 The exact date of these talks is unclear, unlike Mao's speeches at the Zhengzhou Conference, which are part of the official record of the proceedings. Some reprintings suggest they also took place on 9–10 November; that is, during the conference proper. Mao's audience at the time of the talks is unknown.

56 My translation; Mao Zedong, “Du Sidalin Sulian shehuizhuyi jingji wenti” [Record of talks on reading Stalin's Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR], in Deng Liqun, ed., Mao Zedong du shehuizhuyi zhengzhi jingjixue pizhu he tanhua (jianben) [Mao Zedong's notes and talks on reading Socialist Political Economy (abridged)] (Beijing: Zhonghua renmin gongheguo guoshi xuehui, 1998), 20.

57 Mao went so far in his defense of socialist commodities as to question critics’ Marxism: “Now, there are those among us with a great drive to eliminate commodity production. Mention ‘commodity production’ and they grow concerned, thinking that commodities are capitalist things (dongxi). As they push toward communism, these people deviate (qingxiang) in not wanting commerce. There are at least several hundred thousand people who believe we don't need commerce. We have some so-called Marxist economists who have shown themselves to be even more ‘left,’ proposing the immediate elimination of commodity production in favor of the simple allocation of goods. These views are incorrect and go against the principle of objectivity. These people do not distinguish between the essence (benzhi) of socialist commodity production and capitalist commodity production. They do not understand the importance of using (liyong) commodity production under the socialist system. They do not understand that during this period of socialism, value, price, and money are critical (jiji zuoyong) to commodity production and commodity circulation” (my translation; ibid.).

58 My translation; ibid., 25.

59 My translation; ibid.

60 This shift is tied to the emergence of the notion of “continuous revolution” (jixu geming)—as opposed to “uninterrupted revolution” (buduan geming)—which placed an increased emphasis on class struggle and allowed for the creation of new bourgeois elements under socialism as well as the real possibility of revolutionary failure. On this last issue, see Russo, Alessandro, “The Probable Defeat: Preliminary Notes on the Chinese Cultural Revolution,” Positions: East Asia Cultures Critique 6, 1 (1998): 179–202CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Significantly, Graham Young and Dennis Woodward trace the roots of the theory of continuous revolution to Mao's engagement with the Soviet Zhengzhi jingjixue jiaokeshu in “From Contradictions among the People to Class Struggle: The Theories of Uninterrupted Revolution and Continuous Revolution,” Asian Survey 18, 9 (1978): 912–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 924.

61 My translation; “Makesi, Engesi, Liening lun wuchanjieji zhuanzheng.”

62 My translation; Kai, Zheng. “Zhengque renshi wo guo de shangpin zhidu” [Correctly address China's commodity system]. Hongqi 7 (1975): 32–36Google Scholar, 33.

63 If the commodity system as a whole was understood as the “soil” from which capitalism would re-emerge, individual commodities were understood to hold the “sprouts (mengya) of all the contradictions of capitalist society,” as evidenced by the fact that Marx took the commodity form as the starting point for his analysis of capitalism. Xu, Zhengzhi, 47.

64 My translation; Zheng, “Zhengque,” 34.

65 First articulated by Zhang Chunqiao: “It should be noted that this formulation concerning bourgeois rights in the socialist state was totally new [in Marxist theory].” Russo, “How Did the Cultural Revolution End?” 244. See also Zhang, “Lun dui zichanjieji de quanmian zhuanzheng.”

66 By the end of the Cultural Revolution, “bourgeois right” and its antagonistic relationship to the dictatorship of the proletariat emerged as a topic of great concern. Discursively, the danger purportedly posed by “bourgeois right” to the command economy was much the same as that earlier attributed to the “Law of Value,” were it to operate outside the realm of personal consumption. The latter was associated with market mechanisms; the former remained a threat even in the absence of such reforms, though it could be exacerbated by them.

67 Zheng, “Zhengque,” 35.

68 Emphasis in the English translation; Stalin, Economic Problems, 15.

69 Ibid., 14.

70 My translation; Zheng, “Zhengque,” 36.

71 Russo also addresses the importance of this “everyone” in “How Did the Cultural Revolution End?” 259.

72 My translation. Rong, Hu. “Shangpin jiaohuan zhong liang zhong sixiang de douzheng—cong Hunan huaguxi Songhuo lushang tanqi” [The struggle between two kinds of thought on commodity exchange: a perspective from the Hunan huaguxi Delivering goods on the road]. Hongqi 4 (1975): 67–71Google Scholar.

73 My translation; Chang, Wu. “Xue yidian zhengzhi jingjixue” [Study a little bit of political economy]. Hongqi 8 (1975): 9–11Google Scholar, 11.

74 Fang Hai. “Xue yidian zhengzhi jingjixue” [Study a little bit of political economy]. Hongqi [Red Flag] 7 (1972): 35–42; Wu, “Xue yidian zhengzhi jingjixue.”

75 See, for example, Beijing daxue jingjixi pipanzu, ed., Kong Qiu jingji sixiang pipan [A critique of Confucius’ economic thought] (Beijing: Zhongguo caizheng jingji chubanshe, 1974)Google Scholar.

76 Shanghai haiwuju yangcunpu zhuangxiezhan gongren xiezuozu and Fudan daxue jingjixi gongnongbing xueyuan, eds., Matou shang de zhengzhi jingjixue [Political economy on the docks] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1974).

77 Shang gang wu chang yi chejian gongren lilunzu, ed., Lian'ganglu qian de zhengzhi jingjixue [Political economy in front of the smelting furnace] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1976).

78 For a similar view, see Russo, “How Did the Cultural Revolution End?”

79 “New Political Economy Textbook,” Peking Review 1, 35 (1958): 18Google Scholar.

80 One notable exception is Nai Yao, ed., Zhengzhi jingjixue jiaocai (shehuizhuyi bufen) [Teaching materials on political economy (socialism)] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1961).

81 It is no accident that this writing group comprised a number of economists from Fudan University as well as Gang of Four members Yao Wenyuan and Zhang Chunqiao. This group was ground zero of the “Shanghai School” of economics.

82 Zhengzhi jingji xue jichu zhishi bianxiezu, ed., Zhengzhi jingjixue jichu zhishi [Fundamentals of political economy] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1975). In English as Lotta, Raymond, ed., Maoist Economics and the Revolutionary Road to Communism: The Shanghai Textbook (New York: Banner Press, 1994)Google Scholar.

83 Christensen and Delman contend that Zhengzhi jingjixue jichu zhishi is actually a published draft of Shehuizhuyi zhengzhi jingjixue (Political economy of socialism), a larger project shepherded by the same writing group from 1970 to 1976 that was never finalized. Christensen and Delman, “Theory of Transitional Society,” 12.

84 Chao, Feng, ed., “Wenhua da geming” cidian [Dictionary of the Cultural Revolution] (Hong Kong: Ganglong chubanshe, 1993), 369–70Google Scholar.

85 Shanghai shifan daxue zhengjiao xi and Shanghai dengpao chang lilun xiaozu, eds., Xuexi shehuizhuyi zhengzhi jingjixue [Study socialist political economy] (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1976)Google Scholar.

86 “Zhengzhi jingjixue jianghua (shehuizhuyi bufen)” bianxiezu, , ed., Zhengzhi jingjixue jianghua (shehuizhuyi bufen) [Talks on political economy (socialist section)] (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1976)Google Scholar.