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Nowhere to Call Home: A Study of Sanmenxia-Reservoir Resettlement From Henan To Gansu, 1956–1965
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 October 2021
Abstract
In the late 1950s, the creation of a large reservoir for the Sanmenxia hydropower project required the displacement of tens of thousands of households along the Yellow River. Simultaneously, the state commenced a land-reclamation project, sending people from populated areas to the frontiers. Under the supervision of county and provincial authorities, more than 7,000 reservoir inhabitants from Henan were mobilized to migrate to Dunhuang, an oasis surrounded by the Gobi Desert in the northwest. The socialist state's pursuit of irrigation and hydroelectricity benefits not only altered the waterscape of the Yellow River; it also impacted nearby rural communities as well as those a thousand miles away. From the high-modernist perspective, the state-sponsored demographic engineering and the Yellow River engineering seemed to complement each other well. Yet, with the massive flight of resettlers, the state-envisioned integration of reservoir displacement and frontier reclamation ultimately failed.
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References
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25 Scott, James, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 6Google Scholar. Scott outlines several helpful analysis frames, such as state space versus non-state space, high modernism, and the state's consistent simplification effort in history. Drawing on Scott's analysis frames, the Yellow River valley could be understood as a space created through interaction among people, nature, and the state in the past thousands of years. Under the influence of global high modernism, the Chinese Communist state planned to build dams and reservoirs; these could be seen as high-modernist state space transformed from natural and agrarian spaces. To create this state space, residents in the valley were asked to resettle somewhere else under the dispensation of the state authority and with structural coercion.
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37 “Gansusheng yiminju Wang Xianzhi tongzhi fayan” (1956).
38 “Gansusheng yiminju Wang Xianzhi tongzhi fayan” (1956).
39 “Shengyiminweiyuanhui zhuren Jia Xinzhai guanyu Henansheng yinianlaiyimingongzuo de jibenqingkuang de baogao” 省移民委员会主任贾心斋关于河南省一年以来移民工作的基本情况的报告 (November 9, 1956), J149/05/0397 (Zhengzhou, Henan: Henan Province Archives).
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47 On the Anti-Rightist Movement at the local level, see Cao Shuji “An Overt Conspiracy: Creating Rightists in Rural Henan, 1957–1958,” in Maoism at the Grassroots, ed. Brown and Johnson, 77.
48 Wang Yuan 王渊 Dunhuang Yishi 敦煌轶事 (Lanzhou: Gansu renmin, 2005).
49 On the experience of Rightists in labor camps in Gansu province, see He Fengming 和凤鸣 Jingli-Wode 1957 经历-我的 1957 (Dunhuang: Dunhuang Wenyi, 2001); Yang Xianhui 杨显惠 Jiabiangou Jishi 夹边沟纪事 (Huacheng, 2008), and see its English translation, Woman from Shanghai: Tales of Survival from a Chinese Labor Camp (New York: Anchor, 2009).
50 “Henansheng 1956 dongji weiwen yimin heqingkenduiyuan gongzuo zongjie baogao” 河南省 1956 冬季慰问移民和青垦队员工作总结报告 (January, 1957), J149/05/03967 (Zhengzhou, Henan: Henan Province Archives).
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53 Zhou, The Great Famine in China, 1958–1962, 67. Also, on cannibalism in Gansu, see Yang, Tombstone.
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56 “Guanyu yimin daoliuqingkuang de baogao” 关于移民倒流情况的报告 (August 20, 1959), 138/004/1721 (Lanzhou, Gansu: Gansu Province Archives).
57 Zhonggong Dunhuangxian weiyuanhui mishushi, “Liuyue fanjiyimin qiangkuang tongbao.”
58 Sanmenxiashi yiminweiyuanhui 三门峡市移民委员会, “Guanyu dongyuan kuquyimin fandun de gongzuoanpai” 关于动员库区移民返敦的工作安排 (1956), 91/1 (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Municipal Archives).
59 “Duifanjiyimin qingkuangde fenxirenshi he jinhou gongzuo yijian” 对返籍移民情况的分析认识和今后工作意见 (1957), 91/4 (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Municipal Archives).
60 Zhou Enlai 周恩来 1958 nian Sanmenxia huiyi jianghua” 1958 年三门峡会议讲话 (Zhou Enlai's Sanmenxia project meeting), (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Gazetteer Office).
61 “Sanmenxiashi yiminbangongshi guanyu dongyuan yimin chonggananzhiqude yijian” 三门峡移民办公室关于动员移民重返安置区的意见 (1957), 91/5 (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Municipal Archives).
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64 Shi, “Huanghe Sanmenxia kuqu yiminqingku qingkuang gaisu,” 120.
65 “Lingbaoxian yiminweiyuanhui guayu chengguan gongshe jieshou Dunhuang fanjiyimin juzhuchengshi de baogao” 灵宝县移民委员会关于城关公社接受敦煌返籍移民居住城市的报告 (February 2, 1964) 55 (Lingbao, Henan: Lingbao County Archives).
66 Jing, The Temple of Memories.
67 Shi, “Huanghe Sanmenxia kuqu yiminqingku qingkuang gaishu,”117.
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69 Shi, “Huanghe Sanmenxia kuqu yiminqingku qingkuang gaishu,”116.
70 Sanmenxiashi minzhengju 三门峡市民政局, “Sanmenxiashi 1959 nian yimin gongzuo zongjiebaogao” 三门峡市 1959 年移民工作总结报告, 42/1 (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Municipal Archives).
71 Sanmenxiashi minzhengju 三门峡市民政局, “Guanyu jiejue 57nian neiqian Cizhong yimin zhufangyiliuwenti de qingshi” 关于解决 57 年内迁磁钟移民住房遗留问题的请示, 91/40 (Sanmenxia, Henan: Sanmenxia Municipal Archives).
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