In 1983, with the dissolution of the collectives, free medical care naturally ceased as well. The "five guarantees" introduced after 1949 food, clothes, fuel, education and a funeral were gone. Farmers who gave the best years of their lives to the collective found they were without financial support in their old age.
"Villagers said: 'xinxin kuku sanshi nian, yi yie huidao jiefang qian' (we worked hard for thirty years to build up the collectives, but overnight we returned to the status quo before the liberation)." That is from an interview in Jimo Han did in 1990, so one hopes the situation is better for them 30 years later.
Whereas the collective used to pay the tax burden, "The new taxation system in rural China is very regressive. The tax burden is not based on farmers' income but on the amount of land they farm. Consequently, the bigger a farmer's income, the smaller the tax burden as a percentage of his income. Vice versa, the smaller a villager's income, the bigger the tax burden he has to pay as a percentage of his land. " Tax policy, like other aspects of de-collectivization is promoting economic polarization in villages. This, of course, is the intended outcome. Deng Xiaoping himself expressed the view that small segment of the population should get rich first, so that this small segment of the population could lead the whole society towards progress. This was a good reflection of Deng Xiaoping's elitist mentality."
Again, it is absurd to say that China is not Communist the reality is that there is a left and right spectrum in socialist democracy, and that the reversal of the CR was a right-wing move within a socialist revolution, and which did not reverse the socialist revolution.
Negating the Cultural Revolution China should stop doing the West's work for them
Han's final chapter is titled Negating the Cultural Revolution for good reason: not only is the CR totally negated by the West, but the Chinese Communist Party obviously wound back many of its leftist advances despite the obvious success. The reason they did this is probably because leftist advances always undermine those in the 1% in any system. Again, we must reject the typical Western historical nihilism: the 1% in a socialist system is far, far better than the 1% in the neoliberal, neo-imperialist capitalist system.
The final irony regarding Western assessment of the "horrors" of the CR is how incredibly useful they actually were in promoting social good. Mao's idea that government servants should be fearful of being caught waging corruption" this is somehow a negative thing in the West, and apparently was to Deng as well.
"He (Deng) also announced that there would be no more political campaigns, which was like giving the officials a guarantee that they would not be harassed by the masses even if they were corrupt. Many officials slipped into their corrupt old ways very quickly."
No more anti-corruption campaigns the West doesn't have to even make such a statement because capitalism is legalized corruption, after all.
Revolutionary fervor waxing and waning, waxing and waning c'est la vie I think it's clear that in openly revolutionary nations, unlike the conservative nations of the West, such alternations will be more common. The good news is that the tide has turned anti-corruption campaigns are back during the era of Xi Jinping.
Mao's near-yearly anti-corruption campaigns, which culminated in a no-holds barred Cultural Revolution, must be examined with this counterview, if they are to be examined with a hint of objectivity and honesty. Of course, to a capitalist anyone persecuted by a socialist is always innocent of any charge".
Given that he wrote such a heckuva book, we should be interested in Han's final words, which I humbly relate here:
"The Chinese government's official evaluation of the Cultural Revolution serves to underline the idea, currently very much in vogue around the world, that efforts to achieve development and efforts to attain social equality are contradictory. The remarkable currency of this idea in China and internationally is due, at least in part, to the fact that such an idea is so convenient to those threatened by efforts to attain social equality. This study of the history of Jimo County has challenged this idea. During the Cultural Revolution decade and in the two decades of market reform that followed, Jimo has experienced alternative paths, both of which have led to rural development. The difference in the paths was not between development and stagnation but rather between different kinds of development. The main conclusion I hope readers will draw from the experience of Jimo County during the Cultural Revolution decade is that measures to empower and educate people at the bottom of society can also serve the goal of economic development. It is not necessary to choose between pursuing social equality and pursuing economic development. The choice is whether or not to pursue social equality."
Superbly put. An ending worth committing to memory.
Capitalism only chooses between stagnation and development it would rather tolerate Lost Decades, as in the current Eurozone, rather than do something that China and Iran did: effectively shut down the country to honestly discuss national problems and to democratically agree on solutions which benefit the 99%. Capitalism is the alexithymic shark which must keep moving, or it dies.
China, with their renewed emphasis on corruption and equality, did not die nor implode. Iran, despite all the hot and cold war against them, remains firmly revolutionary domestically, admiringly anti-imperialist inernationally, and far more socialist in inspiration and practice than any Western nation. Even with the current US threat of $0 in oil sales (anything to stop Muslim democracy") there is seemingly no indication of a domestically counter-revolution of 1979's ideals.
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