Deagrarianization and Depeasantization: A Dynamic Process of Transformation in Rural China

Centering on the terms of “deagrarianization” 去农化 and “depeasantization” 去小农化, this article aims to reinterpret socioeconomic changes in rural China from a theoretical and global perspective. Deagrarianization and depeasantization interwove to shape the dynamic process of rural transformation. Throughout the reform era, rural China underwent a transition from “deagrarianization without depeasantization” to “salient depeasantization.” In the end, deagrarianization led to a continual process of rural deterioration and at the same time turned rural China into a space of complexity. Depeasantization has been diversifying Chinese agriculture into multiple organizational forms. The mode of “part-time worker and part-time farmer” that emerged in the process of deagrarianization is gradually yielding to the specializing mode of “full-time farmer” or “full-time worker” during depeasantization. The strategy of rural revitalization should be adjusted dynamically on the basis of a recognition of these two interwoven processes.

The Living Conditions and Social Mobility of Rural Households in Yanshan County, Hebei, 1900–1950

An analysis of the Class Background Registers of Yanshan county, Hebei, shows that households of landlord and rich peasant status accounted for less than 10 percent of the local population and possessed less than 15 percent of the land, while households of poor and lower-middle peasant standing owned about half of the land. Overall, land distribution was relatively balanced, as seen in the Gini coefficient of 0.3–0.4 in the distribution of land rights and the fact that about half of the households owned 2–5 mu of land per capita. But the economic condition of the rural population was not determined by the factor of land distribution alone; in places where the natural endowment was poor, off-farm income-making activities mattered a great deal to local residents. Such activities took various forms, which could improve as well as worsen people’s livelihood. An analysis of social mobility in this area further shows the perpetuation of the existing class structure. Those whose grandparents had lived in poverty found it difficult to move up socially. On the whole, the rural area under study shows a prolonged trend of deterioration, which is meaningful for understanding the land reform.

Villager Groups and Self-Governance in China: Power, Incentives, and Risk Prevention

Building a modern grassroots governance system synchronized with national development has become a significant part of China’s rural revitalization strategy. To cope with the overlapping of property rights, social identities, and work and living space in China’s villages, the villager group 村民小组 has been endowed with relatively complete governance power. Regional social networks, the moral constraints of reputation in the village, and the administrative incentives provided by the government constitute the incentive structure of villager group governance. At the same time, granting group cadres official authority and social power enables them to better coordinate the relationship between state and society, safeguard the rights and interests of villagers in the group, and provide low-cost public goods through their structural position in “the last kilometer” 最后一公里. However, they may also bring about the political risk of group confrontation, the economic risk of embezzling collective assets, and the moral risk of negligence and political inertia. To ward off these risks requires strengthening the leadership of grassroots party organizations, making full use of social supervision, ensuring that cadres operate in an open and above-board fashion, and introducing the notion of the rule of law, thus forming a compound risk-prevention mechanism for grassroots power and building a solid foundation for national governance.

Agricultural Involution and Bureaucratic Involution: Types, Concepts, Empirical Generalizations, and Theoretical Mechanisms

The article reviews the history of the word “involution,” the empirical basis of the concept of “agricultural involution,” and the mechanisms operating behind that phenomenon. It then considers the very different empirical bases and mechanisms of “bureaucratic involution.” State and peasant might interact in a positive way that leads to development – as when the state in the Reform era gave peasants the power and right to respond to market stimuli and develop the “labor and capital dual intensifying” “new agriculture” that has led to genuine development, demonstrating how small peasants have been the true primary subjects of Chinese agriculture and the true key to genuine agricultural development. By contrast, if bureaucratic involution should force on peasants policies that run counter to realities, it can lead to malignant “ultra-involution.” Similar consequences can be seen in spheres with scarce opportunities relative to the number of people seeking them, once they are placed under the forces of bureaucratic involution, as in the “examinations-above-all-else education system” as well as in similar (public and private) enterprise management. That is why the word “involution” has recently triggered such widespread resonance among so very many people. What is needed is state-party policies that truly accord with the interests of the people and draw their active participation. That kind of combination is what can check tendencies toward ultra-involution.

Why Good Governance Goes Wrong: Government and Village in the Supply of Public Goods in Rural China

Following the rural tax-for-fee reform and the abolition of agricultural taxes in the early 2000s, the overall supply of rural public goods has improved, but its performance is still deficient. During a field study of ecological migrants in rural Ningxia, the authors witnessed the problems encountered in the implementation of a public housing project. This episode demonstrates how the provision of rural public goods depends on rural governance that responds to the tension between modern development and the values of rural society. The failure of the project stems from the clash between the logic of peasant actions and the performance indicators of cadres, producing an internal rupture between rural society and rural governance. In the process of modernization and urbanization, grassroots government is becoming more bureaucratic and technical, with the prevalence of e-government and especially with village committees turning increasingly administrativized and beholden to superior levels of government, and thus is failing to fully embed itself in rural society.

Notaries and Basic-Level Society: A Study of the Itinerant Notary System during the Republican Period

The itinerant notary system was an important measure taken by the Nationalist government in Nanjing to enhance its control of grassroots society in rural China. There was no intent to challenge the central government’s wishes of “enlarging government revenues for the benefit of the state treasury” and safeguarding the integrity of the central government’s jurisdiction, which made smooth implementation of the itinerant notary system possible. It was against this background that the court of Linxia, Gansu province, expanded its reach to local business centers, selected superintendents of public notaries from among local gentry elites, and offered awards for notary services. The itinerant notary system thus combined a “modern” legal institution transplanted from the West with endogenous resources, and turned out to be an experiment conducive to overcoming the either/or binary of Western vs. Chinese, exploring a pluralistic and less disruptive path of institutional development.

Corruption among Rural Grassroots Cadres: A Study of Its Origins and Development, with Policy Recommendations

Drawing on 1,965 cases of corruption by rural grassroots cadre from 1993 to 2017, this article examines the evolving patterns of and intrinsic reasons for corruption as well as its changing characteristics over time, by focusing on the following indicators: the number of newly increased corruption cases, the frequency of corruption activities, the average amount of cash value involved in the cases, the annual total cash value involved in the cases, and the sectors where corruption took place. This article ends with several recommendations on corruption prevention, including further measures on legislation, ideological education, supervising mechanisms, and investigation and punishment.

Matters Not That Trivial: Damage to the “Safety-Valve” Mechanism in Civil Justice and the Rise of the Boxer Movement in the Late Qing Period

Litigation in rural China under the Qing involved “trivial matters” 细事 over marriage, land transactions, debt, theft, and so on. “Going to court” 打官司, as a regular means of resolving such disputes, functioned as a “safety valve” in maintaining social order, while the mishandling of civil disputes by local magistrates and prefects often had severe consequences. After 1860, Western missionaries became increasingly active in rural North China under the system of unequal treaties. Their arrogance and interference with lawsuits by providing local converts with judicial protection caused damage to the safety valve and disgruntlement among the victims of their abuses. It was the growing enmity toward the missionaries that led to rampant violence by the Boxers around 1900.

Resource Endowment, Rural Governance, and the Development of the “New Agriculture” in China

China’s “new agriculture,” characterized by a “capital-labor dual intensifying” pattern of production, is an effective way of linking small peasants with modern agriculture. Based on a field survey of several neighboring villages in Nijingzhen, Hebei, this article describes and compares each village’s level of agricultural development, and how the new agriculture differs within them. The analysis reveals that both soil texture and land layout affect the ability of villages to adopt new agricultural technologies that characterize the new agriculture. The current land layout is determined by the land division rules that are collectively made by villagers under village self-governance and deeply influenced by the effectiveness of rural governance. “Capable rural people,” family surname and clan structures, and the structure of peasant households, in addition to the choice to remain in the villages, interact with each other and affect the effectiveness of village governing authorities. In turn, the development of the new agriculture impacts the inflow and outflow of the rural labor force, and whether villagers remain in the village, which in turn affects rural governance and social stratification.

To Be Free of Poverty: The Lessons and Prospects of Poverty Alleviation in Rural China from the Perspective of Societal Governance

While the deprivation of rights is among the roots of poverty, an analysis of issues pertaining to rights alone is insufficient for a proper understanding of and solution to the complex problem of poverty. Combatting poverty is essentially an issue of governance. China has made enormous advances in poverty alleviation in the past seven decades, thanks to the formation, perfection, and development of a unique model that allowed the state to identify the particularities of the problem of poverty during different periods and implement suitable measures accurately and efficiently. China’s success in combatting poverty has relied on the state’s strategic promotion, the CCP’s mobilization and organization, and the policies of prioritizing villagers’ interests and paying equal attention to both poverty alleviation and economic growth.