52 { China’s Quest
In agriculture, Stalin’s model of collectivized agriculture was adopted
by the CCP under Mao’s leadership, in spite of warnings from Stalin to go
slow, or even delay indefinitely the expropriation of rich and middle peas-
ants via collectivization. Mao and most of his comrades were inspired by the
rosy image of Soviet agriculture portrayed by the Short Course, and pushed
ahead with the Stalinist agricultural model in spite of Stalin’s warnings.
Stalinist-style primitive socialist accumulation required that the state control
the agricultural harvest so it could channel that wealth into industrialization.
In the Soviet Union, starting in 1928 all peasants were forced to surrender
their land, farm animals, and implements, which were all merged into newly
formed collective farms operating under the supervision of cadres appointed
by and loyal to the party. This ensured that farms planted what higher-level
planning officials specified, that work was properly done, and that crops
harvested went directly from fields to warehouses controlled by other party
cadres. The state asserted a monopoly on the purchase of crops, at low prices
set by the planners. These arrangements gave the state control over the pro-
duce of the agricultural sector at nominal cost. Needless to say, this was not
an arrangement favored by peasants, especially rich and middle peasants,
who tended to be the most effective farmers, producing the greatest amount
of disposable crops.
The Short Course described the collectivization of Soviet agriculture as
a major component of the transition from capitalism to socialism, and as
creating an essential basis for successful socialist industrialization. It also
described the putative enthusiastic welcome for, and happy lives of Soviet
peasants under, collectivized agriculture. Deeply impressed by Soviet expe-
rience as explicated in the Short Course, Mao came to see individual peasant
farming as a backward phenomenon, and collective farming as “socialism”
and as a way of “liberating” the productive forces of agriculture.
During the very early 1950s, as “land to the tiller” was being implemented
across China, CCP leaders debated whether collectivization on the Soviet
model should be the next step. In the CCP leadership, there were “returned
students” (CCP members who had studied in the USSR) who had a better
understanding of the realities of Soviet agriculture and knew that its situ-
ation was not as rosy as Soviet propaganda and the Short Course depicted.
Most prominent among these “returned students” was Zhang Wentian (also
known as Luo Fu), who had studied and taught in the Soviet Union from
1925 to 1930 (in the midst of Soviet collectivization) and had wide contacts
among Soviet leaders, especially Nikolai Bukharin, who had sharply criti-
cized Stalin’s forced collectivization of agriculture. Zhang advocated the use
of supply and marketing cooperatives while retaining family farming (not
collectivized production and land) as the basis for socialism in China’s coun-
tryside. Liu Shaoqi and Bo Yibo favored Zhang’s “cooperatives” approach.
Interestingly, Stalin gave subtle support to Liu. In July 1951, Mao intervened