{"id":187,"date":"2021-04-30T20:37:50","date_gmt":"2021-04-30T20:37:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/?p=187"},"modified":"2021-05-13T04:32:55","modified_gmt":"2021-05-13T04:32:55","slug":"show-and-tell-4-the-famine-of-the-great-leap-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/hst271\/show-and-tell-4-the-famine-of-the-great-leap-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Rewrite of Show and Tell 4: The Famine of the Great Leap Forward"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Once you can look past the staggering death tolls that have been associated with the Great Leap Forward and really get into some of the reasons that the tragedy happened it is almost surprising how the CCP and specifically Mao were able to come out relatively unscathed. The famine that occurred combined with the gross misuse of resources and manpower could have easily been avoided if proper planning and regulations were put into place, but the whole process was rushed. It was as if Mao was attempting to solidify China and the CCP as world superpowers right from the get-go, attempting to clean China’s plate of all of its debts and possible points of judgment to become flawless. But in attempting to do so he created one of the largest logistical disasters in history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impetus for this massive effort to increase agricultural and industrial output across China were the goals set by Mao himself a part of his very own 5-year plan that aimed to make China a superpower, he based his economic theory off of Stalin’s that helped make the USSR into a superpower, which came at the cost of countless lives. (1) One of Mao’s main and most ambitious goals was to overhaul the industrial efforts of China, surpassing the steel production of Britain and matching the output of the US in 15 years. (2) This economic theory and practice was something that was denounced by the leaders of the USSR that stepped in after Stalin, these leaders and advisors advised Mao to change his economic plan moving forward but Mao ignored their advice, pushing forward with his goals. (1) In addition to following his own economic plans and goals, Mao had some personal goals for the country, he wanted to fill China’s grain debt to the USSR as quickly as possible. (2) China had obtained a fairly large debt to the USSR, as the USSR had supplied the machines and advisors for China’s industrialization in their first 5-year plan (1953-1957), but having no industrial means of paying the USSR back meant China was forced to pay back their debt through agricultural means. (2) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Commune members are digging out trenches seemingly for a field. <\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

To fill the ambitious goals Mao had set himself and the country he looked towards policy that would create situations that he believed would be the most conducive for high levels of production. Three of these policies were large contributing factors to the massive famine and shortcomings of the Great Leap Forward. These policies were the establishment of massive communes consisting of tens or hundreds of families, production quotas that were then associated with these communes along with the establishment of competitions based on these quotas, and lastly the effort of Man to tame Nature. (2) The largest and most exacerbating issue stemming from these policies were the quota competitions that the CCP had established, as the establishment led to large-scale fraud and deception. Due to the culture established within the party of labeling those that do not live up to the expectations as rightists, which results in punishment, there was lots of pressure placed on local officials to perform. (2) Thus in order to impress more senior party officials, the local cadres that oversaw the communes would inflate their grain production, while this may seem harmless the effects were catastrophic. (2) As quotas and subsequent grain taxes, were based on previously reported harvests, therefore, the larger your harvest the more the government expected of your commune. (2) Therefore when the government would collect their new quotas and taxes based on the fabricated harvest reports, possibly collecting all of that seasons which left the commune members with nothing to eat forcing them into famine. This problem was only further exacerbated with the battle of Man against Nature, Mao had established 4 pests that should be targeted for removal being Sparrows, flies, rodents, and mosquitoes, the people of China did an effective job of removing these pests but the outcome was disastrous. (2) As the sparrows, who did feed on grain, ate insects but with the sparrows removed these insects thrived ultimately decimating crops through their sheer numbers resulting in only more famine. (2) Additionally, through the efforts to tame nature entire forests were cut down in order to supply fuel for backyard furnaces, this removal of trees loosened soil resulting in soil erosion and poor crop conditions, again further exacerbating poor harvests and famine. (2) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This is a propaganda flyer<\/a> published to show that the communes are plentiful and lead you to salvation through your efforts for the state. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The millions of deaths that occurred due to The Great Leap Forward could have been avoided, an investigation could have been done by the party and actual grain amounts could have been forced to be reported, but there never was a push for confirmation on the actual grain counts or aid provided to the communes that were suffering. The reason behind this was simply that the senior party officials, including Mao, did not care. They were aware of the issues plaguing the rural countryside and the ineffectual application of Mao’s economic plan but they were willing to sacrifice the bodies of peasants in order to achieve the goals and numbers they desired, they saw it as a sacrifice to the cause. (2) But the ethicality of that is terribly flawed and the methods used by Mao to achieve his goals were also fundamentally flawed, which resulted in internal party pressure to have him resign. Mao eventually did step down, but the reason reported to the public was to focus more on communist theory not because he caused the deaths of millions of people through his lack of foresight and negligence, but this excuse maintained Mao’s position in the eyes of the people, he still held an almost god-like stature. Overall I think that the famine of the Great Leap Forward could have been prevented but doing so would have needed a complete overhaul of the culture of the CCP and an overhaul of Mao’s ego and ambitions, two things that would never happen in the realm of reality. China faced the same problems that the early USSR did through the authoritarian and speculative ruling government that used fear-mongering and threats to gain the subservience of their people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How I edited this post: <\/h4>\n\n\n\n

One of the largest points of emphasis when editing this post was clearing up points of confusion or sentences where the meaning may have been lost due to weird wording, as it is a show and tell project the main essence of which is easily convey information that I found interesting. I did not opt for a full rewrite starting from scratch all I thought it needed was some tinkering and some reworking of specific areas, such as the ending of paragraph 3 needed lots of work. After clearing up confusion areas I looked to fix areas that lacked context or could use additional information as suggested by Dr. D’Haeseleer, such as the inclusion of the battle of man and nature that led to even more famine and poor harvests. I think the main thing I learned from this editing is that I need to slow down and allow myself to have a few good rereads before I submit work as a lot of the errors I made are easily seen and fixed if I give myself more time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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(1) Shen, Zhihua, and Yafeng Xia.\u00a0Mao and the Sino-Soviet Partnership, 1945-1959: A New History<\/em>; 4-6. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(2) Mio, Arturo, D\u00e9rives (Firm), and Radio-T\u00e9l\u00e9vision belge de la communaut\u00e9 culturelle fran\u00e7aise. Mao\u2019s Great Famine<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bibliography: <\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Mio, Arturo, D\u00e9rives (Firm), and Radio-T\u00e9l\u00e9vision belge de la communaut\u00e9 culturelle fran\u00e7aise. Mao\u2019s Great Famine<\/em>. Filmakers Library, 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shen, Zhihua, and Yafeng Xia. Mao and the Sino-Soviet Partnership, 1945-1959: A New History<\/em>. The Harvard Cold War Studies Book Series. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2015.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once you can look past the staggering death tolls that have been associated with the Great Leap Forward and really get into some of the reasons that the tragedy happened…<\/p>\n

Read more of Rewrite of Show and Tell 4: The Famine of the Great Leap Forward<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[12],"class_list":["post-187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hst271","tag-extra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":202,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187\/revisions\/202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pcarmody.bergbuilds.domains\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}