Seeking an essay on modern Chinese history 2000 words Wanted tomorrow!

Abstract: The imbalance in the possession of production tools and labor and the importance of inputs of production factors in labor-intensive agriculture have prompted small and medium-sized farmers in modern Shandong to spontaneously establish extensive labor mutual aid relationships. At the same time, inter-household mutual aid also gained room for development in the context of the underdevelopment of hired labor and the high cost of rented land operations. In specific land management, due to the limitations of the social and economic development conditions at that time, this kind of spontaneous mutual aid and cooperation was only a means of subsistence for most peasants, and could not really expand the scale of agricultural operation. However, it supplemented to a certain extent the lack of labor and production tools of the farmers, saved their production and operation costs, and helped to maintain and develop the small land operation of the farmers. Moreover, from the point of view of the "choice" of mutual aid in Shandong by all classes of farmers, the middle-range farmers are the main body of mutual aid, and with the "middle-range farmers" in Shandong in modern times, the role of mutual aid in farmers' land management has become more and more prominent.

Keywords: land management; mutual aid and cooperation; labor-intensive agriculture; employment relationship; tenancy relationship

Classification number: F129 Literature identifier: A

Mutual aid is an important form of production relations in farmers' land management, which is not only a manifestation of the level of productivity of the farmers, but also an expression of their position and rights and obligations in the socio-economic structure. It is not only a reflection of the peasants' productivity level, but more importantly an expression of the peasants' status in the social and economic structure and the rights and obligations between them. However, in the past studies on the social and economic history of rural China, people have focused on tenancy and employment relationships, while paying insufficient attention to the spontaneous labor and mutual aid relationships among farmers, or even completely excluding them from the analytical field of view. Therefore, this paper intends to link land possession and land management organically, focusing on productive forces and ownership relations, and make an examination of the spontaneous labor mutual aid among peasants in land management in modern Shandong.

The development of labor-intensive agriculture and the uneven distribution of factors of production coexist at the same time

In recent times, the rural areas of Shandong, the contradiction between the large number of people and the small amount of land is very prominent, in order to feed more people on the limited land, Shandong rural areas began to popularize the two-year triple-maturing system of farming patterns, along with the introduction of high-yield crops of the Americas, after the crop planting structure and planting the order of the rational adjustment of the land in Shandong, the replanting index and crop yield greatly. After the rational adjustment of crop planting structure and planting sequence, the replanting index and crop yield of Shandong land were greatly improved. The average replanting index of some areas has reached a high level of about 152, which is equivalent to the expansion of the original cultivated area by 0.52 times. Sweet potatoes, peanuts and other American crops introduced will also increase the mu yield of crops by several times, the Republic of Shandong province's statistics show that the sweet potato yields reached an average of 1,289 pounds / mu, folded dry (three pounds folded a catty) or other crops 2-3 times, the peanut yields reached an average of 274.5 pounds / mu, while the average soybean yields during the same period was only 131.8 pounds / mu. [References

[1] Zhang Zhifan, Wang Junqiang. 20th Century China's Major Crop Production Statistics [M]. Wang Baoqing. Study on the change of cultivation structure and its impact in Shandong since Ming and Qing dynasties - centering on the introduction and promotion of American crops [M]. Beijing: China Agricultural Publishing House, 2007.][1](p148)

The adjustment of the planting structure and farming pattern of modern Shandong agriculture is realized by relying on a large number of human inputs of labor and capital under the condition of stagnation of agricultural technology. The development of this labor-intensive agriculture has enhanced the ability of small land decentralized operations and the economic strength of small and medium-sized farmers, and at the same time has given rise to a large number of small and medium-sized farmers on the tools of production, labor and other factors of production demand. However, in modern rural Shandong, the uneven distribution of factors of production is very common, the majority of small and medium-sized farmers are faced with the dilemma of shortage of means of production to varying degrees:

The degree of ownership of farm animals and agricultural tools is an important symbol of the distinction between classes of farmers. Most of the rich farmers have more complete farming tools and livestock configuration, while the poor farmers in the middle of the tools of production are in varying degrees of lack. Bukai's survey showed that the proportion of small farmers without draft animals in North China amounted to 62%, those with medium arable land without draft animals accounted for 40%, and only 4% of large farmers were without draft animals. [[2] Wang Jiange. Ecology and Society in North China at the End of Traditional Society [M]. Beijing: Sanlian Bookstore, 2009.][2](p195) In the area around Fushanhou Village in Jimo County and Dawa Village on Xuejiadao Island at the mouth of Jiaozhou Bay, the middle-aged, poor, and sharecroppers could only use simple triangular "shovels" to plow the land or plant seeds. Before the liberation of 350 households in the village of Houfushan only four columbaria, and all belong to the landlords and rich peasants, the general middle and poor farmers "land is small (only three to five, seven to eight acres), it is not worth to buy, and can not afford to buy". [[3] Li Jinghan. A Survey of the Social Profile of Ding County. Chinese Civilian Education Promotion Association, 1933.][3] (p305-p306) In Huimin County, Shandong Province, small farmers with arable land sizes below 10 acres owned only 0.038 draft animals converted to horses, farmers operating arable land in the range of 40-30 acres owned 0.53 draft animals converted to horses, and farmers operating arable land of more than 50 acres owned by 0.8 draft animals converted to horses. [[4] Mantei North Branch Economic Survey Institute. Report of the survey on the general situation of the rural areas of the Northern Branch (I) - Sunjiamiao, Heping Township, First District, Huimin County [M]. Showa 14.][4]

In terms of the labor force required for the land management of farmers of all classes, the demand for labor was strongly related to the area of land management. Theoretically, the area of operation of rich farmers "exceeded the labor standard of each family (that is to say, the amount of land that each family could cultivate by its own labor)," and there was a certain demand for labor. The small and medium-sized farmers had limited land and sufficient or even excess family labor. However, with the development of labor-intensive agriculture and the commercialization of crops in modern Shandong, the labor intensity of farmland cultivation increased, especially the cultivation of labor-intensive cash crops, which required more labor manpower, and small and medium-sized farm households also appeared to have a shortage of their own labor force.In 1935, in Shandong, per mu of wheat per year, the use of laborers was 15, soybeans 12, sorghum 18, millet 21, peanuts 24, cotton 60, and tobacco 135. 60, and 135 for tobacco. [[5] Fang Xing. Labor Market in Rural Shandong during the Qing Dynasty [M]. Chinese Social and Economic History Series [C], Beijing: China Social Science Press, 2006.][5] (p389) The amount of labor used for cash crops was significantly higher than that for food crops. Cotton and tobacco are the two major cash crops vigorously developed in Shandong in modern times, and they are crops with a high degree of labor economization. Cotton per acre of labor input in about twenty, in the cotton area of northwestern Shandong, the number of plowing and weeding up to six times, interplanting once, picking operations up to two times. Tobacco planting does not need animal power, the labor required is more. In Shandong, the labor for planting tobacco is generally about four times that for planting corn. [[6] Hu Delin et al. Jining Zhili Prefecture Zhi, Qing dynasty Qianlong 50 years (1785) engraved book...] [6] (Volume II, Volume XXXII) With the development of the two-year, three-maturing system in Shandong and the increase in the replanting index, the labor intensity of the farmers was very high, especially during the "double robbery" seasons in May and September, the demand for labor was also very high, and many medium-sized farmers, even if they had enough family labor in normal times, were short of laborers in the busy farming season. According to a sample survey, in North China's agricultural areas, "about two-thirds of those who had insufficient labor for harvesting, one-quarter of those who had too little labor for planting, and one-eighth of those who lacked labor for irrigation". [[7] [US] Bukai. Land Use in China [M]. Department of Agricultural Economics, Jinling University, 1941.][7](p405)

The imbalance in the possession of means of production and labor, and the importance of inputs of factors of production in labor-intensive agriculture have prompted the spontaneous establishment of extensive labor mutual aid among small and medium-sized farmers.

Two, the impact of hired labor operation and rented land operation on inter-household mutual aid

The hired labor operation of farm households was mainly to supplement the shortage of labor. In modern rural Shandong, hired labor has not developed sufficiently, and rich and middle-income farmers tend to farm on their own, supplemented by hired labor. In a typical survey of 13 villages in three districts of Juxian County, domestic workers accounted for 64.7% of the total labor force and hired workers for 32.88% of the total in rich-peasant operations, while hired workers in middle-peasant operations accounted for 1.52% of the total labor force and domestic workers for 98.48%. This is roughly the general level of hired labor operations in Shandong. [[8] Edited by the Land Reform Committee of the East China Bureau. Survey of Rural Areas in Shandong Province on the Outskirts of Large and Medium-sized Cities in East China [M]. 1952.][8] (p32) In some areas where the employment relationship is not developed, the rich peasants don't even hire long-time workers, such as the rich peasants of Liupoewu Village, whose main production is their own labor, and who hire short-time workers only during the busy times of the farm. In areas where the employment relationship is developed, the number of domestic workers and hired workers of the rich farmers is roughly equal, such as Haiyangpo Village, before the war, the rich farmers had 19 of their own laborers and 16 hired workers. Due to the underdevelopment of the hired labor business, the labor force owned by the farmers often failed to meet the actual amount of production needs. For example, before 1937, Yanshan Weiqiao village rich farmers' manpower, calculated on average by household, is short of more than half,...... although the labor force is insufficient, but twenty-four rich farmers only five employ long workers, some also employ half-long workers,*** hire into three half-long workers." [[9] Tang Zhiqing. Social and Economic Research on Rural Areas in Modern Shandong [M]. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 2003.][9] (p751) Haiyangpo village in Jiaodong, the rich farmers' land actually required 46.7 laborers, their own laborers and hired laborers combined ****35, there is still a shortage of 11.7 laborers; the middle peasant class is still short of laborers by 5.7 people. Bei Sui village in the north of Lu, the middle peasants labor surplus and deficit is equal, the rich peasants lacked 29.5-45.5 laborers [9] (p753). Therefore, in the case of hired labor operation is not yet able to fully meet the demand for labor, labor mutual aid has become an effective way to supplement the labor force.

With the deterioration of the environmental conditions of agricultural farming in modern Shandong, decentralized small production is unable to resist and prevent disasters, in order to ensure the "right to live" of small farmers, divided into rent system gradually flourished. In the 1930s, the share-rent system in Shandong accounted for 40.27% of the total, according to the "Houyi Audit Register". [[10] The Houyi Audit Register states that the share-rent system in Shandong was 40.27%. [[10] The Book of Judges of Yueyi [J]. Pinghuai Journal, 1985,(1).] [10] Also according to the Statistics Bureau of the Kuomintang Controller's Office, in 1935 the proportion of the rent-sharing system reached about 50%. [[11] Statistics Bureau of the Nationalist Party Controller's Office. Statistical Abstract of the Republic of China [M]. Shanghai: Commercial Press, 1936.][11] (p538-p539) Due to the poverty of sharecroppers, many of the split rents were paid by both the master and the tenant*** out of the farm capital, so it is said that the split-rent system also had the role of transferring the means of production. Shandong divided into the types of rent is quite complex, some of the cattle, seeds, fertilizer from the landlord, the tenant must eat a share of grain, eat a bucket in the public pile also three to four buckets, the rest of the grain by half or share four industry six points split, grass all or most of the landlord, is sharecropping; some of the cattle, seeds, fertilizer from the tenant, some landlords are also a part of the farm capital. In some cases, the grain and grass were mostly divided equally, and the grass went to the oxen, which was sharecropping land. From this it can be seen that under sharecropping, apart from the condition of the land, the farm capital was an important factor in determining the proportion of sharecropping between the landlord and the tenant. In the case of sharecropping, the sharecroppers contributed less farm capital and were subjected to heavy super-economic exploitation; in the case of sharecropping, the sharecroppers contributed more farm capital and were subjected to poorer or no super-economic exploitation. Therefore, in order to reduce the dependence on the landlord's farm capital, the tenant farmers also began to carry out mutual cooperation among themselves, transferring the surplus and shortfall of the means of production.

Third, the forms and rules of inter-household mutual aid in modern rural Shandong

(a) the economic situation is basically equal to the conditions of labor mutual aid cooperation - partnership in the use of tools of production and hitching

Partnership in the use of tools of production, refers to the adoption of *** have farming tools, *** with the raising of The form of mutual assistance to make up for the lack of production tools. In Weixian, small farmers in order to match the service animals, cars and plows, often several joint, *** with the purchase, *** with the use. Zhang's family bought cattle, Wang's family bought horses, Li's family bought farm tools, Zhao's family bought a large car, forming a cooperative relationship in production. In Sunjiamiao Village, Huimin County, Shandong Province, the landowning class does not bear the burden of raising any large livestock, and homesteaders and semi-homesteaders can raise livestock alone only under the condition of having sufficient arable land. In Sunjiamiao village, there are nine households of farmers who own cattle alone, three households who own mules alone, and three households who own donkeys alone. The number of homesteaders owning livestock alone reaches 15 households, and 3 semi-homesteaders own cattle. Because of the shortage of draft animals, the habit of livestock **** co-ownership is prevalent among homesteaders. Three more semi-owner-peasants **** had them, and two more owner-peasants **** had them. [4] (p124-p129, p146-p149, p167-p196) Partnership feeding livestock farmers are generally equal share of the cost of purchasing and raising livestock, taking turns to raise and use livestock, such as Lixing County, Lujiazhuang's uncle and nephew of the Chen family name, each contributing seventy-five yuan, to buy a ploughing ox. In normal times, the two families took turns raising and using the oxen, changing them once every ten days; when farming was busy, they changed to changing them once a day or once every three days. In the village of Houxiazhai in Enxian County, there was also another way of sharing the cost of "partnering", such as three families*** owning the same animal service, two of whom paid the purchase fee, and one of whom was responsible for the feeding fee [[12] Survey of Inertia in Rural China [中国农村惯行調查[[12] China Rural Inertia Survey [中国农村惯行调查[[[[12 A Survey of Rural Practices in China[M]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1955.][12] (Vol. IV, p460).

"Hitching", also known as "Hapu", "Jiejiu", etc., is the practice of a farmer to use a certain amount of manpower and animal power to form a two- or three-horse oxen with the manpower and animal power of other farmers***. The labor combination form of *** with farming. This kind of labor mutual aid combination is "a common phenomenon of farming in the North China Plain", the Qing Dynasty "Dengzhou Fu Zhi": "ploughing in the spring, there are autumn ploughing, four oxen, so-called one of the quail. The poor people have up to four or five families together in one pile" [[13] Shi Leunzhang修,杨奇烈\任浚纂. Dengzhou prefectural record [Z], Qing dynasty Kangxi 33 years (1694) engraved book...] [13] (Volume VIII), Laiyang County Records also says: "The people have three or four families who plow together" [[14] Wan Bang maintenance, Wei Yuanjue and other compilers. Laiyangyang zhi [Z], qing kangxi 17 years (1678) engraved book...] [14] (Volume II). In the book Small Peasant Economy and Social Change in North China, the author describes a similar situation, stating that "small peasants sometimes 'teamed up' two or three families to combine livestock and labor to cultivate their fields" [[15] Huang Zongzhi. Small Peasant Economy and Social Change in North China [M]. Beijing; Zhonghua Shuju, 1986.][15] (p155).

Both of the above labor mutual aid requires that the mutual aid parties be roughly equivalent in terms of economic conditions and the scale of land management. This principle of reciprocity in economic conditions is very necessary in the above two forms of mutual aid. Because, with the deterioration of the economic situation in the modern Shandong countryside, the livelihood of small farmers is not as generous as in the past, which makes them have to be more calculating in their daily production and management. If the economic conditions of the two families are too different, the less well-off one will be dissatisfied because he or she "loses out", and the mutual-help relationship will often be problematic. As Li Lingyi, a villager from Houxiazhai, said, "In general, people with comparable land holdings share land. In this way, there is no dissatisfaction among them, or else those with less land would be dissatisfied". Of course, the so-called "equal economic conditions" is not absolute equality. Wang Tingzhang of Houxiazhai said, "Only farmers with the same amount of land can join together. A difference of two or three mu of land is no problem", Li Lingyi said: "It is impossible for farmers with ten mu of land to work together with those with only two mu of land, the difference is too great. If I have 10 mu of land and you have 5 mu, you don't want to work together. Because I have a lot of work on my land, twice as much as you do." When asked why he and Wang Tingzhang's family, each with 30 acres and 20 acres of land, are still working together for many years, Li Lingyi explains, "The character and disposition between the two sides is also very important. Feelings are very good, do not care about the difference in the number of acres of land there are instances, but very few. For example, the difference between the two families is 7 or 8 acres of land. The main thing is that the two sides have no opinion, the two families are very right temperament, think back a little reason, eat some losses, regardless of. If you care about this, you will not work in one place." [[16] Zhang Si. The Changes of the Village ****sameness in North China in Modern Times--Historical Anthropological Reflections on the Habits of Farming Combination[M]. Beijing: Commercial Press, 2005.][16] (p170-p171) Visible, in the labor mutual aid, farmers in mind to each other's "economic disparity" have a psychological tolerance range, combined with the two sides of each other's good feelings, may be able to accept the "gap"; and the greater the "gap"; and the two sides of each other's good feelings, may be able to accept the "gap"; and the greater the "gap"; and the greater the "gap"; and the greater the "gap". "The more the gap is, the greater it is; and once the gap between the two sides exceeds the range of their "reasonable calculations", even if the two sides have good feelings, the mutual aid relationship can not be established.

From the point of view of the peasants who participated in the above two kinds of mutual aid collaboration, most of the rich peasants in the area have all the farm tools and livestock, and participate in the labor mutual aid of relatively few; the poorer poor peasants and the hired peasants lack of conditions to participate in the mutual aid; and only the middle peasants, both the conditions of the joint tool, and the necessity of the joint tool. For example, in Lengshuigou Village in Licheng County, farmers who owned and cultivated more than 20 mu of land generally had a full range of livestock and agricultural tools, and there was no need to share tools with others. Farmers with less than five acres of land do not have enough farm implements and draft animals to be able to share tools with others. Therefore, it was generally the farmers with about 10 mu of cultivated land who looked for a suitable candidate to engage in the sharing of tools". In Lujiazhuang, "no one without livestock could join a partnership." [12] (Vol. IV, p257) However, due to the different economic conditions in the rural areas of Shandong, and the different degrees of affluence of various classes of peasants, there were areas in Shandong where both rich and poor peasants were involved in "hitching a ride" or "partnering"; in 1943, in the two counties of Junan and Ganyu, 13 villages were involved in "partnering", In a survey of 13 villages in Junan and Ganyu counties in 1943, the investigators noted the involvement of poor peasants in hitchhiking and "gang-raising" before the war: "Landlords and rich peasants had large oxen and donkeys for their farm animals, while middle-income peasants and poor peasants had small oxen and donkeys for their farm animals, and at the same time, they had one animal for each family, or they each had one animal that did not have oxen, so that there was a simple and easy way for peasants to share with one another, and the farmers had to share with each other. Therefore, the peasants had a simple mutual aid organization, such as the hitching of cows, or the raising of oxen, or the exchange of surplus labor for surplus animal power of landlords and rich peasants"[10](p27). In the lower degree of social differentiation in Huimin County, cultural district of Yu Han village, even the "landlords" have to cooperate with other families for mutual assistance. Farmers in the village who occupy less than 10 mu of land are generally unable to raise farm animals, and most of the average middle-income farmers who occupy 10-20 mu of land are unable to raise a cow independently, and some can only raise a donkey for their own family, or two or even four families can raise or partner with a cow. Among the only two landowners in the village, only Han Youkui's family owned a full set of large agricultural tools, and the combination of one ox and one donkey could also form an independent plough; the other so-called "landowner" Han Taichen's family, although owning an ox, only owned large agricultural tools in general, and apparently had to work with other families to cultivate the land [[17] Yu Han Village Land Float Allocation Register [[18]]. M]. Zhang Peiguo. Distribution of Land Rights - Farmers' Economy - Village Communities: Shandong Rural Areas 1900-1945, Jinan: Qilu Books 2000.][17] (p154-p155).

(2) Labor Mutual Aid with Hired Workers--Exchanging Workers and Helping Workers with Land

"Exchanging Work" simply means "exchanging manpower for oxen", and those who are poor and have no farm animals often use this kind of labor mutual aid to help each other. The poor households without farm animals often exchanged the right to use farm animals with the rich landlords in this way. According to the information in the Survey of Rural Practices in China, labor exchange in Shandong only took place during the busy season, did not last long, and was not large in scale; it was only a combination of farming between two families. In the process of labor exchange, the villagers uphold the fair principle of "reciprocal exchange" and carry out exchange and mutual assistance activities on the basis of a "reasonable calculation" of the conversion relationship between mu, labor and livestock. Although these calculations are not very precise, the final results are satisfactory to both parties. However, behind this so-called "fairness" in the case of labor exchange between manpower and livestock is the exploitation of the labor of the borrower by the possessor of the livestock. Moreover, in the "labor exchange" process, households without farm animals not only have to exchange their labor for the use of draft animals, but also are subject to the owner of the draft animals when farming, and can only farm their own land after they have met the land-farming needs of the cattle owner's family. In Guandi village, Junan county, "a twelve-acre farmer who uses other people's animals to plow his land, in addition to paying for all the grass he produces and helping out with six jobs, has to plow his own land after his cattle owner" [[18] Shandong Branch Investigation and Research Office. Survey of Agricultural Labor Cooperation in Guandi Village [M]. November 1944. Selected Archival Materials on the Revolutionary History of Shandong [C], 13th series...] [18](p190). The mutual aid form of "helpers with land" is also common in modern Shandong rural areas. "with land servants are farmers with insufficient arable land, labor surplus, and unwilling or unable to rent their arable land to others, and their own special as ordinary long-time workers, is living near the larger farmers to negotiate, for their long-term employment, with the cultivation of their own fields, and enjoy the production. The amount of their annual wages was inversely proportional to the amount of land they brought with them. The folk custom of bringing land to laborers was slightly different in different counties, "The employers in Boxing County cultivated the fields brought by the hired laborers as if they were cultivating their own fields. The output of the fields brought by the hired laborers was all owned by the hired laborers. The annual wages of the hired laborers are paid at the highest price, but the annual cultivation fee of the fields brought by the hired laborers is deducted. In Jiaxiang County, the employer deducts the annual cultivation fee of about one yuan and fifty cents per mu, and if the cultivation fee of the field reaches the limit of his salary, he does not pay another salary. In Feicheng County, the workers are required to bring their own food and drink so as not to delay the work of their employers. In Qingping County, the employer pays for all the work on the fields brought by the hired laborers, and the grain produced belongs to the employer, but the firewood and grass must be transferred with the farm animals used. If the employer's farm animals are used, the firewood and grass belong to the employer, but if they are not the employer's farm animals, they do not belong to the employer. The strong farmers there could plow 29 mu of land per year, while the hired laborers could not bring more than 10 mu of land for cultivation, and the situation in Gaotang County was similar. The situation in Gaotang County is similar. In Dongping County, the work of the land brought by the hired laborers is also the same as that of the employers, and those who bring more land do not receive any wages. In Laiyang County and En County, there was also this method of bringing land to the laborers, and Laiyang County commonly called this kind of laborers 'playing the land'" [[19] Chen Zhengmu. Employment habits of agricultural laborers and the supply and demand situation in various provinces [M], Zhongshan Literature and Education Museum, 1935...] [19] (p37-p38).

The exchange of labor and the bringing of land helpers carry the nature of hired labor operations. Under these two forms of mutual assistance, the rich peasants or landlords who possessed the means of production were in a dominant position while the small peasants who lacked the means of production were in a subordinate position, and there was a relationship of exploitation and exploitation between the two parties to the cooperation.

The above forms of mutual labor assistance supplemented to a certain extent the lack of labor and production tools of the farmers, saved their production and operation costs, and were conducive to the maintenance and development of the farmers' small-land operation. However, due to the limitations of the socio-economic development conditions at that time, this kind of spontaneous mutual cooperation was only a means of subsistence for most of the peasants, and could not really realize the development of the scale of agricultural operation. This is mainly reflected in the following: firstly, the spontaneous mutual aid cooperation among farmers usually involves only two or three families, is very small in scale, and lacks stability. Secondly, most of the resources deployed in mutual aid and cooperation are limited to traditional factors of production such as labor, livestock, and agricultural tools, and lack the support of advanced technological factors. With agricultural technology basically stagnant, mutual aid among farmers can only increase farmland production through additional labor and capital, and the direction of its development is the "overcrowding" of agricultural development, rather than relying on technological progress to achieve economies of scale in agricultural growth. Thirdly, mutual assistance among farmers is mostly focused on the production process, and there is a lack of cooperation in agricultural marketing and processing. In the period of economic underdevelopment, the operation scale of small farmland is very fragile, its ability to withstand economic fluctuations is very limited, in order to resist economic risks, farmers should carry out pre-production and post-production cooperation. However, in modern Shandong, the land management of farmers is more scattered, the awareness of commodity economy is not strong, and at the same time, they can not bear the organizational and institutional costs of agricultural industrialization, which makes their mutual assistance is limited to the field of production, and inevitably fall into the "self-sufficiency of the trap".

Fourth, the "choice" of mutual aid among peasants in modern Shandong

The choice of mutual aid among peasants in land management depends on their economic strength and the logic of management based on economic strength.

In land management, the rich peasants were profit maximizers who sought to choose the most economical mode of production in land management and to rationally allocate labor and production tools to increase farm income. The rich peasants in modern Shandong had more than enough means of production, but because of the underdevelopment of hired labor, the agricultural labor force they possessed was insufficient. In order to make up for the labor force, rich farmers often "use mutual aid labor to improve labor efficiency" [24] (p756): rich farmers with abundant animal power and the lack of animal power farmers "work for work", in the supplemental labor at the same time also improves the efficiency of the use of livestock; animal power and farm tools The rich peasants who lacked the power of livestock and farm equipment also participated in the mutual aid of labor, such as joint farming and partner farming.

The middle peasants were the operators who pursued a stable land. On the one hand, they pursued profits and actively moved closer to the rich peasants; on the other hand, they had to protect their production and prevent themselves from becoming poor peasants. The middle peasants in Shandong were mainly self-employed, and the amount of means of production they owned was between the rich peasants and the poor peasants. Compared with the rich peasants who had higher level of management and more complete production tools than themselves, the middle peasants had a greater need for mutual labor assistance; compared with the poor peasants who seriously lacked the means of production, the middle peasants had the advantage of carrying out mutual labor assistance in terms of economic conditions. The economic status of the middle peasants also determines that they tend to choose mutual aid that does not require too much capital investment and does not involve super-economic exploitation, so as to supplement the shortage of labor and production tools. Lengshuigou and Houxiazhai villages mentioned in the data of the Habitat Survey are both villages in which middle-range peasants are in the majority [86.3% of the peasants in Houxiazhai village are homesteaders, and 91.4% of the peasants in Lengshuigou, and middle-range peasants are the majority of homesteaders, so middle-range peasants account for the majority of the peasants in these two villages]. In these two villages, hitching is the most common form of mutual aid. In Houxiazhai village "[villagers] mostly share tools, more than half. Individuals can not solve the ...... have to think of this method, almost 90% of the farmers to share tools" [16] (p96). Liancheng County Lengshuigou village in the 1940s there is a combination of eight or ninety groups [12] (Volume IV, p26).

For the poor peasants, survival came first compared to the pursuit of profit. The poor peasants in modern Shandong possessed a serious shortage of means of production but a surplus of labor, and they were the mainstay of hired laborers and sharecroppers. Due to the limitations of economic conditions, the poor peasants had fewer opportunities to participate in mutual aid in labor, and were often the beneficiaries of relief mutual aid or the exploited under employment mutual aid.

With the development of small land ownership in modern Shandong, the rural structure of Shandong gradually showed a trend of "middle peasantry". Before 1937, the rich peasants in Shandong accounted for 9.5% of the total population and 6.3% of the total number of households, the middle peasants accounted for 42.98% of the total population and 36.63% of the total number of households, the poor peasants accounted for 41.57%, and the hired peasants accounted for 2.24%. In the 1930s, rich peasants in China accounted for about 6% of the total number of peasant households, middle peasants accounted for about 20% of the total number of households, and poor and hired peasants accounted for about 70% of the total number of households."[20] Duan Guo-Qing,Yue Hai-Ying. A Brief Discussion of the Peasant Movement in Shandong during the Second Domestic Revolutionary War [J], Shandong Historical Collections,1983,(1).] [20]. Generally speaking, among the proportions of peasant households of all classes in Shandong, the proportion of middle peasants was the largest, and the proportions of rich peasants and middle peasants were both larger than the national average [ In the 1930s, the rich peasants in China accounted for about 6% of the total number of peasant households, and the middle peasants accounted for about 20% of the total number of households]. . At the time of the land reform, the statistics of the Shandong branch of the C*** Shandong Bureau for 274 typical villages in Shandong showed that the poor peasants accounted for 44% of the total number of households, the middle peasants accounted for 47.8%, the rich middle peasants accounted for 0.63%, the rich peasants accounted for 5.64%, and the landlords accounted for 1.35%. This shows that the middle peasants in Shandong are still on the rise. As mentioned above, the middle peasants were the main body of those who carried out mutual aid in labor [[21] Department of Planning, Ministry of Agriculture, Central People's Government. Two Years' Survey of China's Rural Economy [M]. Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju, 1952.

][21](p224). Therefore, the "middle peasant" of modern Shandong peasants, highlighting the importance of mutual aid in the land management of Shandong peasants.