Article 29
For centuries, Chinese peasants relied on informal mutual aid—sharing labour and draft animals among relatives, neighbours, and friends—to manage agricultural production. Building on these traditions, the CCP promoted mutual-aid groups from the 1940s onward, initially with limited economic success and later with explicit political objectives. Unlike land reform, which aimed primarily to redistribute land and reshape rural political power by replacing traditional elites with loyal cadres, the mutual-aid and cooperative movements sought to reorganize production and gradually socialize agriculture.
Between 1949 and 1954, agricultural collectivization progressed through three stages: mutual-aid teams (MAT), elementary agricultural producers’ cooperatives, and advanced cooperatives. MAT pooled tools and animals while retaining private land ownership; cooperatives went further by pooling land and centralizing planning. These arrangements were intended to address chronic input mismatches—especially labour and draft animals—by formalizing exchange, improving bookkeeping, and enabling collective projects such as composting and, later, irrigation.
Implementation varied widely by region and was often coercive. Many teams were formed administratively to meet quotas and collapsed quickly. Despite ideological confidence in economies of scale, cooperatives faced serious management problems, incentive erosion, and diseconomies of scale inherent to agriculture. Political campaigns, including the Three-Anti and Five-Anti movements, further disrupted rural stability and production. By the early 1950s, excessive zeal and coercion forced the CCP to acknowledge “leftist” excesses and refocus rural policy on stabilizing agricultural output, particularly spring ploughing. The CCP’s “road to socialism” in agriculture was shaped by Soviet models that equated large-scale production with socialist progress. Through campaigns such as “Learning from the Soviet Union,” collectivization was framed as both economically superior and politically advanced, while also providing rural cadres opportunities for promotion. Agricultural cooperatives were expected to expand output and finance industrialization under the First Five-Year Plan, with minimal state investment in the countryside. Following Mao Zedong’s 1953 “general line,” the Party accelerated the creation of elementary and advanced cooperatives as transitional steps toward a socialist economy.
Although officially voluntary, cooperative expansion quickly exceeded targets and became a tool for state control over rural society and grain procurement. Policies governing land dividends, labour remuneration, and piecework pay generated persistent tensions, particularly between land-rich and labour-rich households. Over time, land-based income was reduced and ultimately eliminated, making labour the sole basis of remuneration. Many cooperatives suffered from poor management, lack of democracy, weak accounting, and low work incentives, while peasants largely retained individualistic, short-term economic thinking.
As the movement became increasingly politicized, practices deemed “capitalist”—such as hiring labour, growing cash crops, or participating in markets—were condemned and suppressed. Resistance emerged in subtle forms: evasion of state procurement, market manipulation, sectarian infiltration, and elite-led mediation rather than open revolt. Ultimately, collectivization stripped peasants of land ownership, production autonomy, and market access, binding them to the party-state through comprehensive administrative control over agriculture.
Between 1949 and 1954, agricultural collectivization progressed through three stages: mutual-aid teams (MAT), elementary agricultural producers’ cooperatives, and advanced cooperatives. MAT pooled tools and animals while retaining private land ownership; cooperatives went further by pooling land and centralizing planning. These arrangements were intended to address chronic input mismatches—especially labour and draft animals—by formalizing exchange, improving bookkeeping, and enabling collective projects such as composting and, later, irrigation.
Implementation varied widely by region and was often coercive. Many teams were formed administratively to meet quotas and collapsed quickly. Despite ideological confidence in economies of scale, cooperatives faced serious management problems, incentive erosion, and diseconomies of scale inherent to agriculture. Political campaigns, including the Three-Anti and Five-Anti movements, further disrupted rural stability and production. By the early 1950s, excessive zeal and coercion forced the CCP to acknowledge “leftist” excesses and refocus rural policy on stabilizing agricultural output, particularly spring ploughing. The CCP’s “road to socialism” in agriculture was shaped by Soviet models that equated large-scale production with socialist progress. Through campaigns such as “Learning from the Soviet Union,” collectivization was framed as both economically superior and politically advanced, while also providing rural cadres opportunities for promotion. Agricultural cooperatives were expected to expand output and finance industrialization under the First Five-Year Plan, with minimal state investment in the countryside. Following Mao Zedong’s 1953 “general line,” the Party accelerated the creation of elementary and advanced cooperatives as transitional steps toward a socialist economy.
Although officially voluntary, cooperative expansion quickly exceeded targets and became a tool for state control over rural society and grain procurement. Policies governing land dividends, labour remuneration, and piecework pay generated persistent tensions, particularly between land-rich and labour-rich households. Over time, land-based income was reduced and ultimately eliminated, making labour the sole basis of remuneration. Many cooperatives suffered from poor management, lack of democracy, weak accounting, and low work incentives, while peasants largely retained individualistic, short-term economic thinking.
As the movement became increasingly politicized, practices deemed “capitalist”—such as hiring labour, growing cash crops, or participating in markets—were condemned and suppressed. Resistance emerged in subtle forms: evasion of state procurement, market manipulation, sectarian infiltration, and elite-led mediation rather than open revolt. Ultimately, collectivization stripped peasants of land ownership, production autonomy, and market access, binding them to the party-state through comprehensive administrative control over agriculture.
Starting from 1949, three types of MAT were established. The first type was a temporary team formed solely during the sowing and harvesting seasons, typically consisting of 3 to 5 households. The second type was more permanent, with each team comprising 6 to 7 peasant households working together on a continuous and regular basis. The third category, known as the "combined mutual-aid team," involved the consolidation of two or three groups from the second category. This larger unit allowed members to utilize mechanized farming techniques and engage in large-scale cultivation. Formation of teams in this third category only occurred once peasants had acquired adequate experience, skills, and necessary tools for large-scale operations. Notably, these teams were predominantly established in significant numbers in North East China.
An example of "voluntary" participation in MAT illustrates the coercive practices involved. In some counties in Southwest China, rural cadres, aiming to meet quotas, organized MAT based solely on administrative divisions, ignoring the actual willingness of the peasants. These arrangements were then reported as “achievements” to their superiors, though the teams often failed to function effectively. In some cases, verbal threats and mild coercion were employed. A common tactic was to confine peasants in meetings for days until they agreed to join the MAT. Despite the pressure, the use of violence remained relatively mild.
This indivisibility often led to a paradox: some households had a labour shortage while others in the same community had a surplus. Peasant families typically had varying labour endowments based on their demographics, and local labour markets couldn't perfectly adjust these imbalances. Only a few wealthy peasants or landlords could afford to hire year-round or short-term labourers for profit maximization. For less affluent peasants facing a temporary labour shortage, even hiring a single day labourer—the smallest market unit—was too costly. This issue was usually addressed through non-monetized 'labour exchange' among relatives and neighbours, rather than through formal markets. However, these direct exchanges were limited to close families and were often loosely organized and fragile.
1. Universal and Regular Exchange: They provided a formalized and consistent system for input exchange, extending beyond limited family networks.
2. Formal Management: Teams had designated managers, often local activists or Party members, who planned and conducted input exchanges. These managers also identified and addressed members' difficulties to optimize input use.
3. Regular Bookkeeping and Pricing: Mutual aid teams maintained meticulous records of the quantity and quality of labour and draft animals provided and received, ensuring equitable exchange. Effective bookkeeping required a precise input pricing mechanism to determine price ratios between different types of inputs or those of varying quality. This process typically involved reviewing traditional price ratios and engaging in public discussions for necessary adjustments.
The transition from mutual aid teams to cooperatives aimed to better manage input mismatches. While mutual aid teams relied on quasi-market mechanisms to facilitate input exchange and improve allocation efficiency, co-ops introduced a more centralized approach. They replaced decentralized input exchange and allocation with centralized production planning, managed by co-op leaders.
Mutual aid teams boosted agricultural output primarily through increased fertilizer use and improved water control. Their success with fertilizer stemmed from two key initiatives: Organized manure distribution prevented waste by ensuring households with excess manure could share with those who had insufficient amounts. Collective compost production through mobilizing communal labour. Teams produced more compost, significantly increasing overall manure input.
However, large-scale water control projects were less common during the mutual aid team stage. These projects, far more complex and labour-intensive than individual farm improvements, only began to be built in greater numbers once co-operatives were established.
The cooperative movement regulated the ownership and use of land. The peasant household had to produce what the state imposed on it. The government declared that the agricultural cooperative movement was a fundamental goal to be achieved gradually, without a timetable. This gradual approach was necessary to ensure that radical land reforms (as in the liberated areas before 1949) would not harm the interests of the middle and rich peasants, who were responsible for the highest levels of production. At the start of the cooperative movement, county and prefectural cadres began to set up cooperatives.
From the administration’s perspective, the adoption of cooperative property rights was not merely an option but a vital strategic necessity, decisively superior to the system of individual peasant holdings. The core belief was simple: only through cooperation could the state unlock the true potential of the countryside. The shift was deemed essential for increasing agricultural production and rapidly developing rural productive forces. By eliminating the petty boundaries between individual family plots, the land itself could be used more effectively and efficiently, setting the stage for growth. Moreover, the sheer concentration of manpower in the cooperatives created a scaled economy that was previously impossible. This large scale provided the preconditions for everything from the more efficient cultivation of the soil to the effective deployment of farm machinery and the extension of improved technology.
This consolidation of labour was a force multiplier. It facilitated a necessary division of labour and rapidly accelerated the development of a diversified economy, quickly spinning off new rural industries and sidelines. It was simply easier to mobilize and utilize all available abilities and resources when they were unified under a collective structure. For ambitious projects, such as large-scale irrigation systems, cooperation was the only way to effectively employ the necessary labour and amass capital through cooperative accumulation funds.
Finally, and crucially for the state, the cooperatives served as a seamless administrative tool. They dramatically eased the state’s task of both collecting taxes and procuring grain, replacing the complexity of dealing with countless individuals with a single point of management. In this way, cooperative property rights were the key mechanism for achieving tighter control over rural society and integrating it fully into the national plan.
Out in the fields, it became clear that farm work resisted standardization. Since so many activities were sequential—you had to plant before you could weed, and weed before you could harvest—it was impossible to enforce a strict division of labour or specialization. Every day brought new, non-standardized tasks, which made it incredibly difficult to classify jobs, let alone evaluate a worker's performance fairly.
The result was a fatal fracture: the worker's effort became distant from their ultimate reward. When a worker's income was no longer closely tied to their individual output, their enthusiasm and incentive evaporated. The cold truth was that in collectivized farming, the very size of the organization, intended to be its great strength, became its chief weakness. Diseconomies of scale were not merely a risk; they were a function of size—the larger the cooperative grew, the more severe the problems became.
At the onset of the cooperative movement, county and prefectural cadres initiated the establishment of cooperatives, with peasants having the freedom to decide whether to join or not. Peasants carefully weighed their options and independently made decisions regarding participation. Initially, peasants' choices were respected for a limited period. Some peasants willingly opted to join cooperatives, influenced by various factors such as political aspirations, reverence or apprehension towards the CCP, personal connections, economic considerations, and opportunism. Moreover, peasants managed to exert some influence over the rules to suit their interests to some extent. One notable example was the allocation of community funds, with many peasants discontented with the notion of surrendering 20 percent of their total output, which was almost equivalent to the tax rate. In the early 1950s (until 1952), peasants faced uniform agricultural tax rates for both cash crops and grains, while sideline products remained untaxed.
Rural cadres, eager to replicate the 'success of mutual-aid teams, enthusiastically promoted cooperatives. This enthusiasm quickly led to excesses as they sought to demonstrate loyalty and revolutionary zeal. Cooperatives were established at an unprecedented pace, often through coercion, compelling peasants to join. As a result, the national target for cooperative formation was soon exceeded. The CCP self-criticized in March 1953 that its five-year development plan for mutual aid and cooperation was too ambitious, leading to leftist and reckless behaviour in many areas. At the same time, the Central Committee also supported the central and southern regions, including Henan Province, in correcting the impetuous tendencies in the trial operation of cooperatives.
After the
Not only the Sanfan added to the ‘political oppression’ but also Wufan, RAAK (see
All the political campaigns such as implementing the Marriage Law, building the Party, preparing for universal suffrage, reviewing the land reform in some areas, trying to build a militia cadre, etc. are hindering agricultural work.
"Therefore, the central government has decided that the overwhelming central work in the current rural areas is to intensify preparations for spring ploughing and start spring ploughing production. All other work must be carried out around and in conjunction with spring ploughing production. All work should be changed, postponed or reduced or even cancel the original plan. Party committees and people's governments at all levels above the county level shall arrange various tasks in a unified manner according to local conditions."
The resolution described some basic features of the elementary cooperatives. Membership was open to men and women above the age of 16. Landlords and rich peasants were excluded. The members partly give up their land use rights for collective farming. Draught animals, orchards and herds and large equipment should also be handed over. A suitable compensation was to be paid to the owner, and cooperative members were required to make financial contributions. These contributions enabled the cooperative to establish a production expenditure fund, which was used to purchase inputs such as seeds and fertilizers, as well as a separate fund designated for the acquisition of livestock and equipment. The cooperative’s management was responsible for organizing members into production brigades and for formulating schedules for both daily operations and seasonal agricultural work. In addition, management was required to progressively fulfil state requirements in the organization of agricultural production and to prepare a detailed annual production plan covering seeds, cultivation practices, fertilizer use, and related matters.
Again, it is emphasized that the free choice of the farmers is the basis of this process. The target of 35,000 was exceeded and the leaders did not interfere. Most of the rural cadres treated the campaign as a purely economic target and used economic rather than political incentives to attract farmers. They tried to involve the middle-class peasants into the movement and often did not accept poor peasants. They were seen as a financial burden for the coop. To solve this problem many cooperatives received loans. Material incentives were given, such as the title of "model worker", which came with several benefits (higher social status, trips and networking with party cadres).
The coops gave the CCP the means to control collective local government and the rural economy. It was a means of projecting power into the countryside, and breaking any remaining resistance among the former rural elite. In this way, the government was able to procure grain below market price and provide cheap food in the cities. This control was not total. The rules of the mutual-aid teams and coops varied from place to place. Sometimes the use of land was favoured, sometimes the use of labour and the level of capital accumulation were not the same.
Regulation of labour as a source of income was necessary. Regarding compensation for the work performed by members, the cooperative needed to gradually implement the piece-work system, aligning with the principle of "to each according to his work," meaning that more work should result in more pay. To implement the piece-work system effectively, appropriate standards for different jobs must be established, and payment rates must be determined.
Most mutual-aid teams and coops faced the same problems.
▉ The distribution of resources caused friction and led to disruption of the organization.
▉ The total lack of democracy. Mostly one person ruled the units.
▉ Financial overview was almost entirely lacking.
▉ The lack of details how to build a mutual-aid team provided plenty of room for manipulation
▉ Helping each other and working hard were exceptions.
▉ Even in mutual aid teams and agricultural producers' cooperatives considered successful, peasants often retained their traditional mindset, prioritizing personal gain and short-term objectives. These organizations frequently neglected—or perhaps avoided—educating peasants on the principles of socialism.
The production plans mandated by the government often proved to be unrealistic, and at the local level, rural cadres submitted reports to the administrative hierarchy that emphasized political motives. However, in reality, the cooperatives were primarily economically driven. Due to customary culture and illiteracy, peasants were hesitant, if not entirely unwilling, to engage in planning of this nature. When pressured, peasants or rural cadres would sometimes fabricate plans, but peasants seldom adhered to these artificial plans. Instead, they viewed such attempts with scepticism and amusement. In essence, individual family farming was incompatible with a centralized national economy for practical purposes.
During the course of this process, the mutual-aid and cooperative movement shifted its focus away from purely economic considerations and increasingly became politicized. The pursuit of profit was no longer deemed acceptable. Traditionally, one herd of cattle was valued as equivalent to, if not more valuable than, one and a half full labourers due to their efficiency in farming. However, under the new circumstances, this calculation was deemed exploitative. Consequently, the compensation for cattle was reduced to half the value of a labourer, which, according to the owners' calculations, was insufficient to cover the cost of fodder. Faced with limited options, cattle owners were forced to either consume the cattle or sell them. However, under mounting pressure from cadres, and with peasants reluctant to withdraw from mutual aid teams, cattle owners increasingly viewed their livestock as burdensome and thus opted to donate them to the team or proposed the formation of agricultural producers' cooperatives.
Despite the state reclaiming their land, farmers showed little resistance. Unlike the clear historical exploitation by landlords, the state, framed as "owned by the people," presented a less tangible oppressor. The difficulty in visualizing these new "exploiters" and predicting future consequences, in contrast to the immediate and verifiable actions of landlords, led to a lack of organized resistance, even as doubts began to surface among the peasantry.
The CCP displayed a deliberate approach to fostering social integration by actively cultivating relationships within society. Rather than imposing collectivization forcefully, the Party sought out and collaborated with a group of activists from the peasant class, creating a buffer zone between the state and society. The CCP and its work teams made efforts to identify these activists based on their economic status, with greater trust placed in poor and lower-middle peasants. As a testament to the effectiveness of this approach, during the peak of collectivization, a remarkable 148,000 individuals joined the Party in Guangdong Province alone.
As China's agrarian policy shifted from land reform to promoting mutual aid teams and cooperatives, these new organizations became targets of sectarian resistance and sabotage. Some sects initially adopted a deceptive strategy, declaring themselves mutual aid teams. For example, in Baoji, Shaanxi, the Yiguan Dao sect formed mutual aid teams that held regular worship services disguised as team meetings. Similarly, in parts of Hebei, Shandong, and Gansu, "Daoist chiefs" and their followers established both mutual aid teams and agricultural producers' cooperatives. Authorities were particularly concerned that these sect-sponsored organizations prioritized their own interests over the state's, often pressuring members not to sell surplus grain to the government. While some sects, co-opted the official designations for their own ends, others actively discouraged their members from participating in the new state-sponsored associations. The Zhong Dao of Shaanxi, with over 3,000 members, was accused in late 1954 and early 1955 of preventing followers from joining mutual aid teams and cooperatives. In more extreme cases, sectarian leaders were charged with sabotaging production within cooperatives they had "infiltrated," by destroying farm tools and poisoning livestock.
Resistance to state policies often came from the "elite" members of a community, including teachers, retired soldiers, active-duty soldiers' families, former village leaders, doctors, and even Party members. These individuals, with their access to newspapers, broadcasts, and other media, were well-informed about government policies and external events. This new class of rural elites emerged, taking the place of the former power holders—landlords, intellectuals, and lineage seniors—who had violently disappeared during the land reform. These old elites took charge of public affairs in rural society. They acted as intermediaries, negotiating with higher administrative bodies, but also served as the state's tools for exploitation. This group represented a significant source of independent social power.
They skilfully leveraged the language and official channels provided by the government to make their actions seem both legal and justifiable. Consequently, villagers never directly challenged state-imposed policies or systems. Instead, they focused their criticism on 'local cadres' who had misused their authority in implementing government policies or managing collectives. Common grievances included favouritism in income distribution, financial mismanagement within co-ops, and failures to boost production and food supplies. Even when villagers formally petitioned to leave co-ops—an officially permitted action—they pledged to fulfil tax obligations and adhere to state laws. Notably, they also excluded "bad elements" like landlords and rich peasants from their ranks, further demonstrating their strategic approach to resistance.
The implementation of collectivization in China resulted in the systematic removal of farmers' essential rights: land ownership, decision-making power regarding production, the ability to market their goods, and the freedom to travel or migrate. The party-state assumed complete control over agricultural production, dictating what, how, when, and for whom crops were grown. This system effectively bound farmers to the state, creating a relationship of personal dependence.
Sautin remarks "
1. Uneven use of farm animals, peasants without horses not treated equally within mutual aid teams; some Communists still not wanting to join them. Peasants resisted the idea that all members were on equal footing within the teams.
2. Model workers were only encouraged financially, political work was not done, and many became distant from the collective/masses and stopped being model workers.
3. Mutual aid teams were being corrupted by hired labour, usury. Some party members also engaged in usury." Page 177
The mutual-aid within the group was to be governed by the following principles:
▉ Subordination to those appointed as leaders and the completion of all assignments.
▉ Subordination to the decision of the majority.
▉ Recognition of the need to work according to plan.
▉ Unselfishness and personal honesty.
▉ Unbiased accumulation of later units and an honest, determination of work norms.
▉ Meetings every evening for summing up and evaluating work accomplished during the day.
▉ Inadmissibility of hidden criticism；all dissatisfactions to be brought out openly during group meetings.
The productive plan adopted by the team at the meeting contained the following points:
▉ To save six dan of seed by reducing wedding and religious expenses.
▉ To extend irrigation ditches and to irrigate fields in a more thorough manner during the dry seasons.
▉ To plough the fields in an exemplary fashion and to exterminate field pasts.
▉ To allow 400 man-days for members of the team to engage in outside work for additional income, so as to assure the group with sufficient provisions to last until the new harvest.
▉ To prepare 500, dan of straw and 40 dan of grass to be used as fertilizer, and to mix in 50 ching of lime into every mou of sugar cane.
▉ To sow jointly the early crops: 1 mou of peanuts, 1 mou of pepper, 800 tou of tobacco (one tou is equal to 1/10 of a dan).26 to cultivate 2 mou of virgin land, to raise two pigs, 20 ducks and 30 chickens in common (point six of the production plan points out the in caption of common property and labour in the group).
▉To establish a system of aiding the poorer members of the group.27 Pages 19-20
See for example RMRB editorial "Eliminate the style of coercive orders" 11-02-1953
12-08-1953 Mao Zedong "Combat bourgeois ideas in the party" 16-03-1953 Instructions of the CC of the CCP on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels "As a result, no one picks up dung all winter, no one engages in side-line production, sells livestock, cuts down trees and kills pigs, eats and drinks, and other serious phenomena that disrupt production. We must pay careful attention to all correct criticisms of the peasant masses and correct all leftist and adventurous mistakes. Comrades must be reminded that when organizing mutual aid groups and cooperatives, we must not forget to proceed from the level of consciousness and personal experience of the masses, proceed from the actual demands of the masses, proceed from the current production status of the small peasant economy, and correctly resolve the combination of the individual interests of the peasants and the public interests."
16-03-1953 Instructions of the CC of the CCP on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels 16-03-1953 Instructions of the CC of the CCP on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels 16-03-1953 Instructions of the CC of the CCP on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels 03-07-1951 Liu Shaoqi's Comment on the Shanxi Provincial Party Committee’s Document “Raising the Level of Mutual Aid Organizations in Old Liberated Areas Wei (2010) states "Deng Zihuiʼs assistant Du Runsheng11, also thought there should be no rush to change private ownership, because the peasants needed some years to recover and develop after the wars. Therefore, he thought merging land and labor hiring in some Regions were the results of market regulation and were in fact good for the recovery of agricultural production. Deng and Duʼs opinions were in fact underpinning Liu Shaoqiʼs idea of mechanization before collectivization, contrary to Maoʼs strategy to change private ownership into collective ownership before developing agriculture." Page 14
16-03-1953 Instructions of the CC of the CCP on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels. It states "Naturally, on the other hand, adopting a negative attitude towards the mutual aid and cooperation movement in agricultural production, allowing it to run its own course, allowing the spontaneous capitalist tendencies in the small-scale peasant economy to flourish, excluding poor peasants in mutual aid groups and cooperatives, and making poor peasants suffer, is not a good idea for all." 
27-07-1950 The Cooperative Law of the People's Republic of China (Draft) 00-02-1951 Supplementary Provisions of the Central Committee Concerning the Confiscation of Real Estate from Landlords in the Land Reform in Suburban Areas 30-09-1951 Resolution of the CC of the CCP on Mutual Assistance in Agricultural Production 15-12-1951 Mao Zedong "Take mutual-aid and co-operation in agriculture as a major task" 15-12-1951 Resolution of the CC of the CCP on Mutual Aid and Cooperation in Agricultural Production (Draft) 15-02-1953 Resolution of the CC on Mutual-Aid and Cooperation in Agricultural Production. 08-03-1953 Instruction of the CC on Reducing the Figures for the Five-Year Plans of Agricultural Production Increase and the Development of Mutual Aid and Cooperation 16-03-1953 Instructions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Spring Ploughing Production to Party Committees at All Levels 15-10-1953 Mao Zedong Two talks on mutual-aid and co-operation in agriculture 05-11-1953 Resolution on the Development of Agricultural Production Cooperatives 16-12-1953 Resolution of the CC of the CCP on the Development of Agricultural Production Cooperatives |12|Meetings....