Preface to the 1937 Chinese Edition of «Rural Surveys»

#PUBLICATION NOTE

This edition of Preface to the 1937 Chinese Edition of «Rural Surveys» has been prepared and revised for digital publication by the Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism under the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Switzerland on the basis of the following edition: First Preface to «Rural Surveys», in Mao's Road to Power, First English Edition, Volume 6, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, 2004.

#INTRODUCTION NOTE

This is the preface written by Comrade Mao Zedong to the 1937 Chinese Edition of the collection Rural Surveys, which compiled a number of reports on surveys he conducted in the Central Red Base Area in the early 1930s.

#Workers and oppressed people of the world, unite!

#PREFACE TO THE 1937 CHINESE EDITION OF RURAL SURVEYS

#Mao Zedong
#6th of October, 1937

#★

Beginning with the Northern Expeditionary War in 1927, until we left the Central Red Base Area in 1934, I personally gathered materials from the countryside. Now only those portions of the materials listed below remain:

  • Survey of Xunwu County (May 1930)
  • Survey of Xingguo County (October 1930)
  • Survey of Dongtang and Other Places (8th of November, 1930)
  • Survey of Mukou Village (21st of November, 1930)
  • The Situation of Land Redistribution in Western Jiangxi (12th and 15th of November, 1930)
  • Clarification of the Rent Question (Unknown Date)
  • Mistakes in the Agrarian Struggle in Jiangxi (14th of November, 1930)
  • The Question of the Rich Peasants After Land Distribution (October 1930)
  • Land Law (7th of February, 1930)
  • Land Law (August 1930)
  • Survey of Changgang Township (18th of November, 1933)
  • Survey of Caixi Township (26th of November, 1933)

The last two items were published in the newspaper Douzheng [Struggle] in the Central Red Base Area; all the rest remained in manuscript and have not yet been lost, even after the Long March. Everything else was lost. Among these, the most regrettable is the loss of the surveys which I conducted in the spring of 1927 in Hunan in the five counties of Changsha, Xiangtan, Xiangxiang, Hengshan, and Liling, which were lost as a result of Xu Kexiang's rebellion. The survey in the spring of 1928 of the two counties of Ninggang and Yongxin in the Jinggang Mountains was lost when we were obliged to leave the Jinggang Mountains. The materials which remain here are all from surveys in the Central Red Base Area. The first nine are from the early period of the Agrarian Revolutionary War; the last two deal with the agrarian revolution when it was well advanced. Although they are incomplete, they were worth a look. In order to prevent further loss, we are printing a few copies, and giving them to comrades for their study. These are historical materials, and some of the views expressed in them are those of the times and have subsequently changed.

#Mao Zedong