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Kaz Ross, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania (Australia)
nascent field of Chinese demographic study. Bao Shichen
(1775 – 1855) had argued that ‘the land of China is sufficient
to support the people of the country. His argument was that
more people meant more labor; and that labor is the basis of
wealth, not the cause of poverty’ (Bao, 1999: 167). For Mao
Zedong the Chinese term for population (Ö renkou) clearly
incorporates notions of both production as well as
consumption: Ö(ren – person, hands) and (kou- mouth).
In Chinese, each mouth comes with two hands (White,
1994). The answer to famine specifically and poverty in
general was to utilise the large population in production:
It is a very good thing that China has a big
population. Even if China’s population
multiplies many times, she is fully capable of
finding a solution; the solution is
production…revolution plus production can
solve the problems of feeding the population.’
(Mao, 1949: 483)
For Mao, the Chinese population, not despite its size
but because of its size, already held the answer to the
problem of food production. Mass effort in production would
overcome all obstacles. Furthermore, Mao’s retelling of an
old Chinese tale in a well-known speech during 1945
(published as ‘The foolish old man who moved mountains’)
drew attention to the other qualities he thought were needed
for China to prosper: determination and tenacity. As Mao
told it, an old man in ancient times decided to remove a
mountain in front of his house. In reply to sceptics the old
man explained that although his own individual efforts could
not achieve the aim, he would be succeeded by infinite
generations who will then continue the work until the
mountain is removed. As a political policy, the tenacity and
determination alluded to in Mao's “parable” were enacted
through the mass mobilisation campaigns of the 1950s.
Labour-intensive campaigns such as land reclamation, flood
control and irrigation schemes, and even pest control (killing
sparrows, flies, rats and so on) demonstrated the value of a
large population.
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