Study Sources 1 and 2 before you answer this question.
Source 1: From a 'Resolution on Some Questions Concerning the People's Communes', published in the Peking Review, 23 December 1958. The Peking Review was the official English-language CCP news magazine. The resolution had been agreed by the CCP Central Committee on 10 December 1958. It came at a time of increasing foreign criticism of the people's communes.
Although the rural people's communes were established only a short while ago, the mass of the peasants are already conscious of the obvious benefits the communes have brought. Industry, agriculture, trade, education and military affairs have been closely co-ordinated and rapidly developed under the unified leadership of the commune.
To meet the pressing demands of the people, the communes have set up large numbers of community dining rooms, nurseries, homes of respect for the aged, and other institutions of collective welfare. In particular, these have completely emancipated women from thousands of years of kitchen drudgery and brought broad smiles to their faces.
As the result of plentiful crops, many communes have instituted a dual system of wealth distribution. The mass of peasants, both men and women, have begun to receive wages. Families in the past constantly worried about their daily meals and about their firewood, rice, oil, salt and vegetables. They are now able to 'eat without paying'. In other words, they have the most important and most reliable kind of social insurance.
For the peasants, all this is history-making news. The living standards of the peasants have been improved and they know from practical experience that standards will be even better in the future.
Source 2: From posters opposing people's communes, produced and publicly displayed by peasants in rural areas, April 1959. These two posters were confiscated at the time by a provincial Communist Party Secretary.
Six Transformations:
In the people's commune, everyone has to share a bowl of rice porridge.
In the people's commune, coarse grain cereals have replaced pure rice.
In the people's commune, private housing has been replaced.
In the people's commune, the communal accommodation is not rainproof.
In the people's commune, old people and children have become soldiers.
In the people's commune, people's clothing has become shabby.
Ten Withouts:
In the people's commune, married couples cannot have any children.
In the people's commune, there is no meat to buy at the market.
In the people's commune, villagers cannot build individual housing.
In the people's commune, there is no tobacco to smoke.
In the people's commune, people have no hats to wear in the rain.
In the people's commune, people have no cash in their pockets.
In the people's commune, no one has any relatives or family.
In the people's commune, there is no household furniture, and no oil or salt to cook vegetables with.
In the people's commune, villagers cannot keep ducks and chickens. There is no alcohol to drink and no food for lunch.
In the people's commune, if someone dies, there is no coffin to bury that person in.
How far could the historian make use of Sources 1 and 2 together to investigate the impact of the introduction of the people's communes on the lives of Chinese peasants?
Explain your answer, using both sources, the information given about them and your own knowledge of the historical context.
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