Chapter 93: The New System (Part 2)

The transmigrators decided to implement a completely different civil administration model in Production Teams One and Two of Bairen Beach, which they completely controlled: the people’s commune system that China implemented in the 1960s and 1970s.

The people’s commune system began in 1958 and was officially abolished in 1985, existing for a total of 27 years. The most profound impression it left on people was that it was “large in size and collective in nature.” However, the actual operation of the people’s communes was guided by the 1962 “Revised Draft of the Regulations on the Work of Rural People’s Communes,” which adopted a three-level ownership system with the production team as the basic unit of production and management, while maintaining the system of integrating government administration with commune management.

Under this system, the people’s commune was both a unit of political power in the countryside and a production and management entity. The commune secretary was not only responsible for party affairs, but also had to manage industrial and agricultural production and civil affairs. From a negative perspective, the commune managed too much and too broadly, leading to bloated institutions, a rigid system, an overly egalitarian distribution system, and low production enthusiasm among the members.

From a positive perspective, the 27 years under the people’s commune system were the 27 years in which the Chinese government had the strictest control over rural society and peasants in its history—the situation where political power did not extend to the countryside and clan-based powerful families controlled grassroots power in the countryside was basically eliminated. In that era of stagnant economic development, backward productivity, and low cultural level of the whole people, the people’s commune played a role in concentrating forces to accomplish major tasks and stabilizing social order. Rural primary medical services, universal education, water conservancy, and mechanization all achieved significant development during this period. The high concentration of power under the people’s commune system and its strong control over human and material resources were extremely attractive to the transmigrators.

Some committee members were concerned about the agricultural production efficiency under this system: during the people’s commune period, the actual agricultural productivity per laborer was constantly declining. Would the transmigrators’ adoption of such a system cause the same problem?

“I personally don’t think it matters. The intention of this people’s commune is not agricultural production, but civil administration,” Ma Qianzhu explained. “It can effectively integrate administration, people’s livelihood, public security, education, and military affairs, forming a social organization that is completely dependent on us.”

This brand-new grassroots political power, in terms of system, is under the leadership of the Internal Affairs and Civil Affairs Committee under the Executive Committee, and in terms of specific affairs, it is under the leadership of the various professional groups.

The commune adopts a household registration system. The household is the basic unit, and even bachelors must establish their own households. The registered population, regardless of gender or age, are all called “commune members.” Among the commune members, those who have obtained staff qualifications will enjoy the relevant benefits according to regulations.

Each household has a private plot of land. The private plot cannot be transferred but can be inherited. What to plant on the private plot is entirely up to the head of the household. The private plots are not allocated per capita, but per household. Households with a larger population will have their area increased proportionally. The area of a standard household (4 people) is 1. For each additional person in the household registration, the coefficient increases by 0.1, capped at 1.5—the purpose is to encourage the division of families and avoid the formation of large families with several generations living together. Once a family is divided, the family’s cohesion will be reduced, which can effectively prevent some families from doing evil because they have many men.

The Executive Committee considered that after this policy was introduced, there might be cases of “fake family division” in order to get more land, just as there were “fake divorces” for demolition in the original time and space. It was stipulated that when a family was divided, private plots would only be given to married couples. Single men and women who divided their families could establish a household registration, but could not enjoy a private plot until after they were married.

The housing for commune members will be uniformly built by the transmigrators and then sold to the members according to relevant welfare policies, but this benefit can only be enjoyed once per household. Without the consent of the Internal Affairs and Civil Affairs Committee, commune members are not allowed to build their own houses within the jurisdiction of the transmigrator regime. The housing of commune members can be freely bought, sold, gifted, and inherited, but only after the full payment for the house has been made.

Commune members are not allocated land other than their private plots. They have three basic sources of income: first, the output from their own private plots; second, the work points earned from participating in commune-assigned labor; and third, income from sideline occupations.

Among the commune members, men aged 18-55 and women aged 18-45 are called full laborers. Men aged 13-17 and 56-65, and women aged 13-17 and 46-55 are called half-laborers. In principle, every half-laborer and full-laborer, male or female, unless recruited for work, enlisted in the army, or attending school, must participate in the commune’s assigned labor and complete a certain number of basic attendance days. Additional assigned labor beyond these basic attendance days is considered overtime, and the Executive Committee’s labor department will pay work points at a coefficient of 1.2.

Those not in this age group are called auxiliary laborers. If they are willing to participate in assigned labor and can complete it, they can also earn work points, but the number of attendance days is not specifically stipulated.

The industrial and commercial enterprises established by the transmigrators will give priority to recruiting from among the commune members. After becoming an enterprise worker, the commune member’s status remains unchanged, and they are still under the management of the commune in terms of administration, life, and justice. However, their labor management and remuneration are the responsibility of the recruiting enterprise, and the commune no longer intervenes.

The commune management system adopts a three-level management: commune - village - commune member group. The commune member group is the most basic unit, with each group consisting of eight to ten households. Within the group, there are a group leader and a deputy group leader, who are responsible for conveying and supervising government orders and for supervising and managing the commune members.

The village, as a level of political power, has a village committee, a production group, a militia group, and a women’s group. Unlike indirectly controlled villages like Saltworks Village, the villages under the Bairen Commune have their various administrative organizations led by the commune.

At the commune level, there are a series of administrative, scientific, educational, cultural, and health departments, including the commune headquarters, finance section, production section, propaganda section, culture and education section, judicial office, militia team, women’s federation, health station, agricultural technology station, broadcasting station, primary school, and kindergarten. However, due to a lack of sufficient professional personnel, this is currently just a plan that needs to be gradually improved.

Every commune member above the level of a half-laborer must pay an income tax of 5% of their annual income, regardless of whether the income is from work points or enterprise wages. Income from private plots is exempt from agricultural tax, and the income of commune members under the age of fifteen is tax-exempt. The tax revenue is distributed between the transmigrators and the commune at a ratio of 4:6. The commune uses this fee to maintain daily administrative expenses and pay the salaries of full-time personnel.

On the busy construction site outside the south gate of Bairen City, an inconspicuous wooden sign with black characters on a white background was hung at the entrance of a small, newly completed courtyard: “Bairen Beach Commune.” The commune’s director was concurrently held by Wu De. To be honest, among the few staff members in the production team who were actively trying to get close to the organization, it was estimated that no one could understand the obscure and convoluted terms in the “Commune Organization and Management Regulations.” Even Wu De himself had to frequently call the Executive Committee to inquire about certain details.

Lin Xing was appointed as the deputy director of the commune, but he did not take up his post immediately. Instead, he and several others were sent to Saltworks Village to participate in the first cadre training class of the Saltworks Farmers’ Study Group, organized by Du Wen. Lin Xing and the others all understood that they were being prepared to “become officials”—the chiefs called it “promotion,” which made them feel both sudden and apprehensive. Before leaving, Wu De called the few of them to the construction site and pointed to a tall, nearly completed building:

“You will live in there in the future.”

These “quasi-cadres” had already grown accustomed to the incredible things created by the chiefs. Moreover, they had personally led the laborers to build the houses. But in their wildest fantasies, such a tall and grand building had nothing to do with them. Everyone was dumbfounded. After a moment, Lin Xing asked, trembling:

“Chief Wu, is what you said true?”

“Of course, we always keep our word.”

“Then how much money does it cost to live there—” Lin Xing was certainly not arrogant enough to think that the “short hairs” would give them a house for free.

“Sixty taels of silver. If you staff members buy it, fifty-four taels will be fine.”

This price did not cause much of a stir. Judging by the prices and wage levels of the late Ming Dynasty, this housing price was just average.

When they heard that this money could be paid in installments over ten or twenty years, the smiles on their faces became even more obvious: to live in the house first and pay later, such a good thing was truly rare.

Soon, this news spread throughout the production team. Every day after work, someone would go to the construction site to look at these houses that would belong to them in the future. Ma Peng was one of them. After he returned to the production team, he was assigned a separate shed according to the treatment for laborers with families. All the rags he had brought with him that were related to cloth were confiscated, but as compensation, he received new clothes, a mat, and a quilt. The only thing that made him unhappy was that his old mother also had to experience the “purification” that he had tasted back then. Seeing his mother in new clothes with a cloth wrapped around her head, Ma Peng’s feelings were extremely complicated—this group of “short hairs” really had no respect for the elderly.

However, the main reason he quit his job at Fu Bu’er’s house after returning for the busy farming season, besides the good food here with the “short hairs,” was that he found he could no longer get used to the bites of fleas and bedbugs, the dark and dilapidated houses, the turbid water… Although it was not a life of luxury with the “short hairs,” these most ordinary things in their daily lives were unattainable in his past life.

Now Ma Peng works at the brick and tile factory, digging and sifting earth every day. The rumbling sound of the machines no longer makes him curious or surprised. There are no longer “kūnzéi” guards with bayonets around him and his fellow workers, but their enthusiasm for labor is unprecedentedly high—they are adding bricks and tiles to their own houses. A new life, completely different from the past, is about to unfold.