ABSTRACT
Market town residents were recruited into commune-operated enterprises whose fate fluctuated with political winds rather than with local market demand. Nanxi Town was the largest market town in the northern half of Dagang County on the eve of the Communist revolution. In 1986, the bulk of the town’s population was employed by various industrial and commercial enterprises run by the town government. The privileges of an individual entrepreneur were reserved only for those with the means to protect themselves from the shifting political winds. Yongding Township had also come a long way since collectivization in the 1950s. Despite the limitations imposed, Yongding managed to accumulate industrial experience in the mid- and late 1970s, ironically manipulating the Maoist call to develop agriculturally oriented small-scale enterprises. As a rural collective, Yongding has made the best uses of two political programs that could not have been farther apart ideologically.
