ABSTRACT
The whole subject of China is charged with political emotion and source material, both Chinese and Western, is often biased, misleading and inaccurate. In 1934 the Red Army, dislodged from its bases in south-central China, withdrew, in the famous Long March, to the north-west frontier province of Yenan. The CGP swept to power in 1949 in a China of economic chaos caused by the long period of warfare. Despite problems, the commune seems to have been a viable institution for solving China's rural problems, and offers valuable suggestions for developing and even developed countries. Indeed the pattern and structure of Chinese rural society remained basically unchanged from Han time’s right down to the twentieth century. The strict discipline and moral fibre of the Red Army, so different from the Kuomintang and warlords' bands, and the immediate application of land reform in favour of the poor peasants, ensured considerable rural support when the Chinese Communist Party finally came to power.
