ABSTRACT
The production team was the basis of the structure. It was frequently the former elementary or semisocialist cooperative. In terms of land, it encompassed a hamlet or small village of houses huddled together in the northern provinces, a wheat growing region where water is scarcer than in the rice growing region of the central, western or southern provinces, where the houses are scattered in small groups. The economic function of the commune was obviously the most important. For a start, by means of the commune, it was possible to mobilize all masculine labor in the rural districts and much female labor as well. From a social point of view, the people's commune was to be the basic unit of socialist society, closely associating workers, peasants, soldiers, and bureaucrats, gradually erasing the differences between social and professional categories, between intellectuals and manual workers, and between town and countryside in attitudes and customs.
