The Importance of Revolutionary Land Reform

This chapter critically examines Qin Hui’s Idyll and Rhapsody: Guanzhong Mode and the Reexamination of Premodern Society, challenging his neoliberal critique of the Chinese peasant revolution and socialist agricultural transformation. The chapter dismantles Qin’s arguments, revealing the ideological biases behind his “peasantology.” It exposes Qin’s distortion of Lenin’s “American Path” concept to fit his neoliberal agenda and critiques his narrow interpretation of Marx’s “feudal society” to delegitimize China’s agrarian revolution. Furthermore, the chapter dissects Qin’s portrayal of Chinese peasants as “patriarchal” and “anti-democratic,” tracing it to neoliberal ideologies. It refutes Qin’s romanticization of the “American Path,” presenting it as detached from historical realities. Situating Qin’s views within China’s ideological shifts and post-Cold War mentalities, this chapter provides a robust defense of the revolutionary legacy of the Chinese peasant movement.