In this book David Bachman examines the origins of the Great Leap Forward (GLF), a program of economic reform that must be considered one of the great tragedies of Communist China, estimated to have caused the death of between 14 and 28 million Chinese. While standard accounts interpret the GLF as chiefly the brainchild of Mao Zedong and as a radical rejection of a set of more moderate reform proposals put forward in the period 1956 to 1957, Bachman proposes a provocative reinterpretation of the origins of the GLF that stresses the role of the bureaucracy. Using a neo-institutionalist approach to analyze economic policy-making leading up to the GLF, he argues that the GLF must be seen as the product of an institutional process of policy-making.

Contents

Preface;

Acknowledgments;

Chronology;

1. Introduction;

Part I. Historical Background and Conceptual Approach:

2. Overview: Chinese politics and economy, 1956–1957;

3. Institutions and policy in China;

Part II. The Institutional Origins of the Great Leap Forward:

4. The financial coalition

5. The planning and heavy industry coalition 6. The Party as agent of social transformation

7. The views of the top leadership

8. The Third Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee and the Great Leap Forward

9. Conclusions;

Appendix: the constraints on Mao;

Bibliography;

Index.