On the Shortfalls and Brutalities of Rural Maoism; Letters from Whitey

Abstract

The terrible turn in China has delayed this rejoinder to William H. Hinton. Hinton's views and mine coincide on some matters, among them the recent events in China and the need for a democratic direction there, but we view the Maoist performance in the countryside very differently. Hinton mistakenly wrote that the main issue in our debate is "the viability of agricultural producers' cooperatives as a basis for the rural economy of China." An attentive reading of my essay would show that I am for genuine producer cooperatives—those in which the producers have a real share in decision making.

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