Landlord and Peasant in China
Hansheng ChenHere is a work of extraordinary importance and timeliness. It deals with the key to the socio-economic complex of
China, the land problem; that is, the use to which the land is put the ownership of it, tenancy, rent and other forms of taxation,and
the effects of these phenomena on the people who live on the land.
It deals with a question around which Chinese history-and indeed
world history-is revolving. Dr. Chen presents facts which we
accept as accurate either because of his own very high standing as
a scholar or by comparison with other rural surveys which have
been made in China. He draws certain inferences from these
facts, some direct, some more remote. These inferences, being
interpretations, cannot be verified with the same objectivity as can
the facts on which they are based. But they can, nevertheless, be
checked against the other things we know about China, about
social and economic and political evolution, and about the forces
and counter-forces which are involved in the Chinese equation.
Dr. Chen's book, if made use of. will gready advance our under-
standing of China and of the American relation to the Far Eastern
situation.