On the transformation of wasteland

The form of land ownership in Qing Dynasty is basically the same as that in Ming Dynasty, mainly official land and private land. However, with the gradual reduction of state-owned land, the state-owned land system has tended to collapse, and the increasingly mature private land system has occupied a dominant position. In the eighteenth year of Shunzhi (166 1 year), of the 575 million mu of cultivated land in China, 549.3 million mu were privately owned and 25.7 million mu were officially owned, accounting for only 4.5%.

The number and names of official lands in Qing Dynasty are less than those in Ming Dynasty, which mainly appear in the form of official villages, flag lands and wasteland. Guanzhuang mainly inherited the official land, unowned land and land occupied by the Qing Dynasty in the Ming Dynasty, and was under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Rites and Guanglu Temple. The flag land was occupied many times since the first year of Shunzhi (1644). The officers and men, the people and the slaves in the flag each gave 36 mu of land as shares, while the Eight Banners allocated different amounts of land according to their status. The land they occupied was managed by the manor and cultivated by the "able-bodied". Flag land does not pay taxes to the government, and grain does not increase or decrease. It is hereditary and is not allowed to be sold according to the code. Because flag-bearers were not used to agricultural production, they often bought and sold flag land privately, which made it difficult for many people who lost their flag land to make a living and directly affected the stability of the Qing government. After Yongzheng ascended the throne, he ordered to clean up the flag land, redeem the land sold by the state, and conduct an inventory of the flag land to prepare for the review of the dispute between the flag bearer and the land. Later, the phenomenon of auction of flag land was still repeatedly prohibited. In the 23rd year of Guangxu (1897), the Qing government once again stipulated: "No matter whether the old circle was newly built or not, the flag land was not allowed to be sold to the people, but those who bought it from the former people for promotion were allowed to start business" and allowed to "hand over the flag land to the people", thus acknowledging the legitimacy of the general sale of flag land.

There were three forms of land reclamation in Qing dynasty: military, folk and grass reclamation. After the stability of the Qing regime, it attached great importance to reclamation, formulated reclamation orders, and distributed all uninhabited wasteland in States, counties and health centers to refugees and officers and men for planting. At the beginning of Shunzhi, "Gan Jin Wei changed to Tunding", and later Liangzhou "Qian Jun changed to Tunding". Garrison troops from all over the country reclaimed wasteland and planted seeds under the organization of local governments. Refugees can't farm if they can't farm, so officials borrow money from farm tools, seeds or quantities. According to the records about grain in the Draft of Qing Dynasty, in the early Qing Dynasty, able-bodied men were transferred to open up wasteland and soldiers were set up in the frontier to defend farmers. Later, in order to make the local officials devote themselves to the combination of land and labor, they also formulated the Law of Restricting Punishment Cases to Years, and advised farmers and mulberry farmers to supervise the reclamation. During the Shunzhi period, a large number of ripe fields were opened up in various places.

In the middle and late Qing Dynasty, the number of troops stationed in Jinchang gradually decreased. In addition, some garrison troops and their families have successively settled for the people, and the wasteland reclaimed by the army has been changed into civilian wasteland. By the end of the Qing Dynasty, due to the reorganization of local soldiers in Gansu by Zuo, the strength of each battalion in Yongchang was reduced by about 65% compared with that in the eighth year of Guangxu (1882) and Jiaqing. By the time the Republic of China was founded, except for Ningyuanbao and Shuiquanbao, which each had 50 soldiers, all other battalions had been abolished.

The Qing Dynasty attached great importance to people's villages. In order to heal the wounds caused by the war, the imperial edict of the sixth year of Shunzhi (1649) said: "Reclaiming land and cultivating land shall be distributed to all states and counties by the order of the Duchayuan of the Ministry of Housing, and those who flee to all places, regardless of their origins, shall be widely recruited and incorporated into Jiabao to live and work in peace and contentment. State and county officials inspected the local ownerless wasteland, issued seal licenses, reclaimed land and cultivated it forever. After six years of farming, a company official personally checked the number of ripe acres, caressed them according to the investigation, and asked for an order before collecting money and grain. Six years ago, taxes were not allowed, regardless of the gold faction, such as conniving at officials, officials, township conventions, and a leader, and borrowing the end to harm, the state and county officials were not guilty. Ensure that fugitives can resume their business, and more and more areas will be taken back. Recruiting people and encouraging the amount of farming are the most important things in counties and prefectures, and the most important thing is to blame the governor for being lazy. Massage alone at the end of each year and put it in the exam. The Ministry will quickly issue instructions for compliance. " The imperial edict has four contents: first, recruit refugees, reclaim land and restore agriculture; Second, the government recognized that the land of the reclamation people was private and issued a seal license; Third, tax exemption for five years before reclamation; Fourth, the number of reclamation and collection is used as the assessment basis for the performance of officials. Because of its short tax exemption period and poor soil in reclamation area, farmers are often taken away by landlords and officials in the name of reclamation, or after reclamation, some people recognize their business and file a lawsuit, so farmers can't afford huge litigation fees or abandon their business or go bankrupt because of litigation. During the Kangxi period, the land policy was further adjusted, and the main body was changed from six years to ten years. "Lend it to cattle breeds as appropriate, and borrow it in spring and autumn." The government gives farmers silver, which is called agricultural capital per mu of San Qian, and returns half of it in the second year and pays it off in three years. The government also implemented the system of "changing the name of the field", which changed the land from the imperial palace of the Ming Dynasty to the original land for the people, changed it to private property, renamed the field, and became the world's industry forever. When implementing the reclamation policy, the Qing government also adopted a series of measures to safeguard the private land rights of the feudal landlord class, which not only protected the interests of the feudal landlord class, but also enabled the feudal landlord to arbitrarily occupy a large number of people's barren land.

The period from Kangxi to Qianlong was the last prosperous period of feudal society in China. With the improvement and development of agricultural productivity, land income has increased, which has stimulated the landlords' desire to pursue land income and profits. As a result, landlords and gentry tried their best to buy and plunder land, and land became more and more involved in commodity circulation, and the transfer and transaction volume of land property rights soared. Due to the fierce land annexation, a large number of yeomen and semi-yeomen went bankrupt. Bankrupt farmers have to rent the landlord's land or sell their own labor force for the landlord to survive, while the landlord cruelly exploited farmers through land, mortgage system, sharing system and hiring labor force. In the fourth year of Yongzheng (1726), according to the imperial edict in the early period of Yongzheng, Gansu began to implement new policies such as "spreading ding tax into land tax" and "officials and gentry take grain as a warning", so that poll tax, which lasted for thousands of years, was no longer levied and the burden on farmers was reduced. In the fifth year of Qianlong (1740), in order to alleviate the sharp contradiction caused by the landlord and manor owner's rent change and rent recovery, the Qing government also promulgated the decree that the tenant farmers in the flag land enjoyed the right of permanent tenancy, and implemented the "permanent tenancy system". There are few flags in the territory, and most landless farmers sell their labor to landlords for survival, suffering cruel exploitation and miserable life.