Origins of the Agricultural “Miracle”: Some Evidence from Sichuan

Abstract

The Chinese reforms that began in 1978 mercifully ended one of the most brutal and misguided economic regimes in modern history… [responsible for]… a manmade famine that killed millions during 1959–1961, and for state-promoted social upheaval that destroyed the lives of millions, including almost the whole intellectual class, while paralysing rural development for more than a decade between 1966 and 1978.