3. The Chinese Government’s Plan for Rapid Modernization
As seen above, the plan to exterminate sparrows was part of a wider and vast modernization campaign pushed by Chairman Mao, the Great Leap Forward. The aim was to drag China from its status as an overwhelmingly backward peasant society and transform it into a modern, industrialized, and powerful first-class great power. Unfortunately, Mao’s understanding of economics turned out to be just as faulty as his knowledge – or lack thereof – of the environment and the ecology. The results were disastrous.
A key factor in the catastrophe that unfolded was Mao’s wildly unrealistic expectations of just what could be accomplished with his rapid modernization program. A hallmark of the Great Leap Forward was the Chairman’s brainstorm that increased steel production – a benchmark of industrialization – need not wait for the development of infrastructures such as steel plants, or the training of a skilled workforce. Instead, intrepid Chinese could produce steel from blast furnaces in their communes – literal backyard furnaces. As seen below, that did not work out as well as the Chinese authorities had hoped.
