Historical and geographical study on socio-economic structure of market towns - "shi-zhen" - in the southern Yangtze delta.

第一年，我们走访了江苏、上海的几个小城镇，考察了地理环境、城镇景观、市场、工厂、娱乐设施等。我们也有机会听取当地研究人员关于农业管理、文化税收、行政制度等方面的意见。通过这项听力研究和统计资料，我们可以对这些小城镇有基本的了解。第二年的研究在上海市区的两个对比鲜明的小镇进行。在传统的集镇——久家角镇，我们对基于居民点的行政组织进行了深入的研究，得到了行政与人民关系的有价值的事实。这个小镇被一个大村庄所环绕。通过对该村主任的采访，我们了解到该村可以经营许多增长型工厂，因为该村有大量的工业用地和剩余劳动力。这一地区大部分实行了承包责任制，剩余劳动力主要来自农业部门，这一制度加快了生产率的提高。在我们调查的第二个城镇，土地利用和定居制度发生了重大变化，社会经济结构现代化。在罗甸镇，大片农田由少数专业农民按承包责任制经营，剩余劳动力受雇于镇中心的当地工业。在该镇对居民委员会进行了听证调查，结果与久家角镇相似。在此基础上，对太湖至杭州湾一大片平原的地貌形成过程进行了调查。我们可以从地理学的角度找到一些新的线索来解释这一过程。

In the first year, we visited several small towns in Jiangsu Sheng and Shanghai, and investigated geographical environment, townscape, markets, factories, entertainment facilities etc. We also had occasions to hear from native researchers about agricultural management, cultural excise, administrative system and so on. With this hearing study and statistical material, we could get basic knowledge about these small towns.The research in the next year was carried out in two contrasting small town in the Shanghai City Region. In a traditional market town, Zyujiajiao Zhen, we made a intensive research on the administrative organization based on residential blocks and could get valuable facts about the relationship between administration and peoples. This small town is surrounded by a large rural village. Through the interview with the director of this village, we understood that this village could manage many growth factories because it had plenty of land for industry and surplus labor. The contracted responsibility system has been largely adopted in this area and surplus labor has come from agricultural sector with the raise of productivity accelerated by this system.Land use and settlement system was greatly changed to modernize socio-economic structure in the second town we investigated. In this town, Luodian Zhen, large farmland was managed by a few professional farmers under the contracted responsibility system and surplus labor was employed by local industries in the town center.The hearing research concerning residential committee was made in this town and the result was similar to that in Zyujiajiao Zhen. In addition to such study, the investigation was done to reveal the landformation process in a large plain from Taihu Lake to Hangzhou Bay. We could several new clues to explain this process from the geographical point of view.