Chapter 230 Population Structure and Land Policy
Will there be xenophobia among the naturalized people under the rule of the Time Travel Group? The answer to this question is undoubtedly yes. The aboriginal people in the Shengli Port area are only a small number of fishermen, plus at most the mountain people of the Li and Miao ethnic groups in the inland areas. Although these people accounted for the vast majority of the naturalized people in the early days, as time went by, the outsiders Immigrants continue to pour in, and the resident structure of Shengli Port area is also constantly changing. The numerical advantage of locals is gradually fading, and the foreign population is slowly beginning to become the main body of naturalized residents. This will also be the trend in Sanya in the next few years. The main theme of regional population changes.
The Executive Committee cannot yet make a hasty conclusion on how much impact this demographic change trend will have on the people, but what is certain is that there will definitely be many conflicts between old and new forces in the future - similar incidents occurred a few months ago They have already begun to appear, the most serious one being the farm commune fighting case. The large-scale armed fight in which several people were killed and injured was the most serious civil security case to date. The cause was the conflict between old and new naturalized citizens.
Although the Executive Committee responded and dealt with the incident very quickly, and therefore launched the construction of grassroots civil affairs institutions and gradually began to train naturalized civilian cadres, everyone knew very well that these institutional measures could not completely eliminate civil affairs. This kind of contradiction. In fact, according to statistics from the military and police departments, in existing public security cases, more than 80% of the parties involved are naturalized citizens of different batches. This data is enough to show that the contradiction between old and new naturalized citizens is still the same among the people. main internal contradictions.
According to the more mature sociological views of later generations, xenophobia is a manifestation of the bad nature of human nature, and people who hold this concept are often disadvantaged groups in the region. It is ignorance, ignorance and prejudice that have caused such a social phenomenon. If the Executive Committee wants to alleviate or eradicate the various social conflicts caused by this, it must first guide public opinion and gradually change this social phenomenon by improving the education level of naturalized people.
But it is easier said than done. The phenomenon of xenophobia is still prevalent and difficult to eradicate in the 21st century, let alone the 17th century. Among the naturalized people currently recruited by the Time Travel Group, the vast majority are poor people. More than 90% of them have not received formal education, and less than 10% of them can actually read and read. This situation is certainly related to the policy of obscuring the people adopted by the feudal dynasty for thousands of years, but another reason is that most of the early immigrants who fled to Victory Port came for livelihood, and their families could not support scholars at all. The current prestige and reputation of the Time Travel Group are far from being able to attract talents from all over the world to join them. There are even very few down-and-out literati, and a considerable number of people can even be directly classified as "ignorant". Quality is still at a relatively low level.
On the other hand, when these immigrants came to Victory Port, they often brought a large group of people with them, and there were even large families who moved in as a clan unit. After these immigrants enter the naturalized citizen system, they often regard family and clan as the social relationship on which they rely. The most significant consequence of this dependence is that they form groups based on clans and are outside the existing civil affairs system. In many cases this has become the source of civil security incidents.
The subsequent large-scale immigration of North Vietnamese immigrants will usher in a new wave of grouping. After these people who have left their hometowns arrive in a completely unfamiliar new environment, it is almost inevitable for them to form a group to protect their own interests. The problem that will arise then is not only xenophobia between old and new immigrants, but also new conflicts, such as regional discrimination.
Regional discrimination is nothing new to the people of Chu. In later generations, such social discrimination caused by regional cultural differences existed between provinces within a country, between cities within a province, and even within smaller geographical areas. Phenomenon. And the trouble it will create for the crossing group is no less than the early anti-foreign ideas of immigrants. The most troublesome thing for the Executive Committee is that this hurdle cannot be circumvented, and as the source of immigrants continues to increase, this situation may become more and more serious.
After Tao Donglai explained the key points, everyone present fell into deep thought. If such a factor of social instability cannot be properly resolved, it will plant a time bomb for future immigration work, and there may be big trouble at some point.
The first one to speak was Qiu Yuan: "Since these problems also exist in later generations, their existence is reasonable. If we want to put an end to these phenomena, we will definitely not be able to do so. It is better to block them than to remove them. It is better to think of ways to alleviate possible conflicts. .”
Malico said: "If according to what Mr. Tao said, tens of thousands of Vietnamese immigrants will move to Sanya in the next year, then the number of naturalized Vietnamese will probably be seven to eight times that of other naturalized people. If the population ratio suddenly increases so much, it will be almost impossible not to have problems.”
Tao Donglai keenly captured the hidden meaning of Malik's words: "You mean, the key is to maintain a balance in the structure of naturalized residents in Sanya?"
Zhang Guang asked blankly: "It has been said that tens of thousands of Vietnamese will move in, and immigrants from other places are slow to come. How can we maintain a balanced population structure?"
"You're so stupid!" Zhao Xiaoruo glared at Zhang Guang with hatred: "To maintain the balance of the population structure in Sanya, just directly limit the number of Vietnamese immigrants entering this area!"
"What about the extra immigrants?" Zhang Guang still didn't understand what these people were talking about.
"The extra immigrants can be resettled in other places on Hainan Island to develop uninhabited areas in the form of colonization points." At this time, Tao Donglai had already formed a relatively clear idea in his mind: "Yinggehai, Shilu, just... The population required to develop and construct these two places is at least tens of thousands, and now there is a large coastal plain on the west coast of Hainan Island that can be used for large-scale agricultural development. Not to mention 20,000 to 30,000 people, even 20,000 to 30,000 people can be resettled. Go down.”
"Vietnamese immigrants assigned to these places to establish colonization sites can be screened in a planned way and concentrated in one place as much as possible according to their place of origin, so that problems such as xenophobia or regional discrimination will not occur in the early stages of resettlement." Malik also lost no time in taking the opportunity. added.
"As long as the social stability of the core area of Sanya is ensured, the peripheral colonization and development areas can be used as secondary units to slowly solve practical problems." Qiu Yuan also hurriedly offered suggestions.
Everyone talked to each other and gradually improved the idea, and unknowingly they seemed to have seen the dawn of a solution to the problem. However, Zhang Guang was still very ignorant and poured cold water on everyone at this time: "The development of Black Tu Port in the past few months and now the planning of Tieliang Port have already made everyone at the top and bottom very busy. , if tens of thousands of people colonize Hainan Island, it may not be as simple as just talking about it.”
This sentence brought everyone back to reality immediately from the state of excitement. Indeed, considering the current comprehensive strength of the Cross Travel Group, it would be extremely difficult to implement large-scale colonization and development on Hainan Island. The material consumption of opening a colonization point is too great. If we only count the number of North Vietnamese immigrants, the number of two thousand people moving in every month in the future will be enough to support a colonization point of the same size as Black Earth Port. However, it is a pity. The Crossing Group currently does not have enough capacity to plan and build new settlement sites at a rate of one per month. The colonization point that Chuanchuan Group wants to build is not a self-sustaining village-style immigration point. Instead, it needs to use Black Earth Port as a model to establish a comprehensive civil administration organization and bring local social security under military management. In the short term, Achieve the ability of self-hematopoiesis within the body. The material consumption of building such a colonization point is not a small amount. Under the current population base and production scale, it is indeed difficult to achieve the goal of continuously establishing a colonization point.
Tao Donglai was speechless for a moment. He had indeed only seen the benefits of this plan and temporarily ignored the difficulties that might arise in the process. The Executive Committee has always dreamed of developing the western part of Hainan Island as soon as possible, but it is indeed difficult to realize it and cannot be achieved overnight. Now it seems that this pipe dream may have to be realized for some time.
After temporarily skipping this topic, Tao Donglai returned his attention to the work of the Yazhou Office and listened to the work reports of everyone in the Yazhou Office one by one.
It has been more than four months since the Cliff Office was established in May. In the past four months, the Cliff Office has transported nearly 2,000 immigrants to Shengli Port through various channels and purchased dozens of tons of various materials. , reached several export trade agreements and earned a large amount of silver for the foreign trade department.
In addition, the various intelligence collection and civil and military intelligence monitoring work carried out by the Yazhou Office are also very effective. It is precisely because of the existence of the Yazhou Office that the Executive Committee can focus on its own development. Instead of always being prepared for possible military attacks from Yazhou. However, after this period of operation, the role of the Cliff Office has actually begun to become weaker and weaker. This situation is caused by many reasons.
First of all, the business relations between the two places have gradually stabilized. As the two agents designated by the Executive Committee, "Furuifeng" and "Anfuxing" regularly send ships to Victory Port for trade every month, and cross the group The two trading houses will also try their best to help purchase the materials needed here - anyway, with just one hand, you can earn the Haihan people's circulation coupons. As a result, the function of the Yazhao Office in commerce gradually weakened, and more often it acted as a debt collector, settling outstanding payments with two commercial banks on a regular basis.
Secondly, the strength of the local Ming army in Yazhou has already been clearly understood, and there is no suspense. The shortage of soldiers stationed in the local garrison is very serious, and the combat effectiveness is extremely poor. Mu Xiabai and Feng Annan believed in the report that even the militiamen who had only received one month of military training in Victory Port could defeat twice the number of Yazhou garrison. . And the Yazhou navy, the only one that can really pose some threat to Shengli Port, has already installed Luo Shengdong, a rebellious guy. If the superiors really want to move Shengli Port, I'm afraid the navy's warships have not yet sailed out of the Ningyuan River. , the news has already reached Victory Port.
As for whether there will be a possibility of attacking Yazhou with force in the future, two members of the military and police department also have the same view: There is no need to conquer Yazhou. In less than two years, the immigration policy of the Crossing Group can destroy it. Empty. By then, there will probably only be three types of people left in the city: officials, official servants and serious criminals who cannot be released. Taking this place will have no practical benefit to the Crossing Group. On the contrary, it may anger the Ming Dynasty officials. It's really superfluous.
Not to mention the immigration aspect, which has evolved from the initial reliance on coaxing and coaxing immigrants to the automatic migration of the population. If Yaxing wants to organize immigration now, it must go to Danzhou in the north or Wanzhou or even Wenchang in the northeast. Moreover, Luo Shengdong is not the only one who has recently come to the Cliff Office to inquire about the land price in Victory Port. Some wealthy locals have begun to become interested in Victory Port. Of course, the purpose of these people buying land is not necessarily to move to Victory Port, but as long as this trend begins to appear, the gradual decline of Yazhou City will only be a matter of time. Because anyone who has been to Victory Port will realize that the development prospects of that place are far better than those of Yazhou City, which has been stagnant for hundreds of years. After the construction of Victory Port’s business zone achieves certain results next year, the entire city will The business center of southern Hainan Island will gradually shift from Yazhou to this emerging port town.
The biggest reason currently preventing the middle and upper class people from Yazhou from moving to Shengli Port is generally believed by everyone here to be the land policy currently implemented by the Executive Committee. The people on the executive committee all have extensive knowledge from later generations. They know very well that the root cause of social unrest is the substantial concentration of resources and wealth. During the feudal society with relatively low productivity, this concentration was mainly reflected in on land resources. If the issue of land ownership is not resolved, large-scale land will continue to be concentrated in the hands of a very small number of people, and social unrest will not be quelled. The Executive Committee's solution to this problem is public ownership of land.
The benefits of this policy are obvious, but the disadvantages are also obvious - when the control area of the Crossing Group expands from the unowned land to the owned land, there will inevitably be a huge conflict of interest. Of course, there are ways to peacefully resolve this contradiction. At the beginning of time travel, some people thought that they could just use money to buy, buy, buy, but after all, this is only a temporary solution, not the root cause. China is so big, it will definitely not be able to buy everything by buying. , No matter how rich the Time Travel Group is, it cannot be so willful.
The current strategy formulated by the Executive Committee is to directly skip the owned land and first occupy and develop a large number of unowned land on Hainan Island. After accumulating a certain strength, it will gradually try to annex various large and small areas. Small landowner. Of course, it is difficult to predict how much bloodshed will occur during this merger process.
The reason why Chuan Chuan Group was able to implement this land policy in the early days was that, in addition to the fact that Victory Port was sparsely populated and had no landowners, the early naturalized people were all poor and poor people. These people do not have or have lost their own land. Although they still have a great desire to own land, under the civil administration structure of the Chuan Chuan Group, their desire for land can be satisfied in another way. .
After reaching a certain labor level, every naturalized citizen can obtain a certain area of land use rights at a relatively low price, and this use right lasts for decades. During this period, he only needs to report to the executive committee subordinates every year. The Ministry of Agriculture only needs to pay a small amount of grain tax. Obtaining land use rights is much cheaper than buying land. The grain tax collected by the Ministry of Agriculture is also much lighter than the burden paid by the Ming government. It can be said that it actually reduces the people's ability to obtain land. cost. Moreover, older naturalized citizens all know that the average yield of the grains grown by the Cross-Training Group is much higher than what they knew in the past, and the converted income is much more cost-effective than buying land for farming.
The wealthy people in Yazhou will obviously not be satisfied with such a land system. They need more land as the means of production to generate wealth, but the executive committee will obviously not allow other landowners to appear in the area under their jurisdiction—— Even if foreign trading companies came to invest in Shengli Port for development, they only obtained the use rights of the land rather than the ownership. It is precisely the existence of this conflict of interest that causes many middle- and upper-class people in Yazhou who are interested in developing in Shengli Port to still adopt a wait-and-see attitude and have yet to take actual action.
After listening to everyone's analysis, Tao Donglai nodded and said: "The land issue is indeed a thorny issue in our future expansion process. It involves the foundation of our country in the future. Policies cannot be changed easily, but we can find ways to ease the contradiction. , resolution does not necessarily have to be solved by force. To a certain extent, it depends on you to preach in Yazhou and explain our land policy to these people. The key is to explain to them the benefits they can get. You know what kind of returns you can get from investing in real estate in Shengli Port. Lao Ma, you used to work in investment promotion, so this is your strength!”
Maliko smiled and said: "Mr. Tao has a good memory! It is possible to invite investment, but the executive committee must first give me a clearer policy before I can promote it. The land in Victory Port cannot be purchased directly, so everyone will spend The executive committee had better draw the line on how to operate the money after acquiring the right to use it, and what can and cannot be done, so as to avoid problems in subsequent operations.”
Tao Donglai nodded and said: "I will convene a meeting to discuss this matter after I get back, and I will get you a charter as soon as possible. As for the scale of external publicity, you can control it yourself, as long as it does not incite conflict between us and the local officials. Just the contradiction.”
(End of chapter)