抗战前后陕北的灾荒救济与人口变动

Famine Relief and Population Change in Northern Shaanxi Before and After Anti-Japanese War

1928—1933年,中国西北地区发生了百年罕见的大旱灾,陕北出现了大规模的人口死亡与流迁,有的灾民不堪饥荒和苛政沦为匪寇,买卖妇女与儿童现象尤为严重。当时的陕西省政府成立了赈灾机构,对受灾民众进行救济和安置。但由于其赈灾不力,导致民怨沸腾。后来中央红军长征到达陕北能够站稳脚跟与这场灾荒引发的基层社会变动存在一定关联。抗战时期的陕甘宁边区政府将赈济灾民视为义不容辞的责任,通过颁布法令法规安置灾民和难民,推行婚姻新政改变民众的传统生育观,发展医疗卫生事业降低妇婴死亡率等以增殖人口。这些举措有效缓解了"人丁不旺"的社会问题,增强了民众抵御自然灾害的能力,有利于边区生产发展和社会稳定。

A once-in-a hundred-year drought struck northwestern China from 1928 to 1933,which brought a large number of people to death and many migrated other places.Some flood-stricken people were even reduced to bandits because of unbearable famine and tyrannies,and the crimes of trafficking in women and children were even more severe.At that time,the government of Shaanxi province set up disaster relief agencies to provide relief and resettlement for the post-disaster population.However,because the local government under the rule of the Kuo Min Tang (KMT) government had not been able to relieve the disaster,public resentment and dissatisfaction arose continuously.The fact that the Central Red Army reached northern Shaanxi Province and laid a solid foundation there after the Long March had some relations to the changes taking place in the grassroots community triggered by the disaster.During the Anti-Japanese War,the Shaan-Gan-Ning Border Region Government took disaster relief as its obligatory responsibility,laws and regulations were enacted to resettle the victims and refugees,a new marriage policy was implemented to change people’s traditional concept of fertility,and medical and health care services were developed to reduce the mortality rate of women and infants so as to increase population.These measures effectively alleviated the social problem of population shortage and enhanced people’s ability to defend against natural calamities,which were conducive to the production,development and social stability in the border regions.