LIFE IN PEOPLE'S CHINA 37 according to his work", constituting the two basic hallmarks of socialism, begin to make a real world of difference to the quality of life as compared with the old society. It is this process of inspiring advance that we arc able to observe in the contemporary experience of People's China—provided, of course, we free ourselves from the prejudices that abound and make live contact with the method which the Chinese revolutionaries, in their uncomplicated directness, are fond of calling ^seeking the truth through facts".1 The importance of paying attention to the quality of life of the people runs through the writings of the great revolutionary hero of modern Chinese history, Mao Tsetung, like a bright red thread.3 He repeatedly emphasised that people, rather than weapons or machines or technique, were the decisive factor in the transformation of society, making the point that ^of all things in the world, people arc the most precious^'.8 In order to win and maintain the enthusiasm of the people for socialist transformation, attention, maintained Mao Tseiung, must be paid to steadily improving their livelihood from many sides. At the same time, he emphasised that no such improvement could take place without the development of production. This combination of raising the level of production and steadily improving the life of the masses of the people has proved, in the 29 years of New China's existence, to be an extraordinarily difficult and sensitive task, where one major lag or gap might give rise to serious imbalances. In order to make an assessment of the quality of life of the Chinese people today, one has the advantage of referring to a growing body of literature on the development experience of China. This is made up both of Chinese official accounts and of the accounts and impressions of visiting foreigners, both gencralists and specialists. This literature provides a good deal of detail about life patterns in contemporary China.4 A direct encounter with the lives of the Chinese people, through a visit to China, is a further help in developing an objective appreciation of this reality. Organising Points Whether one depends on the available published material or on one's own limited but direct observations, it is worthwhile using two organising points, pr yardsticks, in attempting to assess the quality of life. In fact, both these yardsticks are widely used by the Chinese people themselves in the .evaluations they make of their present conditions. One organising point is to compare conditions today with those of the past, with the conditions experienced by the masses of the people in the old society before the Revolution. Marny of the people whom a visitor encounters in China—particularly the greying widdl^a^ed and the eldcily, born well before 1949—can vividly recall those days. They