Editor's Introduction

Abstract

This issue of Chinese Sociology and Anthropology now completes out translations from the Historical Materials on the South Seas Brothers Tobacco Company. Since the selections provided here are a continuation of translations begun in the Spring-Summer 1974 issue of the journal (Vol. VI, No. 3-4), readers would be well-advised to refer to the earlier issue, particularly pages 137-184. In the analysis accompanying that issue, we examined, in some detail, phases of organizational change in the period after 1949 with special reference to changes at the elite level. There we focused on such problems as South Seas' elite structure and composition; changing organizational goals; boundary relations between South Seas and state, Party and military organizations as well as other enterprises; centralization and integration of South Seas' branch companies and factories; the processes of takeover and consolidation; and the impact of political campaigns upon South Seas' elite structure.