Twentieth-Century China

Abstract:

Before the War of Resistance against Japan, the Nationalist government’s efforts to control night soil—an important agricultural fertilizer—led to attempts to reconstruct toilets in the major cities under their control. The Japanese invasion forced the Nationalists to withdraw to the interior and to switch their attention to rural toilets. The wartime blockade of the Chinese coastline, which resulted in a scarcity of imported fertilizers, coupled with the pressing need to boost wartime agricultural production, compelled the Nationalists to adopt drastic measures. Such measures involved replacing traditional cesspools with toilet models that the Nationalists touted as “modern” and more efficient for the collection of night soil. Focusing on the case of Fengshun County, Guangdong Province, from 1942–1943, this article analyzes the local authorities’ efforts to reconstruct toilets and control the night soil they produced. Toilets, which used to belong to an exclusively private realm, were subjected to increasing government control.