Communication has played an important role in the dramatic transformation of the rural social system in the People's Republic of China since 1949. Mass media in China in the first two decades of communist rule were underdeveloped when compared with that of the Western world. Interpersonal communication, on the contrary, has been proved to be one of the most effective means of communication in the socialist rural development program. The print medium, particularly official newspapers like the "People's Daily," on the other hand, has also demonstrated its leading role in shaping and promoting the rural development policy. With the advance of the new modernization program, it is expected that China will make fuller use of its emerging mass media technology imported from the Western world in the transformation of its rural development program. (Author/TJ)