The corvée labor system enabled the state to requisition free manual labor from people. This system has frequently been regarded as a means of state control over its subjects, leading to the implicit assumption that the populace was obligated to supply labor whenever the state demanded. Based on such perception, scholars have suggested that the service period for rotating labor(更卒) was set at 120 days per year or that the state could mobilize additional labor beyond legally stipulated quotas whenever necessary. Moreover, the limited availability of historical records has made it difficult to precisely define corvée labor. As a result, previous studies have often assumed an excessive labor burden without clear consideration of when, how, and for what the state mobilized the people. To solve these problems, this study examines the system of corvée labor in the Qin-Han period, focusing on the “Corvée Labor Law”(徭律).
The corvée labor stipulated in the relevant regulations can be categorized into two distinct cases, contingent on the requisitioning authority: 1) commandery(郡) and central, 2) county(縣) and grassroots units. In these regulations, ordinary people were mobilized only after the convict labor(徒隸) had been exhausted and were primarily assigned to relatively small-scale projects such as public works within the town(邑中事). Next, this study reexamined the way of rotating labor focusing on ‘Registers of rotating labor in Southern commandery’(南郡更卒簿). The legal provision stipulated a fixed number of corvée labor days in units of one year and ordinary people filled the number of days through a monthly rotation system.
In administering corvée labor, the state aimed to achieve equity(均) through detailed calculations and various regulations. Officials thoroughly calculated the amount of labor that the people had to bear in order to prevent the waste of manpower. Additionally, carry-over regulations for surplus and shortfalls were implemented to prevent excessive requisitions beyond the legally stipulated total amount. The rotation system was structured to distribute the labor burden evenly over time. The number of shifts was also determined by a number of factors, including the number of adult males in the region, the amount of work required by region, and so on. When labor demands emerged, the state calculated the labor ratio based on the population and distance to the worksite, distributing the workload according to the ratio across lower administrative units. Afterwards, the order of selection was determined by factors such as wealth and agricultural cycle, and according to this order the actual workers were selected. In other words, it has prevented burdens from being concentrated on a specific individual or region. This system ensured that the state did not impose excessive burden on the people, thereby preserving agricultural productivity.