What is Deng Xiaoping's responsibility system?

The responsibility system was part of Deng Xiaoping's four steps or "modernizations". They were Agriculture, Science and Technology, Industry, and Defense. The responsibility system was part of the Agriculture Modernization. In the responsibility system, the communes that china once had under Mao's Communism were abolished and each family got there own plot of land. The family then decided what to grow on their land and turned over only a small amount to the government. They were able to keep the rest to eat or to sell. This was very different from what Mao had done, because he told the communes what to grow, and didn't take into count the growing seasons or what the land was good for. Also, with Mao's large communes, many people decided to slack off because they would still get paid (remember that this was Communist at the time), so none of the work would get done. These two together, the slacking off and Mao not considering the growing seasons, caused mass starvation in china. I hoped that this helped!