Who is running the Chinese countryside? The current governance structure of "township politics and village governance"

Through the ages, people are always willing to believe that the countryside is beautiful and the farmers are simple. When the etiquette of the upper-class society is bad and happy, they can also go to the countryside and the folk to seek rich moral accumulation. However, in recent days, rural governance problems occur frequently, some local criminal and evil forces intervene in grass-roots governance, sexual abuse of left-behind children, left-behind elderly and other social problems occur from time to time. At present, what kind of predicament does rural governance encounter? In the context of the modernization of national governance system and governance capacity, how to realize the modernization of rural governance? In this regard, Guangming net reporter interviewed researcher Song Hongyuan, director of the Rural Economic Research Center of the Ministry of Agriculture. The following is a transcript of the interview.

Rural governance is indispensable in the modern system of national governance.

Rural governance is the basis and important part of national governance. During the period of the Republic of China, the government did not go to the county, and the rural governance was dominated by the gentry. After the founding of New China, rural governance is a people's commune system, which is based on three-level ownership and teams, and is a mode of directing production by administrative means and replacing the organizational form of political power with the form of economic organization. After the implementation of the contract responsibility system in rural areas, this change in the economic system requires that the political system should adapt to it and can no longer be managed by the mode of "people's commune", so strategic response has been implemented.

In 1983, the township government was restored in rural areas, and in 1987, the standing Committee of the National people's Congress adopted the Organic Law on villagers' Committees (for trial implementation), which was tried out in 1987, and villagers' committees were gradually established in rural areas throughout the country. the mode of "township politics and village governance" has replaced the people's commune model.

The so-called "township politics and village governance" includes two levels of "township politics" and "village governance". "township governance" means that the state sets up the lowest level of government in villages and towns to manage villages and towns on behalf of the state; "village governance" means villagers' autonomy and set up autonomous organizations in rural areas to carry out democratic elections, democratic decision-making, democratic management and democratic supervision. The township government embodies the state power, while the village governance is the embodiment of social power. The township is the government and the village is an autonomous organization, which is based on rural governance and family management.

From this evolution process, we can see that whether from the governance system or governance structure, rural governance is a basis and an important part of national governance.

Under the great wheel of urbanization, it is difficult for the countryside to mesh with the country, the city and the market.

Since the reform and opening up, especially since the promotion of urbanization, profound changes have taken place in the spatial state, population pattern, social structure and interest structure of our countryside. there is a coexistence pattern of traditional rural communities, new rural communities integrated by villages and new communities integrated into cities and towns.

The number of units at the township (town) level, from a peak of 56000 in 1990, has been reduced to 33000 by 2012. Village committees peaked at 740000 in 1990 and 590000 in 2012, and the social structure has changed. In addition, with the transfer of labor force to employment, the ratio of rural population to urban population has also changed. We used to have a large rural population, and by 2012, the urban population has exceeded the rural population. In this context, the structure of the labor force has also changed greatly. At present, there are more than 200 million migrant workers in our country, but 62.2% of the migrant workers are employed above the county level, and 37.8% are below the county level, and 20% of the migrant workers have moved to the cities. In addition, the problem of hollowing out in rural areas is serious, who will cultivate the land and who will breed the countryside.

In addition, the pattern of interests in the countryside has also changed. on the one hand, some villages have rich resources, and there will be disputes over who will master and control these resources; on the other hand, in the process of the government promoting urbanization, the implementation of some projects will involve all kinds of resources, such as water and electricity construction projects, education, health and other livelihood projects, how to allocate these resources? With economic interests, all subjects in the countryside have to compete for the control of these resources and interests. All these are related to the reform of rural interest structure.

What problems does this structural change bring? That is, changes in other aspects of the country are being promoted, how should the rural governance system adapt to the modernization of other systems? How to improve the ability of rural governance? How to solve the problem of intervention and rent-seeking by grass-roots organizations and the government?

Of course, the great difficulties in China's rural transformation and village transformation are due to the vast rural areas, the huge population and the weak economic base, but what is more important is that this transformation has special social content and nature, that is, the countryside, which has particularity in geography, production, culture and governance, is increasingly involved in the process of market economy and even social construction on the one hand. On the other hand, it is increasingly incorporated into the process of modern national governance. This means the rearrangement of the three basic relationships between the state and the rural areas, the market and the rural areas, and the urban and rural areas. This is a great change that China's rural society has never experienced before. The way, process and prospect of its transformation depend on the attitude of the country, the market and the city to the countryside, as well as the attitude of the countryside to the country, the market and the city. It is in this sense that observing the transformation of villages can also be regarded as observing the transformation of village relations.