Encounter, Comparison, Option: Inspect Of Rural Democracy

Since the 80’s of the 20th century, China has started the building of rural grassroots democracy based on the villagers self-management, which was recognized and implemented in the form of law in the 90’s. Rural democracy of 20 years has made considerable achievements, but has exposed many problems. In this paper, take Yang Village in the east of He Nan Province as a representative common one. Through years of field investigation on Yang Village, in which collectivism values and cooperation tradition have been kept, democracy based on competitive elections has not brought stability order and effective governance to the village. Instead, it has caused a series of problems. For example, the deterioration of relationships, prevailing individualism, cooperation seriously reduced, village conflict intensified, the village organization efficiency lowed, for which the higher power no longer supported Yang Village’s elections, and villagers did not, either. since committee elections of Yang Village stopped 10 next year ago, the relations of the villagers had gradually improved, the spirit of collectivism had carried forward, the cooperation had enhanced, the organizational effectiveness had also increased. Yang Village’s democratic practice shows that rural democracy are in trouble in some places.China and the Western have different historical cultural context, Chinese rural society has its own special characteristic,which will explain the problems faced by rural democracy. The emergence of the plight of rural democracy should be thought as the result of the conflict of Western democratic and social realities of Chinese villages. On the one hand, "courtesy looking elsewhere". Today’s rural society as the successor of traditional culture, has more traditional cultural factors. Social order based on rural cultural tradition still cannot adapt to Western democracy. It shows:Clan relations cause some impact on the competition elections; Rural traditional customs conflicts with democracy based on modern jurisprudence; Rural traditional collectivism and Western individualism, liberalism also have serious conflicts. On the other hand, democratic practice also has a negative impact on the rural community. It leads to the loss of collectivism in the village society, the reduction of the ability to cooperate of villagers; the spliting of rural community, the destruction of harmonious relations, the periodic unrest of village society. Moreover, village democracy in improving the situation of public goods supply to rural society is limited.The conflict of modern democracy and social realities of villages has a profound social and cultural roots. From the social and historical roots of democratic, it is the result of the rise of individualism with the disintegration of the ancient Greekclan, blood ties and the development of business. From the social conditions of the revival of the of modern democracy, whether the early Greeks, Romans or the Germans, who were engaged in fishing and hunting collection and livestock production as the mainstay. This mode of production itself has produced individualism of the soil, which made western culture include individualism. Meanwhile, Renaissance has also caused further enhancement of this individualism. With the rise of modern industrial society, social mobility increased, the bourgeois struggle against feudalism and the establishment of the dictatWest is based on individualism, adapting to free, competitive cultural tradition aorship of the bourgeoisie, individualism has formed. Modern democracy in the nd the political system of western society. This kind of competition mechanism does not affecte social relations, social order based on individualism. Due to the differences in living environment, Chinese civilization has a different development road with western civilization. Ancient Chinese settlers earlier shifted from hunting and fishing to farming, from which blood relationship did not decompose, was strengthened on the land. Ethical politics resulting from blood relations eliminated the rights sense of individuals. Agricultural production itself rejected competition. Grim living conditions, stable social life made Chinese settlers form close ties of solidarity, reject the competition. Chinese political tradition had no diversed competition, and China formed authority in a stable social order, created the political value system of people as masters.Democracy with competition and aggregation, based on individualism and majority priciple, emphasizes individualism. It takes individual rationality as a standard of justice. Individual rationality is led to the public domain; Public rationality obeys individual rationality. So, individual rationality is only aggregated in the public domain, which is not able to unite individual and collective, personal and national, social interests, causing social division and confrontation. Bsaed on the reflection on democracy with competition and aggregation bringing too much public attention to personal interests and individualism, since the 80s of the 20th century, western scholars have put forward the concept of deliberative democracy, trying to rein in excessive individualism, strengthen mutual respect, understanding, communication and tolerance, pay more attention to the preferences conversion of political interaction, which would elimilate the legitimacy crisis of democracy with competition and aggregation, make people become more public, more tolerant, more caring citizens with social interests.Deliberative democracy advocates strenghening political ideas of mutual understanding, communication, tolerance between citizens, which are connected to Chinese cultural tradition of stressing the importance of collectivism and consultation and cooperation. In addition, it also reflects modern society with the spirit of freedom, equality. On the basis of inheriting the traditional of rural society, respecting the reality, for realizing the effective management of rural communities, we may transplant deliberative democracy in the West to the rural communities in China, which should be transformed according to the practical needs of the rural communities in China, to create a democratic model fitting for rural communities’ reality of China.Of course, the introduction of deliberative democracy in rural society does not mean to abolish the electoral democracy, but deliberative democracy may be more suited to contemporary social reality of Chinese villages. Therefore, the construction model of of democracy in Chinese villages must be properly adjusted. It means to change the model of of democracy from election to consultation which will play a leading role in the rural democracy. At the same time, aiming at electoral democracy which is not suited to Chinese villages, the construction of the rural civil society should be actively promoted; The independence and self-awareness of the rural citizens should be effectively improved; The social foundation of rural democracy should be consolidated; Electoral democracy and deliberative democracy should be combined step by step. By these means, rural democracy will really work.