Research On The Beneficiaries’ Demand And Security Of Five-guarantees Subsistence Program In The Rural Areas Of China

Since there are always certain members in society, such as orphans, the disabled, old men without dependent, who are vulnerable group and existing in long history and have diverse culture, we should shoulder the responsibility of meeting their requirements in accordance with social systems which evolve from unsystematic measures. These responsibilities are undertaken by the household, family, neighbor, community, religion and civil society organization before the industrial revolution. However, the government plays a crucial role in shouldering the responsibilities that are mentioned above. In order to ensure the basic lives of the most poorest group in rural area, Chinese government built the five-guarantees subsistence system in 1950s which was one of the most critical social assistance system in rural area that provided livelihood support and material aid to the villagers in terms of food, clothing, housing, medical care, and burial expenses for the beneficiaries including senior citizens, handicapped persons, villagers below sixteen years old, persons who have lost the ability to work, persons who have no source of income, persons who have no legal guardians whatsoever to support them, or whose guardians do not have the ability to do so. And it has crucial significance of constructing social security system in rural area which is suit to Chinese status, ensuring the sustainable development of rural economy, prompting the development of harmonious society to analyze the way of development, experience and lessons of the five-guarantees subsistence system.The research on beneficiaries of five-guarantees emphasize on the five-guarantees subsistence policy and its state of implementation in perspective of sociology and social security. While the lectures of sociology always put forward the theoretical analysis about the five-guarantees system on the basis of survey and discussing the lives’situation of the beneficiaries of five-guarantees, the lectures of social security explain the development, consummation and trend of development of the five-guarantees system in perspective of system by using the method of literature analysis. There are two consensuses in most researching process. While one is that the true problem that the beneficiaries are facing is the demand of economy, the other is that since meeting the requirements of beneficiaries rely on the financial and system’s support, the government should undertake the responsibilities of ensuring the demands of beneficiaries. So we can get that the previous study emphasize on the system itself, but ignore the diversity of demands of beneficiaries. The basic idea of the paper is that although the five-guarantees system have ensured the most basic requirements of survival by underlining the supplies, especially emphasizing on the financial supply to beneficiaries, formulating and implementing policy top-down, it ignore the subjective initiative and the requirements of beneficiaries who are as the object of policy. So it is significant to get the suggestion of consummating the five-guarantees system in perspective of seizing the actual demands of the beneficiaries down-top.The paper discusses the economic requirements included in the content of the five-guarantees which is providing livelihood support and material aid to the villagers in terms of food, clothing, housing, medical care, and burial expenses and the non-economic requirements which are represented by demand of care, spirit and self-determined in the perspective of the beneficiaries’demands, directed by the theories of requirement and social justice, by using the methods of interviews and studying on literature and analyzing the interview data of parts of five-guarantees Beneficiaries in W and C town, Chengdu city, Sichuan province and B and Y town, Yichang city, Hubei province, discusses the status quo of guaranteeing the beneficiaries of five-guarantees system after the implementation of“Five-Guarantees Subsistence Program in the Rural Areas”in the perspective of security of demand, and explores the way for consummating the five-guarantees subsistence system in the rural areas of China.The study show that in order to ensure the basic lives of the five-guarantees beneficiaries, it should divide the work reasonably among the government, villagers’committee, community, welfare house and non-governmental organization, coordinate he relationships among five-guarantees system, new–type rural social pension system, new rural cooperative medical system, the rewards and assistance policy of family planning, construct specific and feasible evaluation index system of five-guarantees system. And it is shown that the system will only provide economic security to five-guarantees beneficiaries if the work of five-guarantees is in line with the minimum life security system in rural areas which will not only lower the living level, but also make the whole society ignore the non-economic requirements of the five-guarantees beneficiaries. It should always keep in mind that social security could not only provide sufficient financial security, but also would include service security. Only by this way, can social security system ensure the lives of beneficiaries and embody social justice and fairness. And the social workers who are a new type occupational group could play a critical role in the process of ensuring the lives of five-guarantees beneficiaries.