Study On The Public Communes In Suzhou

The public communes in Suzhou are self-governed organizations in the form of neighborhoods that appeared in June 1909 and disappeared in March 1928. There were 28 public communes in nearly 20 years in Suzhou.In the modern times, with the changes between China's national power and the social power, the blending thoughts of local self-government in the modern West and in the traditional China, the implementation of local self-government in the New Policy in the Late Qing Dynasty, a good social environment was provided for the civil self-governed organizations, which ultimately promoted the birth of the public communes in Suzhou with the superior objective and subjective factors in it.According to the reasons and features of the evolution of the public communes, they can be divided into three stages: the stage of starting-up, the stage of development and the stage of climax and atrophy. In the process of development, their organizations and system establishment were becoming perfect and mature and the duty of the organizations is also expanding. Their main activities are involved with social welfare, social salvation, maintenance of the rights and interests of the public and the love of country, etc.This paper also gave a further research into the name of the public communes, their nature and the relationship between the Chamber of Commerce pointing out the influence on the definition of the public communes by the traditional consciousness, not overemphasizing the effect of the businessmen in the public communes. It points out that the relationship between the Chamber of Commerce and the public communes is co-operation not leading or under-leading, etc.Finally, the paper demonstrated the historical inevitability of their demise from the deterioration of the objective conditions for the public communes and their own deficiencies, pointing out the great significance for urban modernization in the process.