A Study Of Chinese Peasants' Self-organization From The Perspective Of Harmonious Society

Chinese peasants' self-organization has existed for a long time, various peasants' self-organizations ever flourished in history. In the early days of our republic, peasants' self-organizations underwent a severe winter. There was hardly any genuine peasants' self-organization in rural area because of the highly centralized political and economical system. Since the reform and opening-up, peasants' self-organizations faced another spring of development, but people are still not satisfactory of the growth and performance of them, because the degree of organization of peasants remains relatively low. The lack of peasants' self-organization has brought a series of challenges in structuring socialist harmonious society, it affects peasants'self-harmony, interpersonal harmony, social harmony and ecological harmony of rural areas. Peasants play an important role in structuring socialist harmonious society, peasants' self-organization is very useful in solving the difficult"three rural"problem, and it also is an important organizational tool in structuring socialist harmonious society. I believe that well developed peasants' self-organization will play a very active and important role in structuring socialist harmonious society. Scholars have been studying peasants' self-organizations since the 1980s, but basically limited to specific empirical research or theoretical research. There is hardly any scholar who ever did systems analysis on peasants' self-organization or analyzed links between peasants' self-organization and socialist harmonious society. Thus, I chose the study of Chinese peasants' self-organization from the perspective of harmonious society as my master's thesis topic,and hoped to do a more in-depth study on issues of this organization.This article consists of five parts, and the first chapter is the foreword. In the foreword, the author describes a narration of the research cause, several key concepts and the main research approach. The author firstly elaborates the background and significance of the study in brief, then defines three key concepts—peasant, self-organization and peasants'self-organization, finally puts forward the main research approach which will be used in latter parts.The second chapter is about the historical review of Chinese peasants' self-organizations. In this part, the author divides these traditional peasants' self-organizations into four categories, they are clan organizations, social service organizations, charitable organizations and religious organizations. The author firstly describes traditional peasants' self-organizations in detail, then elaborates modern peasants' self-organizations, finally makes an overview of peasants' organizations which arose in the early years of PRC.The third chapter is about the situation of Chinese peasants' self-organizations after the reform and opening-up. In this part, the author first lists four reasons which are useful in developing peasants' self-organizations, they are the economic, political and social changes and the lead role of rural elite. Then the author divides present peasants' self-organizations into six categories, they are villagers' autonomous organizations, peasants' cooperatives, peasants' rights-keeping organizations, community-based nonprofit organizations, clan organizations and religious organizations, and makes an overview of each category. Finally, the author analyzes the characteristics of present peasants' self-organizations, including the whole family as a main participant, the limited number of participants, imbalanced fields and areas which peasants' self-organizations arose, traditional and modern peasants' self-organizations which exist at the same time, not standardized operation, etc.The forth chapter is about the links between peasants' self-organization and socialist harmonious society. In this part, the author firstly analyzes the theoretical source, the basic content and characteristics of socialist harmonious society, then points out the phenomenon of disharmony in current rural society, finally, emphasizes the important role of developed peasants' self-organizations in structuring socialist harmonious society.In the fifth chapter, the author puts forward the feasible suggestion as to how to promote the development of the peasants'self-organizations of our country in a healthy way. Firstly, the author proposes four proposals which are helpful in enhancing independence of villagers' autonomous organizations, they are changing the related laws, the villagers'control of wages to village cadres, the limited number of village cadres and the abolishment of township government, then points out that our government should deepen political and economical systems reform and improve laws and regulations, because these two measures are very helpful in developing peasants' cooperatives, peasants' rights-keeping organizations and community-based nonprofit organizations. The author also detailed discusses the prospect of peasants' rights-keeping organizations, and proposes to transform them into peasant associations. The author especially emphasizes legislative in advance, step by step, clearly functions, maintaining independence and the principle of territoriality in development of this new peasant associations. The author proposes three proposals in standardizing clan organizations, they are determining legal status, necessary monitoring, appropriate guidance and the irreplaceable role of peasants'self-organizations based on treaty. Finally, the author lists three proposals in guiding the development of the religious organizations, they are the strengthen management, scientific guidance and the replacement of peasants'self-organizations based on science, technology or culture.