A Study On The Legal Status Of The Villagers' Committee

Compared with the fast development of the market economy and urbanization. China’s rural grass-root system now is experiencing the profound social transition with the decreasing association between the villages and the increasingly prominent contradiction. For example, problems caused by the rural land contract, compensation for land expropriation and collective economic property management happen often, even triggered amounts of group incidents. According to the Constitution and Organic Law of the Villagers Committees, the villagers’ committee is the organizations of mass self-government, and also is the basic method of solving the social contradiction under the new situations. On the practice, the village committee in the process of governance at the grassroots level does play a greater role, however, China’s laws and regulations on the legal status of the village committee is still a lot of problems.Legal status mainly refers to the legal subject to enjoy the rights and obligations of the qualifications, is a kind of right ability. Legal status also indicates the position of the legal entity in the legal relationship, which will come into force after the final confirmation of the legal relationship. The legal status of the village committee is expressed in different legal norms (force).Other laws, such as administrative law and Civil and Commercial Law. also empowered the villagers’ committee can assist the township government to accomplish kinds of administrative works, hold the villagers’ assembly or the villagers’assembly, implement the family planning policy, examine and approve the rural homestead and manage the collective land, which make the villagers’ committee the parties of disputes and contradictions in the rural areas. In other words, the villagers’ committee has been pushed in an awkward situation, which seems like a competitor as well as a referee in a competition. The situation that the villagers’committee plays a variety of social functions of multiple roles has caused lots of problems in decision-making. Many villages actually are in the charge of the village party branch or the villagers’committee, no matter the affairs’decision-making, management and execution, which make the villagers ’autonomy and the supervision of the villagers assembly perform practically no function and the villagers lose the fundamental protection of their legitimate rights and interests.Besides, the villagers’committee becomes an agent of government, for our traditional pressure-type administrative system can make the execution of the villagers’ committee’s function be intervened by the township government, which will easily damage the villages’ interests. Villagers’ representatives’ assembly or the villagers’ assembly is the direct attempt for the rural areas to enjoy the democracy. However, the consciousness of rule of law makes the democracy transformed into tyranny of the majority; the system of collective land ownership is in a corner which caused by the government powered villagers’ committee has the body of private law, with which it can easily confuse the legal status of the villagers’committee. In that situation, the villagers’private interests will be virtually abused by the government power but no means to help.Although our laws and regulations have made a basic definition of law status of the villagers’committee, it just lacks of the effective supervision of the execution of the committee’s statutory functions. When a villagers’ interest has been abused, we have no clear way to help. Theorists incline to define the committee as the subject of administrative by which to find a way of remedies of the villagers. According to the author, if we simply define the committee as the subject of administrative, it will not accord with the existing constitution system of grass-roots autonomy and other correlative laws and regulations, and even more problems happened in the practice. So at the present, we need to clarify the functions executed by the committee with the consideration of our economic system as well as the laws and regulations, just on a case-by-case basis. The author attempts to improve the legal status of the committee from the following aspects to safeguard the villagers’legitimate rights and interests.