Behaviors Of Local Governments In Masses Incidents: A Process Analysis

After30years of economic reform, the social structure of China hasbeen experiencing dramatic transformation in recent years. Socialconflicts emerged as the social estate changed and income gap enlarged,which make popular resistance increase every year during the last decade.Nowadays, the popular resistance in China has become a pivotal negativefactor for CCP and Chinese government to build a harmonious socialistsociety, and hence become a worthy research topic for scholars.Most of the researches of popular resistance in China put emphasison the protestors, instead of focusing on government which is anotherimportant actor in collective actions. Actually, the governmental behavior,especially local governmental behavior can put great influence on theprocess of popular resistance. So my research questions are: Whichfactors influence local governmental behavior during the process ofpopular resistance？ And how these factors come into effect？The structure of this thesis is as follows. After a brief introduction ofpopular resistance and literature review on this topic in the introductionpart, the framework of analysis is discussed in the second chapter. Basedon the observation of popular resistance, three factors (Interests of Local Government, Pressurized System and Repertories of Collective Actors)are concluded as the theoretic framework of this thesis. Chapter Three toFive, each chapter discuss one factor in detail on how these factorsinfluence local governmental behavior. Chapter Six will discuss thecoercive actions made by local government.