Voters Autonomy:Town Governance Mode Of America

Local autonomy, especially the voters autonomy of town governance tradition is the source of civil liberties principles which established by the American people through long-term practice, local self-government system is also an important part of American democracy. It is because of the high degree of voters self-government that voters can participate in the whole process of local governance.Government was placed under the direct supervision and control of voters, which makes the power and freedom of citizens to be realized, at the same time, general social contradictions can be resolved by the local government, social organizations and legal channels, social harmony can be guaranteed.In China, after nearly30years of hard exploration and reform, the villagers ’self-government has made much successful experience, but the villagers’autonomy is not the entire contents of the grass-roots political democracy construction, it’s just taken a first step, which must be done in depth. The next step of reform is to strengthen the grassroots rigime construction in China, As a part of grassroots political regime, township should become a new growth point of the construction of China’s democratic politics, township autonomy has become an inevitable trend.At present, in a small area of china, there has been direct elections of chief township executive and innovations election ways practice of township leaders. However, because of the various pattern design on democratic theory and democratic practice, so far we haven’t seek a right path of China’s township self-government reform, which suit to China’s national conditions.Stones from other hills may serve to polish jade, the United States has a deep democratic tradition in the Local self-government, especially the rich experience accumulated in the township autonomy practice, which provides an important reference for China on improving the local governance model and exploring the new road of grassroots democracy. And threrefore, we selected the United States township governance as a research perspective, as to the choice of the specific case, we select a town in New England district-Town of Brookline as an empirical study, which contains the most unique American township autonomy and has the longest history.We expectate to summ up much benificial experience from the town governance practice of Brookline,in order to conduct China’s town aotonomy explorition.This paper will be divided into five parts.Part Ⅰ:Introduction. The first part elaborates the research origin and significance of the subject, proposing the research issues. The second part sorts out current study from home and abroad, pointing out the characteristics and flaws of the study. The third part is about three searching content and methodology. The fourth part is about the innovations and flaws of this article. The last part is about relevant concepts. The definition and elaboration of some basic concepts and theories relevant to the article lays a theoretic foundation for the next parts.Part Ⅱ:Theoretical and realistical basis of voters autonomy of township governments. First, this part analysises the theoretical basis of voters autonomy, including the sovereignty of the people, multi-center governance and participatory democracy theory;second, this part analyzes the realistic basis of voters autonomy, including the local self-government tradition,local self-government systerm, and the formation of civil society. Through these analyzes, to come to the reasons why the United States voters autonomy of town governance can succeed, and point out the essentiality and feasibility for China to carry out township autonomy in current situation.The whole part is to expand the solid foundation for practice case below.Part Ⅲ:Exploration of voters autonomy of town government in the United States of America.The first section of this part is the introduction of voters autonomy of town government in the USA. I analysis three main town aotonomy mode in the USA today.The second section of this part is an overview of voters aotonomy in town of Brookline in Massachusetts.Here I discribe Brookline’s autonomous mode connotation,its government structure, responsibilities and administrative processes.In this section,I focus on the specific operation of town voters autonomous mode,to expand the pay for the case studies below.Part IV:Case Studies-voters aotonomy in town government public policy making in Brookline. In this section I selecte a case about land use rights policy making, the decision making process of Brookline’s Sheng Anta church, I focus on analyzing the voters participation form,content, functionality and efficiency, highlighting the process of township voters aotonomy,showing the superiority of this govennance mode.This part is co-ordinated with "revelation for China’s township autonomy" below. Part V:The revelation for China’s voters autonomy. This section mainly contains sounding legal system to ensure that the voters autonomy acts according to the law; changing the concept of the government to protect the autonomy power of voters; cultivating public spirit to enhance the participation capacity of voters; and developing civil society to enhance the ability of voters autonomy.These four aspects are the framework of USA’s township aotonomy revelation for China,which can guide us to explore a proper path for China’s township autonomous democracy reform in future.