Conflict And Compromise Clan Tradition And Village Autonomy Republic Of China

The modern feudal clan system, generally refers to the modern feudalclan organization from the Song to Qing Dynasties, of which period theclan’s characteristics are concluded by Chang Jianhua as:"The overallcharacteristic of clan system from the Song to Qing Dynasties is toorganize itself through ancestor worship and shrine building, patriarchelection, genealogy, clan fields location and clan subject setting, whosehistorical development is to manifest popularity and autonomy of its folksociety. The separation between new clan system and state power and theinteractive relationship between them constitute a compelling historicalcontent of this period.＂Clan system has once played an important role ingoverning grassroots rural community and maintaining its stability. Whiledue to the rise of ideological trend of liberty, democracy and right in themodern west, modern local autonomy movement impacted on andcollided with traditional Chinese clan system in the process ofimplementation, leading to the decline of the traditional clan system, andthe rural autonomy movements of the Republic of China also ended infailure.This thesis, taking the game between traditional clan system and modernlocal autonomy movement as a clue, combining the techniques ofhistorical narrative with contrast argumentation,discusses on the basis ofarchives, historical documents, historical and legal journals etc., in three parts of introduction, body and conclusion about the game between clansystem and local autonomy system and its reference significance to theconstruction of grass-root society such as building a new socialistcountryside in contemporary society, and reflects on the integration oftransplantation of law and localization at the same time as well.The body of the thesis consists of five parts. The first part, a briefdefinition of the concepts in order to clarify the relationship between thevarious parts of the body.The second part briefly introduces the influencethat the clan system of traditional Chinese society (pre-modern), or clanculture has on rural governance and its relationship with the modern localautonomy, clarifies issues related to the concepts and made a generaldefinition of the time range. The third part focuses on the impact theRepublic of China’s clan system has on local autonomy and itsmanifestations. With the change of times and the rise of Western culture,the clans＇functions in the Republic of China were also changed, and theireffect on the implementation of the Republic of China Modern localautonomy diversified, which was not only reflected in the legislativeactivity but also in the realistic practice of that time. The fourth partanalyzes the reasons why modern clan system had such an impact onlocal autonomy. From a historical background, it is mainly because theincomplete western constitutional reform resulted in a lot of remnants offeudalism, thus in the process of implementation, local autonomy was inevitably resisted by feudal forces, while people’s constitutionalawareness was too weak to confront with deep-rooted feudal forces. Onthe other hand, a comprehensive constitutional reform had not yet beenimplemented in the whole country, while to complete the reform only bypromoting local autonomy in vain attempt is tantamount to a drop in thebucket and far less than enough to put out the fire of accumulated povertyand weakness. From the perspective of those in power, the then rulerlacked resolve to a thoroughly constitutional reform, therefore treatedlocal autonomy system with an ambiguous attitude naturally. So when thetraditional clan system conflicted with local self-government system,compromise seemed to be the inevitable choice. Therefore the mortalityof the＂local autonomy＂was also a historical necessity in that it grewinto a＂freak＂, a cohesion of the essence of the East-West ideologicalthoughts. From the ideological and cultural level, the ethnic laws andthought of＂ quelling the litigation＂ in traditional Confucian culturewere so deeply rooted that they not only suppressed and impeded thedissemination of the democratic and liberal thoughts in the west, but alsoinhibited the spread and implementation of local autonomy ideas. Thefifth part makes a reflection on the integration of western lawstransplantation and localization,proposes new ways of building a newsocialist countryside in contemporary China on the basis of the lessonslearned: First, absorbing and learning from the experience that is beneficial to grassroots construction in traditional clan cultures; second,cultivating right awareness of citizens to enable them to activelyparticipate in the democratic political life and exercise the fundamentalrights of citizens.