From Domination By Emotions To Governance On Emotions

The Xinfang system is one of the most important institutions for Chinesegovernance. However, previous studies found that this institution cannot solvepetitioners`problems efficiently. Then, why does this system still receiveattention from both the public and the government? This paper focuses on thedaily institutional interactions of Xinfang system in H district and finds thatinstitutional arrangements and official procedures of Xinfang make itself lackthe ability of solving problems. This results to the fact that Xinfang system canonly absorb petitioners, overstock problems and reproduce repeated petitioners,especially the daily petitioners who consider petition as a ritual of life.Moreover, this article argues that developing a series of tactics of emotiongovernance work, Xinfang officials could only pacify the petitioners’ strongemotions like anger, grievance and indigation, but even persuade some givingup their demands, which consequently reduces potential protests and conflictssignificantly. This emotion governance works in three dimensions: respondingto the emotions; utilizing the emotions and reshaping the emotions. In thisprocess of state governance, the emotions are developed from the governancetool to the governance object. Emotion governance presents an emotional stateimage: State of Emotion. On one hand, the state of emotion helps the party-statepreserve the social stability, reflecting the ability of hegemonic governance. Onthe other hand, the state of emotion creates a wider space for petitioners tobargain with the state power and brings more uncertain.