The Clan "Resources" And Rural Governance

China's rural villagers' autonomy originated in early 1980s and was rapidly popularized in mid-1980s with disintegration of the people's communes.However,with disintegration of the people's communes,clan organizations that existed in the rural society had a living space.It has an impact on villagers' life and grassroots autonomy in politics,economy,culture and other aspects.How to use clan resources to consolidate the grassroots political power and stabilize the rural social order,related to construction of the local regime within the transformation period.In this paper,we choose the rural clan after the disintegration of the people's commune as the object of study,through theory analysis on "social capital".Considering the clan resources as a social capital,we try to show the political,economic and cultural functions of rural clan in the process of villager autonomy in the past four decades.In October 1983,the CPC Central Committee and the State Council issued a notice on Establishment of the Township Government by Separation of Government and People's communes,and made specific requirements for establishment of the village committees.The great changes in economy and politics have provided opportunities and living space for the resurrection of clan.The revival of clan is mainly manifested as the return of clan concept,rebuilding family genealogy and use of clan relations to carry banner among villagers.There are also inextricably linkage between the clan and the various rural governance subjects.The first is the dual identity of the village cadres.They are members of party committee and villagers committee and at the same time in a certain clan.Moreover,there are also emotional dependence between the villagers and the clans.In the process of rural governance,we can find that in the election of party committee and villagers committee,the voters always maintain their own clan orientation;In the village decision-making and management,the clan also has its own political expression;In other public affairs,the clan also makes up for the "management vacuum" of the formal organization.As a kind of social resources,the clan show a good performance in the process of interaction within the village governance.The village committee and the village party branch are still the main force of village governance,while clan organizations have less interference on the two committee elections;In the process of governance,clan and formal organization cooperate with each other and have division of labor;In culture,clan has functions of cultural education and transmission;In the economy,the clan organization achieves economical prosperity within the family and the village through the "scale merit".