Researchstudy On The Mechanism Of Village-stationed Cadres Promoting Village Collective Action

Improving the collective action level is a meaningful way to realize sustainable development in rural areas.It has been an essential practice of promoting rural governance for a long time to send village-stationed cadres to rural areas to help rural communities strengthen their collective action ability.Currently,China is in an essential stage of effectively connecting the achievements of poverty alleviation and rural revitalization.Some villages are still strong after the withdrawal of village-stationed cadres,while others lack sustainable development,showing a lack of collective action ability.Therefore,it is worth paying attention to the following questions: Can the village-stationed cadres promote the collective action capacity of the village,and through what mechanism the village-stationed cadres promote the collective action of the village?Based on the data and cases from the period of poverty alleviation,this study tested the positive effect of village-stationed cadres on improving rural collective action ability,and analyzed the specific mechanism of rebuilding social capital of village-stationed cadres to promote the improvement of rural collective action ability.On the one hand,based on the survey data of 1014 farmers in 102 villages with the first secretary from 19 provinces in China,this study explores the path of how village-stationed cadres in the village promote the village’s collective action ability by rebuilding social capital based on the cognitive,social capital theory.The research shows that(1)The higher the villagers’ opinion of the first secretary,the better the collective action the village can carry out.Village-stationed cadres can improve the collective action capacity of the village.(2)The social capital built by village-based cadres is the main path that ultimately promotes the improvement of the rural collective action capacity and endogenous development.The most likely reason why village-stationed cadres can realize this improvement of village collective action capacity is that the first secretary forms the kernel of social capital by weaving networks and building trust in the village.By continuously using the social capital developed by the first secretary when forming institutions,villagers contribute to the improvement of the collective action capacity of villages.On the other hand,the Dashui Village in Yulin City,Guangxi,was taken as an example to carry out a case study.From the perspective of structural social capital,this study explored the specific mechanism of how village-stationed cadres in the village could activate the endogenous power of the village through the reconstruction of social capital to enable the village to acquire the ability of collective action.It is found that,through their linking and bridging social capital,resident village-stationed cadres reshape the three kinds of rural social capital,namely,bonding,bridging,and linking,which improves the participation enthusiasm of villagers,broadens the channels of resource acquisition of villages,forms the common development goals,and further improves the collective action capacity of villages.This ensures the village’s sustainable development after the village-stationed cadres’ withdrawal.This study theoretically explains the mechanism of village-stationed cadres to promote village collective action,which provides some policy references for consolidating and expanding the effective connection between poverty alleviation and rural revitalization at the present stage and presents a mechanism that developing countries can follow in promoting rural collective action and helping to improve the understanding that villages around the world are capable of collective action.