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Journal of Comparative Asian
Development
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Community Governance Reform
in Urban China: A Case Study of
the Yantian Model in Shenzhen
Weihong Ma
a
& Linda Chelan Li
b
a
Depart ment of Public Administ rat ion, College of
Management , , Shenzhen Universit y , China
b
Depart ment of Public and Social Administ rat ion, ,
Cit y Universit y of Hong Kong , Hong Kong
Published online: 05 Oct 2012.
To cite this article: Weihong Ma & Linda Chelan Li (2012) Communit y Governance
Ref orm in Urban China: A Case St udy of t he Yant ian Model in Shenzhen, Journal of
Comparat ive Asian Development , 11: 2, 224-247, DOI: 10. 1080/ 15339114. 2012. 720127
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China:
A Case Study of the Yantian Model in Shenzhen
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Weihong MA
Department of Public Administration, College of Management,
Shenzhen University, China
Linda Chelan LI*
Department of Public and Social Administration,
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Abstract
A major feature of China’s urban transformation has been the breakdown of
the danwei system and the consequent efforts at community building. Since
the early 1990s when a movement for neighbourhood-based community
building was launched, different practices have appeared and the urban
community has changed remarkably. Whilst a number of works have documented this transition, few revealed in sufficient detail the dynamics of
shaping the profile of community space. This paper argues that the
government’s new-found priority on community building has facilitated
the development of community autonomy and self-governance. The interplay of traditional administrative power and newly emerged community
autonomous power drives the transition of the power structure at the
grass-roots level in urban China. The Yantian Model of community governance in Shenzhen demonstrates how this transition unfolds as the reform of
community governance embodies the interplay of these two different
forces, probably with far-reaching impacts on state–society relations in
urban China.
* Correspondence concerning this article may be addressed to the author, Linda Chelan Li, at:
salcli@cityu.edu.hk
Journal of Comparative Asian Development, Vol. 11, No. 2 (December 2012)
ISSN 1533-9114 print/ISSN 2150-5403 online
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15339114.2012.720127 © City University of Hong Kong
224
Community Governance Reform in Urban China
225
Keywords: Danwei system; community building and governance; Yantian
Model; Shenzhen; China
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Introduction
A major feature of China’s urban transformation has been the breakdown of
the danwei system and the consequent efforts at community building. Since
the early 1990s, when a movement for neighbourhood-based community
building was launched, different practices have appeared and the urban
community has changed remarkably. Whilst this transition has been well
described, few studies discussed in sufficient detail the dynamics of
shaping the profile of community space, in particular regarding the more
recent changes since the late 1990s. This paper argues that a new-found priority placed on community building by the government, as the traditional
danwei breaks down, has facilitated the development of community autonomy and self-governance. The interplay of traditional administrative power
and newly emerged autonomous community power drives the transition of
power structure at the grass-roots level in urban China. The paper discusses
a community governance reform experience in the Yantian district of
Shenzhen, dubbed in the Chinese policy discourse as the “Yantian
Model”. We show how the transition unfolds as the community governance
reform embodies the interplay of these two different forces, and extrapolate
its likely impact on state–society relations in urban China.
The danwei (work unit) had played a significant role in China’s administrative system. It was not only the channel for distributing resources, but
also the tool for state control over society (Walder, 1986; Whyte & Parish,
1984). Individuals depended on their danweis for political participation and
the basic security of life, such as health care, housing, their children’s education, and other social benefits. The integration of workplace and living
space in the danwei had an unintended effect of strengthening the boundaries between different danweis, making inter-danwei co-operation
difficult. Cities resembled collections of independent workplace-based
communities, rather than integrated urban environments (Bray, 2006a,
pp. 4–5). People spent most of their time within a distinct spatial territory
defined by their danwei, and the top-down authority structure was the
basic means to maintain order and impose sanctions.
However, this situation changed from the 1980s when the danwei
compound shed its social welfare functions. This change was consistent
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Journal of Comparative Asian Development
with broader reforms emphasizing decentralization and the separation of
government and enterprises. The State Council issued a series of documents dismantling the social and control functions of the danwei, of
which three documents were especially important. One is the “Provisional Regulations on Implementing Labour Contract System in StateOwned Enterprises” (Guoying qiye shixing laodong hetong zhidu
zanxing guiding), which was enacted in 1986 to reform the personnel
system of the danweis. This was followed by the “Opinions on Deepening the Reform of Labour and Personnel, Wages, and Social Insurance
System in Enterprises” (Guanyu shenhua qiye laodong renshi, gongzi
fenpei, shehui baoxian zhidu gaige de yijian), jointly issued by the Ministry of Labour, the Manufacture Office of the State Council, the State
Commission for Restructuring the Economic System, the Ministry of Personnel, and the China Federation of Trade Unions in early 1992 to
further reform the personnel system. The third was the “Circular of the
State Council on Further Strengthening Urban Housing System Reform
and Accelerating the Construction of Housing” (Guowuyuan guanyu
jinyibu shenhua chengzhen zhufang zhidu gaige jiakuai zhufang jianshe
de tongzhi), issued by the State Council in 1998. This document required
the danweis to make a one-off sale of their housing stock to their
workers at discount prices. Since then, the provision of other social
goods such as education, housing, and health care, which was formerly
provided by danweis, were also transferred to either the government or
the market, a process generally described as “socialized and marketized
provision”, with substantial impacts on the urban social structure
(Wang & Murie, 1999; Zhao & Bourassa, 2003).
At the community level, the impacts of the danwei reform are reflected
in two respects. First, the retreat of the danwei from housing provision has
transformed the community profile. As many danweis stopped housing their
workers after 1998, residence has become a commodity rather than a public
good (He & Lu, 2007). Private ownership becomes the new norm as more
private housing is developed. According to Zhou (2006), the homeownership rate in urban China increased sharply from about 30% in the late
1990s to over 70% in 2000.
Secondly, the disintegration of the danwei system has facilitated labour
mobility. Workers are no longer dependent on their work units for a whole
range of social and administrative functions. This, together with the fastdeveloping private sector, has greatly expanded employment options for
the urban residents who have hence become much more mobile participants
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China
227
in the increasingly flexible urban labour market (Lu, 1999; Xiang & Song,
1997).
The emergence of a new urban living space thus brought two challenges to the government. One was the disintegration of the organizational
base for providing social services in the urban area. The other was that as
individuals had more options and avenues for social and political participation, the question of state control arose. The government was concerned
with the means to effectively deliver social services and at the same time to
reconsolidate state control over individuals and society. The movement for
neighbourhood-based community building was started in the 1990s to meet
this challenge in urban China.
A number of works have discussed the policy and practices of community building in the urban area. A large body of the existing literature
described the broad historical contexts in which these practices occurred
(see, for example, Lu & Li, 2005; Wang, 2000). Other works presented
the experiences of community building in different cities (see, for
example, Chen, 2009; Yang, 2003). Still others speculated on the implications for the democratization of the urban grass-roots (see, for example,
Gui, 2001; Shi, 2005).
These studies have contributed to our understanding of the community
building and governance reforms in urban China. Most of them are largely
descriptive, and relatively few have discussed the driving forces and
dynamics of community building. Wu (2002) argues that marketization
has created new elements beyond the reach of the state and eventually
will shake the pillars of the traditional governing structure in urban
China. Lin (2003) points out that the state’s priorities determined the development of urban communities. Chen (2000) reveals that the development of
community organizations and the emergence of social forces have led to the
growth of community self-governance and facilitated the change in urban
communities in the post-danwei era.
Major questions regarding the transition of community governance are
still unanswered despite these works. First, given the prominence of marketization as a major driver of change, many aspects of this role have remained
ambiguous. For example, will this role change over time as the market situation changes? Whilst marketization was the “obvious” initial impetus for
reforming the urban governing system in the 1990s and the early 2000s,
it may no longer be the main driving force under the present, changed, situation. Secondly, the state is no doubt the key driver of social and political
reforms in China. However, as will be indicated, the state is not likely to
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embark on a reform spontaneously. The question is, then, what has made the
state act? Thirdly, although social forces may propel reform from the
bottom up, social autonomy cannot be sustained in a socialist country
without the advocacy and active support of the party-state regime. Hence,
as the urban community structure continues to evolve in the new century,
it is necessary to reconsider what factors drive this continuous restructuring
of the community management system and what the effects are. These questions are unresolved by previous studies.
This paper argues that the interplay of traditional administrative power
and the newly emerged autonomous forces shapes the profile of community
building and facilitates the transition of the urban grass-roots society. This is
a result of the change of government priorities on community building policies. The following sections examine why the government’s priorities have
changed, and how the change has resulted in a change of power configurations in the urban grass-roots community in the Yantian district of Shenzhen, in the Guangdong Province in South China.
Local experimentation with the new forms of grass-roots community
governance exhibits variations, as in other policy arenas. The variations
are usually around the mode of specific interactions between the traditional
administrative power and the newly emerged social forces at the community level. The mode that has evolved in Yantian, described as the “Yantian
Model” in the Chinese policy discourse, sees the establishment of two
different agencies to take up the functions of administration and communal
self-governance, and thus has facilitated a more “balanced” structure of
power configurations in the new urban community governance than
some of the other local practices.1 The operation of this emergent new
model of urban community governance also appears to have worked relatively well since its formation in the early 2000s. The direct election ratio
of residents’ committees has reached 100% in the Yantian district in the
past several years, for example. For its progress the Yantian Model was
awarded the Third Chinese Local Government Innovation Prize (Zhongguo
1 Some other well-known models are the Shanghai Model, Shenyang Model, and Jianghan
Model. The major feature of the Shanghai Model is the administrativization of community
affairs, which is revealed by the dominant role of the Street Office (Sang, Yang, & Gu,
1999). At the other end, the Jianhan Model “evacuates” most of the administrative affairs
from the community and seeks to establish a community self-government system (Chen,
2001); while the changes of the community management system in Qingdao and Shenyang
are described by Benewick and Takahara (2002).
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229
Difang Zhengfu Chuangxin Jiang)2 in 2006. An examination of the
Yantian Model will thus enable us to assess the strengths as well as the
limits of the emerging new governance model at the grass-roots level in
urban China.
Data was collected through fieldwork in 2009–10. Interviews with
leaders of residents’ committees, Street Offices, and community work
offices were conducted, and documents and working reports were collected.
The priorities of government on community building have changed
since the early 2000s. As the following sections will show, the focus of
community building was to strengthen the administrative control over
the grass-roots society at an early stage, which was characterized by reinforcing the administrative function of the Street Offices (Jiedao Banshichu)
and residents’ committees. Since the early 2000s, however, the government
has started to advocate self-governance and self-reliance for the residents.
It emphasizes the cultivation of community self-governance by sufficiently
engaging residents and community organizations in community affairs.
The change of government priorities on community building actually
drives the development of community autonomy and self-governance
(shequ zizhi) and undeniably changed the community power structure.3
Before we examine the Yantian Model in detail, the following will first
outline how the community building policy was proposed, and subsequently evolved.
2 This is a non-governmental prize organized by three research institutes. They are the China
Centre for Comparative Politics and Economics (affiliated with the Central Compilation and
Translation Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China), the Centre
for Comparative Study of World Political Parties in the Central Party School of the
Communist Party of China, and the China Centre for Government Innovation in the
Peking University. The prize was launched in 2001 and is awarded once every two
years. It has shown significant social influence. Hundreds of local government departments
or agencies participate in this contest each time. For detailed information, see http://www.
chinainnovations.org/
3 As to the Chinese word “zizhi”, there are two English translations: self-governance and autonomy. Bray (2006b, p. 543) suggested translating “zizhi” as “self-governance”, because he conceived that “zizhi” in Chinese context is “a more limited form of ‘self-governance’ in which the
community is expected to manage its own affairs within the operational parameters established
by government authorities”. However, the current authors argue that Bray’s understanding of
“zizhi” reflects more the position of the government. From the perspective of residents and community agencies, under the umbrella of “zizhi”, they want more than “self-governing” in the
government’s terms, and they struggle to take more control over their lives. The authors
have thus used both “self-governance” and “autonomy” in this article to denote these notions
of “zizhi”.
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The Introduction of Community Building Policy
The notion of “community” first entered official discourse in China in the
mid-1980s. But a clear definition of this term was not offered until 2000
with the enactment of the “Principles of the Ministry of Civil Affairs on
Nationally Promoting Urban Community Building” (Minzhengbu guanyu
zai quanguo tuijin chengshi shequ jianshe de yijian). Community, in this
document, was then defined as “a social life entity composed of people
inhabiting a certain geographical area. This area refers to the jurisdiction
of a residents’ committee, which has experienced the scale adjustment
under the reform of the grass-roots administrative system”.4 Obviously,
the community in China is understood not as a social collective formed
by people who have common values and customs, but as a physical territory
defined by a residents’ committee. Thus, the Chinese understanding of the
community highlights two characteristics: administrative functions and a
clearly defined geographical territory.
The breakdown of the danwei system means that the government
needs to find a new means of social welfare provision, and the notion of
the community provides an option. In 1987, the Ministry of Civil Affairs
held a meeting in Wuhan to advocate community service (shequ fuwu)
as a possible new form of social welfare provision in urban neighbourhoods (Xu, 2001). Community service was initially meant to serve only
the disabled and aged, and family members of revolutionary martyrs.
With a more mobile and “free flowing” population, the demand for community services escalated and population management became a new
topic of government concern. Under such a context, combined with the
government’s initiative to improve services for all the residents, the Ministry of Civil Affairs started the movement of community building in
1991 to introduce new functions for the urban grass-roots organizations
and encourage an all-round development of urban communities (Xia,
2008).
Pilot measures of “community building” were first experimented with
in nine districts in the cities of Beijing, Nanjing, and Hangzhou. Then 26
more districts joined in 1998. In 2000, the pilot community building
project came to an end with the endorsement of the document “Principles
4 For the sake of city administration, the definition of community varies from place to place.
Some define it according to the jurisdiction of the Street Office, others follow that of the residents’ committee; and still others fall in between.
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231
of the Ministry of Civil Affairs on Nationally Promoting Urban Community
Building” (Minzhengbu guanyu zai quanguo tuijin chengshi shequ jianshe
de yijian). This document extended community building to all cities, and
clearly defined community building as “a process, led by the Party-state,
of encouraging a healthy development of community politics, economics
and culture as well as environment, and constantly improving the level
and quality of residents’ life through building community capabilities,
mobilizing community resources, strengthening community functions and
resolving community problems” (Ministry of Civil Affairs, 2000). From
community service to community building, the community is no longer
confined to the provision of social services, but becomes a new system to
organize the urban population (Bray, 2006b).
For the government, community building is an important tool to
promote social development and maintain urban stability through the reconstruction of grass-roots organizations. At the beginning of community
building, the government’s priority was to strengthen administrative
capacity by reinforcing the administrative functions of the Street Offices
(Jiedao Banshichu) and the residents’ committees. Such an administrative
pattern was named as a Street Office–Residents’ Committee System ( jiejuzhi) (Hua, 2000), through which a large amount of resources – economic
resources, administrative resources, and human resources – were flowing
from the district government to the levels of the Street Offices and residents’
committees (Pan, 2002; Zhu, 2002). As a result, resident’s committees were
absorbed into the administrative system and formed one pillar of the urban
administration, a process which has been described as the “administrativization” of resident’s committees (Chen & Sun, 2006; Read, 2003; Wu,
2002). Lu and Li (2007) point out that the functions of residents’ committees at that time included political mobilization, public service provision,
civic mediation, public order maintenance, and representation of public
opinions. As state-delegated organizations, residents’ committees have
played a significant role in helping the government implement policy and
maintain social control.
There are three reasons for the strengthening of the role of the Street
Office–Residents’ Committee System. First, with the breakdown of the
danwei system, there was a need for an alternative system or organization
to take over the functions of social control and service provision previously
provided by the danwei. Street Offices and residents’ committees had
already existed in the danwei period. These organizations thus became
the natural choice to fill the gaps left behind by the dissolution of
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danweis. Secondly, from the perspective of modern municipal administration, decentralization was the inevitable trend, with emphasis on
citizen participation and co-operation between local government and
grass-roots organizations. Hence, since the early 1990s, a number of administrative functions began to be transferred from the municipal and district
levels to the grass-roots level. Thirdly, the ongoing socio-economic development in cities had generated more demands from residents, which the
government found difficult to meet alone. As the government sought to
involve grass-roots organizations in meeting these demands, residents’
committees became the primary target of mobilization, given their close
links with residents (Gui, Cheng, & Ma, 2006).
However, the operation of the Street Office–Residents’ Committee
System soon faced various difficulties. With more administrative tasks,
the conflicts between Street Offices and residents’ committees also escalated. Street Offices and residents’ committees were two different entities,
not only because of their different positions in the administrative networks,
but also because of their different understanding of community affairs
(Pan, 2002). For example, during the authors’ investigations in Shanghai
in 2004, some of the residents’ committee leaders interviewed complained
about how incapable and inefficient the Street Offices were and how the
Street Offices often did things only to “show off” to the superordinate
levels. Sometimes the residents’ committee leaders resisted and evaded
the tasks assigned by the Street Offices when they did not agree on
these agendas. They had various strategies of resistance, such as slacking
off or skimping some tasks, playing for time, and even directly refusing to
carry out certain tasks (Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, 2003; Zhu, 2002).
Moreover, Street Office officials and residents’ committee leaders often
had different views on their relationship with each other. The Street
Office officials considered the residents’ committee members as their subordinates, but the residents’ committee members saw themselves as coworkers or partners.
On the other hand, the Street Office–Residents’ Committee System has
confronted difficulties in coping with the complex organizational environment in urban communities. As a number of works have mentioned, new
residential developments are being developed, and new organizations
have emerged in the community territory along with housing privatization.
Homeowners’ associations (yezhu weiyuanhui) and property management
companies (wuye guanli gongsi) are two main newly emerged community
organizations. These organizations have different agendas on community
Community Governance Reform in Urban China
233
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affairs.5 The different concerns are likely to cause conflicts among community organizations. On the other hand, some functions previously undertaken by residents’ committees have been taken up by these new
organizations.
The New Priority of Government Policy on Community
Building
To reform the Street Office–Residents’ Committee System, the government
has advocated community self-governance and self-service since the early
2000s. In 2002, the report of the Sixteenth Party Congress emphasized
that “we will improve urban residents’ self-governance and build newtype and well-managed communities featuring civility and harmony”.6
This is the first official use of the term “urban residents’ self-governance”
in the central documents. The new priority of government promises the cultivation of community self-governance and autonomy by engaging residents and social organizations in community affairs.
In 2005, President Hu Jintao raised the notion of “harmonious society”,
which has endowed new meaning to the traditional concept of “community
building”. In the same year, the Minister of Civil Affairs, Li Xueju, emphasized that residents’ self-governance should be the crucial element of harmonious community building (Yang and Wang, 2010, p. 170). The
document “Decisions on the Major Issues of Building Socialist Harmonious
Society” (Guanyu goujian shehuizhuyi hexie shehui ruogan zhongda wenti
de jueding), issued at the Sixth Plenary Session of the Sixteenth CPC
Central Committee in 2006, claims to “improve residents’ self-governance
… and achieve the positive interaction between government administration
and residents’ self-governance according to the law”.
5 The purpose of setting up a homeowners’ association is to protect owners’ housing-related interests, such as property quality, the level and appropriation of management fees, and community
facilities. Homeowners’ associations are responsible for holding owners’ assembly, hiring and
dismissing the property management company, overseeing housing management and the use of
maintenance funds, and collecting and responding to owners’ opinions on a regular basis. Property management companies are business entities entrusted by owners to provide the professional services of property management, including the routine collection of management
fees and maintenance of account books, security of the property and its residents, daily
routine maintenance of the property, and so on.
6 For details, see: http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2005-01/16/content_2467734.htm
(accessed 4 August 2011).
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The best example of community self-governance and autonomy is the
practice of direct election of residents’ committees since the early 2000s.7
The implementation of direct election of residents’ committees in urban
communities was triggered by two developments. In the first place, as residents’ committees were increasingly engaged in administrative tasks, their
principal role appeared to be the execution of administrative functions at the
grass-roots level. This role was, however, in contradiction to the social and
autonomous nature of residents’ committees, which is clearly stated in “The
Organic Law of Urban Residents’ Committees” enacted in 1989. The law
stipulates that residents’ committees are grass-roots mass organizations
for “the self-management, self-education, and self-help of the residents”.
During the authors’ fieldwork, the residents’ committee members we interviewed often complained of the administrative burden assigned to them.
The tension between performing an administrative role and its original
legal status as an autonomous social organization has apparently posed a
dilemma to the Shenzhen government, and contributed to the eventual
“retreat” of the state’s direct application of administrative powers through
the residents’ committees and the decision to introduce direct elections to
the residents’ committees.
Secondly, the practice of village elections across the country since the
1990s has also given impetus to the reform of residents’ committees. The
idea of self-governance and autonomy has become commonly known to
urban residents through rural village elections. Both government officials
in general and grass-roots practitioners agreed that the autonomous nature
of residents’ committees should be restored. It was in this context that the
direct election of residents’ committees was implemented (Gui et al., 2006).
In addition, the government also encouraged the establishment of
various cultural and recreational organizations in the community to help
mobilize community resources for self-governance. In effect, these civic
groups have been instrumental in the emergence of new community
space and the growth of community autonomy, much beyond the original
design of the government (Lin, 2002; Sun, 2001; Zhu, 2002). Based on
their investigation in Qingdao, Benewick and Takahara (2002) find that
communities enjoyed more freedom than before and to a certain extent
the community organizations could make decisions on community affairs.
7 The direct election ratio of residents’ committees varies greatly in different cities. Shenzhen,
Ningbo, Shanghai, and Hangzhou are in the front rank, with 99%, 85%, 80%, and 75% respectively (Nanfang City News, 9 July 2011).
Community Governance Reform in Urban China
235
Tomba (2005) and Miao (2006) similarly found that the development of
community organizations facilitated the growth of social autonomy.
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The Yantian Model
Yantian is an administrative district of Shenzhen city, covering 72.63 square
kilometres. By the end of 2009, the population of the Yantian district was
227,700. There are four Street Offices and 22 residents’ committees
under the jurisdiction of Yantian.8 Although Shenzhen is a new city with
a short history of little more than three decades, the urban administrative
system in Shenzhen is the same as for other places in China. There are
three levels of management in Shenzhen, municipal, district, and the
Street Office levels.9 Residents’ committees, which used to serve as one
level of the network to execute government administrative policies at the
grass-roots level, are now self-governing organizations of the residents.
Like other cities in China, residents’ committees in Shenzhen have
played a significant role in providing social services and maintaining
public order at the early stages of community building. As a result, the
administrative functions of residents’ committees in practice contradicted
its social and autonomous nature. In order to restore the autonomy of residents’ committees and at the same time to hold representatives of the government in urban communities, the Yantian district government initiated the
reform of the community management system in 2002 (Yantian District
Community Building Office, 2009).
The community governance system in the Yantian district has gone
through two rounds of reform, in 2002 and 2005. The 2002 reform aimed
at releasing the residents’ committees from their administrative functions.
Three strategies were adopted. Firstly, the boundary of each community
was redefined. Some communities were thus combined and the number
of communities in Yantian was reduced from 21 to 17.10 Secondly, the residents’ committee was renamed as the community residents’ committee,
8 See http://www.yantian.gov.cn/main/zwzc/tjsj/nb/index.shtml?catalogId=3825 (accessed 22
January 2011).
9 The Street Office is not a level of government, but it plays an important role in the management
structure of Chinese cities. It is the agency of district government. Thus, the Street Office is
usually viewed as a level of administrative management.
10 In 2008, the largest community was re-divided into two, so that the current number of communities in the Yantian district is 22.
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Journal of Comparative Asian Development
with a redefinition of its duties. Thirdly, two working offices were set up
under the community residents’ committee, namely the community work
office (shequ gongzuozhan) and the community service office (shequ
fuwuzhan). This new structure was locally known as “One Committee,
Constituting Two Offices” (Yihui (he) liangzhan) model (Figure 1).
The community residents’ committee was responsible for making
decisions on community affairs, managing community finance, and supervising the work of these two offices. The community work office undertook
the administrative tasks assigned by the government, and implemented the
decisions made by the community residents’ committee. The function of the
community service office was to provide services for the residents, such as
community sanitation, cultural events, and entertainment. The idea was to
disentangle the community residents’ committee from specific administrative tasks so that it could focus its work on community affairs.
To a certain extent, this institutional arrangement resolved the problem
of role conflicts within the residents’ committee by setting up two new
offices within it and assigning different duties to each of them. However,
the division of labour and co-operation in day-to-day work became a new
problem. The confusion of functions and conflict of power had often
stood in the way. In order to improve efficiency, the Yantian district government embarked on a second round of reform in 2005. Guided by the concept
of separating the decision-making power from the executive power (yixing
fenshe), the community work office was separated organizationally from the
community residents’ committee. The community work office became
independent of the community residents’ committee in terms of staff, function, authority, finance, and administrative function. It became an agency
Figure 1 The Governing Model of “One Committee, Constituting Two Offices”
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China
237
(paichu jigou) under the government Street Office. The community residents’ committee, focusing on community service provision, has reverted
to its original status of an autonomous mass organization, and is directly
elected by all residents in the community. This model is known as “One
Committee, Separating Two Offices” (Yihui (fen) liangzhan) (Figure 2),
which is still running at present.
The responsibilities delegated to the community residents’ committee
are numerous. Generally, there are three aspects. First, it represents the
interests of residents and serves as a bridge between the state and residents
and other community organizations. The community residents’ committee
has the responsibility to co-ordinate the relations of homeowners’ associations and property management companies as well as among other cultural
and recreational organizations in the communities. Secondly, it provides
services to the residents, such as taking care of the elderly, the disabled,
and families in need. Thirdly, it organizes recreational and cultural activities. The community service office is an agent of the community residents’
committee, responsible for executing service programmes. Remarkably, the
community service office is now a civil non-enterprise organization that has
been registered with the government by the community residents’ committee. The community service office is financed in two ways. First, the government purchases its public service programmes through outsourcing
arrangements so that residents can enjoy some services for free. Second,
it offers user-pays services to residents.
Figure 2 The Governance Model of “One Committee, Separating Two Offices”
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Journal of Comparative Asian Development
The community work office, as an agency of the Street Office, takes on
administrative tasks assigned by the government. The main responsibilities
of the community work office include community sanitation, community
environment, community security, community culture, and family planning.
Staff members of the community work office are appointed by, and accountable to, the Street Office. As to the finances, the community work office
receives funds from the district government. Additionally, the community
work office also has the duty to assist the community residents’ committee
to conduct community tasks, but the relationship between them is not one of
administrative subordination.
The direct election of the community residents’ committee in 2008
gives an example of how these two organizations co-operate in community
public affairs. The direct election in the Yantian district took place on 27
May 2008. In order to conduct the election smoothly, an election committee was set up in the H community, which was composed of the leaders of
the community work office and the community residents’ committee, as
well as the local party secretary. Before election day, the community
work office held a series of meetings to discuss the effective propaganda
programmes and mobilization strategies. Banners were hung up on footbridges and along the streets, and on the front doors of the major settlements. Meanwhile, staff members of the community work office
accompanied by the residents’ committee members visited each household
to persuade the residents to register as voters and go to vote. On election
day, they jointly prepared fixed ballot points or took mobile ballot boxes to
the voters’ homes to collect ballots. It could be seen that the community
work office co-operated with the community residents’ committee at
every stage of the election.
To further strengthen the self-governance of the community residents’
committees, a “Three Meetings System” (Sanhui zhidu) has been advocated
and implemented in the communities since 2008. These three meetings are
the democratic appraisal meeting (minzhu pingyihui), the democratic coordination meeting (minzhu xietiaohui), and the democratic public
hearing (minzhu tingzhenghui). The democratic appraisal meeting is to be
held once every year for residents to formally assess the work of the
community residents’ committee. The democratic co-ordination meeting
“co-ordinates” the addressing of conflicts amongst residents, social
groups, and the local government. The democratic public hearing facilitates
residents’ participation in community public affairs (DH Community
Committee, 2009; Yantian District Community Building Office, 2009).
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China
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There are indications that the reform has started to bring about initial
changes in the urban community landscape. A recent study has, for
instance, reported a favourable assessment of the reform by a majority of
residents in the Yantian district (Hou, 2007). During the authors’ interviews
with local government officials and community workers,11 both groups
indicated that the main goals of the government in community governance
reform have been achieved with the establishment of the Yantian Model.
First, the community residents’ committees have been repositioned to
their “due” place. The community work offices, as the agents of the
Street Office, now undertake the administrative tasks previously assigned
to the community residents’ committees, so that it is possible for the community residents’ committees to function as the mass organizations of selfmanagement, self-education and self-help for the residents. Secondly, the
administrative capacity of government at the grass-roots level has been
enhanced. Under the previous Street Office–Residents’ Committee
System, a lot of government work was assigned to the residents’ committees. Owing to the complexity of the work, a shortage of appropriate
staff, and other reasons, the residents’ committees often found it difficult
to complete all the work, which in turn undercut the administrative capacity
of the government. The Yantian Model resolves this problem by setting up a
new “community work office”. Thirdly, a new system of residents’ self-governance has emerged. All eligible residents are to elect the members of the
community residents’ committee, which becomes the central body of community self-governance with functions of relaying residents’ opinions to the
government on the one hand and monitoring the work of the community
service offices and – to some extent – the community work offices on the
other.
The Change of Power Structure
Under the Yantian Model, the newly instituted community work offices are
to exercise administrative powers at the urban community level on behalf of
the government, while the community residents’ committees pursue community self-governance and autonomy. The Yantian Model has been considered a pioneer in the practice of community governance reform and in
11 Community workers refer to the group of people who work in the community. In the Yantian
district, this group of people includes members of the community work office, community residents’ committee, and community service office.
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Journal of Comparative Asian Development
particular in its exploration of a way to integrate administrative and autonomous forces for better community governance (Hou, 2007).
Essentially, the development of community self-governance and autonomy in the course of community governance reform has changed the power
structure at the grass-roots level. As the Yantian Model indicates, various
organizations and groups are involved in the process of decision-making
or the completion of community tasks and the provision of public services.
The authors’ interview with a community leader suggests that the community residents’ committees and the “Three Meetings System” have fostered
residents’ capacity to negotiate with the government. For example, the local
government once planned to improve a street park near the H housing estate
in 2009. The renovation programme was worked out through holding
democratic co-ordination meetings and public hearings, which assembled
local officials, representatives of residents, construction organizations,
and related enterprises and public institutions.12 This implies that the
administrative power is no longer the unique centre of power, but co-exists
with the newly emerged autonomous power in the urban community space.
One characteristic of the interplay of these two forces is that they co-ordinate with as well as restrain each other. In comparison with the danwei
era, the degree of administrative control has obviously reduced in urban
communities. For the government, the development of community selfgovernance and autonomy helps to foster political support in two ways.
A self-help service system aggregates social resources and thus reduces
the costs of government. The running of civic services mainly depends
on the active participation of unpaid volunteers from among local residents.
Secondly, a system fostering mutual assistance among residents may alleviate social conflict, which in the long run will improve state legitimacy.
At the same time, the autonomous power in urban communities has
been growing significantly. Besides the advocacy of local government,
the bottom-up forces also contribute to it. People become concerned with
their housing-related interests and expect more services to improve the
quality of their community life and environment. More importantly, not a
few communities see the growth of the civic leadership. These civic
elites have a strong sense of belonging to their communities (Li, 2011;
Xia, 2003). They are good at negotiating with the government to reformulate the rules of the game.
12 The authors interviewed Mr. Hu on 10 March 2010. He is a leader of the Donghe community
residents’ committee in the Yantian district.
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China
241
It should be noticed that, however, the development of community autonomy cannot be achieved without the support of the administrative power.
First, compared with the rural area, community autonomy does not endogenously grow up in the urban area. To a large extent, it is introduced by the government in seeking a solution to the administrative crisis. Even though many
urban residents have a sense of self-governance and autonomy nowadays, it is
not enough to embark on a reform from the bottom up. This is mainly because
the neighbourhood-based community is different from the danwei-based
environment. People living in the same community are highly heterogeneous.
The community is no longer the only resource pool available to the residents.
More often, residents receive political and economic resources from outside
their community. Secondly, the administrative power is still influential.
During the course of institutional transition, it is sometimes necessary to
make use of administrative power to cut through issues.
The development of the community system for delivering public services
and enforcing the state’s regulations, and the development of community
autonomy to improve bottom-up feedback and to buttress the legitimacy of
the government are the two goals of the government’s community building
policy. These two goals, however, result in tension between community
self-governance and administrative control. The variant reform strategies,
or “models”, in different cities reflect the experimentation in balancing administrative power and autonomous power and containing the tension between
the two. The defining characteristic of community governance in today’s
urban China is neither traditional administrative control nor communal autonomy, but reflects an evolving and thus highly unstable combination of the two.
Conclusion
With the breakdown of the danwei system dismantling the grass-roots
administrative–social fabric in urban China, the Chinese government
initiated a “community building” project to reconstruct the social communal
structure. Different from the danwei system with its tight administrative
control on individuals, the newly emergent community system sought to
achieve social organization through residents’ self-governance, embedded
in an interdependent relationship between the government, residents, and
the various community organizations.
With the Yantian Model, it can be seen that the administrative power
and autonomous power are two forces shaping the urban community gov-
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Journal of Comparative Asian Development
ernance reform. In the near future, a completely autonomous community
governance model or a traditional administrative one is unlikely, but,
rather, the interplay of administrative power and autonomous power will
continue to drive the transition of the urban community governance system.
What is the impact of the interplay of administrative power and autonomous power on state–society relations in urban China? State–society
relations in China have been the focus of a large and growing literature.
Two important studies on this subject are Walder’s (1986) research on
urban factories and Shue’s (1988) investigation of rural society. Outside
the area of China studies, Migdal’s work (1988, 2001) has also been influential in many Chinese studies of urban community reforms (Li, 2007; Ma &
Liu, 2005; Wu, 2002). In particular, Hou (2007) has described the relation
of state and society presented by the Yantian reforms as one of “strong
state, strong society”, which means that the state enhances its executive
capacity while society achieves its autonomy. Xiao (2008) argues that the
Yantian Model would lead to a co-operative state–society relationship
because it has successfully divided the duties among different community
organizations. The community work offices and community residents’ committees are independent of each other; one is the representative of the state at
the local level, being an agency of the government Street Office, and the other
is the representative of society as a mass organization at the grass-roots level.
Yet they also work closely together – as shown in our brief discussion above
of the direct election of the residents’ committee in 2008.
Nevertheless, it should be emphasized that the relations between the
state and society displayed by the Yantian Model are not always collaborative, but can be rather contradictory under some circumstances. For
instance, in 2007 some residents in the Y community were not satisfied
with their housing developer’s plan to construct new buildings in the
common green area. When residents’ representatives complained to
the community residents’ committee, they were told that this was an
administrative matter which should be handled by the community
work office instead. When they went to the community work office,
they were told that this dispute was a civic issue which should be
mediated by the community residents’ committee.13 It can be seen
that both tended to shift responsibility to the other side when they
were confronted with a problem.
13 This interview was conducted by Peng Kai on 28 March 2009.
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Community Governance Reform in Urban China
243
It is too early now to attempt a conclusion on changing state–society
relations in urban China. The governance framework of urban grass-roots
communities has undergone revolutionary change since the 1980s, and
the emergence of new actors with heterogeneous interests and goals has
redefined the local power structure. Despite very substantial changes,
however, the state as of today is still an important actor and authority,
setting rules for the evolving new game. The same visibility of the role
of the state is evident in this study of community governance reform in a
city which is essentially a pioneer as well as a product of the immense economic and social transformation in China since the late 1970s. Contrary to
the emphasis on the role of marketization as the driver to change in the literature, we have stressed here the active role of the state. How independent
the society is of the state’s influence is still largely a function of the state’s
decision on how much power it wants to shed or decentralize. On the other
hand, the continuous development of the market-oriented economy – itself
very much an outcome of the active Chinese state – has provided, and promises to provide further, a steady supply of impetus for decentralizing state
power. This interaction of state and society forces in generating change
echoes the observation in this paper on the interplay of administrative
and socially autonomous powers in the micro change processes in the
Yantian reforms.
Acknowledgements
The research for this article was funded by the Social Science Foundation of
China’s Ministry of Education (project no. 11YJC840036, project holder:
Dr Ma Weihong), the Shenzhen University (project no. 09QNCG17,
project holder: Ma Weihong) and the Education Department of Guangdong
Province (project title “Research on the Development of Homeowners’
Associations and Residents’ Committees: The Perspective of Grassroots
Self-governance”, project holder: Huang Weiping). The authors express
their thanks to the funding agencies.
An early version of the paper was presented at the Urban Governance
Workshop held at the University of Turku in Finland in August 2009.
Special thanks go to Professors Yip Ngai-ming, Vivienne Shue, and Jude
Howell for their insightful comments and to Mr Peng Kai for his assistance
in data collection.
244
Journal of Comparative Asian Development
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About the Authors
Weihong MA is an associate professor in the Department of Public Administration, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, China. She is also a research
fellow at the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Political Studies, Shenzhen
University, China. Her teaching and research interests span the fields of
local governance, urban China transformation, and China’s NGOs.
Linda Chelan LI is Professor of Political Science in the Department of
Public and Social Administration, City University of Hong Kong, Hong
Kong. She is the author of Centre and Provinces, China, 1978–1993:
Power as Non-Zero-Sum (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998, 2002), and
Rural Tax Reform in China: Policy Processes and Institutional Change
(London and New York: Routledge, 2012). She is also the editor of The
Chinese State in Transition: Processes and Contests in Local China, and
Towards Responsible Government in East Asia: Trajectories, Intentions
and Meanings, both published by Routledge (London, 2009).