Democratic Management in the Rural Communes

Abstract

At the lowest level of state administration in China some direct popular control of government is formally sanctioned. It is, therefore, at this level that the apparent conflict between the Chinese Communist Party's desire for mass participation in government and Party leadership over policy formation and execution can be analysed. The rural communes serve as a logical point of departure in this analysis. When formed in 1958, the rural communes replaced the hsiang as the basic unit of government administration for roughly 80 per cent, of the population. At the same time “democratic management,” a Party term for all kmds of mass political activity was emphasised, and by the autumn of 1958 a movement for the “Democratisation of Management” was under way. By December of the same year, however, the Central Committee of the Party warned that “militarisation of organisation” (another battle cry of that period) must not be used as a pretext to impair “democratic life” in the communes. From then on, the rural communes have been, in effect, a testing ground for the Party's policy towards popular participation in government.