To Produce The Against Boundary: The Study On The Neighborhood Action Of Safeguarding Rights And Anti-rights In Residential Community Named Spring City Garden

This article shows the life story of neighborhood action of safeguarding rights andanti-rights in residential community named Spring City Garden by means of"telling astory". Since 2000, the action of safeguarding rights and anti-rights can be concludedas the internal conflict of"power control logic"and"owner autonomous logic". From"maintain the real rights"to"fight for the administrative power"and then to"requestrules rationalized", the neighborhood actors use"problems"as the logical clues tocarry out actions; from"collective actions"to"take legal proceedings to safeguardrights"and then to"struggle outside the law", the neighborhood actors have set up therelationship boundary among power, capital, neighborhoods and owners with actions.The study finds that the social resources have lost the embedded"social"attributein the power network controlled by the state. The social resources available for ownersare not only limited in quantity, but also unpredictable in effect. The"fight plays"thatowners can use are extremely limited. Appearing in consistent action logic behind thediversity of actions'strategies, the"law"has become a center throughout the processof safeguarding rights, and"law-abiding logic"constitutes the action boundary ofowners to safeguard rights.The owners safeguard their rights"according to law"and"relying on law"consciously. This is not only a kind of action strategies which relies on the law andpolicy authority, but also a social ethics which is attached to national hegemonyideology. And the state authority is further enhanced from the reverse side, reproducingstate hegemony ideology. The abstract symbol"state"has become the legitimatesource of protesting movements for transitional Chinese citizens. In the owners'consciousness, the law is only the tool to achieve a goal, but the state is the ethics which are integrate into people's mind.The owners are not blindly comply with the state laws and following proceduresstep-by-step, but good at looking for institution leak and holding proper limits ofactions. These so-called"civil courage"and"life wisdom"are not so much that actorstake targeted safeguard rights form that based on different environments and differentopportunities, than they exercise their rights discreetly within state's permission. It is akind of discreetness which the state shapes, but also a"passive survival"under thepressure of the state. The state institution and the institution itself have become thespace of safeguard rights, and the space which not only means the opportunity to takeactions, but also marks the boundaries of the actions.Facing the neighborhood Action of safeguarding rights, the anti-rights occupy adominant position, especially when coping with skills and strategies. This articledescribes the logic of countermeasures from three aspects: the"deliberately-manufactured"neighborhood factions; the logic of rule of morality andthe classified governance.First, the neighborhood factions are manufactured purposefully. In a unfamiliarresidential district, the power and capital occupy the monopoly position , and theyestablish neighborhood support network in a new elites absorbing mechanism bymeans of winning over the neighborhood elites, giving a symbolic courtesy andmaterial reward. As a differentiation and integration mechanism, neighborhoodsfaction itself is a means of anti-rights. In the election of Condominium Homeowners'Association, the "election" has actually become an important mechanism, based onwhich, power and the capital share the community rights with neighborhood factionselite.Second, the rule of virtue logic of the neighborhoods anti-rights factions. It hastwo main characteristics: for one thing, it transforms the "external contradiction"between the housing owners and the real estate developers, property companies and thegrass-roots administrative departments into the "internal contradictions "among thehousing owners; for another, it transforms the conflict of laws and rights into the conflict of morality and discourse by using the moral evaluation and moralclassification model. The rule of virtue logic of the residential district is thecontinuation and activation of the traditional socialist governance in theneighborhoods'space.Third, the classified governance of urban grass-roots regime. Based on thestrategies of suppression and differentiation, absorbability and cooperation,consultation and infiltration, urban grass-roots departments differentiate and dispel thehousing-owners'capacity of mobilization and collective action effectively, and limitthe action of safeguarding rights within the level of neighborhood disputes, whilemaintaining influence and intervention on grass-roots neighborhoods, and promotingthe reproduction of the state authority at the grass roots level.On the basis of reflecting upon the paradigm of"strategy", the writer introducesthe concept of"boundary". The interaction and game playing between the adultsowners and the anti-rights owners not only maintain the action of both parties within acertain boundary and intensify some possible against boundary, but also produce thenew boundary, open up a new space and reproduce and transform the against boundary.The produce of the against boundary. The country creates the opportunity space ofsafeguarding rights and anti-rights with the rule of law, including the legitimateprotests carried out by the rights owners in the use of the state law and the policyresources, but also the"legal"infringement and the anti-rights of the capital and powerin the ambiguous regions and cracks. The confrontation of the safeguarding rights andanti-rights is transformed into the rivalry of selecting, reading and practicing the legaldiscourse. So, the opportunity space created by country with the rule of law is actuallya strategy space which full of competition among each power.The expansion of the against boundary. The against boundary of the law isambiguous and expand to the space out of law owing to the toolism, obfuscation andpolicy in the use of the state law, causing the fact that"raising the quota"and"decoding"out of law is the usual strategy between the safeguarding rights andanti-rights. The space for action created by the rule of law is not only put the confrontation into the legal orbit, but also becomes a kind of limit that cannot be savedfrom itself.The transformation and maintenance of the against boundary. The safeguardingrights behavior of housing owners has dual connotations within legal policy andcommunity structure, which are divided up and classified by the mechanism ofneighborhoods, which is normal and legal from the angle on legal right, whileabnormal and immoral in the neighborhoods context. Therefore, the againstboundary of safeguarding rights and anti-rights is maintained within neighborhoods,which means the level of safeguarding right is limited within neighborhoods, and theobject of contention is limited within the community, and explicit laws and rightproblems are transformed into the neighbor intricate disputes in the action ofsafeguarding rights, and"the the pursuit of rights"is transformed into"the clearance ofmorality"when homeowner appealing their rights. As a result, the possibility ofinnovation of the practice of safeguarding rights and the expansion of the boundary islost, which is also the"governance effect"expected by the grass-roots governance andthe anti-rights.This article proposes a new kind of explanation mode-"the state as a frame", andthe paradigm of"right"and the paradigm of"strategy"in the study of safeguardingrights are further reflected. First,"the state as a frame"endows the action ofsafeguarding rights with the legal meaning and verbal resource as a source of meaning,which cannot safeguard the actions'results, but guard the actions. Second,"the state asa frame"is not only the weapon of safeguarding rights, but also the weapon ofanti-rights. We cannot deny the legitimacy of"the state as a frame", although someconflicts about specific problems and interest exist between the safeguarding rights andanti-rights, and"the state as a framework"becomes the framework and theintermediary of meaning shared by both parties. Three,"the state as a frame"is ofdissociated and governing, which appeals to both parties, and strengthen the legitimacyof the country. Last,"the state as a frame"is the result of the transformation of socialgovernance, but its strategy of governing is not proposing rules, giving meanings, and establishing institutions rather than appear as a action-man.As a kind of explanation mode,"the state as a frame"is more powerful and hasmore locality than"safeguarding rights according to law"in exploring the stable logichidden among many resistance forms and resistance strategies. The writer highlightsthe state attribute in the process of the action of safeguarding rights in order to arouse akind of academic consciousness between"discovering society"and"retrieving state".