The Fragmentation And Governance Of Community

Although the grassroot government makes initiatives to strengthen the communitymanagement with many strategies and policies, such as the “Community Building”, the“Project Management”,“Yi Xing Fen She” or the “Grid Management”, the publicshows lower satisfactions with the performance of governance in the community. Howto explain this phenomenon? Why the difference is so huge among the sections in thesame community? Is it possible for the government to give responds to the publiceffectively in the micro-political level? This paper tries to answer these questions withthe case study on the differentiation and governmance of the four communities in the Ycity.In this case study, I find out that it is because of the community has beenfragmented by the diverse dynamics in the socio-economic transition that explains whythe effective governance of community is hard to be realized. In such fragmentedcommunities, the grassroot government fails to respond to or balance the growingdivided public appeals，which are the economic interests from lower classes or thecitizenship claims from the higher classes. Because of the disorganization of the urbandanwei system or the rural production team, the commercialization of urban housing,the establishment of the labour market, and the urbanization of rural land, the urbancommunity has been fraqmented in its socio-spatial structure, interest structure andpower structure.The freqmentation of community results in many severe social or politicalconsequences. The political attitude or behavior is beginning to be divided. On the onehand, the higher class tends to own higher civic awareness and to take routined civicparticipations. On the other hand, the lower class tends to own the authoritarian valuesand to take the radical civic participations. It is to be worried about the government cannot afford the lower classs’s economic security or meet the higher class’s politicalappeals.In the process of “community building” policy, the city government has set up acomplicated management system, and the grassroot government has to set up a diversemodel of governance in order to manage the challenges from the fragmentation of community. However, the real effects are very limited. Lack of human resourses,financial capacity, powers of management, and the public participation or interaction,the grasroot government is very hard to achieve the goals of good governance.Meanwhile, different social status group shows divided oppions and supports on thecommunity development policy and social management policy.In conclusion, I argue that the fragmentation of community is the main reason whythe grassroot government fails to make effective governance. Indeed, the fragmentationof community is resulted by the changing institution and social structure in the higherlevel. However, the grassroot government has the capacities to reorganize thefragmental community and realize the positive effective governance through integratingthe recent orgniztion resources, market forces and social organizations, and rebuildingthe cooperation among the government, market and society. To meet the challengesgiven by the divded poltical attitudes and civic participation, I suggest that in this paperthe government shoud provide the foundamental services for the lower classes in theshort term and the institutional supplies for the higher classes in the long term. Onlyreform the local system and increase the positive interaction between the people and thelocal government, can we eliminate the roots of the conflicts and realize the effectivegovernance of community.