On Rural Governance Under The Participation Of Multi-subjects In Song Dynasty

With the external and internal acting factors, tremendous changes have been under way in China's rural society from Tang dynasty to Song dynasty,with forces of multi-subjects thriving besides governmental power. Many social elites and management personnel came into stage with the popularization of rural education, which exerted a subtle influence on the obedience of people to the state will. Exemplified by clan fields, genealogy and ancestral halls,newly established clan organization has constituted an integrated management system for clan members, which took on highly organizational and administrative tendency to maintain rural stability. As major and endogenous participants, civil organizations and social elites played a leading and promoting role in rural governance in Song dynasty.Meanwhile the state strategy for rural governance has changed from overall control to technical management, which means direct control gave way to indirectly control. In turn, the rural governance structure and system have been changed, facing revolutionary developments.On the one hand, the governing structure of rural society was shaped by the adjustment of governance concepts and system of central government. On the other hand, state governance strategy was also constantly influenced by internal transformation of rural society. The internal collusion of various elements of governance centered on power and interests had brought about revolutionary challenges in rural society in Song dynasty.To meet these challenges rulers of the dynasty tried to realize ideological control of mainstream society through indoctrination and propaganda of Confucian ethics. In addition,new forces such as civil organizations and social elites have been encouraged to pitch in. Then the state issued a series of regulations and policies to guide the division among state, civil organizations and rural elites in rural governance. It is not that state political power has been wakened in rural areas, or that village autonomy has been achieved, but that the subjects,focuses and patterns of power have been adjusted to ensure the state control of rural society.Within the system each governance subject has been assigned specific tasks with the state in charge of top policy designing and civil organizations and elites of implementing, which has formed a clearly vertical division of trilateral governance in rural areas. At the same time, the horizontal division of social power has been realized through the interaction and cooperation between civil organizations and elites. The benign interactions among governance subjects have rendered rural governance of Song dynasty quite differentiated from Tang dynasty's tendency towards modernization,which is named as "the Song" mode of rural governance.Based on the changes of rural society of Song dynasty and corresponding analysis, the paper has been presented in the following framework.The first chapter mainly introduces changes of rural society of Song dynasty under the background of transformation from Tang to Song, and the resulting changes of rural social order and social structures of villages, which caused the fracture of historical traditions,customs and economic and cultural vitality in rural society. The collapse of the previous order and degradation of traditional governance have been brought about, which led to profound changes in mechanism, relations and processes of rural governance of Song dynasty and social traditions were gradually broken. With the changes of governance structure and adjustment of systematic functions of governance, the rural society has been undergoing double variations-- deconstruction and reconstruction-- in the process of transformation.The second chapter mainly introduces the emergence of multi subjects of rural governance and their roles in the process. The multi subjects include not only official body of rights such as local governments and rural administrative organizations, but also civil endogenous organizations chiefly exemplified by clan, economic and armed organizations, as well as the social elites made up of village wizards, monks, village doctors, scholars, toffs,clan leaders and so on. All the three parties played different roles in rural governance.The third chapter mainly introduces the mechanism of rural governance in Song dynasty.The governance systems have been reconstructed and governance order integrated with state-level institution, civil organizational adjustment and rural elites participation, which conforms to the needs of Tang and Song dynasty transformation and achieves rural governance. It is further illustrated that effective governance is not acquired by excessive expansion of power, but by reasonable operation of settled ranges and social autonomy, and their mutual cooperation and collaboration, which is named "the Song" mode of rural governance.The fourth chapter mainly discusses the outcome of the governance mode. With the mode villagers have been involved in a variety of civil organizations to learn state policies with the aid of rural elites, to pay taxes, to take on corvee and to receive relief. The state control of rural areas has been achieved through civil organizations and social elites, which help issue state decrees to villagers and report local conditions to governments. The perfect combination of efforts from the three parties has rendered rural governance stable and autonomous.The fifth chapter is the summary. Facing great changes of rural areas rulers of Song dynasty adjusted their policies in time, taking advantage of civil organizations and rural elites to solve the difficulties and obstacles caused by sole governance by official organizations. The governance by multi subjects has been realized through the combination between state and local forces to maintain maximum stability of rural society.