Studies On The Megacity Community Conflict And Governance In China

During the Third Plenary Session of the Eighteenth Central Committee of the CPC held in late 2013,the proposed "to strengthen social management" in early 2011 was elevated to "to innovative social governance",so as to adapt to China's economic and social transformation and deal with new problems caused by the changes of the urban-rural structure,in response to increasingly urgent practical problems of social stability and the ruling legitimacy,from a height of the national governance system and the modernization level of governance capacity.The change of the term from "social management" to "social governance",is not only one of the requirements of social transformation,economic transition,and institutional change,but a comprehensive upgrade from the "traditional social management" to "modern social governance" in the concept of pattern,ways and means.In this process,as the foundation of urban governance,social governance and national governance,community governance will be an important basis of social harmony and state's stability.However,community conflict and community governance,as a pair of twin brothers,often go hand in hand and there is a symbiosis between them.Therefore,it is of great significance and far-reaching to regard the conflicts of the urban community and their governance as a "window" or a "key" to understand urban grass-roots social situations of China during the social transformation period from the perspective of public conflicts.In view of the status quo that the community governance theory still lags behind practices during social transformation period,especially the reality that the governance theory of the urban community conflict is still far behind the resolution of community conflicts in reality,the thesis takes megacities in China as examples,and adopts the multi-stage stratified sampling method of "city-district-street-community – residential sub-district-respondents" with a combination of random sampling investigation to select total 1250 survey samples in Beijing,Shanghai,Tianjin,Guangzhou,and Shenzhen.Meanwhile,it fully integrates existing urban community governance theory and practical experience at home and abroad,and comprehensively uses literature analysis,questionnaires,depth interviews,case analysis,comparative analysis and mixed methods to research systematically the urban community conflicts and their governance during the social transformation period.First,depending on the properties of the conflicts,urban community conflicts in China are roughly divided into conflict of interest,power conflict,conflict of rights,cultural conflict,structure conflict,complexity conflict(such as property conflicts,NIMBY community conflicts,etc.)during the social transformation period.And,community property conflict which is more intractable during the social transformation period is analyzed selectively.Second,according to the heterogeneity among the different types of communities,the community-type of the megacities in China during the social transformation period is broadly divided into five categories: traditional neighborhood community,a single unit community,hybrid integrated community,as well as succession transition community and modern residential community.The thesis points out that different types of conflicts within the community should be different,and carries out related empirical research.Third,the causes of the urban community conflicts during the social transformation period and the main affecting variables are analyzed by multiple regression analysis,and diffusion processes and escalation mechanisms of community conflicts are discussed systematically.Fourth,after discussing governance subject of urban community conflict,the thesis analyzes selectively the major methods and measures taken by community residents and grass-roots governments to solve the urban community conflicts.Major methods are dialogue and conciliation,mediation,arbitration,letters and petitions,litigation and appeal to violence,while measures are mainly community conflict reconciliation,conflict mediation,conflict management and control,conflict settlement and violent coercion.Fifth,the main problems of governing urban community conflicts that exist in our country during the social transformation period are pointed out,and the direct causes of these problems and deep dilemmas(e.g.subjective difficulty,involvement difficulty,platform plight,cost plight and institutional dilemma,etc.)are researched systematically.Sixth,effective practices of governing community conflicts in developed countries such as Britain,the United States,Japan,Korea and Singapore are introduced systematically and implications for Chinese urban community conflict governance during the social conflict transition period are also given.Finally,on the basis of effectively learning the existing experience of dealing with urban community conflicts of other countries,the thesis combines practice explorations and attempts in governance of community conflicts in some cities during the post social transition,proposes objectives,principles and methods of governance of community conflicts in the late social transformation period,and further suggests the following strategies based on the reality of our country: community conflicts should be solved from the perspective of consensus vision,multi-governance,classification governance and mechanism constructions based on the principle of "making the best use of circumstances,classified governance and accurate resolution”,so as to “transformation” rather than "resolution" community conflicts and to provide meaningful references in theory and practice for other cities in China which are exploring how to resolve and governing the community contradictions,disputes and conflicts.Urban community,is a highly intensive,complexity and heterogeneity of social life community.It is a daunting task to govern community conflicts of the metropolis effectively.It is not only an innovation on concepts,but also an revolution in practice from community conflict management to governance,from traditional community conflict settlement to conflict resolution and to conflict transformation.Of course,the purpose of governing urban community conflict is not to eliminate conflict,but in order to bridge differences,transforming contradictions,resolve conflicts,and create a more efficient and reasonable path to clear up conflicts.It is an objective fact that the formation of the urban community conflict resolution mechanism is a system of social engineering,which not only requires a long process that requires correct guidance of the Party and the government,the reasonable sets of community institutions,the sound community systems,the optimized structure of community,the running mechanism of community smoothly and the improvement of community governance system,but also needs equal social relations among members of the community bodies and the common community identity.Conflicts are a kind of widespread phenomenon in the process of social development,however,it is always the survival state of human society pursued from conflict to harmony.The reason why I research on urban community conflict,the ultimate aim is to better forewarn conflict effectively,to control conflict benignly,to manage conflict moderately,to resolve highly and govern conflict effectively and to transform conflict reasonablely,in order to maintain urban community order and stability,to promote community harmony and to realize social peace.