Study On The Fragile Poverty Alleviation Of Small Farmers In Western China And Its Formation Mechanism

With the all-round success of poverty alleviation,China has entered a post poverty alleviation period.During this period,the Party Central Committee has included"consolidating the achievements of poverty alleviation and preventing large-scale return to poverty" in its important policy agenda,and clearly proposed to establish and improve the monitoring,early warning and dynamic assistance mechanism for returning to poverty,so as to reduce and prevent the return of people out of poverty.The most important measure is to set up a five-year transition period for poverty prevention in poor areas,The core task of the transition period is to keep the bottom line that there will be no large-scale return to poverty.The policy shift at the central level from "overall victory in poverty alleviation"to"transition period for poverty alleviation" means that there are still some hidden dangers of returning to poverty in China’s poverty alleviation achievements.This kind of poverty relief with the hidden danger of returning to poverty is the fragile poverty relief that this study focuses on.Its representative group is the left behind small farmers in the western region.Due to various subjective and objective reasons,these groups can not achieve the transfer of employment from poverty,but can only stay in the countryside and rely on agricultural production for a living.The reason why these groups are vulnerable to poverty alleviation is that the livelihood fracture caused by the combined effect of livelihood situation transformation and livelihood resource shortage often leads to a fracture zone between their income and expenditure,showing strong instability of birth count,and the government’s poverty alleviation work fails to fully repair their livelihood stability.Therefore,the research on the fragile poverty alleviation of left behind small farmers in Western China has important policy value and practical significance,which is related to the consolidation of poverty alleviation achievements and the promotion of common prosperity.This study takes the fragile poverty alleviation plight of small-scale farmers in the West as the core issue,takes Giddens’ structural theory as the analytical perspective,takes the livelihood resources of small-scale farmers as the main line,selects GY County as a case,systematically investigates the whole process of poverty alleviation of small-scale farmers in the west through field research methods,and tries to find the generation mechanism of fragile poverty alleviation in this process.In this process,small-scale peasant poverty is the starting point,targeted poverty alleviation is the means,fragile poverty alleviation is the result,and the overlapping effect of small-scale peasant poverty and targeted poverty alleviation constitutes the generation mechanism of this result.In the presentation logic of the study,it first describes the current situation of small-scale farmers’ fragile poverty alleviation in Western China,and then explains the causes of this situation from the two progressive levels of small-scale farmers’ poverty and targeted poverty alleviation.In this study,the fragile poverty alleviation of small farmers means that after the targeted poverty alleviation,their economic income has been increased through the government transfer payment,exceeding the poverty alleviation standard set by the state.At the same time,they have completed the identity transformation from the label of poor households to the label of poverty alleviation,which is completed through the government’s poverty alleviation planning,However,their livelihood has not been completely improved,and they are still in a traditional and backward small-scale peasant economy.In short,fragile poverty alleviation means that small farmers have completed economic and political poverty alleviation,but have not completed social poverty alleviation.Why did the small-scale peasants not complete the social poverty alleviation?We must first examine how the livelihood poverty of small farmers is formed at the social level,and then examine why the targeted poverty alleviation of the country has failed to fully eliminate the livelihood poverty of small farmers.In the investigation of small-scale farmers’ livelihood poverty,from the perspective of the theoretical concept of restrictive structure,and taking the small-scale farmers’ livelihood resource transformation action as the investigation object,by examining the smooth degree of small-scale farmers’ livelihood resource transformation action under the dual effects of livelihood intention and livelihood situation,it is found that the poverty at the social level of small-scale farmers is a kind of livelihood fracture poverty in the binary situation.This kind of livelihood fracture presents as a kind of "double fracture":within small-scale peasant families,the monetary income as the result of livelihood action cannot meet the various consumption needs of small-scale peasants;Outside the small-scale peasant family,the traditional livelihood mode of small-scale peasant can not achieve the extension of time and space across the dual livelihood situation,so it can not form a stable development livelihood mode.The urban-rural dual livelihood situation is the restrictive structure of this "double fracture".In this situation,the life of small farmers is dragged into the modern consumption culture,and gradually has the "budding rationality",in which the livelihood intention of "currency logic"is formed.However,in production,the traditional production "knowledge" of small farmers is stripped off by modern "knowledge" and becomes "invalid knowledge".Under the action of"budding rationality" and "invalid knowledge",small farmers are transforming their livelihood resources into money,and the weakening of resource accumulation has occurred.The continuous cycle of weakening accumulation has finally led to the poverty of small farmers,which is called livelihood fracture poverty in this study,that is,the social poverty of small farmers.In the investigation of targeted poverty alleviation,from the perspective of the theoretical concept of catalytic structure and the government’s resource input action,by examining the resource input effect between the state and small farmers,it is found that there is a certain degree of resource input deviation in China’s targeted poverty alleviation system,which fails to fully eliminate the social poverty of small farmers.Specifically,this study regards targeted poverty alleviation as an accurate resource input system,which is designed to help small farmers restore their livelihood stability by inputting livelihood resources.Therefore,it can be regarded as a driving structure in the livelihood of small farmers.However,in the process of institutional practice,this kind of resource input has deviated,resulting in the"materialization" tendency in the process of resource input,that is,it tends to the input of quantifiable,explicit and rapid public goods,while ignoring the input of non quantifiable,internal and long-term public services.However,for the long-term livelihood stability of small farmers,public service is a more deeply driven factor.Therefore,the livelihood resource input in reality presents a mismatch between the input mechanism and the input resources,that is,the "mismatch adaptation" input logic.In this input logic,the monetary income and material life of small-scale farmers have been improved,the economic poverty alleviation has been completed,and they have been rated as poverty alleviation households in the exit review.They have been "cancelled" from the national poverty system,and the political poverty alleviation has been completed.However,the livelihood improvement at the social level has not been completed,so they have entered a fragile poverty alleviation state.What is more noteworthy is that even if the state gives money income to small farmers,these currencies will still fall into a cycle of accumulation and weakening in the process of the transformation of money and livelihood resources.Small farmers may eventually return to the original poverty state of broken livelihoods.With the gradual fading out of the national poverty alleviation measures,the risk of small farmers returning to poverty will be further exacerbated.Through a comprehensive review of small-scale peasant poverty and targeted poverty alleviation,this study found that the reason why small-scale farmers fall into the plight of fragile poverty alleviation is that targeted poverty alleviation,as a driving structure,has not completely repaired the restrictive structure in the process of small-scale farmers’ livelihood,and there are three main loopholes:The first is the failure to provide small farmers with livelihood resources in the process of agricultural production,that is,the supply of livelihood resources is unbalanced;Second,due to the neglect of agricultural production,it failed to resist various risks in the process of small-scale agricultural production,that is,the production risk defense failed;Third,due to the "tough nature"of poverty alleviation itself,it failed to resist the consumption risk in the lives of small farmers in a long-term way,that is,the resistance to consumption risk failed.Therefore,in the transitional period of poverty alleviation,to consolidate the achievements of poverty alleviation,we should start with repairing these three loopholes,and strive to realize the connection between the livelihood of small farmers and the dual livelihood situation.According to the structural theory,this study puts forward countermeasures and suggestions to strive to create resilient small farmers at the micro level,rebuild resilient villages at the meso level,and eliminate livelihood risks at the macro level.These three levels together constitute a resilient poverty governance system.