Beyond Peasant Society: A Research On Urban Village Community

Since 1980s, the expansion pace of urbanization characterized by industrialization has further accelerated, affecting each city and village from the coastal areas to inland areas. In this transformation of post-industrial era, "Urban Villages" has increasingly become a universal social phenomenon in China's urbanization. J Village has transformed into urban village community by taking the market village road. As a relatively abstract sociological concept, "Community" has been concerned more at the practical level than the theoretical level. By using the Community theoretical perspective, this paper attempts to explore the problem of survival and mutation of community property of those villages which has gradually integrated in cities in the back of social change and urbanization at the practice level, and study the change process and the logic of inherent operation of the urban village community which formed by blend and promote of the two forces of tradition and modernity. This paper tries to resolve this problem:which relationship exists between the urban village community and traditional peasant society? What kind of existence is the urban village community? Specifically, what did this urban village community experience in the change process after all? How the implementations of the joint-stock system of the community influence the reconstruction of the urban village community? In blend of two forces of the traditional and modern, what kind of living logic and organizational structure does the urban village community have?This paper is divided into six parts. Chapter I is the Introduction. This chapter mainly describes the research problems, the core concept, the research overview, the theoretical perspective, research methods and sample profiles. The second chapter is mainly explains the change process of J village from suburban village to urban village community. Chapter 3 clarifies the effect of implementation of the joint-stock system of the community to the reconstruction of the urban village community. At the level of collective economy, further at all levels of the urban village community, the implementation of the joint-stock system of the community reconstructs the organization and survival configuration of the urban village community. The living logic of the urban village community is interpreted in chapter 4. In construction of the life-world field, the urban village community reflects the unique value of transition. The living logic of the urban village community is close to cities, but the culture and living logic of the traditional peasant society still exists. Chapter 5 elaborates the new organizational structure of the urban village community. As a non-agricultural economy neighborhood, the economic foundation of peasant society has been thoroughly shaken, but the traditional endogenous structure has infiltrated into the reconstruction of the organizational structure of the urban village community. The last Chapter is basic conclusion. The urban village community is beyond the traditional peasant society and is a special form during the process of the end of village. The survival and mutation of community property manifested in that the traditional resources coexist with the modern civilization and the organization of the community in the urban village community. In the process of "the end of the village", we should not only utilize the factors of modern civilization, but also explore the traditional local resources and forces. The experience and practice of this model of urban village community is worth learning by some rural areas, but this model can not become a a popular choice to build community in rural society of China.