A Comparative Study On Occupational Gender Structure Of Urban And Rural Grassroots Self-government Organizations

Urban and rural grassroots self-government organizations of China includes community committee and village committee; however the gender structure of community committee and village committee is very different. Members of the community committee are female-dominated, but it is just the opposite in village committee. Based on my investigation, I find that embedded resource capacity and scarcity is deciding whether men hold or not, and men hold the scarce occupation. The embedded resource capacity of community committee is relatively at low degree with less scarcity to make it become the women's territory, and relatively rich resource capacity of village committee make it become men's territory. In addition, the inertia of historical gender structure, social recognization of gender structure and social culture impacting on women cause different gender structures of urban and rural grassroots self-government organizations together. I further find that these are caused by gender stratification under the male-dominated system. Men hold scarce resources, but women are excluded out of the power system. I find that manifestation of gender stratification is different in urban and rural areas, and the women's high turnout among community committee is also a kind of expression of gender stratification, and the gender stratification in community committee is recessive. In addition, I find the male election motive to gender structure in village committee, and emergence of women with power in community committee is caused by their seniority and policy protection. Finally, I put forward to the further discussion of internal stratification and the gender participation trend of the urban and rural grassroots mass self-government organization.