Study On The Plight And Countermeasures Of The Owners’ Committee In Community Autonomy

With the deepening of reform and opening up and the promotion of construction ofurban communities, the owners’ committee is gradually becoming an importantorganization which could promote the development of owners’ autonomy anddemocratic development process in China. In order to safeguard and promote thedevelopment of its operation and development, the government has developed a systemof laws, policies and measures. Although it has only been22years since the rise of theowners’ committee, with its rapid development, it has opened a new prologue of thegrass-roots democracy and autonomy. Meanwhile, we should note that the developmentpath of the owners’ committee, like all newborn things, may encounter a lot ofdifficulties in its growing process. Under the deeply-rooted traditional social mode ofplan system and unit system, establishing an autonomous organization of independence,democracy and the spirit of free civism and make it take root in the grass-rootscommunity needs us to explore constantly and overcome the difficulties. Seen from theoverall development situation, the current development of our owners’ committee hasnot reflected full utility of the system. Some issues as the root of the plight of theowners’ committee, and how to break through the barriers for the growth of the owners’committee, need to be seriously considered and explored.Second only to Qingdao and Jinan in Shandong Province, Weifang’s propertymanagement is among the best in Shandong Province, and its owners’ committees’development level is more representative in most large and medium-sized cities.Weifang, referred to here in a narrow sense namely Weifang city, including4Districtsand2Development Zones, as the pace of their development is consistently balanced.This paper aims to find out the problems of the development of owners’ committees inWeifang City through investigation and statistics, and then analyze the causes andpropose solutions, from an individual case to the whole, from the micro level to themacro level, and from appearance to depth. In this process, the deep-rooted problemsregarding the system and thinking consciousness should be focused on in order toprovide a reference and guidance as fully and accurately as possible for futuredevelopment of the owners’ committee.This paper, by using empirical and quantitative analysis methods from the publicadministration and urban governance perspective, systematically expounds thedifficulties faced by the owners’ committees in Weifang, including the unevendistribution of the established committee amount and the development levels, the lackof successors in election, the nonstandard election procedures, the unclear subjectqualifications, the lack of operating funds, the indifference of owners, the awaitingenhancement of guidance from government departments, sub-district offices and community offices, and the non-cooperation between developers and property serviceenterprises. To solve the above problems, the institutional, legal, social, managementsystem aspects as well as the owners themselves should become the exerting pointswhen exploring the reasons. Implementation of the housing reform in the1990s, as atop-down mandatory reform, has promoted a rapid transformation of urban society andspeedy community establishment, however, some side effects have been generated atthe same time such as the imperfect institutional environment, the strong administrativecolor and the indifference of owners, which become the root causes of the plight of theowners’ committee development; the imperfect laws and regulations especially theunclear subject positioning have hindered the owners’ committee from fully playing itsrole and fulfilling the responsibilities and obligations; the concept of citizenship stilllies in the traditional ideas of obedience to the higher authorities, standing aloof fromworldly success, as well as the unwillingness to speak out, hence the owners autonomylacks the civic spirit and it takes time to form the civil society; governing subjectsclosely related to the owners’ committee development such as property serviceenterprises, community offices and governments still have some inconsistencies evenconflicts in behavioral ideas and development directions, and the unified andcoordinated management system has not been formed yet. The causes of thepredicament of the owners ’committee in Weifang City in fact are the universalproblems of many other owners’ committees. Therefore, the future developmentcountermeasures of owners’ committees in China can also be analyzed by exploring thecase of Weifang. From practice to the theory, and then from theory back to practice withcontinuous modification and perfection, owners’ committee needs to follow such a pathto grow. Improving and perfecting the institutional environment is fundamental topromote the progress of the owners ’committee; more independent legal status andsubject qualifications should be given to the owners’ committee to enable them toexercise rights and take responsibilities more independently; community propertyservice enterprises need to change the business philosophy and enhance the businesslevel and service level, to pull together and push each other mutually with owners’committee; developing civism required by owners autonomy such as senses ofautonomy and participation, expanding citizens’ orderly participation and structuringcitizens’ trust and sense of belonging, to promote the development of the owners’committee in a more democratic and civilized atmosphere; the government, as theleader of promoting the development of owners’ committee, should further transform itsfunctions to a limited government and service-oriented government to offer sufficientguidance and help to the owners’ committee, and achieve both win target of developingcivil autonomous organizations and promoting the usage efficiency of public serviceresources; As the owners’ committee, it should actively seek the best path fordevelopment, cultivate and introduce elites and improve the degree of specialization ofthe owners’ committee. In short, the growth of owners’ committee cannot beaccomplished within a day or by the power of one’ own. As long as relevant partiesunify consensus and cooperate closely towards the common goal of communityautonomy and grassroots democracy, the owner autonomous road with Chinesecharacteristics will eventually come true.