A Comparative Study Of Grassroots Community Governance In China And The United States Under The Public Health Crisis

Under the impact of the epidemic,the rapid spread within the community has made the epidemic situation in the United States severe,becoming the country with the largest number of infections and deaths in the world.In contrast,at the beginning of the outbreak,my country controlled the overall spread of the epidemic in a relatively short period of time.Faced with the same crisis,why did the grass-roots community governance in the two countries have very different epidemic prevention and control effects? What are the differences in the logic of local governance between the two countries?Through case analysis and comparative research,this paper finds that the prevention and control of urban grassroots communities in China has formed a highly organized mobilization system centered on the party committee and government,while urban grassroots communities in the United States are highly dependent on the voluntary service division of labor system.This is an extension of the“administrative-led” model of Chinese grassroots communities under normal conditions and the “citizen autonomy” model of American grassroots communities.The study believes that the differences in the above-mentioned governance mechanisms are rooted in the differences in the political culture of the two countries.The "rule of etiquette" ideology nurtured and formed by China’s farming civilization has shaped the governance tradition of maintaining social order at the grassroots level and obeying authority.As a result,the government plays a key role in governance affairs,thereby gaining the trust and cooperation of the residents,forming an administrative-led governance model,resulting in relatively good results in epidemic prevention and control.The difference is that,under the influence of the unique history of nation-building and the Puritan ideology brought by the early colonizers,the people of the United States generally focus more on individual freedom.A sufficient distance was maintained,and a governance model of citizen self-government was formed.As a result,in community epidemic prevention and control,residents believe more in the community that has a closer relationship with them than the government,which leads to a lack of unity in the allocation of epidemic prevention resources at the macro level,making it impossible to carry out unified actions beyond the community level.In the context of globalization,the state governance model is no longer limited to the "autonomy" of a small field.China and the United States have their own advantages and disadvantages under the conventional governance model.However,for sudden and large-scale governance problems,the political culture rooted in Chinese history has obvious mobilization power for the allocation of human,financial and material across the country.This is precisely the political and cultural gene of China’s institutional advantages,which has formed a governance model and governance effect that is different from other countries.