Democracy in China. Some people, especially in some Western countries, do not
believe it even exists. But it does, and journalist Zhang Yingping has written a
new book about it.
The book will probably not be a commercial hit in a market increasingly
inundated by leisure-reading or money-making titles, both translated and
home-brewed. But it will have a place in China's history because it reports on
democracy as practised in the countryside in East China's Zhejiang Province.
Its Chinese title reads: "What Has Happened in Zhejiang: Democratic Life
During an Era of Transition." Its English title, however, is simply "Democracy
in Zhejiang," reflecting obvious inspiration from "Democracy in America," a
19th-century classic by Alexis de Tocqueville, a Frenchman who reported on
democracy in the early United States.
Besides admiring de Tocqueville, Zhang, 31, who works for the
Chinese-language weekly Economic Observer, is also eager to challenge some
commonly-held myths about China's grass-roots politics.
"People seem to have many negative stories to tell about rural China, but
each of them knows about only one or two cases," Zhang said. "But if you try to
piece together a broad picture by using those stories which admittedly are all
true you end up getting something that gives you a feeling that's different from
reality."
But what is the reality? "That's the thing that I wanted to find out," Zhang
said.
"I have been covering rural development since 1999, and the reality at least,
as far as I can see from the relatively well-off and better-educated communities
in the Yangtze River Delta is far from dark. Nor is it simply black and white."
He added: "Despite so many things happening in modern China, the grass-roots
level government still has to accommodate, if not rely on, the traditional
definition of moral authority."
For years, not many investigative pieces were published about democracy of
that sort a subject treated as either too trivial by the scholars busy
translating the thick volumes of Western political science or as not interesting
by the journalists always chasing such sensations as the largest growth in gross
domestic product in the world or China's worst industrial hazards.
But for Zhang, those subjects pale in comparison to social innovations in the
Zhejiang countryside, which are designed to make supervision of the government
more effective, and make officials more accountable.
They include the pledges of prospective local government leaders to set up
community welfare funds, and legislators directly contributing columns in
newspapers, whereas media organizations elsewhere in the country are more often
guided by the executive branch of the government.
Some elected officials are even required to take out special insurance
policies to guard against any mistakes they make in their roles.
Zhang tells the tale in his book of a visit he made to Shacheng County of
Wenzhou.
A local farmer there explained that he had enjoyed 27 free lunches in the
summer of 2002, when candidates for the leadership of his village held free
banquets to all voters during the election campaign.
"It would be terrific if there was an election for the village head every
year," said the farmer. He was sorry that village heads were only voted for
every three years in China.
Being the village head is the dream of many rich men in Zhejiang's
countryside, who compete fiercely to get the position in spite of the fact that
the position is for a grass-roots administration for self-governance.
Yang Baowei, who owns a pencil factory in Shangyang Village in Chengxi
County, Yiwu, had an amateur band beating drums and gongs to accompany him when
he put up dozens of bright red election posters around his village in January
2002.
On the posters, he pledged he would donate 100,000 yuan (US$12,500) to have a
road built in the village if he was voted village head.
He also promised to donate all of his salary as village head to an
entertainment centre, established for senior citizens in his village.
The entrepreneur beat other candidates, including the man in power at the
time, to be elected to the post two months later.
As more and more rich men began running their own villages, a special
regulation came into force in Ruian of Zhejiang, requesting that elected village
heads sign insurance agreements in case their decisions adversely affected the
village.
Zhang tells in his book how Wang Xiantao, head of Hongguang Village, Xinsheng
County of Ruian, showed him a contract he signed with the representative of
residents in his village in 2002, in accordance with the regulation.
In the contract, Wang agreed that he would compensate public funds with his
own money if he were to make any decision with the purpose of seeking personal
interest or that endangered public money.
Zhang also lavishes praise in the book on legislators who have made good use
of the local news media in Wenzhou.
The city's People's Congress initially planned to only open a column at the
website of Wenzhou News, which is hosted by the municipal government. But
hearing of its intention, a senior editor at Wenzhou Metropolitan News visited
the congress and persuaded it to produce a column in his newspaper as well as
the website.
After the first columns appeared in July 2003, editors at Wenzhou Television
Station visited the congress. In September, the station launched a new
programme, "Face-to-Face Facts," in which local congress deputies had
face-to-face dialogue with government officials.
Since then, the 30-minute programme has been broadcast at 8 o'clock every
Sunday, and then rebroadcast three times during the week.
The newspaper columns and TV programmes have attracted so much attention from
both the public and the government that local entrepreneurs have been more than
happy to pay for advertisements.
These entrepreneurs are also finding the congress a place for help when they
are unsatisfied with the government's work.
In one case, a private entrepreneur publicized his diaries in a congress
programme on TV in October 2003.
He recorded a period of 70 days, in which he visited a host of offices at the
county government to try to gain approval to have his new factory built. He
received no clear replies from any of them.
Soon after his programme was broadcast, the entrepreneur was finally given
planning permission by those government organs mentioned in the diaries.
The local legislators also benefited from playing active roles in the media,
Zhang explains in his book.
More than 100 people's congress deputies have appeared in the congress
programmes on TV and they are becoming more and more confident and skilful in
using their political rights.
In one programme broadcast in May 2004, three deputies questioned a
vice-mayor of Leqing in Wenzhou over a bus terminal that was still not being
used more than six months after it was completed.
"The government has abused its power in the case," they said. "It will
greatly reduce the confidence of the public in the honesty and capability of
local government officials."
One trend that has spread is "Min Zhu Ken Tan Hui," or "Meetings of
Democratic, Heart-to-heart Conversations," which originated in Wenling in June
1999.
They began when some municipal government officials were given the task of
organizing routine meetings between farmers and government officials.
To make these meetings sound more attractive, the officials told farmers that
they would have the opportunity to speak on almost every aspect of government
work by talking with the top leaders of their districts.
Farmers used the opportunity to talk about topics ranging from conflicts with
village heads to a rise in the price of tap water.
The meetings proved such a success that they have since been held on a
regular basis by different levels of the government in Wenling, and duplicated
by other cities in Zhejiang.
Zhang is so in tune with Zhejiang's rural life that some people thought he
was native to the area.
"But, actually I am not," he said. "I am just a journalist. My beat is
politics and law. And I've been stationed in the Yangtze Delta for a long time."
However, just like many innovations in everyday life going unnoticed, many
people in the big cities tend to pour scorn on what the country people are
doing. Even the publisher of the book admitted to China Daily that it was not
selling as well as Zhang's previous ones.
Zhang said many reviewers argued against his claim that business people could
be good public officials as well.
But he added that his book allowed readers to see that a unique class of
private entrepreneurs does exist in Zhejiang's countryside "which may not hold
true in other places," he hastened to add - who do have a moral commitment to
their neighbours and communities' well-being, thanks to their traditional
upbringing.
Some reviewers argued that democracy was just wishful thinking without China
changing more radically from its traditions. To them, Zhang said: "I'm not
gifted in defending or attacking pure theories. I'm just a journalist. I trust
only what I see."
(China Daily 05/09/2006 page1)