Going to the Polls

Successful village elections show a deeply rooted democracy By Lan Xinzhen

Going to the Polls

Successful village elections show a deeply rooted democracy By Lan Xinzhen

On December 18, farmers in Lichang Village, Zuoquan County in north China’s Shanxi Province, elected the villagers’ committee.

According to the Organic Law of Villagers’ Committees of China, the villagers’committee is the primary mass organization of self-government, in which the villagers manage their own affairs, educate themselves and serve their own needs and in which election are conducted, decisions adopted, administration maintained and supervision exercised by democratic means. Any villager at or above the age of 18 shall have the right to elect and stand for election.

Last November, an 11-member electoral committee was set up by Lichang villagers to register voters and verify the quali fi cations of candidates for the new villagers’ committee according to law and election rules. The fi nal candidates were announced 10 days ahead of the polling day.

Direct election

When Liu Shengfa came to the polling booth at 9 a.m., he saw many villagers had already arrived. Most of them squatted against the wall, enjoying the sunshine and chatting while waiting for others to arrive. Liu squatted down and joined their conversations.

The snow that had fallen on the village not long ago was still on the roofs, on the roadsides and in the fields. The winters in Shanxi are cold, but the cold weather did not dampen villagers’ enthusiasm to vote.

At around 9:30 a.m. the election of fi cially started.

Three members of the electoral committee examined the ballot box, which was made out of a carton once used to hold a desktop computer. The empty carton was coated with red paper. Election supervisors then told villagers how to fi ll out their ballots.

There were two types of ballots, in pink and yellow. The pink ones were used to elect chairman of the villagers’ committee and the yellow ones were for two other committee members who would be selected out of three candidates.

The polling booth was in the of fi ce of the villagers’ committee, a two-storey building.Voters registered and exchanged their voting certi fi cates for ballots on the fi rst fl oor. They then went to the second fl oor to fi ll out their ballots in either one of the two voting rooms.Only one person was allowed to enter at a time. After fi lling out their ballots, the voters cast them into the ballot box that was placed in the corner of the corridor, and was guarded by members of the electoral committee.

Very few young people came to the ballot booth. Most of the voters casting ballots were middle-aged and senior residents.

Since proxy voting is legally allowed,almost everyone present at the voting cast ballots on behalf of their absent younger relatives. The 65-year-old Liu said that senior citizens had already called their children working away from home and received agreement on which candidates to vote for.

The voting concluded at 11:30 a.m. There were 368 registered voters in the village and the vote count showed that 363 votes had been cast. The electoral committee announced that the election procedure was legal and the election result would be effective.

The election results were announced at 4 p.m. on the same day. Song Xianglin was unanimously elected as chairman of the villagers’ committee, with Fan Lina and Yang Shubao as committee members.

“These are the wishes of the villagers.No government department has the right to tamper with the election procedure or result,”said Zhang Feng, Deputy Director of the Publicity Department of the Zuoquan County Committee of the Communist Party of China.

After the election result was announced,the electoral committee was automatically dissolved.

Ambitious leader

The newly elected villagers’ committee chairman, Song Xianglin, 35, was the only candidate nominated for the position in the election, and had already served at the position for two consecutive terms between December 2005 and December 2011. The Organic Law of Villagers’ Committees stipulates that the villagers’ committee chairman serves three years each term and can seek reelection.

ON-SITE INSTRUCTION:An electoral committee member explains the procedure for fi lling out a ballot to voters in Lichang Village on December 18,2011

According to Zhang, it is not unusual for a village to have only one candidate for the chairmanship of villagers’ committee.

“In economically developed villages, the chairmanship of the villagers’ committee is highly sought after; whereas in less developed villages, many villagers are reluctant to run for the position for fear that holding the position will prevent them from migrating to cities to make money. Sometimes, villagers find themselves having to convince the candidate they have nominated to run,” Zhang said.

In his latest election campaign, Song pledged to increase the annual per-capita net income of Lichang villagers to 5,000 yuan ($769) in three years, up from 1,400 yuan ($215) in 2011.

Lichang is not well-endowed with natural resources and villagers primarily make their living from the fields. In Song’s first two tenures, Lichang villagers’ annual per-capita net income increased from 400 yuan ($61) to 1,400 yuan. But it was mainly achieved by encouraging young people to fi nd work in cities and remit money to the village.

Though it is not an easy task to double the villagers’ annual per-capita net income in three years, Song said he was confident of achieving the goal by developing the agricultural products processing industry. In a campaign speech, Song said he had negotiated with food companies in neighboring counties and cities about the possibility of their opening processing factories in Lichang.

“If factories could be brought to the village, they would boost the village’s economic development, and villagers would be able to fi nd jobs without leaving the village,” he said.

Evolving democracy

At the end of the 1970s, China implemented the reform and opening-up policy. Land was contracted out to individual farmers under the household responsibility system.

After the reform, production teams were abolished and production team leaders no longer governed villages. However, village-level administration is needed to inform villagers of government policies, convey villagers’complaints and suggestions to upper-level governments, sign land contracts and resolve con fl icts between villagers.

In the early 1980s, in some villages in southwest China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, villagers spontaneously established villagers’ committees to handle their affairs.

The first such spontaneous self-governing body was set up in February 1980 in Guozuo Village in Yishan County. Before land was contracted out, the village had six production teams.After the reform, villagers decided to elect a villagers’ committee to practice self-governance.The candidates in the first election were six former production team leaders and a villager.Finally, voters elected fi ve people to the villagers’ committee, including a chairman, a vice chairman and three members.

The Constitution passed in December 1982 legitimized villagers’ committees. From 1983 onward, more and more villages in China began to elect villagers’ committees,and by 1985, villagers committees had been set up nationwide.

To standardize these local elections, in 1987 the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature,enacted the Organic Law of Villagers’Committees, which lays down the legal framework for villagers’ committee elections.

In 1988, Shanxi held its first villagers’committee elections. Lichang villager Liu said he was then so inexperienced that he slavishly followed others’ suggestions. However, the second time he participated in the election in 1993, he made his own choice. After 1993,villagers’ committee elections have become a triennial event in Shanxi. So far, Liu has participated in seven such elections.

Lu Xueyi, former Director of the Institute of Sociology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, believes the villagers’committee system is an example of rural grassroots democracy with Chinese characteristics. He said that the system has achieved reasonably good results.

In some exceptional cases villagers’committee elections have been affected by powerful clans and bribery scandals.

Zhang said that such problems also exist in elections in Western countries, and they are worldwide problems. “China’s village elections are at a preliminary stage, and farmers still do not have a good awareness of democracy. Once a problematic election is found,relevant government departments will investigate and punish the people involved and a reelection will be organized,” he said.