Farmers’ Political Cognition and Political Ability

【Abstract】In order to provide a new theoretical perspective for the academic research， the group measured political cognition on account of Almond scale. We had found that farmers’ political cognition is related to their subjective political ability but not to objective ability， at last we supposed elaborate village cadres’ function in giving political information publicity.

【Key words】Farmer；Political cognition；Political ability

1.Political Background

In 1982 our state promulgated the new constitution， and it firstly stressed that the political organization form of the villager autonomy institution was village committee. In 1997 the National People’s Congress adopted the Villager Committee Organization Law， it marked that our country grass-roots democratic political construction had gone into a new stage. By the end of 2014， there were about 650000 village committee organizations in rural， and at most 90% of them had draw up the villager autonomy standards. On the other hand， there were 30 provinces had formulated the New Village Committee Organization Law combined with their reality， the number of the model autonomous township reached 8000.

The villager autonomy system has an important effect on the rural development， the party and the state has paid much attention to it. On the background of the rural political reform， there will certain significance to discuss the relationship between farmers’ political cognition and political ability. At present， there are few results which from the empirical relationship to analysis the villager autonomy system. In order to provide a new theoretical perspective for the academic research， I plan to rationally test the correlation. It’s very useful to summarize the shortage and experience of the rural grassroots democracy institution and detailed describe the characteristics of famers’ political cognition and their ability.

2.Investigation Situation

The citizen political cognition scale of Almond was quoted in this study. Research group measure farmers’ political cognition from these 4 dimensions： the authority of the government， the contact of political affairs， the awareness of political information and the judgment of political problems. Moreover， taking into account the development level of rural economic， the group has also brought into the political channel index. The channel has deeply affected on farmers’ political awareness， TV is the main media tool for them to get current political news. Of course， some old farmers like to reading newspapers or listening to radio to get the state dynamic.

There are many different ways for farmers to obtain political information， such as the village cadres play a role as well. Along with the network popularization in countryside， network news has become the main tool for young peasants to be concerned with the state’s political life. The formation and change of farmers’ political attitude may be influenced by many factors， which meaning that the traditional style of socialization mode has been difficult to achieve effect. There has a very interesting phenomenon needs we to take attention， the information farmers can get always come from official organization， all most farmers don’t touch into the regional news.

After investigating about 500 farmers in 10 different rural places， the research group shares these findings. Firstly， the degree of farmers’ political cognition is on the high level. Farmers have a high recognition to the central government， and they have their own value opinions on important political issues. The tools to get political news is diversify， especially the network are more popular. Secondly， there have big differences in farmers’ political ability. Farmers are generally having strong subjective political ability， they are aware with the rural political development. But what’s hardly worthy of belief， the farmers’ objective political ability is very limited， and the degree of political participation is also relatively low. Thirdly， the farmer individual factors have a significant impact on their ability， for example， farmers’ sex， education level， economic income and so on.

3.A Case

In order to further understand the situation of farmers’ political cognition and their ability， I plan to take an investigation case. In October last year when we sent out the questionnaires in Zhejiang Province， our research group had interviewed a farmer Mr. Wang. His children were working in overseas， and he was taking care of grandsons at home. He almost every day watched news broadcast and always paid attention to the village political activities. When asked the situation participate in the village cadres selection， Mr. Wang said that because of had know nothing about the election process he didn’t vote several sessions. The information which government reports have a strong influence on farmers’ political ability， the government should elaborate village cadres’ function in giving political information publicity to farmers. As for the specific way to publicize， the village affairs conference can be the effective organization. [科]

【References】

[1]Joshua J.Dyck，Edward L.Lascher. Direct Democracy and Political Efficacy Reconsidered[J].Political Behavior，2009（3）.

[2]Mary M.Gergen，Kenneth J.Gergen. Positive aging： New images for a new age[J].Ageing International，2001（1）.