Community Volunteers' Associations in Contemporary Tianjin: multipurpose partners of the party–state
The Community Volunteers' Associations (CVAs) are among the oldest grassroots organizations in contemporary China and as such provide a valuable case for a study of China's fast-growing non-profit sector. The author defines CVAs as multipurpose partners of the party–state in its pursuit of social stability and maintenance of legitimacy. In this role, the CVAs have served three major tasks. They have provided social services, acted as a link between the party–state and urban residents, and served as a medium for shaping values. The article explores the definition and redefinition of these tasks as well as the actual operations of the associations since the late 1980s.
International influence and local response: understanding community involvement in urban heritage conservation in China
This paper explores the situation of community engagement in the heritage sector in China, which is facing increasing international pressure particularly through donor agencies. It is argued that government-led residents’ committees do not essentially serve the interest of the local communities, whilst grassroots civil societies and NGOs are, to a great extent regulated, by the prevailing political power. Given the situation of insufficient community involvement in the sector of cultural heritage conservation in China, local government has adopted the international approach introduced by donor agencies, but this has not resulted in power sharing and the state constrains community involvement within certain limits. This paper examines the situation of community involvement in heritage management in the city of Yangzhou.
Traditional Orientations and Political Participation in Three Chinese Societies
Based on three large-scale sample surveys in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, this study purports to delineate the relation between traditional political orientations and political participation. It is found that among all three societies, Chinese in the Mainland are most traditional. In general, the negative impact of traditional political orientations on political participation is small once education is controlled for. In particular, political participation in Hong Kong is more individually based, facilitated primarily by modernization pressures. In Taiwan, institutional factors such as democracy, elections and civic associations are paramount and are buttressed by a rising white-collar class. In Mainland China, traditional political orientations have a positive impact on participation and this impact stays much the same even after controlling for education. The positive impact can be explained by institutional interference whereby traditional political orientations exert influence differently on different modes of participation: negative on adversary and protest activities but positive on voting, campaign and appeal activities. The findings of this paper imply that the argument that Confucian political culture makes a democratic China impossible is incomplete and will become irrelevant.