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Li Xueju: Contributor to China's Grass-Roots Democracy
It still seems incredible to Li Xueju when he recalls the scene one decade ago: a dozen farmers from North China's Liaoning Province came to the Ministry of Civil Affairs in Beijing to bring a lawsuit against their village committee because it failed to follow the election procedure.
The farmers could even recite the "Provisional Law on the Organization of Villagers' Committees" to the letter.
The farmers told Li Xueju, who was then an official with the Ministry of Civil Affairs, that the law provided a kind of protection, as well as a kind of right for them.
Li Xueju, now Deputy Secretary and Standing Committee member of Communist Party of China (CPC) Chongqing Municipal Committee, told Xinhua: "After twelve years' exploration, the system of villagers administrating their own affairs is on the legal trail, which has also become a grass-root democracy model with Chinese characteristics.
Since the People's Public of China was founded in 1949, the country has experienced a period of difficulty in grass-root democracy construction, noted Zhan Chengfu, an official for grass-root democracy from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, adding that with the abolishment of the people's commune system, China started in 1978 the village committee system which let villagers running their own affairs.
The village committees, the most grass-roots mass organization in Chinese rural areas, govern the most important life and production elements including money, grain, house and land.
In 1988, China promulgated the Provisional Law on the Organization of Villagers' Committees, which has endowed the country's 900 million farmers with the right to elect their village governors.
Li Xueju also pointed out that if implementing a system of contracted responsibilities based on the household opened the door of China's economic reform system, villagers administrating their own affairs is signal of rural grass-roots democracy reform.
The Ministry of Civil Affairs issued a circular in 1990 asking the country's rural areas to extend the policy of villager administration of their own affairs.
As an official in charge of the work, Li Xueju came to do research in rural areas at least four months a year, and organized training classes for the work. He was called the "pilot of the grass-roots democracy experimental field".
"All my experience comes from the grass-roots, from the invention of people", said Li who already had over two decades working experience of rural work.
In Zhangqiu county of Shandong Province, villagers formulated Methods on Village-level Standard Management based on their practice, which laid a foundation for today's Regulation on Villager Administrating Their Own Affairs.
Even today, reports written by Li Xueju on the policies of villagers administrating their own affairs are still important materials for those engaging in work of grass-roots democracy.
Chinese farmers, who have become rich since the country adopted the policy of opening up to the outside world in 1978, have showed unusual enthusiasm towards the political rights they have been given.
In many areas, over 95 percent of farmers participate in the village election work. The farmers told Li that village leaders should be elected directly by villagers.
Words that have become important components of grass-roots democracy include, "Democratic decision", "democratic management" and "Haixuan", which means that each person in a village has an opportunity to nominate a particular person he or she trusts, unlike before when the candidate needed to be nominated by a political party or at least by a ten-voter group.
"Villagers administrating their own affairs has been a great contribution of Chinese farmers to the country's democracy construction," said Li.
In 1998, China promulgated the new Law on the Organization of Villagers' Committees. To date, 24 provinces in China have participated in electing village committees, with over 600 million farmers involved.
The 55-year-old Li Xueju still remembers: In a small village, when the village leader candidates promised that he would sell his TV and collect money to set up a factory for his village, all the farmers on the spot were filled with excitement, the applauds and hurrah soared to the clouds.
"My eyes were blurred, for at that moment, I saw clearly the hope of Chinese rural areas", Li recalled.
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