As a modern bureaucratic body, community-level government is not adequately institutionalized. The crux for such institutional insufficiency features three facets.
The feature of corporatization-based community-level government is mainly reflected by taking economic growth and especially fiscal revenue as the utmost driver.
The process of reform is one of remaking institutional arrangements. In terms of rural reform, the first fundamental methodological question is what is the basis for making institutional arrangements.
In the process of social transition, there have arisen various new social problems and social demands. Solving these problems and meeting these demands also depend on, apart from government efforts, organized social forces.
Whether the people could participate in political affairs in wider areas and on a larger scale are gauges for measuring democratic development level.
Democracy is by itself a value and embodies the essential requirement of socialism. The construction of democratic politics should not be in a utilitarian manner or with an absolute thinking.
In reviewing China’s community-level democracy progress since reform and opening-up, we may find on one hand, the social foundation of democracy progress is rapidly expanding and numerous new forces are becoming the propeller for democratization.
The reports delivered at the 15th and 16th National Congresses of the Communist Party of China took expanding community-level democracy and fully motivating the people as a key task of the political system reform.