AbstractsSociology

From the late 1970s, China has witnessed an enormous growth and development of NGOs. Different kinds of organizations began to emerge within major cities, including business associations, self-help organizations for economic production, new professional organizations, and local social welfare organizations. The transformation of China’s economy and society opens up opportunities for multi-level development of civil associations, not simply in the urban area, but more and more so in the rural area. In 2005, the central government launched a policy of rural reconstruction, which aimed at providing a broad framework to promote autonomous finance and self-sufficiency in service provisions at the village level. This new policy drive provides both opportunities and threats to local governance. For grassroots NGOs, this is an opportunity to develop themselves within a more relaxed environment. New cooperatives thus emerged under such circumstances. However, for local village administration, the emergence of such new cooperatives is in some ways a threat to existing power structure and authority in local governance. This thesis presents three cases of new cooperatives in Lankao County of Henan Province. It aims at analyzing the dynamics within these new cooperatives and how they affect the formation of social capital within these cooperatives. My central argument is that the development of these three cooperatives, though vary to some extent, however, they do carry important implications on understanding the emergence of civil society in China. vi, 179 leaves : ill. 30 cm. CityU Call Number: HN740.H5 L83 2008