Mediation and grassroots policing in China: Conflict resolution or social control?

IF 2.3 3区 社会学 Q1 AREA STUDIES China Information Pub Date : 2022-09-19 DOI:10.1177/0920203X221121716
Lingxiao Zhou
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Abstract

This article examines the practices of mediation that have become increasingly common in contemporary grassroots governance in China. The analysis focuses on the mode of governmentality embodied in the discourse on the ‘Fengqiao model’, which supplies a framework for hierarchizing and managing social conflict with the goal of keeping instability at bay. Based on 10 months of ethnographical research in various political-legal organizations within a single county, I found a grassroots governance apparatus that positions a recently invented institution – the Social Governance Centre – as the core organizational locus for coordinating a broadly distributed collection of daily operations aimed at preserving social stability. Analytically, I provide ideal-typical characterizations of three distinct conflict types – ordinary, abnormal, and tricky – to describe the discretionary decision-making by which local party-state operatives perceive and react to social conflicts based on their implications for the value of social stability. Drawn from conversations in the ethnographic literature on policing, this study of street-level mediation contributes to our understanding of how social conflict is rendered policeable, and it provides a case study of the use of mediation as a mode of police work in an authoritarian context.
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调解与中国基层警务:冲突解决还是社会控制?
本文考察了在当代中国基层治理中日益普遍的调解实践。分析的重点是“凤桥模式”话语中体现的治理模式,该模式提供了一个框架,用于分级和管理社会冲突,目标是保持不稳定。基于对一个国家内各种政法组织的10个月的民族志研究,我发现了一个基层治理机构,它将一个新发明的机构——社会治理中心——定位为协调广泛分布的日常行动的核心组织场所,旨在维护社会稳定。分析上,我提供了三种截然不同的冲突类型——普通、异常和棘手——的理想典型特征,以描述地方党国特工根据其对社会稳定价值的影响来感知和应对社会冲突的自由裁量决策。从民族志文献中关于警务的对话中,这项关于街头调解的研究有助于我们理解社会冲突是如何变得可警务的,它提供了一个在威权背景下使用调解作为警察工作模式的案例研究。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
China Information
China Information AREA STUDIES-
CiteScore
3.50
自引率
4.80%
发文量
38
期刊介绍: China Information presents timely and in-depth analyses of major developments in contemporary China and overseas Chinese communities in the areas of politics, economics, law, ecology, culture, and society, including literature and the arts. China Information pays special attention to views and areas that do not receive sufficient attention in the mainstream discourse on contemporary China. It encourages discussion and debate between different academic traditions, offers a platform to express controversial and dissenting opinions, and promotes research that is historically sensitive and contemporarily relevant.
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