Analysis on Causes of "Micro-corruption" of Rural Cadres in China and Recommendations

Anti-corruption Research Center, Railway Policy College, Zhengzhou 450053, China

AbstractThis paper mainly introduced major manifestations of corruption of rural cadres in China, and analyzed causes of "micro-corruption" in rural areas. On the basis of analysis, it came up with pertinent recommendations for regulating "micro-corruption" of rural cadres, including improving the overall quality of village cadres, improving treatment of rural grass-roots cadres, improving grass-roots supervision system, activating the functions of rural discipline inspection commissioners, and reinforcing the punishment of "micro-corruption".

Key wordsChina, Rural cadres, Micro-corruption, Recommendations

1 Introduction

The corruption involved in grass-roots cadres in rural areas is a "trifle", but this trifle involved in rural grass-roots cadres is a big matter that happens to the villagers, because the corruption is closely related to the masses themselves. Compared with the "Tigers" (big corrupt officials) far away from rural areas, common people do not have such personal experience and feelings. For the village cadres who deal with village matters all day long, their corruption is often based on the interests of the common people and will be resented by the masses. President Xi Jinping said that the "micro-corruption" may also become a "big evil"[1].

2 Current analysis of "micro-corruption" of rural cadres in China

2.1 Cadres standing high above the masses and disregarding the masses

Some grass-roots cadres are sluggish, inactive, and like to put off matters of the masses. Some cadres do personal or private affairs during work, but disregard letters and visits from the masses, ignore complaints of the common people, and find various grounds to shirk the responsibility. Their service awareness and responsibility awareness are very weak. Such problem is common in rural areas of China.

2.2 Misappropriation of public funds

In recent years, China has been constantly strengthening the support for agriculture, farmers, and rural areas. However, in some areas, while implementing the national policy of benefiting agriculture, they just juggle things, the policies are not open, not implemented promptly, or just not in place. Some grass-roots cadres swindled all kinds of subsidy funds directly or in concealed manner by taking measures to conceal facts to the common masses; some cadres retained special compensation funds and diverted special funds for other purposes."

2.3 New means and concealed consumption

The consumption of public funds is diversified and concealed, changing from the hotels and restaurants to countryside farmhouses and canteens, and homes of cadres. Some cadres included the public funds for consumption into the reimbursement of meetings, and some administrative villages had high hospitality expenses. In terms of the use of public cars, there are still problems of using public cars for private purposes. Even in remote rural areas, granting of disaster relief supplies and assistance of poverty-stricken people are not fair and there is problem of benefiting friends and relatives. Some village cadres are too self-interested. They do not comply with related regulations, become corrupt and degenerate and misappropriate public funds for illegal activities.

2.4 Benefiting friends and relatives and reaping profits

China is a large traditional agricultural country. The collection of traditional rural areas is mainly connected through geographical, blood, and marriage. Therefore, the relationship between village cadres and villagers is inevitably different for villagers. Some village cadres first consider their family members, relatives, and friends when there are poverty alleviation policies for low income families and poor households, to seek profits for themselves and their relatives and friends. Instead, they disregard interests of other villagers. When other villagers have requests, village cadres will take gift or profit as precondition. For example, cigarette, wine, milk, having dinner. These matters may be not noticeable, but they will cause distrust of the farmers in the party, and misunderstanding of the party’s philosophy of serving the people.

3 Causes for "micro-corruption" of rural cadres in China

It is known that the matters are the results of joint action of internal and external causes. Likewise, the "micro-corruption" of grass-roots cadres is also the result of internal and external causes. As the proverb goes, flies go for cracked eggs. The low comprehensive quality of rural cadres and the vacancy of a legal supervision system will aggravate the corruption awareness of village cadres. Therefore, fighting "micro-corruption" is a top priority of anti-corruption in rural areas.

3.1 Inadequate cultivation and low educational level of village cadres

In rural areas, due to the difference in the educational level, many village cadres lack comprehensive understanding of rural policies. There are deviations in the rural development trend and understanding of market information. They do not fully understand the working principle of "stressing on both hands", they fail to well implement some regulations of the central government. In summary, weak political and ideological awareness is a major cause for frequent occurrences of "micro-corruption" of village cadres.

3.2 Excessive concentration of powers in few village cadres

In the rural areas, village cadres hold absolute powers and authorities, and there is no power to restrain them. As a result, they have the final say in any decision-making, and the villagers have no sense of decision-making. In consequence, the loopholes are getting bigger and there are more and more problems, and problems are worse and worse.

3.3 Loose financial management at the grassroots level

In recent years, rural financial management has become stagnated, failed to solve the problem of financial disclosure, and even some cadres have the final say. All of these have slowly led to corruption. When deciding on major matters in the party and in the village, some teams of "two committees" engage in "black-box operations", do not listen to villagers’ opinions beforehand, and do not give any information during the event, and do not make public the results afterwards. In some villages, some village accounts are operated by the secretary of the village branch at will. The account income has no basis, and account expenditure has no plan or budget. For the funds allocated by the superior finance for the village collective, they just open account or misappropriate public funds at will.

3.4 Supervision system not in place

In respect of the supervision by the masses, the villagers are afraid of causing trouble and ignore some of the village cadres’ behaviors. The villagers avoid trouble whenever possible, then they are reluctant to supervise. They are unwilling to supervise and do not want to supervise. As a result, it fosters corruption of village cadres to a certain extent.

3.5 Insufficient party-style and clean government education

At present, our understanding of the achievements in the clean government work in rural areas is one-sided. It just focuses on the investigation and prosecution of corruption cases. Some areas seldom conduct propagation of clean government work. In addition, the understanding of clean government education is insufficient. Besides, even there is clean government education, some activities just remain in form. There are no good innovations in the content. All are some old knowledge. They don’t introduce new ones and they only do superficial work. The effect is self-evident.

4 Recommendations for control of "micro-corruption" of rural cadres in China

4.1 Improving the overall quality of rural cadres

The rural cadres have problems in their ideological style. The fundamental reason is that the political quality and ability are not high. Therefore, strengthening the clean government education and training effort at grass-roots level is the major work of rural anti-corruption work. It is recommended to improve the overall quality of grass-roots party members, and further strengthen their theoretical and ideological ability, to better contribute themselves to rural cause. It is required to combine actual situations of party members in rural areas. Specifically, it is recommended to seek truth from facts, combine actual situation of rural areas, and give prominence to main points and difficult points of education, so as to better make decisions. Party members in rural areas work in rural areas for a long time, have dealings with farmers everyday, every move and act of them are seen by the masses. Therefore, improving the overall quality of village cadres is favorable for maintaining the image of the party.

4.2 Improving the treatment of rural cadres

The fundamental problem of "micro-corruption" lies in the benefit driving. Therefore, it is recommended to improve the political treatment of rural cadres, make rural cadres have objectives, raise their influence power, and encourage rural grass-roots cadres to serve the masses. In terms of participating in and discussing government and political affairs, all levels of representatives from Party committees, people’s congress deputies, and members of the CPPCC actively participate. College students are encouraged to work in rural areas, so as to obtain more preferential policies, increase their wages, eliminate their worries, ensure their economic benefits, so as to prevent them from undermining the image of the party and the state just for some petty profits. Besides, it is recommended to gradually increase the subsidy for them and eliminate their worries.

4.3 Improving grass-roots supervision system, activating the functions of rural discipline inspection commissioners

It is recommended to collect various grass-roots information by many means. For example, holding meetings, regularly visiting party members and the masses, discussing affairs, and promptly inspecting financial instruments. It is recommended to widely collect information, set up report and complaint box, give certain awards for the masses with great contribution, and actively bring into play the role of rural discipline inspection commissioners. In the first place, it is recommended to fully equip the rural discipline inspection commissioners, implement the obligations of the discipline inspection commissioners, supervise the government responsibility, and provide active cooperation when dealing with investigation and prosecution cases of rural cadres. Next, every village should set up clean government supervisors, to supervise the disclosure of village affairs, clean government work, to form the supervision network at three levels (villages, towns, and counties), and fill the gap of no supervision at the village level. At last, it is recommended to actively promote the vocational training of village-level discipline inspection personnel, optimize the age and knowledge structure of discipline inspection cadres, and give full play to their role in building grass-roots and clean government in rural areas.

4.4 Reinforcing the punishment of "micro-corruption"

It is recommended to constantly undertake the campaign of "killing flies" (fighting corrupt elements), supervise the subsidy funds allocated by the state for rural organizations, collectives, the masses, and supervise funds allocated for agricultural production, house renovation, disaster relief, pollution control, special care, and grass-roots law enforcement[3]. Besides, it is recommended to seriously investigate and punish corrupt elements of "micro-corruption", and reinforce the punishment of ant moving style corruption. There is no difference in the size of corruption. As long as it is within the scope of the disciplinary inspection and supervision department, it should be investigated thoroughly. In the meantime, it is recommended to make full use of Internet to disclose the case investigation results, disclose the specific cases in violation of the work style, and seriously inhibit the behavior of party members. For rural cadres that violate the laws and regulations, it is required to investigate and prosecute in compliance with laws, so as to make rural cadres concentrate their efforts on serving the masses.

In summary, rural cadres are important cells of the party to govern the state in compliance with laws. Only when they are healthy and active, may the whole body of the Party and the state develop better. If rural cadres care about their own benefits and interests, and place themselves above the masses, the corruption will spread like cancer cells. Even if the heart of the whole body is healthy and active, the whole body will eventually be perished. In all, it is required to curb the "micro-corruption" of rural cadres, but closely combine their self-discipline and their benefits with the benefits of the collective and the state, to make the masses feel the care and service of the party and the government.