The Formation Path of Moral Authority of Village Leaders

General Secretary Jinping Xi put forward the ‘Implementation Strategy for Rural Revitalization’ at the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. This is the first time that the Party Central Committee has raised the rural issue into a strategic issue. It proposed rural revitalization along with regional coordinated development and healthy China as a strategy for national development. Talents are the key to rural revitalization. As the ‘key minority’ of villages, village leaders have a crucial influence on rural development. This paper adheres to the basic standpoint of historical materialism and grasps the ethical relationship and moral life changes between village leaders and villages from the production and lifestyle of Chinese rural society. In the specific research process, the article uses the methods of text analysis, empirical research, and interdisciplinary method to conduct an ethical analysis of the village leaders' governance of the village during the transition process. The article pointed out that in the process of social transformation, some village leaders have gone astray into the evil path of ‘village hegemony’, ‘profit-sharing’ and ‘lazy politics’ by pursuing excessive personal gains. The reconstruction of moral authority by village leaders in the new era needs to start from the three dimensions of bottom line ethics, responsibility ethics and virtue ethics, stick to the interests of villagers, promote the development of villages, and consciously give back to the villages.


Introduction
General secretary Jinping Xi has stressed that 'If we want rural areas to develop rapidly, it is important to have a good leading group and a good leader'. This conclusion clarifies the relationship between village leaders and rural development, pointing out the significance of village leaders to rural development. The village leader is the commander of the collective behavior of the villagers, representing the overall interests of the village externally, and dealing with the internal affairs of the village as the leader internally. Moral authority is the value basis for village leaders to play a role.

The Village Leader That Lacks Moral Character
As village leaders, they should play the key role of "key minority" in the practice of rural revitalization. In the process of social transformation, in the face of the temptation of interests, some village leaders break the moral bottom line, unload the responsibilities of leaders, violate the ethics and morality, move towards the opposite of the villagers and hinder the development of the village.

'Village-Bully Type' Village Cadres
'Village-bully type' village cadres refer to those village leaders who do not care about the feelings of the village and use violence, intimidation, coercion, inducement and other unreasonable ways to treat peasants in the same village on the grounds of performing the tasks of their superiors. Generally speaking, this part of the village cadres have both the support of the superior power, and the support of the underworld forces, easy to form 'dominate' monopoly power in the countryside.
This phenomenon is not a unique product of the current society, but rather a 'problem left over from history'. In mid and late 1990s, confiscating the agricultural tax has become the main task of the rural cadres, at the same time, "the more difficult it is to collect taxes, close not taxes and fees, and the more I want to complete the taxes and fees to evaluation task village cadres", even for not on time according to the amount collected in some places of the agricultural tax and surcharge village cadres to take 'one ticket is overruled make', leading to a large number of village cadres who don't want to offend the villagers left the village in the political arena. [1] Faced with this situation, the grassroots government began to support the villager who did not care about the village friendship as the village cadres, and used 'more interests to induce the village cadres to take the risk of offending the villagers to collect taxes and fees from the farmers'. [2] This part of 'village-bully type' village cadres rely on the underworld background, in forcing the villagers to pay taxes and fees at the same time using public funds to eat and drink, and for their own wealth. As they can complete confiscating the required taxes and fees on time, the county and township governments generally turn a blind eye to this, which further leads to the deterioration of the relationship between cadres and the masses. 'The more serious the contradiction between cadres and masses is, the more difficult it is to collect taxes and fees, and the more drastic measures taken by the township government for the village cadres' tax assistance, the more extreme it will be', constantly stimulating the desire for profit of 'village-dominant' village cadres and acquiescing to the special means used by 'village-dominant' village cadres, thus creating a vicious circle. [3] As predators in the villagers' eyes, 'Village-bully type' village cadres, use with the authority of the grass-roots government and underworld forces, on the one hand, forcing farmers to pay high taxes, on the other hand to accumulate wealth for themselves, in the process of the rural collective property gradually into the private sector, debt in the name of the country is also growing, forcing farmers to complain, even some of the desperate poor only by death. For a short time, Chinese villages fell into the awkward situation of 'the countryside is really poor, farmers are really suffering, and agriculture is really dangerous'. [4] At the beginning of the 21st century, the state made the decision to cancel the agricultural tax and its surtax, which effectively alleviated the contradiction between the village cadres and villagers, prompting a large number of 'village-dominant' village cadres to disappear from the village. It should be pointed out that although the abolition of agricultural tax and its surtax can effectively destroy the interest chain existing in the 'dominant' village cadres, from the perspective of ethics, it will still lead to the emergence of "dominant" village cadres in other forms to some extent if the moral character of village cadres is not restrained. At present, in some villages, there are both village cadres who directly ask farmers to call them 'long live', and village cadres who illegally collect protection fees from farmers. These 'village-bully' village cadres 'manipulate elections, set up casinos, violently resist laws, and commandeered resources, presenting the 'four characteristics' of political chaos, resistance to laws, money control and crime'. [5]

'Profit-Sharing' Village Cadres
With the abolition of agricultural tax and its surtax, the state continuously increases the investment in villages to support rural construction in order to solve the problem of rural infrastructure and public goods. The transfer of a large number of resources to the village effectively alleviates the contradiction between supply and demand in the village as a whole, changes the appearance of the village, and improves the production and living quality of farmers. However, in this process, it also creates convenience for village cadres to seek personal interests. In the top-down resource transfer process, some village cadres form a relatively stable profit sharing order with the superior departments, encroach on the interests of the village, and thus having a negative impact on rural governance. Different regions and villages in different situations have differentiated demands for infrastructure and public goods. It is difficult for the state to operate with a unified standard in the process of resource transfer. Active and effective resource transfer must take care of local moral knowledge of different villages. Ideally, allocating reasonable resources to each according to his need can stimulate rural development, however, although 'as the certain measures of benefiting and helping farmers are gradually going into overdrive, the grass-roots class can gain considerable project funding, but from the construction of the project funds of all project proportion of the total amount of money needed to look, the scarcity of project indicators which are available to towns also exist'. [6] In the case of limited resources and extensive demands, local governments play an important role in the process of national resource transfer, and have an important impact on practical issues such as how to allocate and use the resources transferred from the state to the local government. Based on the objective conditions, some village cadres started, 'run up project' in the process, 'if you can find in the master project department such as the relationship between classmates fellow villagers, connection through bribes, even though the rural collective doesn't really provide matching, superiors may award money down. As for whether the project can meet the acceptance requirements, it may be dealt with through various adaptations, such as integrating different award and subsidy projects and dealing with their acceptance respectively. [7] In the process that the country transfers resources from top to bottom to the village, the village cadres start to build a bottom-up relationship network around project resources, thus forming a 'new type of interest community that includes more extensive personnel, closer interest connection and hidden interest, and this stable interest community constitutes a profit-sharing order'. [8] In this kind of benefiting order, although the village cadres and looting were not directly to the farmers, but once did order form and curing, its members will be for the purpose of the community of interests, from rural actual development needs, will be transferred to the national resources to achieve the interests of the internal parts, objectively to encroach on the interests of farmers, is not conducive to the promotion of rural governance.

'Lazy Politics' Village Cadres
In contrast with 'village bully type' village cadres and 'profit-sharing type' village cadres, there are also 'lazy politics type' village cadres. This part of the village cadres take the principle of 'more than one thing is better than less than one thing', they are indifferent to things related to the interests of farmers and lack of responsibility as village cadres.
With the abolition of agricultural tax and its surtax, village cadres no longer need to collect taxes and fees from farmers. At the same time, village cadres also have an excuse not to respond to the needs of farmers. In the past, village cadres had to collect taxes and fees from farmers under pressure from their superiors. Under the restriction of this system, village cadres need to deal with farmers frequently and try their best to solve their difficulties in production and life, so as to win their recognition and encourage them to actively pay agricultural tax and related taxes. The abolition of the agricultural tax changed the long-term relationship between village cadres and farmers. Without the pressure of taxes and fees, some village cadres lacked the initiative to contact the value demands of farmers and turned a deaf ear to the difficulties of farmers' daily production and life.
Mentioned in the research of the villagers: before hand over agricultural, village cadres no matter how to say and beg, drains is broken, the road is not good, they can help to get it more or less, if they don't make, we have reason not to pay tax, is they didn't fix canal anyway, there is no water the crops how long, how long don't come out crops Jiao Liang. Don't pay tax now, the burden of an common people is really light, but irrigate, build a road these want an oneself to solve however, go looking for village cadre, village cadre says to do not have money, let an oneself solve, where does an common people have so much money. (interview record with a 46-year-old female villager at JN village home in Xuzhou, Jiangsu province from 12:50 to 13:30 on July 12,2016) In addition, in order to ensure 'nothing will happen' during their term of office, some village cadres often deliberately avoid the realistic contradictions in their villages, hoping that these contradictions can live and die on their own. However, in the process of social transformation, rural contradictions are inevitable, village cadres should not avoid contradictions, but to face up to contradictions, specific analysis of specific problems, encourage farmers to face up to contradictions. This process may touch the interests of some farmers and cause their dissatisfaction, but putting this problem under the overall development of the village and involving all farmers in this contradiction analysis can promote the real solution of the problem. As a matter of fact, the avoidance of contradiction by village cadres can only be a false alarm. 'such a practice of avoiding contradiction certainly cannot solve the contradiction existing in the countryside itself, and the result is that the accumulated contradiction will burst out more violently in other forms', thus creating obstacles for the improvement of rural governance level. [9]

The Bottom Line Ethical Requirements Based on the Interests of Farmers
Farmers are the core of the village, and the generation of moral authority of village leaders must always take the protection of farmers' interests as their bottom line ethical requirements. The so-called bottom line itself has the meaning of 'insurmountable', which can refer to 'insurmountable red line, warning line, limiting scope and constraint framework'. [10] Although the bottom line of morality is only a basic thing, it has a logical priority. As members of society, individuals must jointly abide by some basic codes of conduct and norms. Otherwise, society may collapse. This bottom line can be best summarized in Chinese terms as 'do not do unto others as you would have them do unto you.' The stability and development of a society indeed depend greatly on the control of this kind of behavior beyond the bottom line in a small, not spread, this depends not only on sound laws and institutional norms, but also on the conscience, rely on our inner moral beliefs. [11] In the practice of rural governance, for village leaders, taking farmers' interests as the basis is not only the intrinsic requirement of bottom-line ethics for their behaviors and the legitimacy of their codes of conduct, but also the most important ethical norms and universal ethical requirements, as well as a positive attitude towards rural governance.
First of all, based on the interests of farmers is the inherent requirement of the legitimacy of the behavior of village cadres. The base line of ethics main consideration is the nature of behavior or conduct themselves, 'claiming the 'legitimacy' behavior or conduct (right) does not depend on the behavior of the purpose or the results of the 'good' (good), but mainly according to the nature of the conduct or code of conduct', which will behavior is legitimate or not and behavioral consequences, emphasizes to analyze the behavior process and the principle of legitimacy. [12] Of course, the emphasis of the bottom line ethics on the behavior process is not the rejection of the behavior result, but the analysis of the behavior nature rather than the result when discussing the legitimacy of the behavior. In the rural society, farmers are the main groups in the countryside, and they have given the village cadres the power to actually govern the countryside. Therefore, the behavior of village cadres is based on the interests of farmers, and it is inherently legitimate to be responsible to farmers. In the process of social transformation, some 'village-dominant' village cadres, under the pressure of the grass-roots government, mistakenly take the responsibility to their superiors as the starting point of rural governance. Under the guidance of this code of conduct, "village-dominant" village cadres take peasants as a means to encroach upon peasants' interests on the grounds of completing the tasks of their superiors, thus failing to establish their position of moral authority in villages. The current practice of rural governance, the procuratorates village leaders should be with farmers, the relationship between the grass-roots government, whether will be conducive to the interest of the farmers as the standard to guide their own behavior, 'consciously from the people's interests, never in order to establish personal image, make overblown, waste of money and' image projects and 'achievement projects'. [14] Secondly, based on the interests of farmers is the bottom line ethics of village leaders put forward by the bottom line of the ethical norms. It should be pointed out that the bottom line ethical norms are not the lowest moral requirements, nor the least important norms. On the contrary, the bottom line ethical norms are the most important moral norms. The so-called bottom line, that is, one of the most basic, must abide by, do not cross the border, is the 'life two, two gave birth to three, everything' (moral, the chapter 42) in one, has a priority on logic, not the bottom line as the premise, all moral principles will be a castle in the air, admiral from this meaning, the base line of ethics stresses is not the most dispensable, and the most important ethical norms, 'pour on the moral requirements of the order should be' the first ', 'first'. [12] In the practice of rural governance, it is required that the village cadres should not trample on or ignore the bottom line for any reason in the specific practice process to take safeguarding farmers' interests as the basic ethical criterion. Village cadres should establish a clear sense of boundaries and make prudent decisions and actions based on the clear bottom line of rural governance. As for profit-sharing village cadres in the rural society in the transition period, they just take the interests of farmers as the least important part. While applying for resources from the state in the name of farmers, they constantly encroach on the resources transferred from the state to villages. Profit-sharing village cadres hinder the connection between the state and farmers. The more resources the state transfers to the village, the more benefits the village cadres get, and it is difficult for farmers to fully enjoy the resources transferred by the state. Solve this dilemma must rely on the village leader for linear ethics compliance, "the correct exercise of power, unavailability in accordance with the law and justice unavailability, honesty and unavailability, do the statutory functions and powers must be method without authorization for remain trapped, cautious, every heart to fear and speak to quit and do a check, to deal with public and private, the relationship between feeling and the method, and method", the farmers' interests as the highest moral demands of rural governance, thus win the moral prestige in the villages. [13] Finally, the bottom-line ethical requirement based on farmers' interests is not a passive state, but a positive moral attitude. Bottom line ethics is not a passive adherence to the principle of minimum behavior, but a positive consolidation and maintenance of the bottom line. The bottom line ethics requires the subject of behavior to abide by the bottom line as the bottom line, improve their own moral level as much as possible on the basis of the bottom line, and realize the positive practice of the bottom line ethics through the pursuit of higher moral principles. In the process of rural governance, the bottom-line ethics requires village leaders to safeguard the interests of farmers with a positive attitude and put an end to lazy political behavior. In the practice of rural governance in the transitional period, some village cadres, in order to avoid conflicts, often turn a blind hand to behaviors that harm the interests of farmers, shackle the existing level of the village, take maintaining the current situation of the village as the best professional ethics, and regard no accident as the highest principle. The village cadre's lazy government behavior, finally causes the administrative efficiency low, and extends the perfunctory, the prevarication village government strange appearance, causes to the farmer benefit infringement. As a matter of fact, many interests of farmers are reached in the 'quarrel'. For example, in the process of land transfer, farmers' direct interests will inevitably be involved, and some farmers will quarrel with each other due to dissatisfaction. However, it is in this quarrel that the relationship between farmers can be smoothed and their enthusiasm for rural development can be mobilized. Therefore, in the new era of rural governance practice, village leaders will not maintain the status quo, do not have an accident as a way to maintain the interests of farmers, but to give full play to its own ought to value in rural governance, 'solved the people most concerned about the interests of the most direct and realistic problems, especially to break bureaucrats' backs to solve the problem of the good people are not satisfied, do more nice surprise things'. [14] Only when village leaders face the problems in rural governance with a positive attitude can they truly protect the interests of farmers and improve their moral status in the countryside.

The Ethical Value of Responsibility Based on Rural Development
Rural development is the most realistic problem for village leaders. In the practice of rural governance, the moral authority of village leaders cannot be established without the support of the ethical value of responsibility based on the premise of rural development.
'Ethics of responsibility' is a value concept opposite to 'ethics of faith'. As weber said, [15] Guiding behavior criterion, can be a 'faith ethics' (Gesinnungsethik), can also be a' responsibility ethics' (Verantwortungsethik), of course, this is not to say faith ethics does not speak responsibility, responsibility ethics without faith, but "by faith ethics behavior, namely the religious in the sense of justice, 'Christ' let god tube results, with the following responsibility ethics behavior, namely must consider the consequences of their actions, it has a very deep rivalry between". Weber affirms the value of ethics of responsibility by criticizing the ethics of faith.
[16] In weber's view, 'if someone is in a war of religion, according to the pure faith ethics to pursue an ultimate good, the target is likely to be so hurt, broken in several generations', faith ethics emphasizes the principle of action, the consequences of a lack of consideration on behavior, easy to cause major disaster to the objective reality. "Believe in the power of the responsibility ethic performer will consider people modalities shortcomings, like fichte said right, he have no right to assume that they are kind and perfect, he will not in their own position, he can let others to bear his behavior consequence -if he has foreseen the consequences.
[17] He would say, 'these consequences are due to my actions.' he could avoid the possible consequences and protect every individual within the scope of his power to the greatest extent. To the distinction between the beliefs, ethics and responsibility ethics and the ethics of belief criticism mainly lies in the highlight for the foreseeable consequences of evade responsibility ethics, emphasizes the effect of the responsibility ethic value, but there is no deny responsibility ethics value of faith to hold, though faith ethics and responsibility ethics in some sense is 'extremely deep opposition', but 'a man can bear 'political mission' in holding responsibility ethics must keep faith value and effect value at the same time, 'able to deeply impress people, is a mature man (regardless of their age, he is aware of the responsibility of the consequences of their actions, I really feel this responsibility from the bottom of my heart.
[18] Then he ACTS on the ethics of responsibility, and at a certain point he says, 'this is where I stand, this is what I can do.
Ethics of responsibility requires individuals to take their occupation as a 'vocation'. For village leaders, village development should be regarded as their 'duty'. However, in the process of the transformation of rural society, neither the 'bully type' village cadres, nor the 'profit-sharing type' village cadres, nor the 'lazy politics type' village cadres take village development as their own responsibility. For 'village bully type' village cadres, their 'responsibility' is to complete the task assigned by the superior, and take the opportunity to seek for their own interests; 'Profit-sharing' village cadres put 'responsibilities' on encroaching resources transferred from the state to the village with relevant departments; 'Lazy' village cadres to 'more than the less about' mentality 'responsibilities' lock in 'no accident', under the presupposition of these duties, the village cadres truly village development as the premise of the rural governance, which is unfavorable to solve the problem of villages in the development of ethics and moral identity is difficult to make the villagers of village leaders. In fact, the village leader moral authority set must be based on their own responsibility for rural development, the village leader only development as its first village 'duty', 'in a real detached attitude, the spirit of transcendence, through diligent work, dedicated, dedicated to offer displays the feelings of birth' in the WTO's enthusiasm, is likely to get the recognition of the villagers, and enhance our moral authority in village. [19] At the same time, responsibility ethics also requires the individual to take responsibility. Under the norms of responsibility ethics, village leaders should take village development as their own responsibility, not just based on their inner belief, but on the premise of comprehensive consideration of all possible consequences. As practitioners of rural governance, the village leader of any decision will affect the villagers and the whole village, is not the purpose of 'goodness can do for the political behavior of politicians', village leaders can't be fond of, with one person take it for granted to influence the decision of the rural governance, must be conducted to determine the possible consequences of fully analyzed, prudent decision-making, and on the evasion of the possible consequences to make feasible solutions. [20] In the specific practice process, village leaders need to understand the possible paths of rural development, avoid the possible adverse consequences of these paths, select the most suitable method based on the comparison of different paths, and take responsibility for the interests of the village as a whole and its villagers. Ethics of responsibility is mainly a behavior choice to avoid foreseeable consequences. What is more of moral value is that such consequences will not only affect themselves, but also affect others or groups within the scope of their power. 'From the choice of individual behavior to the decision of a politician, a 'wise' (wise self-love) that considers the long-term and overall consequences becomes a moral one: when he no longer only considers his own interests and consequences, but considers others and even other countries.' [21] From this perspective, the village leader village development as their duty to think clearly has transcended the responsibility for their own boundaries, it's to expand this kind of responsibility to the country all related to the villages and the number of villagers groups, this kind of 'smart' has been turned into moral, set in the village moral authority provides a favorable factors.

Virtuous and Ethical Behavior Oriented to Give Back to the Village
The generation of moral authority of village leaders is inseparable from the requirements of virtue ethics. 'A leader with great intellectual and social skills is probably the worst leader because he or she is likely to find the best way to achieve his or her immoral ends.' [22] Only when leaders consciously regard virtue and ethics as their internal requirements, can they truly serve others and gain moral authority. For village leaders, in the practice of village governance, they should actively practice virtue and ethical requirements, and consciously take giving back to the village as the direction of action, which is conducive to better establishing moral authority in the village.
The ethic of virtue, as a kind of moral teleology, refers to 'the remarkable achievements and outstanding qualities of individuals living in a particular moral culture community when they commit and practice their unique 'character role''. [23] The key of virtue ethics lies in the understanding of 'virtue'. Virtue is related to the outstanding achievement of the subject and is the affirmation of the value of individual behavior. 'Every virtue is the quality which makes the thing which is its virtue both good in its condition and good in its activity', 'the virtue of man is the quality which makes a man both good and excellent in his activity'. [24] Therefore, the virtue of village leaders in rural governance must be related to their personal virtue. 'If and only if an act of virtue is right, it is the typical act that a virtuous actor will take in such an environment'. Village leaders can only play virtue ethics in the practice of rural governance if they first become a virtuous actor. [25] The formation of 'virtue' is not a fixed pattern, but in practice constantly improve, 'believe that virtue ethics to make ethical decisions, actions shall cultivate and play, including moral alertness, perception and imagination, practical wisdom, rather than to set the rules of a single system or deduction formula'. [26] Village leaders need to develop good moral habits in specific personal practices, 'strengthen moral cultivation, pursue healthy taste, treat friends prudently, and check every aspect of their lives', and treat others with the attitude of active contribution to improve their moral integrity. [27] 'Historical experience tells us that a society's moral gentleman' and 'cultural elite' or 'elite', is actually leads humans continuously seek higher mental state, higher culture of civilization, village leaders are become under the background of 'virtue', have the opportunity to have the pursuit of more excellent in mission, led the villagers mental state, so as to gradually establish moral authority. [28] Through investigation and study, we know that HSY, secretary of HH village branch in Wuxi, Jiangsu province, has gradually established her moral authority in the process of giving back to the village. HH village has 26 natural villages, 66 groups, 2,263 households, more than 8,000 villagers, more than 7,000 migrant workers, over 15,000 actual residents, and more than 60 enterprises and two listed companies. HH village ranks among the top villages in China in terms of population size and economic output. Faced with the achievements of village development, HH villagers all agree in the interview that without HSY's dedication to the village, it is impossible to have the current development of HH village. In the interview, the villagers mentioned that secretary HSY has a good reputation, and he often considers the welfare of the villagers. He has promoted the village economy, and the villagers' income has also increased, and the villagers have received real benefits. (14:00, August 20, 2017 -Wuxi in Jiangsu 15:00 HH village committee office with a 61 -year -old female retired cadres, interview) HSY as HH village branch secretary is also the chairman of the board of the listed company, the company he founded in the early 1990 s, and rely on traditional industries such as machinery, chemical fiber, copper alloy, hit the billions mark and lead the group in 2011, accounting for more than 85% of all economic activity in the village of HH. During the growth of the enterprise, HSY never gave up its identity as the village party secretary, and often gave back to the village in different forms. When asked whether she prefers to be called party secretary or chairman, HSY vividly describes herself as "one head and two butts, but says she 'values the responsibility of the village party secretary more, and still prefers to be called party secretary'. In HSY's opinion, 'the development of enterprises only serves the village, so that the village has a good development environment and makes contributions to the villagers. In order to HH village better, so to put the enterprise. HH village is empty without enterprises.' (August 22, 2017-9:30 at 10:30 in HH village Wuxi, Jiangsu, a group meeting rooms and HSY interview record) as the secretary of the counting, HSY in addition to lead the villagers to get rich, to provide more favorable opportunities for rural development, and pay in the country established a center for senior citizens, and each year the Spring Festival greetings to the old apartment and activities center, care for the elderly health and living conditions, and do our best to solve the villagers difficult. As the secretary of HH village, HSY takes the initiative to give back to the village in the process of governance, which is exactly the requirement of 'virtue actor' on themselves and the practice of virtue ethics.

Conclusion
The key to rural revitalization depends on talent. Village leaders are special talents in the countryside. Whether village leaders can play an active role in rural governance practices is related to the quality and level of rural revitalization. However, in the survey, it was learned that some villages currently drive people to pursue their own interests and ignore the interests of the collective and others. It resulted in a weakening of their moral prestige. In the practice of rural revitalization in the new era, the village leaders should proceed from the overall interests of the village and the reasonable interests of the villagers. They should adhere to the bottom line ethics, responsibility ethics and virtue ethics. They will consciously give back to the village and promote the smooth implementation of the rural revitalization strategy.