清白与信任:乡土治理安排的信息经济学解读

Innocence and Faith:the Information Economics Interpretation of Rural Society's Management Arrangement

在"民间法"的分析框架中,源于"地方性知识"和执行费用的比较优势,讲求实质理性的乡土社会规范以及相配套的非正式社会控制总是可欲的。但是,发生于中原农村的一起因欠条引发的欠款之争,进而在乡村舆论下衍生为自杀悲剧的人命纠纷却表明:由习俗、惯例承载的乡土治理安排并不必然能够保证人们日常交往行为的基本可预见性,甚至会导致比规则治理的普适化之弊更为沉重的机会成本;形式理性及由国家财政能力支持的正式社会控制同样是获得乡村生活确定性的内生要素。

According to the present dominant analyzing framework, spontaneous norms in rural society and the corresponding informal society control are always desirable based on their comparative advantages in local knowledge and enforcement costs. However, while analyzing a true debt case caused by a written proof, which was then changed into a suicide tragedy under the public opinion in a remote village of Henan Province, this essay points out that the spontaneous norms in rural society cannot always stabilize the basic anticipation of people＇s daily interactions, to make matters even worse, they may lead to more undesirable opportunity costs compared with the disadvantages attached to the ＂rule of rules＂, and the formality and the formal society control supported by the state finance are also the constitutional element to attain the indispensable certainty of rural life.