从单一主体到五社联动:社会工作者推动农村社区治理结构优化的行动研究

From a Single Agency to“Alliance of Five Agencies”:An Action Research of How Social Workers Contribute to the Optimization of Governance Structure in a Rural Chinese Community

农村社区治理主体单一,严重影响了农村社区治理效能,社会工作者可以发挥专业优势,推动社区治理结构优化。本文采用行动研究法,以S村社区营造项目为例,探讨社会工作推动农村社区治理结构从单一主体型向五社联动协同共治型转变的发生过程。研究发现,社会工作在街道授权下以外部专业人才嵌入社区,发挥专业优势,成为社区治理结构优化的推动力;社会工作通过自我增能成为社区治理的重要新主体,并通过培育社区社会组织、社区志愿者,重点采用增能策略提升了他们参与社区治理的意识和能力,也成为社区治理的积极新主体;社会工作发挥“联结”功能,透过集体决策和行动,初步促成了五社联动下的协同共治行动。

A single governance agency has negative influences on the governance effectiveness in rural communities.Social workers can utilize their professional strengths to promote the optimization of governance structures in these communities.Using the community development program of S village as a case,the current study employed the action research method to explore how social workers promoted the governance structural transition from a single agency type to an“Alliance of Five Agencies(五社联动)”type.Before social worker professional interventions,the villager’s governance committee and the party branch of S village used to organize villagers to form a“villagers’self-governance association”with the authorization of administrations.However,due to limited time and capacity,the initiatives failed by passively receiving services,and the“villagers’self-governance association”appeared as a self-governance tool of the villager’s committee and the party branch.Then,social workers were authorized to engage in community governance through the government’s purchase of social services.During 7.5 years of social work activities,social workers have experienced three stages in participating in community development:the first step was preliminarily proposing community-themed activities;the second step was to activate villagers’subjective creation with the nurturing of community social organizations as the core;the final step is to engage collaborative governance creation with a goal of sustainable community development.Finally,the five agencies of the community(villager’s governance committee and the party branch),social workers,community social organizations,and community volunteers were linked together with community charitable resources.Thus,the community governance structure of“collaborative co-governance of an alliance of five agencies”has been formed with the core leadership of the villager’s committee and the party branch.The results have several findings regarding the logic of social workers in promoting the optimization of community governance structure.First,social workers,as external professionals,became a core force to promote governance structural optimization.The original single agency community governance structure is a relatively stable system formed under the joint action of various factors,so it is not accessible to self-innovate.Social workers,under the authorization of the street government to external professionals,were inserted into the original community governance system.Social workers utilized their professionality to convince the villager’s committee and the party branch to release their power and space in governance.Then social workers could unitize their professionality in cultivating new agencies,enhancing the capacity of agencies in community governance,integrating the various charity resources for the community,promoting the five agencies to collectively participate in community governance,and thus promoting community governance structure optimization.Second,social workers applied empowerment to form new active governance agencies.Social workers“eat,live and work together”with villagers and thus deeply rooted in the community.After convincing village committees and villagers,they engaged in their professional roles as service providers,empowerment implementers,coordinators,and others.During the 7.5 years of services,social workers continuously adjusted their roles and improved their professional capacities,and became a new agency of community governance through self-empowerment.Finally,by cultivating community social organizations and community volunteers,social workers focused on enhancing their awareness and capacity to participate in community governance through three levels,including individual,organizational,and community empowerment.Community social organizations and community volunteers also became a new active agency in community governance.Third,social workers functioned to promote collaborative governance of an“Alliance of Five Agencies”through collective decision-making and actions.In the first phase of the project,social workers actively initiated community-development activities with culture and environment themes together with the villager’s committee,the party branch,and active villagers.Thus an alliance was preliminarily formed in community governance that linked social workers,community village committees,and community volunteers with social workers as the core.In the second phase of the project,social workers focused on cultivating the altruistic spirit and actions of community social organizations.The awareness and capacity of the two village committees in serving the community were enhanced by social workers.Social workers utilized work experience and public welfare resource network to solicit charitable resources for the community,which gradually formed a community governance action alliance including where social workers were the core,community village committees,community social organizations,community volunteers,and community charitable resources were other agencies.In the third stage,the villager’s committee,and the party branch began to take the leading role in community governance and actively collaborate with social workers as well as community social organizations to plan for community development.Social workers thus properly paced back to provide strategies to the villager’s committee and the party branch.The community micro foundation was established and leveraged the charitable resources within the community.Through collective decision-making and actions by the community,S Village initially formed a collaborative and co-management structure with the community village committee,social workers,community social organizations,community volunteers,and community charitable resources,where the community village committee were the core and social worker were the counselor.