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Is it better or worse to talk about "imperial power does not go down to the county"?
Our ancient state system is a centralized system, since Qin Shi Huang founded the great unification, the administrative system adopts the county system, and the extension of state rights generally to the county level, and further down is not dependent on state administration, but by the gentry management, which is the so-called "imperial power does not go down to the county, the township gentry manages the four sides."
This management model is above the central management county, the township gentry manages the county below, Wen Tiejun teacher also mentioned in the lecture that the ancient countryside is managed through the gentry model of "imperial power does not go down to the county", so is this model of gentry at the grass-roots level good or bad?
To put it bluntly, it is problematic to rely on the gentry model of "imperial power not going down to the county" to manage the grassroots.
The biggest problem with this model is that it can't be managed to the end, and once the popular uprising will soon cause the empire to collapse.
The change of dynasties in ancient times was largely due to land annexation, which made it impossible for peasants to live and work in peace and contentment, and eventually broke out into peasant wars, leading to the collapse of the entire empire, which showed that the gentry managed the grassroots level was problematic.
Since there is a problem with "imperial power does not go down to the county", why further implement it?
"Imperial power does not go down to the county" is not that the emperor is unwilling, but in fact, it cannot be done, and the reasons for not being able to do it are as follows:
First, the management area is too large
Beginning with the unification of the Qin Dynasty, ancient China had to manage a larger area than the rest of the world. Some people say that the Territory of the Huns is larger, but the nomadic people of the Huns are not called management, but follow the climate migration, not management.
Farming peoples have been fixed in one place for a long time to live a stable life, which will involve management, because the area is too large, so the cost of conveying state decrees is very high, so it is impossible to reach the grassroots.
Second, there are too few managers
Since the Sui and Tang Dynasties began to establish the examination system, only once every three years, and the talents selected each time are only a hundred people, and there are only a few managers who have to manage millions of square kilometers, which is obviously an impossible thing.
If you want to manage the grassroots, then the managers must be multiplied, and the managers have to take money to eat, and the people's money will also crush the empire.
Third, the level of management is limited
The average age of ancient China is relatively low, it is said that the average age of the ancient population is less than 30 years old, the people who do management may be a little older, but it is not high enough, the living conditions of The Chinese emperors are high enough, but there are very few who have lived past 60 years old, so the life expectancy of a manager determines that he cannot manage too many people and things.
In addition, although there was a examination system at that time, it was impossible for all these selected people to be delegated to the most basic level to manage, because the whole empire still had a lot of things to do, and the things of the ordinary people in real life required you to have various skills. In addition to neighborhood disputes between ordinary people, what is more fatal is all kinds of homicides, which require professional knowledge and skills, and cannot be solved by ordinary managers.
Fourth, there is a lack of management tools
The management of ancient China relied on various ledgers, books, local chronicles, etc., which were recorded by hand, lacking modern management tools and a systematic set of algorithms. For example, the climate of a place is regular, and the current means of recording can quickly speculate about future changes, and in ancient times, you looked at the previous records and sorted out these records clearly, which would be a very headache.
For a place, population growth and decline is very important, because it directly affects the tax burden of the place, and these things undoubtedly require huge labor costs if they are simply manually registered and checked.
Therefore, based on the above four major aspects, the reality of "imperial power does not go down to the county" has been created, but this is not that the emperor is unwilling.
So for today, "imperial power does not go down to the county" is still applicable?
Obviously not suitable, taking last year's new crown epidemic as an example, if the management is only at the county level, then if the grass-roots level cannot be implemented, how can the new crown epidemic be quickly controlled? It is precisely because we have managed the neighborhood committee that we can control the new crown epidemic to the lowest in the world.
Today, we have reached a very high level in terms of the number, ability and means of management personnel, and the management is completely reduced by ability to the grass-roots level, which is undoubtedly of great benefit to the overall rapid development of the whole country.
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