Zhang, S and McGhee, D (2020) Governing for and through harmonious community: The emergence of moral clinics in China. Urban Studies. ISSN 0042-0980

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Abstract

In this article, we advocate the adoption of 'more temporal and processual characters' to understand contemporary community governance in China. We show that communities in China are seen both as producing moral problems and as being the solutions to these problems. Furthermore, we argue that the establishment of the moral clinic provides an alternative to neoliberal ways of self-governance. In the article, we present moral clinics as a new form of community self-governance whose aim is to achieve a complex balance between various conflicts in the context of China's unprecedented urbanisation in the name of governing for and through community harmony. Through examining the establishment of moral clinics, we expose how the relationship between the moral 'hospitalisation' of society and the socialisation of individuals can be understood in new ways. We argue that the institutionalisation of this 'moral work' is a strategy based on old techniques of Chinese traditional medicine that are being enhanced by modern organisational settings. In addition, we examine the micropolitics of the moral clinic through exposing the power relations behind its structural design, and especially its links with the state.

Item Type: Article
Additional Information: The final accepted version of this article can be found online with all relevant information at; https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098020940640
Uncontrolled Keywords: Agglomeration/Urbanisation, Community, Governance, Local Government, Public Space, Moral Clinics , Chinese Traditional Medicine
Subjects: H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
J Political Science > JA Political science (General)
J Political Science > JQ Political institutions Asia
Divisions: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of Social, Political and Global Studies
Depositing User: Symplectic
Date Deposited: 16 Jul 2020 12:57
Last Modified: 04 Sep 2020 12:16
URI: https://eprints.keele.ac.uk/id/eprint/8350

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