To Dong Hai
Any reference to huong uoc (village code) implies a reference to the structure of the old village, an economic- political-administrative model very typical of the ancient Vietnamese society. The August 1945 Revolution has not only liberated the country from subjugation to foreign countries but also freed the countryside of Vietnam from the feudal ruling machinery in its capacity as a stooge of colonialism. The collapse of the feudal system in the Vietnamese countryside is synonymous with the disintegration of the traditional village of Vietnam. Both the original and reformed (huong uoc) have lost their basis for existence. Since then the Vietnamese society, especially in the countryside, has been built up according to a new model with the xa (commune) as the grassroots administrative unit. A commune comprises many villages (prior to the August 1945 Revolution, most of them consisted only of one village). Along with the creation of the agricultural cooperatives on the model of a concentrated and government-subsidized unit, the traditional village with its functions of a social, economic and cultural unit of the society has gradually lost its position and role in social life.
More than forty years after the August 1945 Revolution, through the development of the consciousness about social development, the Vietnam Communist Party has had a better, more correct look on the role of the traditional village. In the Resolution of the 10th Plenum of its Central Committee, the Party officially recognized the farmers’ right to stable and long-term use of land. The household has been restored to its role in socio-economic stabilization and development in the rural areas. The traditional village has been restored to its rightful place as the habitat of a traditional population community with its own organizational institution, its own belief, lifestyle, customs and habits, character and mentality. In the early nineties of the 20th century, new-type village codes were written one after another under the common denomination of “Regulations of Cultured Villages.” In 1991 and 1992 the compilation of such regulations became a movement in some villages of the former Ha Bac province (now Bac Ninh and Bac Giang provinces) which spread quickly to other areas in the whole country.
The compilation of the Cultured Village code in Ha Bac drew the attention of managers and scientists who regarded it as a breakthrough in the search for an efficient mode of managing the countryside. The Resolution of the 5th Plenum of the Party Central Committee (VIIth Party Congress) called for “encouraging the compilation and execution of village codes and regulations on a civilized lifestyle in the villages” (“Documents of the 5th Plenum of the Party Central Committee, VIIth Congress,” National Political Publishing House, Hanoi - 1993).
In 1996, the VIIIth National Congress of the Party issued a resolution affirming the people’s right to mastery as evinced in the huong uoc (village code) and quy uoc (regulations) which is another manifestation of the broadening of democracy at the grassroots. In June 1998, the Prime Minister issued Directive No. 24/CT-TTg on the compilation and implementation of huong uoc. Thus, huong uoc, as a document of regulatory character, has affirmed itself as an instrument for self-management of a village designed by the villagers themselves on the basis of the particularities of that village with its specific social, economic and cultural conditions.
The village regulations and codes have also been compiled on the basis of the restoration of the role and position of the family households, family clans, hamlets and craft guilds, especially the restoration of the village, a unit which holds an important role in the civilian management of society, an informal form of management which is nevertheless very strict and efficacious.
However, the compilation of the new huong uoc has met with not a few difficulties. First, nearly all of them have taken after the provisions of State laws. Some of the regulations in the new huong uoc contradict the spirit of law and even violate provisions of State laws. This has given them little creditability, makes them hardly practicable and explains why people are still reluctant or not fully ready to accept them and carry them out of their own free will... These initial shortcomings have been remedied to make the new huong uoc more rational and practicable. Acting along this line, many provinces such as Ha Bac, Ha Tay, Nghe An and Ha Tinh have published regulations on the cultured lifestyle in their villages. In some localities in these provinces, some family lines have even laid down regulations of their own, such as the Nguyen Nghia family in Dien Chau district, Nghe An province. Tuong Dong village in the same province has adopted a new huong uoc in replacement of the old one. People in Nam Dinh province have even compiled regulations for their hamlets such as Pham Tang hamlet in Hai Tan commune, or Nguyen Chan hamlet in Hai Thanh commune, etc. To facilitate the implementation of these regulations, various Councils have been set up to monitor their implementation.
In fact, huong uoc has become an increasingly important cultural phenomenon actively contributing to the building of a new and cultured lifestyle in the Vietnamese countryside.
It can be said that the new huong uoc is actually the affirmation of the national identities in the domain of social management. It is the way our nation has preserved and developed the fine customs and habits and cultural traditions. The restoration of the traditional huong uoc and the compilation of the new huong uoc is actually the continuation of the self-management tradition of the villages and the conciliation of the village rules with State laws to make the State laws closer to every villager. It is relevant to recall here the thinking of President Ho Chi Minh on the implementation of the huong uoc when he received a delegation of Thai Binh province at the Presidential Palace in 1958. He said:
“Huong uoc are the conventions in the villages. People agree among themselves not to let the cattle eat up or destroy rice, or the poultry eat up young rice seedlings and vegetables, not to steal from one another... These are good customs in our countryside in the past. The revolution only abolishes the bad and wrong, but preserves the good and fine...”
That is actually the basis for us to compile the new huong uoc. It is also a positive appreciation of the role and position of the huong uoc in the present-day social life, especially when we have already abolished what is backward and inadequate in the old huong uoc and those regulations and conventions which contravene State laws and have added new regulations arising from present realities and conforming with the contemporary way of life.
Huong uoc (village codes), as said earlier, are the regulations agreed upon by a stable village community of long standing history with an “administrative apparatus” running all affairs in the village according to the rules provided by them. Nowadays, the village has ceased to be exactly what it was in the past. It may be a new village, a new hamlet or a population area newly founded by a community of people coming from different places. It still has a village or hamlet chief who, because he is no longer an administrative post as in the past, has a greatly restricted power. In the spiritual domain, the village is no longer a single community worshiping the same tutelary genie because the population composition has seen many changes. Accordingly, it can be hardly expected that a huong uoc could be unanimously set out, adopted and voluntarily acted upon by the entire village.
For these reasons, a new form of village management, quy uoc, or new codes village, has seen the light. Quy uoc has a much more flexible scope for application than huong uoc. It is the regulations worked out by a population community of any size, that may be a condominium or a street quarter, who unanimously vow to carry it out. Quy uoc may involve many aspects of life: culture, social affairs, order and security, environmental sanitation, weddings, funerals, festivals, rituals, production and protection of production (especially agricultural production), the building of cultured families and a cultured village... That is why, a set of quy uoc is also referred to as regulations on a cultured village, a cultured condominium, a cultured street quarter... depending on the size of the community and its character. Thus, quy uoc is actually a system of newly established customary laws “to lengthen” the arm of State laws, to support them and to make them closer to each member of the community.
The compilation of quy uoc is assigned to the Cadre Committee of the hamlet, the street quarter or the condominium and placed under the leadership of the local Party cell. Depending on the situation in the locality, the compilation can also be assigned to the Managerial Committee and the Executive Committee of the Party cell, or to the Front Committee of the village or hamlet, or the street quarter Cadre Committee. After compilation, the quy uoc are subjected to discussion at the Cultural Committee of the village, the Front Committee, the Association of War Veterans, the Association of Aged People, the Women Union, the Youth Union... and in particular, it has to go through democratically organized discussion of the entire village or street quarter.
The contents of the new village codes are relatively unified.
Structurally speaking, they are divided into two parts.
Part I comprises:
- The general situation summarizing the process of formation and development of the village and the characteristics of the village, especially in the present period.
- The necessity to compile the codes of the new cultured village.
Part II sets down the general regulations and specific speculations:
- The general provisions are stipulations concerning the members of the village, the community activities, the social organizations, family clans and lines. This part also makes clear that the Code aims to safeguard the solidarity and mutual love of the villagers and their self- consciousness in building a new-type village marked by the new culture.
- The specific regulations concern the organization of the Steering Committee in building the new cultured village, the implementation of the regulations on a cultured lifestyle, including the safeguard and embellishment of the cultural relics and welfare establishments, the development of the fine traditions of the village, the consolidation of the solidarity and mutual aid, the strengthening of public order and security... This usually comprises ten specific regulations, such as prohibition of gambling, opium smoking, drug addiction and alcoholism, especially drunkenness, prohibition of theft and burglary, promotion of environmental sanitation and observance of the regulations on residence registration. This also includes recommendations on building new harmonious families based on concord and mutual respect, mutual aid and solidarity, good observance of the policies of the Party and the State laws, as well as regulations on the organization of weddings, funerals, celebration of festivities in a healthy and joyful but economical manner, free from wastefulness and ostentation as well as superstition. There are regulations on building the infrastructure for cultural activities, creation of information, culture and arts teams, on organizing recreations and entertainments. The regulations also provide for the organization and protection of agricultural production.
In addition to providing guidance for the implementation of the above regulations, the new code also makes concrete stipulations on the various forms and degrees of punishment of the offenders such as keeping the villagers informed of the violations over the loudspeaker or imposing cash fines on serious offenses.
The codes on cultured villages, also called new village codes, have been welcomed by the entire population which can be seen as a response to the Resolution of the 5th plenum of the Vietnam Communist Party Central Committee, VIIIth Congress, to the Instruction on building and implementing the village codes and regulations of the villages, hamlets, population agglomerations and Circular No. 04/1998/TT-BVHTT of the Ministry of Culture and Information guiding the observance of civilized practices in weddings, funerals, festivities...
The new codes of the villages, street quarters and other population centers have contributed to heightening and deepening the awareness and understanding of the people about their villages, street quarters and other population centers in the political, economic, educational fields and security, their origins and history of development, together with the customs and habits, lifestyle, social relations and behavior with a view to improving management.
In spite of the dissimilarities and diversity of formulation of the codes of the villages and in some cases their inadequacies, the new huong uoc have in essence made an active contribution to the building of cultured villages and other residential units. Where the new huong uoc are properly formulated and correctly carried out, social security has been better ensured and the people have better fulfilled their obligations toward the State, the locality and the community, a more cultured way of life has been established and strengthened. Since they originate from the concrete realities of each village or community, the new huong uoc have better answered the needs of life in their most minutious details which the State laws cannot cover.
However, the new huong uoc cannot replace the laws of the State. In fact, the competence of their executive board is very restricted since it is not an administrative agency vested with the legal power of the grassroots unit of State authority.
On the other hand, the wording of some huong uoc is almost identical, consisting of oft-repeated slogans and generally speaking, lacking conciseness, which make them not convincing and hardly applicable. Some regulations in some huong uoc even blatantly go against the State laws.
Such are some of the shortcomings of the present village codes. On the other hand, through the implementation of the new huong uoc in the recent past, it is evident that the presence and application of the huong uoc is an urgent necessity in the Vietnamese society at the present stage. The on-going movement to compile new cultured village codes has proved its great vitality and compability with the law of development of the Vietnamese society.-