The fruits of modern democracy are mainly the checks and balances of power. On this issue, there is a famous "donkey and horse theory", which says: horses run faster than donkeys, and when compared, it is found that the horse's hooves are better than the donkey's hooves, so the donkey's hooves are replaced with the horse's hooves, and the donkey runs slower; Then he found that the horse's legs were better than the donkey's, so he replaced the donkey's legs with the horse's legs, and the donkey could not run. Next, and so on, the body was changed, the internal organs were changed, and finally the whole donkey was replaced by the whole horse, so as to achieve the goal of running fast. This "donkey and horse theory" shows that "democratic elections" are just a "horseshoe," and it is better to change the "horseshoe" than to promote the building of democratic politics. "Democratic management, democratic decision-making, and democratic supervision" are as important and crucial as "democratic elections." The "half-pulled" democracy has resulted in "democracy at the time of the election, but no democracy after the election," and on the contrary, it has messed up the original order.

——"Speech during the investigation in Jinhua City" (June 17, 2005) excerpted from "Doing in Practice and Walking in the Forefront - Thinking and Practice of Promoting the New Development of Zhejiang"

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The donkey changed to the horse's hooves, and the donkey was still a donkey, but it ran more slowly. Changed legs, body, internal organs...... The whole thing was replaced, and the run was fast, but the donkey became a horse. By telling the "donkey and horse theory", Xi Jinping explained the theoretical issues clearly and thoroughly when the exquisite metaphors, vivid details, and interesting plots made people laugh, which can be described as a light weight and simple explanation, and has a communication effect.

In this speech, he also cited as an example the "Hou Chen experience" that originated in Wuyi and was being promoted in Jinhua at that time. At the end of the 20th century, with the advancement of industrialization and urbanization, the village collective funds increased sharply in a short period of time, and there were frequent problems of village cadres violating discipline, serious conflicts between cadres and the masses, and continuous petitioning by the masses. In June 2004, Houchen Village established China's first "Village Affairs Supervision Committee" with a grassroots democratic political innovation full of "earthy flavor". The implementation of the village affairs management system and the operation of the village affairs management system are supervised by a third-party supervision body independent of the village party branch and the village committee, which opens the prelude to the exploration of the practice of democratic management of village affairs. Since then, Houchen Village has embarked on an innovative road of promoting the improvement of the system through supervision, promoting the construction of democracy through supervision, ensuring social harmony with supervision, and realizing the prosperity of the village through supervision, and has realized the "turnaround" from chaos to order.

Subsequently, the village affairs supervision committee was written into the "Organic Law of Villagers' Committees", which was upgraded from an emergency "plan for governing the village" to a "policy for governing the country", and became a successful model for strengthening the building of democracy at the grassroots level in rural areas.

In 2005, Xi Jinping, then secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee, talked about the "donkey and horse theory" during his investigation in Jinhua, which was to explain that the construction of village-level democratic politics should actively promote "democratic election, democratic decision-making, democratic management, and democratic supervision", and "the content of these four aspects should be comprehensively understood". Xi Jinping believes that democracy cannot simply be equated with democratic elections, and to promote the construction of democratic politics is just to change the "horseshoe", that is, the "half-pulled" democracy, it is better not to change, and there will definitely be chaos after the election. "Orange is orange born in Huainan, and orange is born in Huaibei." This is also an old saying often quoted by Xi Jinping. He emphasized that copying and copying the political systems of other countries will not work, and they will not adapt to the water and soil, and they will not become anti-dogs, and even bury the future and destiny of the country.