禁约是清代乡村社会为保护风水、山林资源、生态环境和公益设施而公同议定的带有强制性规范内容的民间自治规约。从禁约合同的议定来看,乡村公共秩序的形成主要是在宗族、乡绅、地保、文会、乡约、会社等地方权威人物或组织的倡首下,由血缘和地缘范围内的民众公同讨论、集体协商后,通过特定仪式以成文的形式公之于众。合村或合族公议的禁约规条涉及日常生活实践中的信仰、生产、生态、公益、治安等公共秩序的诸多方面。乡村公共秩序的维护主要有赖于民众的力量对违禁者实施精神或物质性的惩罚,必要时借助于官府的权威,从而在官民互动中达致一种结构上的均衡。以禁约合同为代表的自治性规约与私人契约、国家律例共同绘制出一幅清代基层社会法律秩序的整体图景,对当下的基层群众自治具有借鉴意义。
The restraint contract discussed together by rural communities of Qing dynasty, is a folk autonomy regulationthat had compulsory normative content, which is for protecting the geomancy, the resources of wooded mountain, ecologicalenvironment and communal facilities. From the forming process of the restraint contract, firstly the rural public order ismainly advocated by the authority figures and organizations of the clan , the squire, the beadle and the local communities ;then discussed and agreed by people of the same ethnicity or from the same village , through the specific ceremony pub-lished to the folk. The restraint contracts of rural combination or family combination involved in the belief, production, zo-ology, public ware fare, pubic security and so on, which is about the public regulation of the daily llfe. From the discus-sion and effectiveness of implement of the regulation of prohibition, the form and the maintain of the public order thanks tothe effort of all the rural people, at the same time, the authority of the government is also very important, and it finds itsbalance in the interaction of the government and the folk. Together with the private contract and state statutes, the autonomyregulation, which is representative by the restraint contract, draw a picture of the legal order of the rural community, havinga great reference to the current self-governance of the grassroots.