Village (Taiwan)

Villages are the basic level administrative subdivisions of the Republic of China, under townships, county-administered cities or districts. There are two types of villages depending on the divisions it belongs to.^[1]

Name	Chinese	Mandarin Pinyin	Taiwanese Pe̍h-ōe-jī	Administered by
Urban village	里	lǐ	lí	Urban township, County-administered city, District, Mountain indigenous district
Rural village	村	cūn	chhun	Rural township, Mountain indigenous township

Structuring and Sizing

The history of Village in Taiwan could date back to the Hoko system in the Japanese era, which ho (保) changed into village after Republic of China ruled Taiwan. The formation of village helps to divide area in considerations for transportation and city planning. The formation of village and its size depends largely on the county it is located or the population nature of the local area. In counties or districts of limited population, 100 households could form a village whereas in dense populated New Taipei, 1,000 households are necessary to form a village. In very densely populated areas, a village could comprise a population of up to 4,000 households. (Fushan Village of Kaohsiung City contains a population of 39,800) Thus the sizes of village varies widely.

The following are the statistics of villages in each administrative division in June 2018.

Region		Township-level divisions	Village-level divisions	Types of Villages
Region		Township-level divisions	Village-level divisions	Urban	Rural
Fujian Province	Kinmen County	6	37	24	13
Fujian Province	Lienchiang County	4	22	0	22
Kaohsiung City		38	891	891	0
New Taipei City		29	1032	1032	0
Taichung City		29	625	625	0
Tainan City		37	649	649	0
Taipei City		12	456	456	0
Taiwan Province	Changhua County	26	589	264	325
	Chiayi City	2	84	84	0
	Chiayi County	18	357	89	268
	Hsinchu City	3	122	122	0
	Hsinchu County	13	192	96	96
	Hualien County	13	177	72	105
	Keelung City	7	157	157	0
	Miaoli County	18	275	169	106
	Nantou County	13	262	133	129
	Penghu County	6	96	34	62
	Pingtung County	33	463	139	324
	Taitung County	16	147	61	86
	Yilan County	12	233	111	122
	Yunlin County	20	391	164	227
Taoyuan City		13	504	504	0
Total		368	7761	5876	1885

Head

The head of a village is elected by the people of the village every four years, the head is subsidized with 45,000 NT per month for local transportation, stationary, postage and bill fees.

The head of a village holds responsibility to accept complaints and suggestions, initiate and hold meetings, handout certificates of various sorts, encourage bill payments and assist filling out of government documents if required.

Example of villages in Taiwan

Region	District or Township	Village
Kaohsiung City	Jiaxin District Cianjhen District Zuoying District	Guanshan, Siaolin Caoya Fushan
New Taipei City	Ruifang District	Houtong
Changhua County	Fuxing Township	Xishi
Chiayi County	Alishan Township	Leye
Kinmen County	Jincheng Township	Zhushan
Nantou County	Puli Township	Taomi
Yunlin County	Gukeng Township	Caoling

Notes

^ Also known as the Taiwan area or Tai–Min area (Chinese: 臺閩地區; lit. 'Taiwan–Fujian area')
^ The mainland area consists of Mainland China, Tibet and (previously) Outer Mongolia
^ Special municipalities, cities, and county-administered cities are all called shi (Chinese: 市; lit. 'city')
^ Nominal; provincial governments have been abolished
^ Constitutionally having the same structure as the free area, these are currently under the Chinese Communist Party control with a different structure
^ Sometimes called cities (Chinese: 市) or provincial cities (Chinese: 省轄市) to distinguish them from special municipalities and county-administered cities
^ There are two types of townships: rural townships or xīang (Chinese: 鄉) and urban townships or zhèn (Chinese: 鎮)
^ Villages in rural townships are known as tsūn (Chinese: 村), those in other jurisdictions are known as lǐ (Chinese: 里)

References

^ "Laws and Regulations - Local Government Act". Ministry of the Interior, Republic of China (Taiwan). Archived from the original on 2016-03-15.

[a-4] Has an elected executive and an elected legislative council.

[b-9] Has an appointed district administrator for managing local affairs and carrying out tasks commissioned by superior agency.

[11] Has an elected village administrator for managing local affairs and carrying out tasks commissioned by superior agency.

[2] Also known as the Taiwan area or Tai–Min area (Chinese: 臺閩地區; lit. 'Taiwan–Fujian area')

[3] The mainland area consists of Mainland China, Tibet and (previously) Outer Mongolia

[5] Special municipalities, cities, and county-administered cities are all called shi (Chinese: 市; lit. 'city')

[6] Nominal; provincial governments have been abolished

[7] Constitutionally having the same structure as the free area, these are currently under the Chinese Communist Party control with a different structure

[8] Sometimes called cities (Chinese: 市) or provincial cities (Chinese: 省轄市) to distinguish them from special municipalities and county-administered cities

[10] There are two types of townships: rural townships or xīang (Chinese: 鄉) and urban townships or zhèn (Chinese: 鎮)

[12] Villages in rural townships are known as tsūn (Chinese: 村), those in other jurisdictions are known as lǐ (Chinese: 里)

[1] "Laws and Regulations - Local Government Act". Ministry of the Interior, Republic of China (Taiwan). Archived from the original on 2016-03-15.