"when the officials are not around"

Roland Soong has more on the aftermath of the Great Mayday Knicker Riot:

At the home of Shangyi village director Zhang Zhaolie, the family is away and there is only a banner that read: "Give me back my land, give me back my existence." The village government and party offices are basically idle as the officials are staying away. A certain knitting factory was besieged by almost 1,000 villagers who demand the boss to give a full accounting of how he got the land. Meanwhile life appears to be normal, with the shops and schools running smoothly. According to one villagers, "I feel more secure when the officials are not around." There are signs of police presence.

So the state is here. And the people are here. It’s just the Communist Party that’s been pushed out of town. I’m not sure that this has happened before as a result of an MGI – individuals, yes, but not a whole township cadre. We appear to have a liberated zone.

Debates about China’s political future generally take the shape of “reform from within” versus “change the system”. Another argument, afaik associated with the New Left/critical intellectual tendency, is negotiated withdrawal: that the Communist Party should dismantle its apparatus first in the villages and then upwards, leaving local communities to elect their own rulers and gain administrative experience as self-governing communes. This seems to be the option that the people of Gurao have voted for.