Village cadres in China now face hierarchical plateauing because they are excluded from government’ s bureaucracy.Empirical study based on questionnaires of village cadres from Baise City,Guangxi province shows that,firstly,there is a positive correlation between promotion desire and desire for control.Secondly,hierarchical plateauing leads to village cadres’ immoral manipulation,and promotion desire enhances this relation.Thirdly,village cadres tend to have more behavior of immoral manipulation when they encounter hierarchical plateauing.The conclusion indicates that lack of promotion channel is the main cause of immoral manipulation for Chinese village cadres,which can result in the problem of invasion of farmers’ interest.Therefore,it is necessary to introduce career issue into behavioral analysis of village elites on the basis of the research paradigm of “state-individual-society”.