The relationship between accountability and blame avoidance is an important topic in the study of responsibility politics where the mechanisms by which accountability leads to blame avoidance needs to be explored urgently. Taking the early rice crop production policy process in X County as an example, this paper discusses the relationship mechanism between accountability at higher-level and blame avoidance of lower-level, based on the analytical framework of “action-institution-environment”. The study found that the blame avoidance behavior of grassroots cadres is the result of the joint effect of the accountability system at the higher level and the social environment at the lower level, and it is the rational choice of the grassroots cadres as those responsible in the face of the pressure of accountability from the higher level and the resistance of farmers. In order to implement the non-grain rectification policy, the superiors have imposed huge pressure on the grassroots cadres through responsibility distribution, responsibility assessment and supervision and accountability systems. The farmers, nevertheless, have developed a relatively stable production order dominated by the middle rice crop planting model over the long-term production history and refused to implement the early rice crop production policy. Grassroots cadres who are under double pressure can only adopt a territorialization mechanism of responsibility underwriting, the market-oriented mechanism for exchanging interests, and the bureaucratic mechanism for joint responsibility avoidance to avoid the rist of accoutablity at higher levels. The grassroots cadres who are the actors use their discretionary power to change the existing institution-environment to a certain extent and recreate the grassroots governance structure by concealing information and collective indebtedness.