Young people were sent to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution and were later allowed to return home in the 1970s. This paper examines the return migration of Chinese youth from the countryside based on officially sanctioned reasons and grounds. The most often used reasons or grounds were in fact claims to urban residentship arising from connections to the city by previous residence, by birth and by family. Claimants negotitated with the state in a cultural language which rationalizes the claimed needs in terms of traditional social codes. The study reveals that the passive and submissive image the Chinese civil society outwardly present is deceptive. Their claims, however, still fall short of modern social citizenship.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BanisterJ.1987China's Changing Population. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
2.
BernsteinT. P.1977Up to the Mountains and Down to the Villages — The Transfer of Youth from Urban to Rural China. New Haven: Yale University Press.
3.
BlecherM.1983“Peasant Labor for Urban Industry: Temporary Contract Labor, Urban-Rural Balance and Class Relations in a Chinese County,”World Development, 11(8):731–745.
4.
ChangP. H.1979“Control of Urbanization: The Chinese Approach,”Asia Quarterly, 3:215–228.
5.
ChristiansenF.1993“The Legacy of the Mock Dual Economy: Chinese Labor in Transition 1978–1992,”Economy and Society, 22(4):411–436.
6.
ChristiansenF.1990“Social Division and Peasant Mobility in Mainland China: The Implications of the Hu-k'ou system,”Issues and Studies, 26(4):23–42.
7.
Davis-FriedmannD.1985“Inter-generational Inequalities and the Chinese Revolution,”Modern China, 11(2):177–201.
8.
Davis-FriedmannD.1991Long Lives: Chinese Elderly and the Communist Revolution. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
9.
FarinaMarian Basso1980“Urbanization, Deurbanization and Class Struggle in China 1949–79,”International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 4(4):485–502.
10.
FengL.1988“Youth Unemployment in China,”International Social Science Journal, 40, 2(116):285–296.
11.
FengL.1991“A Comparison of the Two Unemployment Peaks in China During the Last Decade,”International Social Science Journal, 43, 1(127):191–207.
12.
GoldsteinA.GoldsteinS.1987a“Varieties of Population Mobility in Relation to Development in China,”Studies in Comparative International Development, 22(4):101–124.
13.
GoldsteinA.GoldsteinS.1987b“Migration in China: Methodological and Policy Challenges,”Social Science History, 11(1):85–104.
14.
GoldsteinA.GuiS.1992“Temporary Migration in Shanghai and Beijing,”Studies in Comparative International Development, 27(2):39–56.
15.
GoldsteinA.GoldsteinS.GuiS.1991“Rural Industrialization and Migration in the People's Republic of China,”Social Science History, 15(3):289–314.
16.
GoldsteinS.1990“Urbanization in China, 1982–87: Effects of Migration and Reclassification,”Population and Development Review, 16(4):673–701.
17.
GoldsteinS.1984“Population Movement, Labor Force Absorption and Urbanization in China,”Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 476(Nov): 90–108.
18.
GuiS.LiuX.1992“Urban Migration in Shanghai, 1950–88: Trends and Characteristics,”Population and Development Review, 18(3):533–548.
19.
HanJ.MorishimaM.1992“Labor System Reform in China and Its Unexpected Consequences,”Economic and Industrial Democracy, 13(2):233–261.
20.
HuH., ed. 1987China's Population: Shanghai Volume. Beijing: China's Finance and Economy Press (in Chinese).
21.
KimJ.1988“China's Modernization, Reforms and Mobile Population,”International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 12(4):595–608.
22.
KimW. B.MaL. J. C., 1990“Population Distribution Policy in China: A Review,”Regional Development Dialogue, 11(1):159–187.
23.
MarshallT. H.1963“Citizenship and Social Class.” In Sociology at the Crossroads. Edited by MarshallT.H., London: Heinemann.
24.
Population Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences1988China Migration of 74 Cities and Towns Sampling Survey Data. Beijing: Population Science of China, Special Issue.
25.
PotterS. H.1983“The Position of Peasants in Modern China's Social Order,”Modern China, 9(4):465–499.
26.
SeldenM.1988“City Versus Countryside: The Social Consequences of Development Choices in China,”Review, 11(4) (Fall):533–568.
27.
TrescottP. B.1985“Incentives Versus Equality: What does China's Recent Experience Show,”World Development, 13(2):205–217.
28.
WhiteG.1982“Urban Employment and Labor Allocation Policies in Post-Mao China,”World Development, 10(8):613–632.
29.
YangM. M. H.1989“The Gift Economy and State Power in China,”Comparative Studies in Society and History, 31(1):25–54.
30.
YangX.1993“Household Registration, Economic Reform and Migration,”International Migration Review, 27(4):796–818.
31.
YangX.1992“Population Mobility in Zhejiang, China.” Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Brown University.
32.
YuY.C.1979“The Population Policy of China,”Population Studies, 33(1):125–142.
33.
ZhangK., ed. 1989A Study on Migration of Shanghai Population. Shanghai: Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences Press (in Chinese).
34.
ZhangQ.1988“Basic Facts on the Household Registration System,”Chinese Economic Studies, 22:1.
35.
ZhangR.1980“The Problem of Employment and the New Recruitment Method in China,”Labor and Society, 5(4):367–372.
36.
ZhangX.1991“Urbanization in China,”Urban Studies, 28(1):41–51.
