Migration and Educational Policymaking in China

A Critical Engagement with Policy Sociology and Bourdieu

Hui Yu

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9781032289939
• eBook ISBN: 9781000606805
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Education General
• Index: Social Sciences

By concentrating on the topic of school enrolment policy for rural-to-urban migrant children in China, this book analyses the unequal power relations and structural inequalities that can appear in the context of education.

The author complements current knowledge by applying theoretical resources of policy sociology, in particular the thinking of Pierre Bourdieu, into analysis of educational policymaking in the Chinese context. He takes a policy trajectory approach to trace the (unequal) power relations and structural inequalities invested and realised in the school enrolment policy. Rooted in rich qualitative data from five metropolises, he examines both external influences of politics, economy and public policy on educational policy agenda setting and discursive practices within the educational policy cycle, inherent in the post-2013 restrictive school enrolment policy. Structural constraints and agency in the local context are also explored, indicating that the intersectional effects of political, economic, and civic logic can result in differentiated modes of policy enactment.

The study will be of interest to scholars, students, policymakers and practitioners in helping address policymaking and social justice in education for migrants and other marginalised groups.

1 Migrant children’s school enrolment in urban China

DOI: 10.4324/9781003299516-1

This chapter gives a brief introduction to the research background and context. It starts with introducing the tendency of rural-to-urban migration over the past four decades in China and identifying an increasing number and percentage of the migrant population in urban areas, including the five fieldwork sites of this study (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Foshan). Then the chapter reviews migrants’ social positionality in urban China. In contemporary Chinese society, social stratification can be conceptualised as five social classes (including upper level, middle-upper level, middle-middle level, middle-lower level, and bottom level) linking to ten occupational categories (Lu, 2002). The categorisation of social class is based on occupation and the organisational, economic, and cultural resources people have. The majority of rural-to-urban migrant labourers can be categorised as middle-lower class or bottom-level class, which resonates with the concept of ‘working class’ in the Western context.

For the majority of migrant children, they have a strong expectation of enrolling in urban state schools. The main reasons include that many migrant families are long-term residents in urban areas, and many children themselves are second-generation migrants. The migrant parents do not want to send their children back to their hometowns to become ‘left-behind’ children. In urban areas, there is a dual-track system in state school enrolment which differentiates the criteria of migrant children from that of local children. The intersectional effects of household registration (hukou) system and educational financial mechanism result in institutional barriers in migrant children’s schooling. Because of limited financial budget and educational resources, the receiving local governments in urban areas are unable to accommodate all migrant children in local state schools. As a result, many migrant children have to go back to their parents’ rural hometowns and become ‘left-behind’ children or enrol in unlicensed informal private (UIP) schools in urban areas.

The end of this chapter elaborates on the study’s qualitative research approach and sources of data (together with data analysis methods) to give the audience an understanding of how the findings and arguments in this book were developed and on what basis.

Rural-to-urban migration since the 1980s

In China, rural-to-urban migration has been a nationwide trend since the 1980s, driven by the need for semi-skilled (or non-skilled) industrial and service-sector labourers under national economic reform (Mok, Wong, & Guo, 2011). Since the Reform and Opening-Up in 1978, the central government has gradually loosened its restriction on rural-to-urban migration. In 1984, the State Council promulgated the Notification on Issues of Peasant Entering Household Registration in Towns, confirming its permission on massive rural-to-urban migration. Following this national policy, the number of migrants increased a lot in the mid-1980s. The increasing tendency of the nationwide migrant population is presented in Figure 1.1: in 1982, the number was 6.57 million, only accounting for 0.66% of the national population, yet only after five years, the migrant population had almost tripled (18.10 million) in 1987; entering the 1990s, the increasing tendency had been even more evident, with a fivefold increase from the year 1990 (21.35 million) to 2000 (102.29 million); after that, the migrant population has kept increasing.

Figure 1.1 Nationwide number (millions) of rural-to-urban migrants (1982–2020) (Data source: Duan, et al. 2008; National Bureau of Statistics, 2011, 2016, 2021).

In terms of the destination of rural-to-urban migration, metropolitan areas (such as Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou) and provinces in coastal regions (such as Guangdong, Fujian, and Zhejiang Provinces) are the most popular destinations for rural migrants. Among the coastal regions, the Yangtze River Delta region and the Pearl River Delta region are the most popular destinations for migrants. These regions, if compared with smaller cities in less developed regions, can offer more job opportunities with better incomes. According to the investigation of Duan et al. (2008), over the past three decades, perusing job and business opportunities have always been the primary reasons for rural-to-urban migration. Around 50%–55% of respondents report that they move to the cities for job or business opportunities. There are also around 25%–30% of migrants who come to the city for family reunions. In addition, most of my migrant respondents report that they also want to improve their ‘quality of life’, as they can enjoy a modern lifestyle and create more opportunities for their children in urban areas.

Along with the rural-to-urban migration movements, migrants have become a noticeable group in some metropolitan areas. This phenomenon can be identified with the following numbers regarding the percentage of the migrant population of the five fieldwork cities of this study in 2020: in Beijing, the migrant population accounts for 38.5% of the total residents (Beijing Municipal Bureau Statistics, 2021); in Shanghai, the migrant population accounts for 42.1% of the total residents (Shanghai Municipal Bureau Statistics, 2021); in Guangzhou, the migrant population accounts for 50.22% of the total residents (Guangzhou Statistics Bureau, 2021); in Shenzhen, the migrant population accounts for 70.84% of the total residents (Shenzhen Statistics Bureau, 2021); in Foshan, the migrant population accounts for 52.84% of the total residents (Foshan Statistics Bureau, 2021).

Migrants’ social positionality in urban China

Social stratification in contemporary Chinese society

In urban social space, rural migrant labourers have an intersectional identity of being a rural, floating, and working-class group. Since the 1990s, researchers have explored the condition of social stratification in China. Among them, the most established and influential study to date is a nationwide investigative report published in 2002 (Lu, 2002). It outlines ten occupational categories, which are then classified into five social classes. The categorisation of social class was based on four factors – namely, occupation, organisation,¹ economic and cultural resources people have. Figure 1.2 shows the relationships of the ten occupational categories and the five social classes. Although that research was done almost 20 years ago, and the description was based on a nationwide analysis, it still resonates with my fieldwork data collected from five cities in Northern, Eastern, and Southern China. It is important to note that while Lu (2002) categorises social class by examining multiple indicators, he takes occupation as the main indicator. As a result, his visualisation of the relative positions of different social classes in the social space is occupation-based.

Figure 1.2 Five social classes and ten occupational categories in China (Lu, 2002, p. 9).

In this figure, some important points need to be explained. First, while the five classes/levels on the left side follow a descending sequence, the ten occupational categories on the right side do not necessarily follow a descending sequence. For example, being an owner of a private company (third from the top) or a professional (fourth from the top), one can both be in either upper, middle-upper, or middle-middle level, depending on the exact occupation and the organisational, economic and cultural resources of that person. In other words, there is not a superior or inferior sequence between a private company owner and a professional. The same can be said of the service-sector employees (seventh), industrial labourer (eighth) and agricultural labourer (ninth).

Second, within the Chinese context, the ‘bottom-level class’, ‘middle-lower class’ and the bottom of the ‘middle-middle class’ resonate with the concept of ‘working class’ in the Western context. The reason is that the three classes in China cover the main manual labourer occupation categories, such as service-sector employees, industrial labourer, and agricultural labourer (which accounts for the vast majority of the country’s population). Accordingly, most of the migrants I have interviewed can be categorised into these three classes.

Finally, there is a variety of socio-economic conditions within each occupational category. That is to say, people in the same occupational category can be classified into different social classes, depending on their occupation, income, cultural and organisational resources. For example, engaging in industrial labourer occupations, A is a technician with a professional certificate and works full time in a big state-owned company with a good income, while B is a low-skilled worker without a professional certificate and relevant experience, undertaking occasional work for several small, private factories with low pay. Their socio-economic situations can be very different. As a result, A may be considered as belonging to the middle-lower class, while B may be considered as belonging to the bottom class. Such diversity also applies to the migrant labourer group, as I will elaborate on in the following section.

Migrants’ social positionality and living conditions

As for the question of to which occupational category and social class rural migrant labours belong, there is not a clear, unified, and official definition. The term ‘migrant population’ refers to those who migrate from one place to another and do not hold the household registration (hukou) cards in their destination. The government, scholars, journalists, and ordinary people apply the term ‘migrant rural labourer’ to more or less the same group – namely, those rural migrants who are involved in routine manual work. Yet in most cases, people do not give a clear definition of this term, assuming that the readers have the same understanding as themselves. The authoritative definition of the term ‘migrant rural labourer’ (waichu nongmingong) comes from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS): ‘migrant rural labourer is those who have their household registrations (hukou) registered in rural areas but are working outside their villages’ (National Bureau of Statistics, 2021). According to this definition, any person who is employed or self-employed can be seen as a labourer, regardless of his/her actual occupation. As a result, some rural migrants are engaged in those occupations that can hardly be considered akin to a labourer’s job. For example, a rural migrant can be the owner or CEO of a construction company in Beijing. Therefore, an ambiguity exists in the NBS’s definition. The reason for this ambiguity is that traditionally, most of the rural residents worked as agricultural labourers with low income. This situation creates a perception link between the rural residency and manual labourer occupation in public discourses. Although this perception link is a prejudiced assumption, it is also accurate in many cases. In other words, if you are a rural migrant in an urban area, it is highly possible that you are working in a manual labourer job.²

A nationwide investigation (Yuan, 2010, p. 242) reveals that 20.1% of the ‘migrant labourer’ parents are manual workers in companies; 17.2% of them run their own small businesses (often with low income); 10% are construction workers; 9.6% are shopkeepers; 6.6% of them are unemployed; 5.4% work in haulage; 5.3% are managers; the remaining 25.8% are other kinds of labourers. In other words, most of them are doing labourer jobs, which are unlikely to offer them a strong monthly income. As revealed by Lu (2013, p. 13), in Shanghai, 33.4% of the migrant labourer families have their total monthly incomes within the range of ¥1,001–3,000 (£100–300 equivalent); 30.2% of the migrant families have total monthly incomes w...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• Preface
• Acknowledgement
• Foreword
• 1 Migrant children’s school enrolment in urban China
• 2 Fluctuating development of school enrolment policy
• 3 Tracing educational policy trajectory with policy sociological and Bourdieusian resources
• 4 Intersection of multiple fields and social spaces framing policymaking
• 5 Cross-field effects: External influences on policy agenda
• 6 Discursive practices: Inside the ‘black box’ of the policy cycle
• 7 Intersectional logics: Local diversities in policy enactment
• 8 Nature of policymaking and concerns for social justice
• 9 Being reflexive: Policy sociology, Bourdieu, and the ‘toolbox’ approach
• Appendix: Lists of interviewees
• Index