The World's Largest Migration
Every year, as China celebrates its New Year (or Spring Festival, as it's been called since the 20th century), hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens take part in the world's largest annual migration.
In 2011, the Chinese government estimated that about half of China's population of 1.3 billion people, 700 million (more than twice the population of the entire United States), would travel home between January 19 and February 27, taking a total of 2.85 billion passenger trips on trains, planes, boats and buses. An average of 2,265 trains per day were scheduled to be in service, including 300 extra trains added to help carry the record 230 million passengers anticipated over the peak period. Still, ticket shortages were expected.
Many of the passengers in this annual pilgrimage are Chinese migrant workers traveling from coastal industrial centers to the interior countryside. Many of them travel home only once a year to visit family they have left behind.
The migration of the peasant work force started in the early 1980s, when the country first opened its economy. The influx of foreign investment created a soaring demand for labor, and millions were lured out of the undeveloped, western farmland to work in factory towns in the southern coastal regions. Because of the size of China (slightly smaller than the United States) and the quality of the transportation available, trips from these coastal regions to the countryside can take many days to complete.
While China has made efforts to accommodate the mass migration, including adding new high-speed rail lines, officials say it will be another five years before China's rapidly expanding rail network will be able to meet demand. Meanwhile, China has been preparing for a massive population shift from the countryside to cities in the next 25 years or so by rapidly building housing and amenities in urban centers.
China has set a goal to urbanize half of its population of 1.3 billion by 2020, and 70 percent by 2050.
Photo caption: Guangzhou Railway Station illuminated in the dark with stranded passengers impatiently waiting for trains to go home.
Credit: Lixin Fan
Sources:
» BBC News. "The Second Industrial Revolution."
» ChinaSmack. "Chun Yun: World's Largest Yearly Human Migration, 1995-2011."
» CIA. "The World Factbook: China."
» Fan, Lixin. "A Statement and Q&A with Lixin Fan." Spirituality & Practice, October 2009.
» MacLeod, Calum. "New High-speed Rail Aids China's Mass Migration." USA Today, February 2, 2011.
People born after 1980 account for about 60 percent of China's 240 million migrant workers, and their changing habits and aspirations will help determine the development of the country's manufacturing sector and broader economy.
Since 1978, when China implemented economic reforms intended to liberalize and boost the economy, the country has seen a rapid, massive urbanization. Not only have populations moved from the countryside to urban areas in unprecedented numbers (the proportion of China's urban population increased from 18 percent in 1978 to 43.9 percent in 2006), but the number of cities themselves skyrocketed, more than tripling from 191 in 1978 to 661 in 2005, as industrial centers were erected and expanded to meet global demand for Chinese-made goods. It is expected that an additional 345 million people in China will move from rural to urban areas in the next 25 years -- a mass migration larger and faster than any in history.
Seven cities and provinces have absorbed the majority of the migrant workers, who now make up more than one third of the population in cities such as Beijing and Zhejiang. Shenzhen, the town where Qin is bartending at the end of the film, has grown from a small town to a major metropolis in the past three decades; as of 2007, 12 million of the city's total population of 14 million were migrants.
As the population urbanizes, the gap between rural and urban wages widens, making the move to city centers more and more appealing. In their hometowns, rural workers hardly make enough to get by; by 2006, the average urban worker earned 3.27 times as much as his rural counterpart.
People born after 1980 account for about 60 percent of China's 240 million migrant workers, and their changing habits and aspirations will help determine the development of the country's manufacturing sector and broader economy.
Young Chinese migrant workers earn an average 1,747.87 Chinese yuan ($277) a month, about half the average urban salary, but have high expectations for personal development, according to a survey by the All-China Federation of Trade Unions.
That survey also found that young migrant workers are three times as likely to change jobs as their parents. They also have far less experience in farming than their parents, an indication that they are likely to remain in urban areas even if they cannot obtain the residency permits required to access the full range of social benefits.
As a way of accommodating this movement, the trade union federation recommended that the government allow at least 4 million young migrant workers to settle permanently in cities every year.
Photo caption: The father on his journey back home as the train nears his village.
Credit: Lixin Fan
Sources:
» "Migrant Workers in China." China Labour Bulletin, June 6, 2008.
» "The Second Industrial Revolution." BBC News. May 11, 2004.
» Hesketh, Therese, and Ye Xue Jun, Li Lu, and Wang Hong Mei. "Health Status and Access to Health Care of Migrant Workers in China." Public Health Reports, March-April 2008.
» Swift, Richard, "Whose Miracle." New Internationalist Magazine, April 1, 2011.
» China's young migrant workers mobile, ambitious - survey. Reuters, Feb 21, 2011.
Though these migrant workers have effectively relocated to areas where there are jobs, Chinese social policy has prevented them from fully establishing themselves there.
In 1958, China created a household registration system, called hukou, designed to aid the distribution of welfare and resources, control migration and keep watch on criminal activity. Each citizen is determined to live in either a rural or urban household, or hukou, based on his or her place of residence. Local governments are responsible for providing services such as education, housing and medical care to the constituents within their districts, and urban residents are given additional benefits in the form of food rations and job allocations. To discourage migration between districts, residents are not allowed to work or live outside their hukous without approval from authorities. If they do, they forfeit all rights and benefits, including education and medical care. Citizens are required to register their permanent and even temporary locations with police, and in some cases rural registrants may be arrested just for entering cities.
Despite the massive migrations within China in the past three decades, the hukou system persists today, making it nearly impossible for migrants to bring their families with them. Hukou reform has become a crucial political issue, but many migrant workers lack the education, motivation or political voice to fight for their rights.
Over the years there have been several efforts to reform or relax the hukou system, but widespread reform has yet to be enacted. One program proposed introducing temporary and visiting statuses that would allow some access to social services. One tried to grant permanent residency to migrant workers who had stable work, but also required applicants to own their own apartments -- a stipulation that ruled out most struggling workers.
In some provinces, workers can apply for temporary residency status that allows them to collect some benefits, or at least grants them access to services for pay, but the application process is usually complicated, and the fees required to register discourage many from applying. At one time, workers who had not registered as temporary residents could be barred from getting any job or from renting property, but those restrictions were abolished in 2003.
Migrant workers have seen some improvement in conditions in recent years, at least on paper. Reform enacted in 2003 requires employers to sign labor contracts with workers, pay them on time and compensate them for termination of employment. In response to those reforms, the All-China Federation of Trade Unions encouraged migrant workers to join local unions, and by 2008, half of them, or 62 million, had. In 2007, the All-China Federation of Trade Unions announced that it had helped more than 30.3 million migrant workers get home for the Chinese New Year using special trains and buses and group ticket purchases, secured 1.73 billion yuan in back wages for 2.65 million workers and provided financial assistance for more than 80,000 workers to allow their children to go to school.
Photo caption: Qin and her brother talk on the mountain where they usually play before she sets on her unknown journey to the city.
Credit: Liming Fan
Sources:
» "Migrant Workers in China." China Labour Bulletin, June 6, 2008.
» "The Second Industrial Revolution." BBC News. May 11, 2004.
» Hesketh, Therese, and Ye Xue Jun, Li Lu, and Wang Hong Mei. "Health Status and Access to Health Care of Migrant Workers in China." Public Health Reports, March-April 2008.
» Swift, Richard, "Whose Miracle." New Internationalist Magazine, April 1, 2011.
» China's young migrant workers mobile, ambitious - survey. Reuters, Feb 21, 2011.
According to a survey by the National Bureau of Statistics of China, the average monthly income for a migrant worker in 2004 was 780 yuan, just over half the national urban average of 1,350 yuan.
In 2008, another study showed a more favorable comparison: 850 renminbi (RMB) per month for migrant workers, as compared to 1,050 RMB per month for urban workers. The exchange rate at the time of USD $1 = 8 RMB, however, shows how little both types of worker make by U.S. standards. Furthermore, these workers were required to work long hours; they averaged 11 hours a day, 26 days a month. A 2008 study showed that 28 percent worked more than 12 hours a day, and 81 percent worked six or seven days a week.) One study of three central provinces found that migrants worked 50 percent more hours than native urban workers, but earned less than 60 percent of native urban workers' average salaries, making their hourly wages about one quarter those of urban residents. Also, migrant workers reported frequent delays and arbitrary decreases in pay.
Employers are not required to provide certain benefits for migrant workers, who have also forfeited government benefits. A 2008 study showed only 19 percent of migrant workers had some form of health insurance and 26 percent were entitled to limited sick pay, compared to 68 percent and 66 percent, respectively, for urban workers. Of those migrants who do receive sick pay, only 15 percent receive sick pay that matches base pay. Because medical treatment is drastically more expensive in urban areas than in rural ones, migrant workers often return home when forced to seek medical attention (a practice that can skew statistics on the health of migrant worker populations, making them seem healthier than they are).
Photo caption: The Zhang family at a factory -- their lives represent the lives of millions of Chinese migrant workers
Credit: Lixin Fan
Sources:
» "Migrant Workers in China." China Labour Bulletin, June 6, 2008.
» "The Second Industrial Revolution." BBC News. May 11, 2004.
» Hesketh, Therese, and Ye Xue Jun, Li Lu, and Wang Hong Mei. "Health Status and Access to Health Care of Migrant Workers in China." Public Health Reports, March-April 2008.
» Swift, Richard, "Whose Miracle." New Internationalist Magazine, April 1, 2011.
» China's young migrant workers mobile, ambitious - survey. Reuters, Feb 21, 2011.
Eastern and Western scholars analyzing China's meteoric economic rise in the past thirty years -- and its previous economic sluggishness -- have often focused on the relationship between capitalism and traditional Confucian values.
Confucianism is a philosophy attributed to the philosopher Confucius and has long been a chief cultural influence in China. Confucianism places weight on familial relationships and respect for elders and parents, a virtue known as "filial piety" (or "devotion to family"). In addition to creating harmony in the family, this virtue is considered essential in preparing children for respectful conduct in everyday life.
During the 1950s and 1960s, while Western nations were establishing themselves as world superpowers, some scholars attributed China's comparative failure to develop its economy to Confucianism. German political economist Max Weber believed that capitalism was influenced by religious ideas and that the values integral to Confucianism were incompatible with real economic performance or growth. Chinese scholar Chi Kong Lai writes extensively on the government officials in China who viewed the selfless ideals of Confucianism as incompatible with the selfishness that it took to succeed in business. Confucius is quoted saying, "If seeking wealth were a decent pursuit, I too would seek it, even if I had to work as a janitor. As it is, I'd rather follow my inclinations."
Following China's economic liberalization in 1978, many scholars and analysts in both the East and West began to emphasize Confucianism's values of xin (trustfulness), cheng (sincerity), ren (humaneness), and zhong (loyalty) -- qualities attractive in a business person - as well as pragmatism, harmony, reverence for family, acceptance of hierarchical social structures, concern with shame and saving face. Suddenly Confucianism was seen by some as not a barrier to success, but as a force behind it.
More pressing today, however, are the challenges faced by working families divided by migration. In a country where blood ties are paramount, the impediments that long-distance relationships can impose on families are seen as particularly insidious. Statistics show that although 56 percent of Chinese migrant workers are married, most of those couples are split between home and work so that one person can take care of family, and consequently see each other only once a year. In 2009, some 2.3 million couples divorced in China, an increase of 8.8 percent over the previous year, for a seventh consecutive year of increase. Among divorcing rural couples, 50 to 80 percent are estimated to include one migrant worker. Of younger migrant workers -- those born after the 1980s -- 80 percent are unmarried, and more than 70 percent list loneliness as their principal burden.
Filmmaker Lixin Fan says, It's true that the Confucian virtue of filial piety has long played a big role in Chinese lives. Being away from one's family was never encouraged by traditional values. Now the changing society has shifted toward a more pragmatic judgment and the bettering of one's material life. However, this doesn't necessarily mean that the Chinese are losing their traditional values completely. For example, in the film, the parents worked away from home but they sent all their savings to their parents and kids. I think that although the way of life has transformed along with economic changes, deeper values still remain."
Photo caption: Qin helps grandmom with farm work.
Credit: Liming Fan
Sources:
» Bao, Angela. "Endless road in China: from country to city and back." World Policy Journal. June 10, 2011.
» Fan, Lixin. "A Statement and Q&A with Lixin Fan." Spirituality & Practice, October 2009.
» PBS. Hidden Korea: Religion. Accessed Sep 22, 2011.
» Sang-in, Jun. "No (Logical) Place for Asian Values in East Asia's Economic Development. Development and Society." Development and Society, Volume 28 Number 2, December 1999, pp. 191-204.
» Yao, Souchou. Confucian Capitalism: Discourse, practice and the myth of Chinese enterprise. London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002
» Zarrow, Peter, ed. Creating Chinese Modernity: Knowledge and Everyday Life, 1900-1940. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2006.
» Zurndorfer, Harriet. "Confusing Confucianism With Capitalism: Culture as Impediment and/or Stimulus to Chinese Economic Development," paper presented at the Third Global Economic History Network Meeting, Konstanz, Germany (3-5 June 2004).
With a booming economy, rising international status and power and one-fifth of the world's population, China is one of the world's major forces.
In the past couple of years, China has surpassed Japan to become the world's third largest economy after the European Union and the United States. It also surpassed Germany and the United States to become the world's second largest exporter, trailing only the European Union. China produces and uses more electricity than any other nation, has spent billions on contracts with U.S. allies, is investing heavily in Africa and now conducts more trade with key U.S. partners Japan and Brazil than the United States does. However, a telephone survey of 1,400 urban Chinese residents conducted in 2010 by the Global Times newspaper found that only 15.5 percent of respondents saw their country as a "global power."
Opposing voices like that of Hu Ping, the chief editor of Beijing Spring, a pro-human rights and democracy journal, argue against China's potential "superpower" status and point to the country's uneven standard of living, controversial politics and persistent human-rights violations, as well as the lack of global Chinese brands, as evidence.
China has long been considered a secondary player because it built its wealth not through its own brands but by providing for major companies from the United States, European Union, Japan and elsewhere -- more than three-fifths of China's overall exports and nearly all its high-tech exports are made by foreign companies. Will Hutton, British political analyst and author of The Writing on the Wall: Why We Must Embrace China as a Partner or Face It as an Enemy, says that China remains, in essence, a subcontractor to the West.
For their part, Chinese business leaders are taking advantage of the global recession and their own cash wealth by expanding internationally and investing in Western concerns. In 2009, the China Market Research Group -- a strategic market intelligence firm headquartered in Shanghai -- interviewed 500 senior executives at 100 Chinese companies in 10 industries. Seventy percent of them said they specifically aimed to tap into the United States and Western Europe during the downturn.
While China has the third largest gross domestic product in the world as a country, its per capita gross domestic product still ranks 126th, at $7,600 annually, according to the CIA. (The United States, at $47,200, ranks 11th.) Much of the country still feels under-developed: Hundreds of millions of rural Chinese lack reliably safe drinking water, corruption is widespread and migrant workers make up one quarter of the workforce. Furthermore, some analysts argue that the national gross domestic product figure may be buoyed by overbuilding of real estate that is unaffordable to most Chinese and that could eventually prompt a massive housing market crash.
Photo caption: The Zhangs are crowded by passengers at Guangzhou Railway Station, heading home for Chinese New Year.
Credit: Weishan Tan
Sources:
» CIA. "The World Factbook: China."
» Hill, Steven. "The China Superpower Hoax." The Huffington Post, February 10, 2011.
» Kuhn, Anthony. "As China's Stature Grows, Is It Superpower Or Not?" NPR, January 8, 2010.
» Mong, Adrienne. Do the Chinese Believe China Is a Superpower?" MSNBC, January 19, 2011.
» Ramzy, Austin. "Person of the Year 2009, Runners-Up: The Chinese Worker." Time, December 16, 2009.
» Rein, Shaun. "Yes, China Has Fully Arrived As A Superpower." Forbes, December 15, 2009.