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Urban Population Growth and Urbanization in China Since 1949: Reconstructing a Baseline*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Kam Wing Chan  and
Xueqiang Xu
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Extract

China's urbanization patterns and policies since 1949 have been the focus of a good deal of attention. The main elements of this “Chinese Model” have been the massive “rustication” movements, the recruitment of large numbers of city dwellers to work in rural areas, strict controls on rural-urban migration through food rationing and household registration, and the expansion of rural employment through the development of rural industries. While controlling urban population growth has been problematic to most governments of developing countries, it has been widely accepted that China, particularly in the Maoist era, has been successful in this sphere. The “Chinese Model”, therefore, may offer such countries great promise as an alternative approach.

Type
Research Article
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 104 , December 1985 , pp. 583 - 613
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1985

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References

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18. In countries where urban designation may not imply non-agricultural predominance, an additional explicit criterion of economic activities may have to be introduced. See UNPD, Pallern of Urban and Rural Population Growth, p. 9Google Scholar. This is not very relevant to China where the criterion of non-agricultural predominance in economic activities must be met for most urban designations.

19. For example, the percentage of urban labour force engaged in agriculture ranged from 11·3%, to 22·8% during 1950–71 in Nicaragua, Peru, Romania and Turkey. Ibid. pp. 9 and 74. Most of these urban farmers are found in small and medium cities and towns.

20. Other studies also confirm the same point, see Eyre, Alan L., “Shanghai – world's second city?” Professional Geographer, Vol. 23, No. 1 (01 1971), pp. 28–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Chance, Norman A., China's Urban Village: Life in a Beijing Commune (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1984)Google Scholar, Chap. 2. Indeed, the surburban counties are often referred to as nongcun (rural villages).

21. See. for example, Ullman, Morris B., Cities of Mainland China: 1953 and 1958 (Washington, D.C.US Department of Commerce, International Reports Series P-95, No. 59, 1961), p. 4.Google Scholar

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23. According to this definition, which has been used in many UN studies, China's urban population would have totalled 167 million (22% of the nation's total) and 195 million (23%) in 1970 and 1975. respectively. UNPD, Pattern of Urban and Rural Population Growth, p. 136.Google Scholar

24. Ministry of Domestic Affairs, Zhongguo xingzheng quhua jiance (A Handbook of Administrative Districts in China) (Beijing: Ditu chubanshe, 1982).Google Scholar

25. This programme was first initiated in the late 1950s. A renewed emphasis has been made since the early 1980s. Mingbao (Ming Pao, Hong Kong), 1 01 1983, p. 5Google Scholar. At the end of 1981, only 56 municipalities, out of a total of 230, included one or more counties under their administration. This number has increased to 121, out of a total of 286, in 1984. Dagonghao (Tu Kung Pao, American ed.), 21 03 1984, p. 1.Google Scholar

26. An example one may use to illustrate this is the case of Chongqing. This municipality covered an area of 9,800 sq. km., and had a population of 6·4 million, before the shiguanxian programme was implemented in 04 1983Google Scholar. After that, however, with the inclusion of 11 counties and another small city, the total municipal area expanded to 22,909 sq. km., and the municipal population to 13 million, to become China's largest “city” by TPM. See “The nation's largest city,” in Dagongbao (American ed.), 21 03 1984, p. 1.Google Scholar

27. This does not imply that all temporary and contract workers will be counted as part of the TPCT. Only those who are regular residents of urban areas will be counted.

28. Tingwei, Zhang, “Dui chengshihua fazhan dongli de tantao” (“Discussion on the driving force of urbanization”), Chengshi guihua, No. 5 (1983), pp. 59–60Google Scholar; Xuwei, Hu, “Analysis of China's urbanization level,” pp. 25–26Google Scholar; see also supra fn. 17.

29. Owing to the incompleteness of enumeration, most national census figures underestimate the number of urban residents by about 5 to 10%.

30. Orleans, , “China's urban population,” pp. 273–77Google Scholar; and Aird, J., “Population studies and population policy in China,” pp. 279–82.Google Scholar

31. State Council (ed.). Collection of Legal Documents, 1955, p. 413.Google Scholar

32. Reproduced in ibid. pp. 409–417.

33. The 1955 urban criteria also made provision for a special urban category called “urban-type residential areas” (chengshi xing juminqu), which mainly referred to sites of institutions and enterprises and their residential areas whose number of regular residents was between 1,000 and 2,000, of whom 75% were “non-agricultural.” This type of urban settlement, however, was not granted “town” status.

34. See State Council (ed.). Collection of Legal Documents, 1955, p. 413.Google Scholar Some of these small settlements were, instead, reclassified as “urban-type residential areas.” However, they probably remained in the “urban” category.

35. Xuwei, Hu, “Analysis of China's urbanization level,” p. 25.Google Scholar

36. The State Council issued a set of revised criteria for defining towns in 1964 stipulating that a “town” was a settlement (i) with a population of more than 3,000 of whom more than 70% were “non-agricultural,” or (ii) with a population of 2,500 to 3,000 of whom more than 85% were “non-agricultural.” See ibid. The widely quoted definition of urban places in TJNJ 1981, p. 495Google Scholar, which only specifies (i) above represents a partial description of the criteria which have been used since 1964.

37. SCPCO and SSBPSD, China's Third Population Census, p. 2.Google Scholar

38. Of course, there are also some “movements” between the two categories of “cities” and “towns.” Towns might expand to become cities, and cities might decline to become towns.

39. Calculated from 1964 data reported in SCPCO and SSBPSD, China's Third Population Census, p. 1.Google Scholar

40. Xuwei, Hu, “Analysis of China's urbanization level,” p. 24Google Scholar; and Youren, Wu and Linde, Zhuang, “Guanyu woguo chengshi jiaoqu fanwei de wenti” (“Questions on the boundary of urban suburbs”), in Geographical Society of China (ed.), Gongye buju yu chengshi guihua (Industrial Location and City Planning) (Beijing: Kexue chubanshe, 1981), pp. 144–49.Google Scholar

41. For example, see Shiqing, Wang and Hanbing, Qi, “Xianzhen guihua zhong jige wenti de fujian” (“Some preliminary views on planning of county towns”), Chengxiang jianshe (Urban and Rural Construction), No. 7 (07 1983), pp. 6–8.Google Scholar

42. There are more than 300 county towns (xian zhen) which, though they have attained the conditions suitable for urban designation, are still excluded from the urban category. See Mengbai, Li “Woguo chengzhen fazhan de zhanwan” (“Prospect of urban development in China”), Chengxiang jianshe, No. 12 (12 1983), p. 17Google Scholar; also Xuwei, Hu, “Analysis of China's urbanization level.”Google Scholar

43. Chengrui, Li, “The Chinese population,” pp. 31–32.Google Scholar

44. See the Explanatory Notes of TJNJ 1981, p. 495. A recent confirmation of the above is in Kaihua, H u and Wei, Chen, “Woguo chengzhen renkou tongji de youguan wenti” (“Questions related to China's urban population statistics”), Renkou yujingji, No. 3 (06 1984), pp. 39–42 and 24.Google Scholar

45. Chengrui, Li, “The Chinese population,” pp. 31–32.Google Scholar

46. Examples of the NPCT and the TPCT not being differentiated can be found in Hong, Ma et al. , Dictionary of Economic Events, p. 14Google Scholar; and Chunyuan, Zhang et al. (eds), Renkou jingjixue (Population Economics) (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanxue, 1983), p. 330.Google Scholar

47. In fact, the definition of urban population based on a de jure criterion is not particularly unique to the Chinese case; the same thing is found in the USSR, see Houston, Cecil, “Administrative control of migration to Moscow, 1959–75,” The Canadian Geographer, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Spring 1979), pp. 32–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

48. By defining the urban population on a narrower population base, the state would apparently reduce its moral, if not financial, commitment of providing rations and services to urban residents without non-agricultural household status.

49. Xuwei, Hu, “Analysis of China's urbanization level,” pp. 23“26Google Scholar; Yuren, Wu, “Questions on China's urbanization,” p. 96Google Scholar; and Tingwei, Zhang, “The driving force of urbanization,” p. 59.Google Scholar

50. For example, Shanghai's population in 1982 was reported by residence (city proper/suburban counties) instead of the conventional household classification (agricultural/non-agricultural) in Academy of Social Science, Shanghai, Shanghai jingji (Economy of Shanghai) (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1983), p. 1, 237Google Scholar; and SCPCO and SSBPD, 10 Percent Sampling Tabulation on the 1982 Population Census of the People's Republic of China (Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe, 1983).Google Scholar There are, however, still some cases where the NPCT/non-NPCT division is used as an approximation of the urban/rural dichotomy, particularly in social and economic surveys.

51. This change in definition was made known by the statistical authorities in 1982 (see supra fn. 44) and other subsequent publications. Some authors, writing after 1982, including those who cited figures from the TJNJ 1981, were either unaware of the change or incorrectly interpreted it. Examples of these include Aird, John, “The preliminary results of China's 1982 Census,” CQ, No. 96 (12 1983), pp. 613–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jowett, , “The growth of China's population,” p. 156Google Scholar; and Orleans, and Burnham, , “The enigma,” p. 790.Google Scholar

52. The urban population of the USA and the USSR was about 149 million (1980) and 173 million (1982), respectively. See US Bureau of Census, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1982–83 (Washington, D.C., US Government Printing Office, 1981), p. 21Google Scholar; and USSR State Statistical Administration, Narodnoe khoziaistvi SSSR 1922–1982: Iubileinyo statisticheskii ezhegodnik (The National Economy of the USSR: the Jubilee Statistical Yearbook) (Moskva: Finansy i Statistik, 1982), p. 9.Google Scholar

53. There is another possible reason for underestimating the actual urban size in the post-1964 period in comparison with the pre-1964 one caused by a change in the enumeration criterion in the 1964 Census. Refer to the discussion in Section 5.

54. A note of caution is necessary here. Statistics in Table 4 are based on estimates from each country and hence are subject to variation in both definition and accuracy. But in general, they are still indicative of the long-term urban trends.

55. Refer to the discussion in Section 1. Chen, Pi-chao, “Overurbanisation, rustication of urban-educated youths, and politics of rural transformation,” Comparative Politics, Vol. 4, No. 3 (04 1972), pp. 373–74CrossRefGoogle Scholar, also cites statements indicating that the Chinese Goverment may have hoped to stabilize the urban population at 110 million during the mid 1960s.

56. For example, see Kojima, Reiitsu, “Shakaishugi kensetsu to toshika”Google Scholar (“Socialist development and urbanization”), in Kojima, (ed.), Chūgoku no toshika to nōson kensetsu, pp. 19–22Google Scholar; Ma, Laurence, “Anti-urbanism in China,” Proceedings of Association of American Geographers, Vol. 8 (1976), pp. 114–18Google Scholar; Cell, Charles P., “The urban-rural contradiction in the Maoist era: the pattern of deurbanisation in China,” Comparative Urban Research, Vol. 7, No. 3 (1980), pp. 48–69Google Scholar; Ishikawa, , “China's economic growth since 1949,” pp. 250–51.Google Scholar

57. SSB, Zhongguo tongji nianjian 1983 (TJNJ 1983) (Statistical Yearbook of China 1983) (Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe, 1983), pp. 103–105.Google Scholar

58. Chengrui, Li, “Shinian neiluan qijian woguo jingji qingkuang fenxi – jianlun zheyi qijian tongji shuzi de kekaoxing” (“An analysis of China's economy in the ten-year internal-chaos period and comments on the reliability of statistics of this period”), Jingji yanyiu, No. 1 (1984), pp. 23–31.Google Scholar

59. Some of the minor differences in the 1950s' figures are presumably due to the retrospective adjustments of the previous data by the SSB.

60. In fact, one would note on inspection of the TPCT data three periods when the level of urban growth suddenly changed, in 1955, 1960–63 and in 1964. While the drop in urban growth in 1955 is likely to be caused mainly by the revision of urban criteria, and the trough of the early 1960s is definitely a result of the decline in urban increase rate and of the then massive resettlement of urban people, the precipitous increase of 13 million within one single year of 1964 is likely to be a statistical phenomenon. Much of this “abnormal” growth occurred in the first half of 1964, as shown in the mid 1964 figure (127·1 million). One suspects that this anomaly was caused by:

(i) The retrospective inclusion in the 1964 Census of urban residents not counted or registered in any previous enumerations. Incomplete population registration in 1960–63 would be likely in time of massive migration. Indirect evidence of this is found in Rertkou pucha qiansuo (A Brief Discussion of Population Censuses) (Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe, 1982), pp. 46–47;Google Scholar

(ii) The change of criterion in classifying “regular” residents. Before 1964 a migrant would be included in the regular resident population of the “destination” place irrespective of his length of stay there; as from mid 1964 (the Second Census) the new enumeration method required a migrant to have stayed in the “destination” place for at least one year for such inclusion, otherwise he would still be counted as a member of the population of his former residence. (See ibid. p. 47.) The new enumeration method will shift (or delay) the effect of net migration on the urban size by one year compared to the previous method. In a situation experiencing net urban out-migration, as was in 1964, the urban population size calculated by the new method would tend to “overcount” the urban size when compared to statistics based on the previous method, resulting in an abnormal growth.

61. In a more general case of net urban in-migration, the post-1964 calculation method (see footnote above) would tend to “undercount” the urban size in comparison with the pre-1964 one. Over the long term, however, this discrepancy will diminish to an insignificant level.

62. This net in-migration figure calculated here also includes net population gain or loss due to urban reclassification, the extent of which cannot be gauged from the existing information. The figure, however, excludes illegal and semi-legal urban in-migration, which would most probably have increased since the early 1960s.

63. Based on Coale, Ansley J., Rapid Population Change in China. 1952–1982 (Washington D.C.: National Academy Press, 1984), pp. 28 and 69Google Scholar, the completeness of birth registration in China averaged about 91% for 1966–76 while death registration averaged about 84% over the same period. When applied against 1966–76 vital rates in TJNJ 1983, p. 105Google Scholar, these figures would yield an undercounting percentage of about 8% in the reported national rate of natural increase for this period.

64. Adding 6% to the higher version of the average annual rate of natural increase (1·75) yields a rate of 1·86, which is still lower than the average annual growth rate of urban population (1·88).

65. One also suspects that out-migration occurred mostly in large cities and in-migration in smaller urban places.

66. This total includes the resettlement of 17 million urban youths in the countryside through shangshan xiaxiang. The remaining 13 million include the number of relocated urban workers and intellectuals, and their families through xiafang. See Youren, Wu, “Questions on China's urbanization,” p. 97Google Scholar. Similar evidence is found in Lanrui, Feng and Lukuan, Zhao, Zhongguo chengzhen de jiuye he gongzi (Employment and Wage in Urban China) (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1982), p. 6Google Scholar; Orleans, , “China's urban population,” pp. 279–83Google Scholar; and Beijing Review, Vol. 25, No. 39 (27 09 1982), p. 20.Google Scholar

67. Lardy, , Agriculture in China's Development, pp. 196–97Google Scholar; and Hongjun, Yu and Yuemin, Ming, Chengshi dili gailun (Theories of Urban Geography) (Hefei: Anhui keji chubanshe, 1983), pp. 155–56.Google Scholar

68. Examples are: State Council, “Directive on the strict control of the flow of rural labour force into cities to work and the conversion of agricultural population into non-agricultural population,” Guowuyuan gongbao (10 02 1982), pp. 885–87Google Scholar; and “Directive on the strict forbidding unhealthy tendencies in the work of recruiting and assigning state workers and staff,” ibid. 10 June 1982, pp. 339–42.

69. State Council, “Directive on the strict forbidding unhealthy tendencies,” ibid. pp. 339–42.

70. A detailed explanation of these is found in Blecher, , “Peasants labour for urban industry.”Google Scholar

71. Ibid.; Emerson, John, “The labor force of China 1957–80,”Google Scholar in US Congress, China Under the Four Modernisations, Pt. I, pp. 224–67Google Scholar; Lardy, , Agriculture in China's Development, pp. 196–97Google Scholar; and Chance, , China's Urban Villages, pp. 51–54.Google Scholar

72. A portion of their salaries, however, has to be handed over to the production teams to which these temporary and contract workers belong. In addition to other possible benefits such as free housing and learning of skills, there is also a likelihood that they might one day be granted regular worker (non-agricultural household) status. See Blecher, , “Peasants labour for urban industry”Google Scholar; and Xia, Ma, “An exploratory study.”Google Scholar

73. Blecher, , “Peasants labour for urban industry.”Google Scholar

74. There are some close parallels here with the problem of “temporary” and “permanent” residence status in the Soviet cities and the associated statistical accounting problems. See Houston, C., “Administrative control of migration to Moscow, 1959–75,” pp. 32–44.Google Scholar

75. Xia, Ma, “An exploratory study,” and State Council, “Directive on the strict control of the flow,” Guowuyuan gongbao (10 02 1982), p. 885.Google Scholar

76. This has been widely reported in Chinese media; see Lanrui, Feng and Lukuan, Zhao, Employment and Wage, pp. 6–7Google Scholar; and also Beijing Review, Vol. 25, No. 39 (27 09 1982), p. 20.Google Scholar

77. Rusticated urban youths legally began to flow back to cities since 1974 under various names, see Feng Lanrui and Zhao Lukuan, ibid. p. 7; also Bernstein, Thomas P., Up to the Mountain and Down to the Village (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977), Chap. 6.Google Scholar

78. Yuren, Wu and Linde, Zhuang, “Questions on the boundary of urban suburbs,” p. 146.Google Scholar Natural increase was not likely the sole contributor of a rapid annual population growth rate as high as 5%; a large part of this growth rate must be attributed to in-migration.

79. The definition of various urban size categories is in City Planning Regulations, Art. 2, reproduced in Xinhua yuebao (New China Monthly) (1984), No. 1, pp. 84–86.Google Scholar The policy favouring smaller settlements has been the official guidelines for locating new industries since the late 1950s. Developing small urban places was made official urban policy in 1980. See Buck, , “Policies favouring the growth of smaller urban places,” Ma, Laurence and Hanten, Edward (eds.). Urban Development in China (Boulder: Westview Press, 1981), pp. 123–24Google Scholar; and Renmin ribao, 16 10 1980, p. 1.Google Scholar

80. According to TJNJ 1981, p. 92Google Scholar, the NPC/TPC ratio for cities with NPC over one million was 0·81, and for those between 0·5 to one million, it was 0·71 (1981 end-year). The overall NPCT/TPCT ratio for all cities and towns was 0·71 in mid 1982 (computed from Table 3).

81. Xueqiang, Xu, “Trends and changes of the urban system in China,” Third World Planning Review, Vol. 6, No. 1 (02 1984), pp. 47–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

82. Xiatong, Fei, “Xian chengzhen da wenti” (“Small towns, a big issue”), Liaowang (Lookout), No. 2–5 (16–30 01 1984).Google Scholar

83. Refer to supra fn. 56.

84. The average annual urban population growth rates for India and Brazil between 1960 and 1975 were 3·4%, and 4·8%, respectively (computed from UNPD, Patterns of Urban and Rural Population Growth, Table 48).Google Scholar

85. Some of these problems are discussed in Emerson, John P., “Urban school-leavers and unemployment in China,” CQ, Vol. 93 (03 1983), pp. 1–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lanrui, Feng and Lukuan, Zhao, Employment and Wage, pp. 6–7Google Scholar; and Haohua, Feng, “Dui Qinghai yimin yu kenhuang de lishi kaocha” (“An historical survey of the migration to, and opening up of Qinghai”), Jingfi yanjiu, No. 3 (05 1983), pp. 52–57.Google Scholar

86. Of course, in certain periods like the early 1960s the availability of surplus grain from rural areas for the urban population might act as an effective constraint on the increase of the urban population, see Ishikawa, , “China's economic growth since 1949,” p. 257.Google Scholar

87. Computed from 1978–82, TJNJ 1983, p. 103.Google Scholar This sudden rebound of urban growth rate was caused by the return of urban people previously rusticated. This suggests that the rustication movement only delayed, rather than actually reduced, the urban population growth.