Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T23:20:33.009Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Towards Inclusive Social Citizenship? Rethinking China's Social Security in the Trend towards Urban–Rural Harmonisation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 July 2012

SHIH-JIUNN SHI
SHIH-JIUNN SHI*
Affiliation:
Graduate Institute of National Development, National Taiwan University, 1, Sec. 4, Roosevelt Road, 10617 Taipei, Taiwan email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Urban–rural harmonisation has risen to prominence in recent social security reform in China. This article offers an account of the changing welfare institutions and social citizenship configurations unfolded by this particular policy approach. As social activism gained substantial weight as part of the regional developmental strategies of local governments, harmonisation efforts have led to a boundary shift of social citizenship largely defined by the within–without criterion rather than the urban–rural divide. In places where urban–rural harmonisation takes hold, the pivotal criterion for claiming social benefits is the possession of local resident status, regardless of whether this status is urban or rural. The heterogeneity of regional social security developments resulting from social decentralisation also calls attention to the ‘variable geometry’ of institutional change, i.e. various social policy domains manifest diverse degrees of institutional dynamics towards harmonisation. In this light, urban–rural harmonisation is likely to trigger competitive solidarity in terms of regional competition and emulation in economic development and social provision, leading to regional disparities that will shape the future contours of social policy and social citizenship in China.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 41 , Issue 4 , October 2012 , pp. 789 - 810
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Brown, P. H., de Brauw, A. and Du, Y. (2009), ‘Understanding variation in the design of China's New Cooperative Medical System’, China Quarterly, 198: 304–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cai, F. and Cheng, X. (2008), Urban–Rural Harmonisation: Research on Comprehensive Reform of Urban–Rural Pooling in Chengdu, Chengdu: Sichuan People Publisher (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Chan, C. K. (2010), ‘Rethinking the incrementalist thesis in China: a reflection on the development of the minimum standard of living scheme in urban and rural areas’, Journal of Social Policy, 39: 4, 627–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chan, K. W. and Buckingham, W. (2008), ‘Is China abolishing the Hukou system?’, China Quarterly, 195: 582–606.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chan, C. L. W. and Chow, N. W. S. (1992), More Welfare after Economic Reform? Welfare Development in the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong: University of Hong Kong.Google Scholar
Chang, K.-S. (1993), ‘The Confucian family instead of the welfare state? Reform and peasant welfare in post-Mao China’, Asian Perspective, 17: 3, 169–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, S. (1996), Social Policy of the Economic State and Community Care in Chinese Culture, Aldershot: Avebury.Google Scholar
Cheng, X. (2011), Chengdu Scientific Development Report 2011, Chengdu: Sichuan People Publisher (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Chien, S.-S. (2007), ‘Institutional innovations, asymmetric decentralisation and local economic development – case study of Kunshan in post-Mao China’, Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, 25: 2, 269–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chien, S.-S. (2008), ‘Local responses to globalisation in China: a territorial restructuring process perspective’, Pacific Economic Review, 13: 4, 492–517.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duckett, J. and Carrillo, B. (eds.) (2011), China's Changing Welfare Mix: Local Perspectives, London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Dwyer, P. (2010),Understanding Social Citizenship, 2nd edition, Bristol: Policy Press.Google Scholar
Fan, J. (2008), Equalisation of Public Service in Coordinating Urban–Rural Development, Beijing: China Financial and Economic Publishing (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Ferrera, M. (2005), The Boundaries of Welfare: European Integration and the New Spatial Politics of Social Protection, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flick, U. (2009), An Introduction to Qualitative Research, 4th edition, London: Sage.Google Scholar
Frazier, M. W. (2010a), ‘Popular responses to China's emerging welfare state’, in Gries, P. H. and Rosen, S. (eds.), Chinese Politics: State, Society and the Market, New York, NY: Routledge, pp. 258–74.Google Scholar
Frazier, M. W. (2010b), Socialist Insecurity: Pensions and the Politics of Uneven Development in China, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Goldman, M. (2007), From Comrade to Citizen, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Gong, S. and Su, Y. (2010), Social Policies for both People's Livelihood and Inclusive Growth, Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Gong, W., Hao, J. and Zhai, S. (2009), ‘Coordinating urban–rural medical system: situations and problems in Chengdu’, Chinese Journal of Health Policy, 2: 12, 11–15 (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Guan, X. (2005), ‘China's social policy: reform and development in the context of marketisation and globalisation’, in Kwon, H.-j. (ed.), Transforming the Developmental Welfare State in East Asia, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 231–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heilmann, S. (2008), ‘Policy experimentation in China's economic rise’, Studies in Comparative International Development, 43: 1, 1–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heilmann, S. (2009), ‘Maximum tinkering under uncertainty: unorthodox lessons from China’, Modern China, 35: 4, 450–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, C.-K. (2007), Against the Law: Labour Protests in China's Rustbelt and Sunbelt, Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leibfried, S. (2010), ‘Social policy: left to the judges and the markets?’, in Wallace, H., Wallace, W. and Pollack, M. A. (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 253–81.Google Scholar
Leung, J. C. B. (2003), ‘Social security reforms in China: issues and prospects’, International Journal of Social Welfare, 12: 73–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leung, J. C. B. and Nann, R. C. (1995), Authority and Benevolence: Social Welfare in China, Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong Press.Google Scholar
Li, J. and Zhou, S. (2008), China Sample: Reflections on the ‘National Experiment Zone for Urban–Rural Harmonisation’ in Chongqing and Chengdu, Guilin: Guangxi Normal University Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Liu, S. (2007), ‘Social citizenship in China: continuity and change’, Citizenship Studies, 11: 5, 465–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liu, W., Zhang, S. and Sun, J. (2010), ‘Comparison and evaluation of the urban–rural integration in the four municipalities’, Beijing Social Sciences, 25: 4, 28–36 (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Lockwood, D. (1996), ‘Civic integration and class formation’, British Journal of Sociology, 47: 3, 531–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lu, C. and Tang, L. (2010), ‘Urban–rural integration: patterns and strategies’, Anhui Agriculture Science, 38: 3, 1585–7 (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Ma, Q. (2011), Integration of Urban and Rural Areas: A New Liberation of China's Productivity, Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Marshall, T. H. (1964), Class, Citizenship and Social Development, Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company.Google Scholar
Morris, L. (ed.) (2006), ‘Social rights, trans-national rights and civic stratification’, in Morris, L. (ed.), Rights: Sociological Perspectives, New York, NY: Routledge, pp. 77–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peking University (2010), The Road to Property Rights Delineation: Experience of Chengdu, Research report of the National School of Development, Beijing: Peking University Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Perry, E. J. and Goldman, M. (eds.) (2007), Grassroots Political Reform in Contemporary China, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ragin, C. C. and Becker, H. (eds) (1992), What Is a Case? Exploring the Foundations of Social Inquiry, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Saich, T. (2008), Providing Public Goods in Transitional China, New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Saunders, P. and Shang, X. (2001), ‘Social security reform in China's transition to a market economy’, Social Policy and Administration, 35: 3, 274–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scharpf, F. (1999), Governing in Europe: Effective and Democratic? Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Selden, M. and You, L. (1997), ‘The reform of social welfare in China’, World Development, 25: 10, 1657–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shen, C. and Williamson, J. B. (2010), ‘China's new rural pension scheme: can it be improved?’, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 30: 5/6, 239–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shi, S.-J. (2006), ‘Left to market and family, again? Ideas and the development of rural pension policy in China’, Social Policy and Administration, 40: 7, 791–806.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shi, S.-J. (2009), ‘The sub-nationalisation of social protection: the spatial politics transformation of social citizenship in China’, Taiwanese Sociology, 18: 43–93 (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Shi, S.-J. (2012), ‘Social policy learning and diffusion in China: the rise of welfare regions?’, Policy and Politics, 40 (forthcoming).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solinger, D. J. (1999), Contesting Citizenship in Urban China: Peasant Migrants, the State, and the Logic of the Market, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Streeck, W. (2000), ‘Competitive solidarity: rethinking the European social model’, in Hinrichs, K., Kitschelt, H. and Wiesenthal, H. (eds.), Kontingenz und Krise: Institutionenpolitik in kapitalistischen und postsozialistischen Gesellschaften, Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, pp. 245–61.Google Scholar
Threlfall, M. (2003), ‘European social integration: harmonization, convergence and single social areas’, Journal of European Social Policy, 13: 2, 121–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, W. (2010), China's Urban–Rural Integration: A Research Report on Theory and Planning, Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Wong, L. (1998), Marginalisation and Social Welfare in China, London/New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Wong, L. and Macpherson, S. (eds.) (1995), Social Change and Social Policy in Contemporary China, Aldershot: Avebury.Google Scholar
Wong, L. and Flynn, N. (eds.) (2001), The Market in Chinese Social Policy, Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wu, J.-m. (2010), ‘Rural migrant workers and China's differential citizenship: a comparative institutional analysis’, in Whyte, M. K. (ed.), One Country, Two Societies: Rural–Urban Inequality in Contemporary China, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, pp. 55–81.Google Scholar
Wun, T. (2009), Rural Issues and Institutional Evolution, Beijing: China Economic Publisher (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Xie, J. (2009), Rights Safeguard for Chinese Migrant Workers, Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Ye, X. (2009), ‘China's urban–rural integration policies’, Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, 38: 4, 117–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Z. (ed.) (2011), Development and Practice of Chongqing's Urban–Rural Pooling, Chongqing: Chongqing University Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Zhu, J., Zhan, Y. and Han, C. (2008), The Way to Urbanisation in Southern Jiangsu: Change and Innovation of Hudai Town, Beijing: China Social Sciences Press (in Chinese).Google Scholar