Collective Memory And Identity Construction Under The Background Of Danwei Transformation

This paper tries to show the complete process of Danwei-institution transformation after new China, describe life-history of people in Danwei, discover their collective memories of social transformation, and analyze their identity construction in order to reflect Danwei-institution. Around the theme, these three problems will be discussed: The first, during life-history of individual and family, what collective memories have been produced? Secondly, how do people construct their identities? Thirdly, basing on this transformation of Danwei-instition, what shall we do for a new kind of community-style living? In this study, as for general idea, qualitative research is conducted with oral history, literature, observation and other specific ways. Considering historical status, current dilemma and representativeness, H Factory has been chosen as the study sample.During the transformation of Danwei-institution, people their-selves in H Factory have been changing with differentiation from high degree of homogeneity continuously. As kind of production mechanism, collective memory shapes people in Danwei, and the order??individual as center, has been showed during memories of difficult periods. The planned economy era, workers, as the typical representative of people in Danwei, although endured entrepreneurship's hard, bitter in body have been integration into the liberation and gratitude. In the Danwei society with low-wage and high-benefit, they mostly have achieved the same sense of equality and ownership, formed intensivecollective identity. During the Cultural Revolution, production of H Factory has been advanced still, although affected by general class struggle.Even influenced by the thought of Cultural Revolution, social status and identity of workers in Danwei, have achieved unprecedented enhancement. At the early stage of reformation, although market and capital have begun to reconstruct, in the old industrial bases in Northeast China, H Factory won new production and research peak, and the identity construction were stable still. During 90s, the concentrated promotion of state enterprise reform, change of Danwei-institution was rapidly extremely. Production order based on planned economy, which depends on national directives, has been replaced by market center-economy. Almost at the sudden, people in Danwei, who were represented by traditional industrial workers, their living condition and social status changed intensively. Economic, political and social status of them gone down nearly at the same time, previous cultural activities disappeared, their own identity construction declined sharply, collective consciousness, which ever leaded Danwei-institution into glory, has been hit into fragment. With the stage of further reform, people of Danwei fall into identity confusion again. The discrete restructuring of H Factory, is just as the pause of passionate march, proclaiming the halt with no sign. While the left shock is difficult to disappear, identity of people in Danwei has been crushed much than ever.Since the reform and opening, the three generations of Danwei in H Factory have common witness and memory the ups and downs of H Factory, it experienced a process of evolution from Danwei life community to atomizationand encountered identity transformation from People of Danwei to social person. In the formation and evolution on system of Danwei, according to the inheritance on generations of group relations, it can show identity evolution on three generations of People of Danwei, while according to this result that produced by the identity evolution, such a context can be roughly tease out: The ordinary working class'life sank to the bottom in People of Danwei, on the one hand, this identity recognition on worker is contradictory, while fully affirming the social value of their own, they recognized that society self-identity for their own is insufficient.Therefore, their own self-identity on worker is extremely low, even trying to warn their offspring not to repeat their life. on the other hand, they try to construct itself on the identity foundation.They want to strengthen their own identity as factory contributor, national suffering partaker and the reform and opening bearer through recall the past. Based on this situation, they want the country and society can give them reasonable explanation. Accordingly, the leadership who has political capital mainly achieved identity status'rising in the country's reform and Danwei system changes on Danwei system. And then, in the collision of between the warmth memory on the past Danwei and the realistic situation, in the joint of elder generation's advice on no longer as worker and successful socialist values on mainstream social espouses, as the third generation People of Danwei, they tried to jump out of the history of their parents and reset their social identity in the new social space. It is different from the workers'memory practice, they have a high recognition for their own. One the one hand, through reviewing the past especially when they do hard work and share their misery in order to construct the explaining logic about after suffering comes happiness. On the other hand, they are more inclined to use words in the context of the global market, for example, they use some worlds such as market, opportunity to construct themselves to be entrepreneurs, leaders, innovator and a lot of identity which are full of the modernity color.In different system of words and explain, the interior differentiation of Danwei was gradually strengthened, it disintegrate the unified collective consciousness originally and further led to fragmentation in people of Danwei identity system. People of Danwei are gradually differentiation from Danwei community's life and the trend of atomization process is present. It reveals the track about Danwei system's formation and change through People of Danwei groups'memory practice and identity construction, and it reveals the objective necessity,long-term and complexity about Danwei system vicissitudes. Admittedly, changes in Danwei system is imperative, but under the steady erosion of the market and the capital logic, the original beneficial function of the Danwei system also disappeared as reform, instead, the process leaves a heavy and difficult social consequences. Under the background of countries and society universal advocate livelihood and in the requirements of seeking decent labor and dignity life, how do we seek the third road between market and society?Here, this article is trying to build probable community life in New Danwei Society, by the levels of concerning face the history compensatory social policy, stimulating Community-based middle strength, recollecting the internal virtue of Unit-System Tradition and seeking connotation development way of serving the livelihood.