An Institutional Analysis Of Citizenization Of China’s Rural Migrant Workers

The transfer of labor force surplus in agriculture is the inevitable result of industrialization and modernization. However, because of the barrier by the urban-rural dual institutions of urban-rural partition and urban bias, China’s agricultural labor force surplus shows a great difference with Western developed countries in the course of transferring to cities and towns, and the process of transfer of labor force surplus in China’s rural is not accomplished at one time, peasants to migrant workers first, and then migrant workers to the public.The unique way of China’s transfer results in a large group of migrant workers and increasingly serious problems on migrant workers. Much attention from society to "the tide of migrant workers" and "shortage of migrant workers" reflects the importance of the issue on migrant workers in the socio-economic. To resolve the issue on migrant workers, the basic ideas and ways involve no more than three aspects: to citizenize, to return and to return to start an undertaking, and to improve the treatment of migrant workers and living conditions. In these three basic ideas and approaches, the latter two can not be a fundamental solution to the issue on migrant workers and do not comply with the laws of transfer and urbanization, then, to citizenize is either a fundamental solution to the issue on migrant workers, or conforming to the laws of transfer and urbanization laws and urbanization, and it is the fundamental means to solve the issue on migrant workers.In this paper, according to the lack of institutional research for citizenization of migrant workers, we study the unique process of the transfer of agricultural labor force surplus and the issue on migrant workers, clearly attributing the main reasons for the issue on migrant workers and the main obstacles to the urban-rural dual institution, and comprehensively and systematically analyse the dual system at the overall level and sub-system level, making the history of the urban-rural dual system and its major sub-systems clear. And then theoretical and empirical analysis of the impact on the will, the ability and process of citizenization of migrant workers is given by use of cost-benefit theory, threshold theory. Finally we discuss the keys, difficulties and specific institutional arrangements of the urban-rural dual system and its major sub-systems based on citizenization, as well as the possible conflict and coordination in the process of institutional innovation.The text is divided into five sections, adding up to nine chapters.The first section, i.e. the Chapter I, is introduction. In this section the research background and significance is given. We focus on literature review from three levels: studies on the issue of surplus agricultural labor migration, general studies on the issue of migrant workers in China, as well as specific studies on the citizenization of migrant workers. Then we carry out the status and lack at home and abroad, and define the main purpose and methods, the ideas and the basic framework, as well as major innovations and shortcomings.The second section, i.e. the Chapter II, is the general discussion. It mainly studies the main driving forces for the transfer of China’s agricultural labor force surplus as well as the special reasons for the large-scale transfer of China’s agricultural labor force surplus, and attributes the main reasons why migrant workers appear to the urban-rural dual institution. We analyse the nature and the basic characteristics of migrant workers, and sum up the survival state of migrant workers. Then the basic ideas on how to resolve the issues on migrant workers are concluded to three aspects: to citizenize, to return and to return to start an undertaking, and to improve the treatment of migrant workers and living conditions. Among these three aspects, citizenization is considered to be the fundamental way to resolve the issue on migrant workers. And then we analyse the major obstacles and socio-economic conditions of the citizenization, and particularly point out that the urban-rural dual system is the most important obstacle and institutional innovation is of great significance for citizenization.In the third section, including Chapter III and Chapter IV, an analysis of the impact on the citizenization of migrant workers and institutional innovation at a whole system level is given. In Chapter III, we theoretically analyses how the urban-rural dual institution affects the citizenization of migrant workers by use of the cost-benefit theory and threshold theory based on the analysis of the formation, basic features and evolution of the urban-rural dual institution, and a double-constrained model of citizenization of migrant workers is established, and then empirical study of the impact on the will, the ability, and the process of citizenization of migrant workers is offered based on survey data. Under the analysis in Chapter III and the framework of neo-institutional economics, a theoretical analysis of the subjects, power and conditions, and the influencing factors of innovation of the urban-rural dual institution is carried out in Chapter IV. And then the basic ideas of innovation, the specific periodic institutional arrangements and supporting measures ar explored.In the fourth section, we analyse the impact on the citizenization of migrant workers and institutional innovation at the sub-system level, including the chapter V to VIII, which respectively review and sum up the formation and evolution of the urban-rural dual household registration system, the dual land system, the dual employment system and the social security system, and their impact on the citizenization of migrant workers and the principle, ideas and policy options of institutional innovation.The fifth section, i.e. Chapter IX, mainly involves the internal conflict and coordination between the sub-systems in the urban-rural dual institution in the process of institutional innovation. Based on the institutional link theory and the institutional risk theory, we mainly anslyse the reasons for theoretical links and theoretical conflicts and their main performance, and discusse the basic ideas and strategies selected of harmonizing the institutional conflict.