The Research On The New Generation Of Migrant Workers’ Political Identification From The View Of Generational Differences

Political identification is a kind of belongingness aimed at political system andrelative things. It is the legal resource of political system, the foundation of politicalstability, and also the motive of political development. Migrant worker is a specialgroup in the social transformation time of China. Affected by the history and culture,system arrangement, social psychology and other factors, the working right and citizenright of migrant workers are always been invaded, that must affect the group’s politicalidentification to a certain degree. Numerous migrant workers have caused a lot of socialproblems; some prominent problems have conditioned China’s development. Theproportion of migrant workers born after1980has risen to60%in the total160millionworkers, they are different from last generational from needs level, identityidentification and belongingness. Therefore, it is more realistic and prospective toresearch this project in a comparative perspective. It is of great importance to cultivateconscientious citizen, push on Chinese city urbanization and modernization, promotethe social harmony and stability.Political Identification includes interest identification, institution identification, andvalue identification, also the identity identification is the most basic problem. Thepolitical identification system is made up from the four aspects. Among them, identityidentification is the logical start, as a main body of political Identification, a citizenmust finish the identity identification firstly;politics is the authoritative interestdistribution of interest, so interest identification is the reality base; the institution is thetext definition for the value, the effective institution must establish on the idea offairness and justice,to eliminate “the worker’s injustice”——the decisive variable thatinfluences the migrant workers’ political identification, It depends if they obeyspecific related institution, not on the lofty ideal. So, institution identification is thebottom line; value identification difficult to grasp as its abstract，but true and positive political identification would reflect in the value identification,so value identification isthe intrinsic growth of their political identification. In addition, the four aspects are notisolated, they have the internal logic. On the basis of identity identification, interestidentification, institution identification, value identification are progressive from low tohigh.The new generation has been to the main body of the migrant workers, their livingenvironment and their growth experience determine they are different from the old inbelongings, hierarchy of needs, the pursuit of occupation and the goal of life. The oldworkers work in order to survive, they earn money for raising their quality of life. Theywork in town just for a good life in village. The new workers work not only for earningmoney, but also for settling down to be city people. So their needs change from meetingthe survival to developing themselves. Secondly, their flow mode changes fromcirculation flow to one-way flow. Thirdly, the new workers compare their lives with thecity people, their satisfaction is reduced to a certain extent. Moreover, affected by socialenvironment and the level of education, the new workers extend their consciousness ofrights from the right of labor to the civil right.The changes of their flow mode, hierarchy of needs, the object of comparison andconsciousness of rights start a new trend of the new generation. According to theexisting data and my questionnaire investigation from Shanghai and Harbin, thecharacteristics of the new trend are described briefly below: their identity identificationbecomes fuzzier; their interest identification trends bidirectional lifting; their institutionidentification shows more rational value, and their value identification shows obviousconflict characteristics.In addition, from the perspective of political behavior, thedilemma of the new workers’ political identification has transformed frompsychological conflict to behavior conflict. The growing background of the oldgeneration determines their political identification is on the base of firm ideology, theirdilemmas living in city concentrate in the problem of the labor rights infringement, sotheir political identification always stays in the level of interest identification. Relatively,the reference object of the new workers’ life satisfaction is the city people, they are noteasy to form interest identification; also, in needs of interest, their hierarchy and rangeof needs obviously higher than the old ones. In addition to paying attention to the levelof wages, they have demands in employment, education, pension and housing and so on,as the new workers’ self-consciousness continuously promoting, they will pay more attention to political interests of their taking leadership. Higher life expectancy of thenew generation leads to the pursuit of equality inevitably, in the face of developmentobstacles, they will have to strive for and realize their rights from the level of systemand the law. Therefore, the new generation of migrant workers’ political identificationdoesn’t stay in the level of interest, but relate to the institution identification and valueidentification. Although the new workers have better education and more desire for cityintegration, they are facing more pressure than the old ones in institutional bottlenecks,which cause the obstacles of their political identification. At present, the new workershave put forward more requirements in policy of employment, education, pension andhousing and so on, the governmental respond will influence their institutionidentification. In addition， their concept of interests, values and awareness of the lawmake them value judgment more consciously, that may influence both valueidentification and political behavior. Through analyzing the new trend of the newgeneration of migrant workers’ political Identification, in general, it is dominated by thetool rationality, lacks the value rationality; through analyzing their system demand, theyhave value rationality preliminary. Therefore, we think, there are certain obstacles forthe new generation of migrant workers. We can understand it from three aspects: firstly,the level of the workers’ political identification is to be improved; secondly, from themain level, there are certain obstacles for the citizen identification; thirdly, from thelevel of behavior, they lack the institutional political participation.There are deep subjective and objective reasons for the new workers’ politicalidentification obstacles. Compared with the old workers, the new workers have changeda lot in all respects, but these changes reflect in the subjective level. Objectively, seenfrom a scope of time and space, they haven’t got rid of the old social systemenvironment. For political identification is a political phenomenon under the action ofthe main and object body, actually we can’t separate the two ones. From the objectfactor, the new workers’ political identification obstacles are influenced by the systemand social environment, as the influences are widespread on economic, politics, cultureand other social fields, they interact with the workers’ political psychology. From thesubject factor, the features of continuity and fracture coexisting aggravate thephenomenon that they do not adapt to the objective environment.Because the real system arrange the lag and the workers’ political cognition andthinking characteristics are limited, the new workers’ political identification is in an unstable state-rational and non rational identification coexist. In a sense, the presentsituation of the new workers’ political identification becomes a challenge for thedevelopment of Chinese economic society. If the obstacles cannot be get rid of timelyand effectively, they may influence on society successful transformation, the credibilityof the government and social harmony. Further more, the obstacles may reduce thelegitimacy of reform even influence the ruling foundation. Aiming at the new trend andmain problems, we must deal with the problems from subject and object aspects: Oneside, the new workers should be developed into qualified citizens of the citizen spiritand ability; the political socialization should be constructed subjectively. On the basis ofcitizen identity identification, higher levels of political identification should be formed.On the other side, the institutional obstacles and social environment need positivefeedback from the government, because of the feedback should include selfimprovement of the ruling party and the government, and also include the developmentof social functions, such as develop the function of interests integration and theideology function integration, enhance the social service function. Then again, the rulesto protect the migrant workers’ rights and interests must be established and improved,the institutional political participation must be increased, the migrant workers’organization and self organization must be established; and the judicial reliefmechanism should be improved etc. Only when the dilemma of the new generation ofmigrant workers’ survival and development is solved, their sense of injustice in the citywill be eliminated, and the present situation of their political identification will beimproved.