Transnational Fostering In Qiaoxiang Of Fuzhou:Reasons,Changes And Problems

With the development of globalization and population migration,transnational fostering is gradually becoming prevalent,resulting in a great need to study this phenomenon which can contribute a lot to the overseas Chinese affairs and deeper research.By using interview and participant observation to collect relevant data,this paper examines the general picture of transnational fostering in the hometown(Fuzhou)of oversea Chinese,and further explores the following questions:the reasons why migrants send their babies born oversea to their hometowns,changes happed in recent years,and relevant disadvantages existing in the process of transnational fostering.The whole thesis is divided into five parts.Chapter one introduces the social context of transnational fostering in Fuzhou,and reviews the previous relevant researches before presenting theoretical perspective and research method that will be utilized in this paper.This study find that transnational fostering in Fuzhou has caught media’s attention while there is few researches on this special social phenomenon.Chapter two analysis’ the characteristics of transnational fostering and its process,arguing that the transnational fostering mainly result from numbers of population migration which exists in young migrants’ families,the origin countries of those babies are very wide.For the migrant’s families,transnational fostering is a helpless choice.In addition,the process of the transnational fostering is quite different from that of the left-behind children in Chinese rural areas.Chapter three explains the reasons why migrants and their families decide to send their babies to their hometowns,finding that there are 3 elements that make them decide to join the group of transnational fostering:firstly,the obstacles existing in fostering their babies abroad which contribute the main reason;secondly,sending babies back to their hometowns could be helpful to their extended families,which constitutes a stimulator;thirdly,the development of outside environment facilitates transnational fostering,becoming the necessary realistic conditions for fostering babies in China.Given the evidences above,it is clearly that whether migrants decide to send their babies to their hometowns not only depend on the economic costs but also some non-economic factors.Chapter four explores the changes of the transnational fostering happened in recent years.As a whole,the number of overall babies witnessed a general down-ward trend due to the decline of illegal population migration.Again,the time used in transnational fostering is less than before.Finally,migrants more care about family attachment and their babies’ education.There changes are not only related to the changes of international migration in their hometowns but also migrants’ thinking which were impressed by social culture of the immigration countries.Chapter five discusses the disadvantages related to transnational fostering,implicating that the negative effect babies received are various,while migrant families suffered long-term difficulties.The final chapter makes a conclusion from the main findings and theoretical knowledge,arguing that there are strong links between the transnational fostering and transnational migration involving in the appearance time,reasons,changes and related disadvantages.Furthermore,Child play an important role in the transitional fostering and transnational migration,which is quite different from the previous findings.