Is migrant system China's apartheid?
December 25, 2012 -- Updated 0535 GMT (1335 HKT)
China's migrants struggle
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Migrant family's hope is that their child doesn't also have to be migrant worker
- China operates on a system that differentiates between rural and urban
- Rural workers' plight likened to illegal immigrants and apartheid
Guo, together with his
wife and son, live in a narrow, 53-square foot room furnished with a
bed, faded chair and table. They share a bathroom with 20 to 30
neighbors in their building in suburban Beijing -- a little piece of home for China's army of migrant workers.
Despite their modest
living conditions, Guo insists his family's standard of living is
improving. "I feel we are already getting better and better," he said.
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Like 200 million Chinese
migrants, Guo, 30 and his wife, Ge Yaru, 26, are part of the
"nongmingong" -- which means peasant class, a term used to describe those who've left the countryside. They are also known as "liudong renkou" which means floating population.
In the last decades, as
waves of migrant workers have found jobs in the cities, hundreds of
millions in China have been lifted out of poverty, according to official
estimates.
But beyond China's
successful facade, migrant workers face difficulties accessing public
services due to a household registration system called "hukou," which
divides the population into rural and urban residents.
When a migrant worker
like Guo leaves his village, he also leaves his social benefits behind.
Without an urban hukou permit, a migrant is often denied access to the
subsidized health, housing and education that city dwellers enjoy. The
workers find odd jobs in factories, construction sites, public
infrastructure projects, restaurants and households but cannot enjoy the
same privileges as urbanites.
"Their plight has been described as them being like illegal immigrants in their own country," according to the Global Times, a Chinese state-controlled newspaper.
Some scholars have likened China's hukou system
to South Africa's now-defunct apartheid, a system of segregation that
severely restricted the rights of the country's black population, with
whites enjoying preferential treatment. This legalized form of
discrimination relegated the nation's black workers to migrant labor
with little rights.
China's migrant workers
never integrate into the city to enjoy the same rights and opportunities
as urbanites, said David Bandurski, an author of an upcoming book about
migrant workers.
"The discrimination is very real in China," he added.
Under the hukou system, migrant workers can secure temporary residence certificates but getting them is a lengthy process. In some cases, their employers are obligated to pay exorbitant fees to the city government for such certificates.
Guo, who has a tanned,
leathery face, spends 10 hours a day painting outside, dangling from
high buildings where he's exposed to the sun, heat and wind.
When asked about his
dreams for his family's future, they say they want to open a store
someday and be able to send their son, who is now two, to middle school.
"I'll still be a migrant worker," he said.
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"During our lifetime, I guess we won't have any high hopes," said Guo. "Really any hopes are for the children."
His son shyly hides
behind his parents. Squirming on a bed that he shares with both parents,
the toddler peeks over his mother's shoulders.
Guo's wife, Ge, is pregnant with their second child. They plan to pay a fine -- about $1,500 -- for violating the country's One Child Policy. Ge plans to give birth in her village in Hefei province.
Their reasoning for having a second child pertains to their migrant worker status.
"If something went
wrong, and you lost your only child, then you would grow old alone," Guo
said. "You'd at least want two, no? One is just not enough. Especially
for us, villagers. The city and the village -- it is not the same.
"When people get old in
the city they can just be sent to the old people's home, where as if we
grow old, we can only rely on our children," his wife added. "We don't
have any pension. We don't have any hope or anything. All of that we put
it on the shoulders of our children. So if there aren't enough kids,
and something goes wrong, we are also done for."
They acknowledge that
raising a second child adds financial pressures; but in a way, a second
child provides a security net in a society where migrant workers do not
have one.
While people in the cities have pensions, Ge said their village has nothing.
Chinese media, including state-run news agencies, have reported on the difficulties faced by migrant workers.
For example, the
children of migrant workers cannot go to the same school as the city
kids. They've been called "liu dong er tong," which means floating
children, because of the question of where they can go to school and how
they'll be able to afford it.
Migrant children have to
pay for private schooling, said the author Bandurski, who taught at one
for migrant children. In China, calling it "private school" is also
misleading, he said.
"They're not getting the
same quality of education. It's not even close to their counterparts,
'city kids' although they are city kids," he said.
Without education and
opportunities, many children of migrants end up doing the same work as
their parents. This continuous cycle has spanned almost four
generations, Bandurski said.
"I think in the last 15 to 20 years, it's not a socially mobile society," he said.
And there are signs of
unrest. Thousands of workers rioted in Guangdong province early this
year after reports that police officers had beaten a migrant teenager in
June, according to both Chinese and Western media reports. Tensions also spilled over into violence in the city of Xintang last year when migrant workers clashed with locals after reports that officials had beaten a pregnant migrant worker and her husband.
Some families pin their hopes on their kids to break the cycle by gaining admission into a university.
The chances of that, Bandurski said, are "very very slim."
Guo insists that he wants his son to go to school.
"We villagers don't have
many ambitious hopes about our kids, as long as he goes to school and
studies hard. Otherwise, we don't have any plans for our kids... I just
hope he doesn't do what we are doing."
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