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Article: The changing situation of migrant labor.(III. Social Groups)
- Article from:
- Social Research
- Article date:
- March 22, 2006
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2006 New School for Social Research. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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DURING THE LAST 15 YEARS, CHINESE URBAN AREAS HAVE BEEN THE SITE of a paradoxical situation: a great numbers of workers in state-owned enterprises have lost their jobs while many rural residents have flocked to the cities to work in the industrial and service sectors. These rural people are called migrant workers because of their administrative status and occupation. There are as a result two kinds of workers, one called urban resident-worker (zhigong, literally "employees and workers"), the other peasant-worker (nongmin gong). What are the differences between them? Why do we consider the migrant workers a new working class? We shall try to identify the characters of this ...