Table Of ContentSocial Mobilisation in Post-Industrial China
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This book is dedicated to all the people who have contributed to this
research.
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Social Mobilisation in
Post-Industrial China
The Case of Rural Urbanisation
Jia Gao
Asia Institute, University of Melbourne, Australia
Yuanyuan Su
School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Nanjing University,
China
Cheltenham, UK • Northampton, MA, USA
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© Jia Gao and Yuanyuan Su 2019
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical or photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior
permission of the publisher.
Published by
Edward Elgar Publishing Limited
The Lypiatts
15 Lansdown Road
Cheltenham
Glos GL50 2JA
UK
Edward Elgar Publishing, Inc.
William Pratt House
9 Dewey Court
Northampton
Massachusetts 01060
USA
A catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018958900
This book is available electronically in the
Social and Political Science subject collection
DOI 10.4337/9781786432599
ISBN 978 1 78643 258 2 (cased)
ISBN 978 1 78643 259 9 (eBook)
Typeset by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire
2
0
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Contents
List of figures vi
List of tables vii
List of abbreviations viii
Preface ix
Acknowledgements xv
1 China’s current rural urbanisation and historical context 1
2 The evolving role of central decision-makers in launching policy
initiatives 30
3 The politics of social mobilisation at the provincial level 61
4 The emerging powers of the ‘invisible hand’ 89
5 Mobilising policy support and resources at the prefectural
level 111
6 The awkward roles of county and township governments in
rural urbanisation 141
7 Participatory responses of villagers to initiatives 162
8 Towards an updated understanding of social mobilisation in
China 184
References 201
Index 239
v
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Figures
2.1 Location of Yantai, Shandong province 36
2.2 China’s governmental structure, 2015 38
2.3 Urban–rural distribution of population in China, 1975–2015 48
2.4 China’s rural–urban income gap, 1978–2006 53
2.5 China’s GDP across three sectors, 1978–2015 53
2.6 Percentages of employment across three sectors, 1980–2015 54
3.1 Shandong’s GDP compared to other rich provinces, 1996–2014 64
3.2 Shandong’s gross industrial and agricultural output values,
1949–2015 67
3.3 Population of Shandong and rural–urban distribution 80
4.1 Numbers of sizeable domestic enterprises in Shandong,
2005–15 97
4.2 Numbers of Shandong people working in three types of
sizeable domestic enterprise, 2005–15 98
5.1 The location of Laiwu, Shandong province 120
5.2 Shares of three sectors in Laiwu’s GDP, 2005–15 121
7.1 The increasing occurrence of mass protests, out of 871 cases,
2000–2013 165
7.2 The growing dependence of governments on revenues from
land transfer, 2006–13 166
7.3 Four types of responses and the most difficult groups 173
vi
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Tables
2.1 Reductions in the number of State Council agencies 40
2.2 China’s main post-1978 financial reform efforts 42
2.3 Key strategic ideas of ‘No. 1 Document’ from 2004 56
3.1 Shandong’s gross industrial and agricultural output
(billion yuan), 1949–2015 66
3.2 Gross output values of Shandong’s light and heavy industries
(million yuan), 1949–2015 68
3.3 Lower-level governments under Shandong, 2015 69
3.4 Central rural work conferences and the rural land-use policy,
2004–15 73
4.1 Introduction of market forces into the Chinese economy,
1978–2004 91
4.2 Annual business turnover of three sizeable domestic
enterprises in Shandong (billion yuan), 2005–15 99
6.1 Laiwu’s total population and urban–rural distribution,
2005–16 145
6.2 Laiwu’s rural income and public investment in rural
infrastructure, 2005–15 150
6.3 Laiwu’s public investment in rural infrastructure, new projects
and housing units, 2009–16 156
7.1 Mass protest incidents in 17 categories, out of 871 cases,
2000–2013 164
vii
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Abbreviations
CASS Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
CCDI Central Commission for Discipline Inspection
CCP Chinese Communist Party
CCTV China Central Television
CDRF China Development Research Foundation
CIS Centre for Independent Studies
CNR China National Radio
CPC C ommunist Party of China (the CCP’s own English
translation of its name)
CSC China Scholarship Council
GDP Gross domestic product
HKTDC Hong Kong Trade Development Council
IMF International Monetary Fund
KPI Key performance indicator
LWTJJ Laiwu Tongjiju (Laiwu Bureau of Statistics)
NBSC National Bureau of Statistics of China
NDRC National Development and Reform Commission
NSSFC National Social Science Fund of China
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
PLA People’s Liberation Army (of China)
PRC People’s Republic of China
RMB Renminbi, China’s currency
SEITC Shandong Economic and Information Technology Committee
SOE State-Owned Enterprise
SPBS Shandong Provincial Bureau of Statistics
TVE Township and village enterprise
UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund
USITC United States International Trade Commission
VOA Voice of America
viii
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Preface
This book seeks to fulfil the timely need for a better understanding of
how social mobilisation works in present-day China, and the changes
that have occurred with this important socioeconomic and socio-political
mechanism since the late 1970s and early 1980s, especially since the mid-
1990s, when more fundamental reforms of China’s party-state system
and governance have been undertaken. Social mobilisation has long been
considered a key characteristic of modern Chinese life, which has been so
apparent over the course of past decades that many analysts even define
China as a nation of mobilisation. The existing scholarly literature on
social mobilisation in China, however, is largely characterised by studies
of pre-1978 Chinese socioeconomic and socio-political situations, many
of which are also scattered and fragmentary. These problems have not
only resulted in misjudging the crucial role of social mobilisation as a
process of social change and a key analytical construct, but have also
overlooked the work of many researchers in the fields of socioeconomic
and socio-political activities in China, which is rather different from what
we have known from the past and even what we can read in English these
days.
Through careful and thorough analysis of new empirical evidence from
both primary and secondary sources, this co-authored book aims to
contribute to the discussion in academic literature on contemporary China
in the midst of competing views. Those views cover the ways in which the
social mobilisation mechanism is used at different levels of government
and society at different times for different purposes, how meaningful
mass socio-political participation is, and the ways and the extent to which
China’s governance has been transformed as a result of many fundamental
shifts in its economy and politics, as well as whether China’s state capacity
has declined since the early 1990s.
The research focus on social mobilisation emerged in the 1960s and
1970s when waves of socio-political activism were spreading, especially in
the United States, China and several European countries. China became
a subject of intellectual interest and inquiry soon after the concept of
social mobilisation emerged, though China closed its door to the West
in the 1960s and through much of the 1970s. Despite this, there are not
ix
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