During the 1950s and 1960s, great successes were obtained in reducing mortality in
China. A dramatic decline of fertility has characterised Chinese population trends from
the early 1970s. After the second half of the 1980s, a tremendously growing internal
migration, largely typified as movements from rural to urban, and from underdeveloped
regions to relatively developed regions, has become another feature of China's recent
demographic development.
The volume of internal migration was rather small in China before the 1980s, in order to
control urban growth and to avoid many undesirable side-effects of development as
observed in other nations: massive urban unemployment, great strains on urban
infrastructure, and slum development. Various migration control policies have been
employed in China since the early 1950s. All these control efforts were based on the
household registration system. Under this system, each individual has an official place of
residence, the record of which is maintained by the Public Security Bureaus, at the
brigade level in rural areas, and at the neighbourhood level in urban places. To effect a
permanent change in residence, a person must be granted permission by the appropriate
authorities in the places of origin and destination. Furthermore, each individual is
assigned either urban or rural registration status. Change in status was difficult, and, as a
result, peasants were effectively tied to the rural areas, and migration to the cities was
carefully controlled. During times of urban expansion, as during the Great Leap Forward
(1958), the constraints of the registration system were largely lifted, but they were
reinstalled when it was deemed necessary to send thousands of peasants back to the
countryside. With a limited number of exceptions, therefore, moves from rural to urban
places were kept at a minimum till the mid-1980s.
These policies constrained population movement before 1980 in two ways. On the one
hand, the volume of migration was highly limited, although government-organised
population movement was spectacular in some specific regions during specific periods.
On the other hand, the policies were generally effective in containing the vast majority of
the population in the countryside and in limiting the growth of the cities. Urbanisation
was kept at a rather low level.
After 1980, the Chinese government remained keen on controlling urban growth,
although there has been a debate on the urbanisation strategy among scholars and
officials. Proponents of a 'bottom-up' strategy argued that China should give priority to
rural development, along with the development of small cities and towns, to avoid overconcentration
of industries and population in a few major urban centres (e.g. Guo, 1980;
Wang and Wu, 1985; Xu and Ye, 1985). Opponents argued that, at the early stage of
economic development, concentration of modern industries and population in a few major
urban centres was necessary in order to acquire maximum economies of scale with
limited investment (e.g., Feng, 1983; Zhou and Li, 1989). While the debate on the best
development strategy continues, economic reforms since 1978 have given priority to rural
development and the development of small cities and towns, in order to disperse
economic opportunities to rural areas and to absorb rural surplus labour in situ. The 1982
Urban Distribution Policy prescribed strict control of the growth of large cities, rational 82 Chapter 4
development of medium-sized cities, and encouragement of the growth of small cities and
towns.
Concurrently, reforms in the rural areas have dismantled a considerable portion of
government control of agricultural production, replacing it with individual incentives and
decision-making. Under the household responsibility system, land is allocated to and
cultivated by individual households under a contract; non-agricultural activities, including
cottage industries, are promoted; and peasants are allowed to keep the side products as
well as the profits of basic agricultural production under the contract and to use them in
their own way. These policy changes have offered rural peasants a great incentive to
maximise their production. This more efficient household-based organisation of
agriculture and side production has resulted in hundreds of millions of rural surplus
workers. In 1984, China had a surplus rural labour force of about 94,850,000; it exceeded
200 million in 1994, and will surpass the 300 million mark in the year 2000 (Li, 1996).