Washed by human waves

By Xiao Pan


TEN year ago, it could be difficult for people living in the city if they didn?¡¥t know Shanghai dialect, but such difficulties have now more likely to be faced by those who can?¡¥t speak Putonghua (Mandarin).
With the large inflow of migrants, who now make up a quarter of the city?¡¥s permanent population of more than 17 million, Shanghai has become one of the country?¡¥s main migration centres and a cultural melting pot. The figure is even larger if those who came to the city for short-term stays of less than six months are included. Experts estimated that this group may well exceed 150,000 in the city.
The numbers keep growing. A survey conducted last year said the population of long-term migrants (living more than six months) in the city had increased by 200,000 annually since 2000.
These figures would have been unimaginable in the early 1990s when restrictive policies on residential status were in place. When picking up a newspaper of that time and looking at the job advertisements, it is clear there were scarcely any vacancies open to those without a Shanghai hukou (registered permanent residence).
The hukou system, also known as the household registration system, dated back to 1958. Dividing people into categories of ?¡ãagricultural?¡À and ?¡ãnon-agricultural?¡À, hukou also bound people to their birthplaces. For a long time, people were only supposed to work or live in the place where they had their hukou.
The hukou status hierarchy varied from big cities to medium cities all the way down to villages and it was hard to climb the hierarchy.
?¡ãLike a wall, the hukou kept many people out of the city, both highly talented professionals and ordinary labourers alike,?¡À said Zhang Henian, an expert with the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.
As China?¡¥s biggest city, Shanghai occupies a position at the top of the hukou status hierarchy, and is thus more strict about its floating population control. But in 1994, this famous business-focused city took a bold step forward by implementing the so-called ?¡ãblue-stamped hukou?¡À.
The path-breaking step followed Shanghai?¡¥s grand plan to open up Pudong, which made it thirsty for new workers of all types. In February 1994, Shanghai took the lead in the country by introducing the blue-stamped hukou, giving its much envied urban hukou to three kinds of people coming from other parts of China. These were people who bought houses in the city, those who invested in the city and those highly talented people with medium or above technical titles who were employed by local government organs, institutions or large State-owned enterprises.
This blue-stamped residential status ensured people the same rights as Shanghai citizens.
More than 42,000 people received the blue-stamped hukou before the policy was terminated in 2002 due to the excessive pressure caused by an overwhelming number of applicants.
Today, migrant workers can apply for temporary residence certificates if they want to work in urban areas. People are also allowed to move their hukou to other places to join their parents, spouses and children, which a decade ago would have been considered a huge luxury.
By the end of the 1990s, people could move around the country to seek jobs, but there were still problems caused by the hukou. A prominent example was social welfare entitlements, which were left behind in people?¡¥s hometowns.
Another common phenomenon was that while big cities were taking measures to attract highly educated people by providing them with local hukous, they paid much less attention to migrant workers who were poorly educated or less technically capable, but nevertheless made a huge contribution to urban development in construction and other fields.
Except for temporary residence certificates ensuring they could work without being sent back to their hometowns, they were kept out of the welfare systems enjoyed by local citizens. This is still the case in many Chinese cities today.
To Shanghai?¡¥s credit, it is among the first cities to begin dealing with such unfairness. In October last year, it extended its residence certificate system to all floating people in the city with stable jobs and residential addresses. Experts have noted that this is a radical change.
In April 2002, when the city first advanced the residence certificate system to replace the blue-stamped hukou, it was with the intention of seeking more highly skilled workers. Only applicants with a bachelor?¡¥s degree or above could apply. Now the policy has been extended to ordinary migrant workers.
Certificate holders enjoy the same rights as local citizens in many areas including social security, children?¡¥s education and starting businesses.
?¡ãIt was a great leap forward and obviously the leap is in the right direction,?¡À said Zhang.