Chinese Urban Life under Reform: The Changing Social Contract (review)

This is a comprehensive study on China's urban society during the post-1978 reform period based on several surveys conducted in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It brings up to date much of the information presented in the important book Urban Life in Contemporary China, written in 1984 by Martin Whyte and William Parish, who interviewed 133 former residents of Chinese cities who were living in Hong Kong in 1977-1978. The 1984 volume, primarily empirical in nature, was highly informative, providing the first detailed account of Chinese urban society under socialism at a time when little was known about it. Much has changed in China since the 1978 reforms, and the changes have been widely reported in the media and studied by social scientists. Consequently, the book under review breaks fewer new empirical grounds than the Whyte and Parish book, which established a solid new foundation for our understanding of urban China. However, Chinese Urban Life under Reform is an important book because it is based on several large-scale surveys, and the analysis is conceptually rich and intellectually stimulating, despite the fact that it has not fundamentally altered my perception of Chinese urban society.

Whereas some readers may not like the term "social contract" that is used throughout the book—the term "contract" implies some formal and often legally binding commitments made between two parties—the book provides a great deal of information and analysis of the social consequences of the changing systems of production as of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Throughout the volume, the authors compare and contrast the sea change in life opportunities in urban China from socialist social contract to marketization. A major strength of the book is that the analysis is always set within the frameworks of relevant theories, or presented against findings by other scholars on the issues in question. The book is also very strong in its comparison of urban China with other societies, including the transitional economies of Russia, Eastern and Central Europe, the United States, and Taiwan. Each chapter opens with a broad and often theoretical discussion of the key issues to be examined and ends with a summary and additional discussion. The introductory and concluding chapters are tightly linked. This gives the book a neat and consistent organization.

The book is divided into three parts. In part 1 the characteristics of socialist and market social contracts are clearly outlined in terms of systemic differences and their positive as well as negative consequences for the urban population. It is made clear that there are divergent views on the nature of socialist production and its impact on the lives of the people, as the debates between Kornai and Inkeles have shown.¹ The growing literature on the politics of market transformation in China and other transitional economies is also ably reviewed. For the less informed, chapter 2 provides a solid summary of the key events in the history of the PRC. The division between urban and rural populations is highlighted, with the former enjoying a host of urban entitlements denied to rural villagers, including job security, educational opportunities, subsidized housing, and food, medical care, retirement benefits, and so forth (urban and rural residents are seen as "castes" by the authors, with urban dwellers labeled "aristocrats"—the appropriateness of these designations in the Chinese context inviting discussion). These topics are analyzed in great detail in subsequent chapters.

Part 2, which takes up about 40 percent of the volume and contains six chapters, looks at group interests, examining social changes resulting from economic reforms in education, employment, economic rewards, popular perceptions, and reactions to the new social contracts, including labor-management relations, civil servants and bureaucratic behavior, political participation, and interest articulation by different social groups.

Part 3 contains two chapters on gender. I especially enjoyed reading chapter 10...