Wang Taiyuan (王太元)

Editor's Note:

China's hukou (household registration) system was originally established in the 1950s to stop the rural population from flocking to cities. Monday, holding the right hukou can still determine access to public services as basic as schooling and health, and obtaining an urban hukou remains out of reach for many migrants. Has China made progress in reforming the system? What would a fair system look like? People's Daily Online (PO) invited Wang Taiyuan, a professor specializing in hukou reform at Chinese People's Public Security University, to discuss these issues.

PO: Is China determined to carry out the reform on the household registration system? Has China made some progress in this regard?

Wang: As we've seen in the past, whenever social resources, rights and opportunities become scarce or are in crisis, hukou reform falters or even stops. But as far as I see, China has been attempting to make breakthroughs in this regard. Many factors, such as building a harmonious society and balancing urban and rural development, are pushing us to discuss reform.

There is definitely progress. Now there are no dispute over the basic pattern of reform needed in the hukou system. The economic aspects and access to public services that have been bound up with the hukou since the planned economy period need to be untangled from it.

We need a clear plan to move forward. Specifically, we should first analyze the harm the planned economy did to the registration system and the cause and decide on the respective task of reform in different areas based on the central government's ideas of building a harmonious society and coordinating urban-rural development. Then we should deal with various rights and interests like the right to education, the right to employment, the right to social welfare, and so on, and discuss how people can receive fair and equal treatment according to the present constitution and law.

Actually, we can see that there is a lot of hope from the efforts to the government has done in solving rural problems since 2003, such as abolishing agricultural taxes, tackling the problem of aging population and medical care problem in rural area, the increase of investment in rural area and the building of new rural construction. The integration of urban and rural development is helping to solve the biggest headache in China's internal migration, which is farmers seeking employment in cities. There is similar progress in other fields.

PO: As hukou-linked policies like limiting house purchases and casting lots for a license plate number are introduced, is the hukou more important than ever? Are these policies obstacles to reform?

Wang: I believe such specific policies are issued to solve the existing problems in daily life in big cities or mega cities. It is not correct to see them as obstacles to reform.

Rather, I see these policies as consistent with the overall direction of our hukou reforms. For instance, purchasing a house in market economy should remain an individual economic matter rather than a social problem requiring some intervention. At present, the policy of limiting house purchases, as seen in the housing purchasing situation in Chongqing, Shanghai, and other cities, has unhooked housing from the hukou in some ways. For example, you can apply for low-rent housing even without a Beijing hukou. In this way, people with hukou and those without them are actually standing at the same starting point.

As to the different kinds of purchasing limits due to the difference in housing prices in various cities, the government is not limiting the purchase for its own purpose. Rather, it is for some rights and interests of the public. In this sense, such policies mean progress rather than being obstacles.

Some people may think the hukou means more now. But I think these are just policies of a certain period. On the whole, the mainstream of China's reform is marketization.

The central government has made it clear that we should return market affairs to the market and public affairs to the government. And the fairness of household registration mostly concerns public problems rather than commercial ones. But housing is not a completely public problem. It is commercial too.

For instance, there is difference between having a house available and having a satisfactory house. Having somewhere to live means basic fairness, so you can apply for low-rent housing. But if you want to live in a bigger house, which is a commercial problem, you need to realize it with your own efforts rather than rely on the government's policies or systems.
 

PO: What's the purpose of hukou reform?

Wang: We hope we can all stand on the same starting line and compete in a fair way.

But people may fail to notice that there are four levels of fairness. The first is fairness in rules. If the management system in a certain area is not fair, the precondition of fairness will be lost.

Then there is fairness in starting conditions. Our children should all start from the same line. It is not fair when some are studying in exclusive private schools while others are in schools that don't even have full time teachers.

Another aspect is fairness in process. Students should study in the same environment, taking the same examinations and enter a higher school in the same way. Migrant workers' wages and treatment should not be worse than those of workers with urban hukou.

Finally there is fairness in results. I don't emphasize this much, since it is almost impossible to achieve the fair results for a population of 1.3 billion people. If you must achieve that, you probably are repeating the supposed absolute egalitarianism of the 1950s. It should not emerge again because it definitely will limit China's development.

The purpose of the reform is multiple. For families, the purpose is to bring up children in a proper way. For employers, it is to cultivate talent, seek talent and develop talent. In any field, we hope to develop the good and expel the bad. In a country with a proper legal system and a regulated market it is up to individuals to decide where to live and where to get a hukou rather than a certain institute or leader to examine whether one is qualified to live in a certain place and get a hukou there.

PO: How can a system be built that genuinely aids development?

Wang: To answer the question, we first should be clear there are two levels of the registration system. One involves the registration, statistic gathering, documenting and archiving of residents' basic information. The other is about the regulation and control of migration and limits on people's rights. In a properly open system, only the first should apply.
 
We need to detach issues of migration and access to public services from the hukou system. The hukou should just be the hukou, not a control on migration or a mark of different rights.

Every country relies on information about householders to gather the data needed for public management. This is the basis of proper administration.

As society becomes increasingly open, the sphere of people's activity is wider and there are more channels of communication. There are more and more places that require people to provide all kinds of information and certificates. So public information management is still needed, and it is impossible to play down its role under such circumstances.