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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Comparing Local Models Of Agrarian Transition In China, Qian Forrest Zhang May 2013

Comparing Local Models Of Agrarian Transition In China, Qian Forrest Zhang

Qian Forrest ZHANG

The development of markets and the penetration of capital into agriculture have started the agrarian transition in rural China, which is transforming smallholding, household-based agriculture into various forms of capitalistic production. This again raises in a new historical and social context the long-debated question in the agrarian transition literature: Can family farms survive the onslaught of capitalist agriculture based on wage labor and what shapes the confrontation between family farms and agro-capital? I argue that it is the local political economy—rather than some natural obstacles in agriculture to the penetration of capitalism—that shapes this confrontation and gives rise to a …


The Strength Of Sibling Ties: Sibling Influence On Status Attainment In A Chinese Family, Qian Forrest Zhang May 2013

The Strength Of Sibling Ties: Sibling Influence On Status Attainment In A Chinese Family, Qian Forrest Zhang

Qian Forrest ZHANG

What allowed eight siblings from a politically disadvantaged rural family to overcome institutional barriers and achieve upward mobility during Maoist China? What then restricted their children’s chances of upward mobility during the Reform era, when both family background and institutional environment were more favourable? In studying this anomalous case, whose experiences contradicted the well-documented effects of state policies and yet cannot be explained by parental influence, this study examines how adult siblings influenced each other’s status attainment processes, an issue largely neglected in the literature. Through comparing the micro-level mobility processes of the two generations in this family, I propose …


Women’S Entry Into Self-Employment In Urban China: The Role Of Family In Creating Gendered Mobility Patterns, Qian Forrest Zhang, Zi Pan Apr 2013

Women’S Entry Into Self-Employment In Urban China: The Role Of Family In Creating Gendered Mobility Patterns, Qian Forrest Zhang, Zi Pan

Qian Forrest ZHANG

How did family characteristics affect women and men differently in self-employment participation in urban China? Analyses of national data show dual marriage penalties for women. Marketization made married women more vulnerable to lay-offs from state-sector jobs; their likelihood of being pushed into unskilled self-employment surpassed that of any other groups. The revitalized patriarchal family tradition favored men in family businesses and resulted in their higher rates of entering entrepreneurial self-employment. Married women who had the education to pursue entrepreneurial self-employment were constrained by family responsibilities to state-sector jobs for access to family services, and had much lower rates in entering …