Doctoral Dissertation Research: Market Transition in China: Rural Households and Nonagricultural Employment

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SES-1003820John LoganJing SongBrown UniversityMarket transition in China has been an intriguing topic concerning the withering of the socialist legacy and the expansion of market, but limited efforts have been made understanding changes in the rural household since the reinstatement of the family farming system. This dimension becomes more important given the industrialization of the countryside, the rise of the private sector, and the increase of migration. This project seeks to answer how new economic opportunities are allocated in transitional rural China, i.e., who is employed in nonagricultural employment and how family and market factors are translated into employment patterns? The project integrates quantitative and qualitative analyses. The quantitative models use the CGSS (cross-sectional), CHNS (longitudinal) datasets to estimate what kind of men and women under what family and market conditions are more likely to have nonagricultural work over time. The qualitative part of the research will collect in-depth interviews in coastal and inland village with different levels of industrialization and urbanization. The qualitative analysis will capture political economic dynamics underlying employment patterns, offer supplementary explanations for observed family and market effects, and open up new territories that helped to shape gendered experiences in economic expansion. Based on the integration of small-N case studies and large-N data analysis, the project tries to bridge research traditions of rational choice, gender theories and developmental politics, and to fill the knowledge gap between patriarchal family and developmental state. Broader ImpactsResearch findings have the potential to contribute to a better understanding of grassroots reactions to market-oriented reforms in a previous socialist regime; aid governments and international organizations in the design of developmental strategies that speak to family norms and local contexts and to better evaluate market reform policies in patriarchal societies; suggest fresh ways to look at the relationship between agriculture and other economic sectors in the developing world provide new information on gender relations and family roles in China that are relevant for long term concerns with the position of women in society.