Does hukou still matter? The household registration system and its impact on social stratification and mobility in China

Abstract

户籍制度是中国社会一项基本的制度安排， 它把户口作为资源配置和利益分配的重要凭据， 对社会分层和流动产生了较大的影响。在改革开放近三十年后， 中国的户口还起不起作用， 以及起着怎样的作用？通过对综合社会调查数据的分析， 发现中国社会分层具有城乡户口差别和城市户口等级差别并存的特点， 户口转变和迁移的开放性程度与个人社会流动机会获得有正相关关系。市场转型虽带来了较多流动机会， 但户口等级差别以及户口对体制内流动所起的结构性影响依然存在。鉴于户籍制度的强粘附性生成了社会差别， 改革这一制度的基本方向是推行户口一元化和迁移自主化。 The household registration system has been a basic institutional arrangement in Chinese society. Under this system, registered residence (hukou) plays an important role in resource allocation and interest distribution, and thus exerts a significant impact on social stratification and mobility. After nearly three decades of reform and opening up, does it still play a role, and, if so, what is this role? Drawing on data from the China General Social Survey, we find that China's social stratification is characterized by the simultaneous existence of differentiation between urban and rural hukou and hierarchy within urban hukou; furthermore, there is a positive correlation between one's opportunities for social mobility and the possibility of changing and transferring one's hukou. Despite the increasing social mobility ensuing from market‐oriented transformation, the hukou hierarchy and its structural influence on mobility within the institutional framework persist. The strongly conglutinative nature of the household registration system has given rise to social disparities. The basic direction for reform of the system should be unification of hukou and free choice of movement from one place to another.