Abstract
This paper explores the links between migration and social differentiation in rural Vietnam after the reform period (2005–2015) through a case study of Maithon village, Chilang District, Bacninh Province. Since 2005, many villagers have left Maithon to work in cities, industrial zones or to find employment abroad. The migration process has transformed labour and income structures and supply in many households. However, 90 percent of Maithon households claimed on the positive contribution of remittance, while at the same time, they did not suffer from labour shortage due to the circular pattern of the migration. Therefore, rural out-migration is one of the diversification strategy which enables the villager to gain access to cash income in urban areas while still keep position in rural areas. It has resulted in the increase in the size of the middle class, rather than the generation of the gap between the rich and the poor. Through this process, migration becomes a developmental strategy, as a means for upward mobility rather than mechanism of social differentiation.
Highlights
Vietnam still tends to be characterized as a region where farming remains the pre-eminent occupation
Circular migration in Vietnam has been defined with the main intention of earning money and returning, having closed relationship with the place of origin and sending remittance frequently
The relationship of circular migration with social differentiation has been analysed through the framework that includes the cause, the mechanism and the indicators
Summary
Vietnam still tends to be characterized as a region where farming remains the pre-eminent occupation. There has been a change in the structure of GDP whereby the share of agriculture has relative declined from 42 percent in 1989 to 26 percent in 1999 and 21 percent in 2011 while the industry sector has more than doubled from 23 percent in 1990 to 47 percent in 2011 (GSO, 2011). The economy of Vietnam still depends on agriculture which accounts for more than one-quarter of the GDP, provides 85% of exports and employs about 60% of the work force, and a large part of the Vietnamese population (68%) resides in rural areas which makes farming continue to be the important lives and livelihoods of many Vietnamese, especially the most vulnerable people. In Vietnam, the Red River Delta region in the Northern part shares the common features of agrarian transition undergone by the Doimoi (Innovation Reforms) in the mid-1980s. Rural households often adopt more than one strategy to diversify their livelihood such as intensifying agricultural production and ass.ccsenet.org
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