Unequal Chances, Unequal Outcomes: Pension Reform and Urban Inequality

Abstract

Since the Third Plenum of the 11th Party Congress in December 1978 China's leaders have moved decisively to restructure the nation's economy. However, it now appears that while the decollectivization of agriculture has dramatically reoriented rural society, entrenched urban bureaucracy prevents a comparable change in the cities. Analysis of personnel policy, and in particular examination of expanded pension programmes, further articulates the nature of these entrenched interests, revealing in detail why post-Mao urban reforms have maintained, even intensified, privileges which rural reforms have transcended or eliminated.