Xi Jinping's View on Immigration As a Solution to China's Population Crisis

Xi Jinping’s View on Immigration as a Solution to China’s Population Crisis

Christian Nordvall

Supervisor: Johan Nordensvärd

FALL 2020

DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENT, UPPSALA UNIVERSITY

13,177 words

Contents

Contents ...... 1

1. Introduction ...... 4

1.1. The shrinking giant ...... 4

1.2. Aim of this study ...... 5

1.3. Research questions ...... 5

1.4. Definitions ...... 6

1.5. Translation ...... 6

2. Background: China’s current immigration policy ...... 7

2.1. Constitutional rights ...... 8

2.2. Residence ...... 8

2.3. Permanent residence ...... 10

2.4. Citizenship ...... 11

2.5. Communist Party membership ...... 12

2.6. The 2020 proposed changes to permanent residence ...... 13

3. Theoretical framework and literature review ...... 16

3.1. Immigration to authoritarian regimes ...... 16

3.2. The population question ...... 19

3.3. Studies on immigration to China ...... 20

4. Method ...... 21

4.1. Quantitative content analysis ...... 22

4.2. Qualitative text analysis ...... 22

4.3. Analytical framework for qualitative step ...... 23

4.4. Choice of text producer: Xi Jinping ...... 24

4.5. Choice of materials ...... 26

4.6. Search terms for quantitative step ...... 27

4.7. Limitations ...... 28

5. Results and analysis ...... 29

5.1. Quantitative step ...... 29

5.2. Qualitative step ...... 31

5.2.1. Is immigration presented as a solution to China’s fertility crisis? .. 31

5.2.2. What is said about (ethnically non-Chinese) foreigners moving to China? ...... 32

5.2.3. What is said about Overseas Chinese moving to China?...... 37

5.3. Summary ...... 39

6. Conclusions ...... 40

7. References ...... 42

1. Introduction

1.1. The shrinking giant

The world’s most populous country is running out of people. At least, that is the current forecast for the People’s Republic of China. The combination of the country’s One-Child Policy (1979-2015) and negligible immigration has led to a significant graying of the Middle Kingdom, and it is projected that the country’s population will begin shrinking perhaps as early 2023 (Nash 2019).

In the long term, there are only two ways a country can grow its population: either increase births, or increase immigration. China has clearly moved towards the first option by changing the One-Child Policy to a “Two-Child Policy” in 2015. Yet, by 2019 the country’s fertility rate1 was only 1.7 – hardly a baby boom (World Bank).

Even if there had been an instantaneous rebound in births, children born in 2015 will not be ready to enter the workforce until about 2035, which leaves China with the problem of how to support its ageing population during the transition. There are for instance doomsday scenarios of China’s state pension fund going insolvent by that time (Tang, 2019).

Additionally, the patriarchal norms of Confucianism led many people during the Policy to desire their one child to be a son, which led to mass abortions of female fetuses. For this reason, China currently has a surplus of some 30 million males who mathematically cannot find a wife within the borders of the country (Denyer & Gowen, 2018).

From a rational point of view, it would appear that both the workforce problem and the gender imbalance problem could be solved (or at least alleviated) through increased immigration: allow more foreigners of working age to settle in China, with

1 Fertility rate: the average number of children born by one woman during her lifetime. For a population to remain stable, each woman must on average have about two children: one to replace herself, and one to replace the father. In demographic literature, the so-called “replacement level” is conventionally set at 2.1 children, as an adjustment for the tragic reality that not all children survive to adulthood.

a preference for female foreign workers of marriageable age. But is this something an authoritarian Leninist state is willing to do?

1.2. Aim of this study In this paper we will examine how Chinese paramount leader Xi Jinping 习近平 talks about immigration and foreigners, in hopes of getting a clue as to whether a liberalization of immigration policy might be forthcoming. The choice of Xi is due to the fact that he currently (2020) holds unchallenged personal power over the Chinese Communist Party, state, and military, to the extent that Xi’s personal opinions can be regarded as synonymous with government policy. Understanding what Xi thinks about something therefore goes a long way towards understanding what “China” thinks about it.

The topic is chosen primarily because China is home to about 18% of humanity, meaning that whatever happens to its population size will have significant economic, political, and cultural consequences for the entire world. Secondarily, the study might also tell us something more general about how authoritarian regimes (such as Marxist-Leninist Communist states) handle issues of immigration and multiculturalism.

1.3. Research questions

Because of the lack of public debate in China, the main source of information for predicting the country’s future policy direction is the speeches and articles issued by the country’s top leadership. A policy statement ought to have more predictive power the more senior the person issuing it is, and we will therefore focus on the proclamations of paramount leader Xi Jinping, the most senior of all Chinese politicians. The research questions of this thesis are therefore:

What does Xi Jinping say about immigrants and foreigners in his speeches?

Does Xi’s rhetoric around immigrants and foreigners suggest an openness to liberalizing China’s immigration policy?

Does Xi explicitly present immigration as a solution to China’s population crisis?

1.4. Definitions

Diplomatically, “China” is regarded as a single country composed of four territories: the Mainland, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. However, each territory maintains its own separate immigration policy. As the Mainland accounts for by far the largest share of China’s territory, population, and economic output, the present discussion will mostly focus on immigration to the Chinese Mainland.

For the purposes of this essay, an “immigrant” is a person living outside their country of birth for at least 1 year, for the purpose of work or family reunification. Students will not be considered immigrants, as they are presumed to return to their home countries upon graduation.

1.5. Translation

Where possible, the translations of Chinese quotations are taken from officially authorized English versions, such as books published by the state-owned Foreign Language Press or articles carried by the official English-language newspaper China Daily.

I am however a fluent speaker of Chinese myself, having lived in China for seven years. When no official translation is available, I have translated the quotations myself, which is indicated where applicable.

2. Background: China’s current immigration policy

To properly interpret Xi’s stance on the future of immigration to China, we must first give a short sketch of China’s current immigration policy.

The 2010 census found 593,832 foreign nationals living in Mainland China (National Bureau of Statistics, 2011). As of this writing, the 2020 census has been delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and therefore a more recent figure is not available. We will however round upwards from the 2010 figure and guess that the number of foreigners in Mainland China is now somewhere in the region of 1 million. This would mean that foreigners make up less than 0.1% of the Mainland population (total 1.4 billion). This is in sharp contrast to the other three territories making up Greater China, as the below table will show:

Territory Territory Territory Foreign Foreign Territory population share of population share of share of Greater territory Greater China population China population foreign population

Mainland 1,400,174,000 97.77% 593,832 0.04% 30.45%

Taiwan 23,607,000 1.65% 772,281 3.27% 39.59%

Hong 7,560,000 0.53% 584,383 7.73% 29.96% Kong

Macau 679,000 0.05% 42,120 6.20% 2.16%

Greater 1,432,020,000 100.00% 1,950,496 0.13% 100.00% China

(IMF: World Economic Outlook 2019; Mainland 2010 census; Macau 2011 census; Hong Kong 2016 by-census; Taiwan Immigration Agency 2019. As this table is compiled from different censuses taken in different years, it should be taken only as indicative of the general orders of magnitude and not as an exact count of foreigners in any given year)

We can see that the distribution of foreigners across Greater China is very uneven. In a hypothetical scenario where all Chinese cities and provinces were equally attractive to (or welcoming of) immigrants, we would expect more than 90% of foreigners to settle somewhere in the Mainland. Yet we find that nearly one-third of immigrants to China live in just one city – Hong Kong! This despite Hong Kong housing only 1/200 of the total Chinese population.

As Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan have the same basic language, food, and social customs as Mainland China, the lack of foreigners in the Mainland is likely not due to them being unwilling to live in an ethnically Chinese society, but rather due to the greater legal difficulty of immigrating to the Mainland. If settling in the Mainland was as easy as settling in Hong Kong, we would proportionally expect the territory to have about 108 million foreigners, rather than currently under 1 million. We therefore need to briefly examine the legal environment facing prospective immigrants.

2.1. Constitutional rights

The Chinese constitution (last amended 2018) permits foreign enterprises to operate in China, guarantees the “lawful rights” of foreigners within Chinese territory, and gives the state the option of granting asylum. However, it also explicitly prohibits foreigners from spreading their religions in China.

2.2. Residence

Foreigners from most countries require a visa to enter Mainland China. If the stay is to exceed six months, a residence permit is also required. These may be granted for one of four purposes: work, journalism, study, or family reunification. Only the “work” and “journalism” types permit the foreigner to do full-time work. Students may only take of part-time internships, and family members (e.g. spouses) must be supported entirely by their Chinese relative (State Council, 2013).

Foreigners may only work in positions that are “in special need and which can not be taken up by domestic candidates for the time being” (Ministry of Labor, 1996). In the early days of the Reform Era, this criterion was relatively easy to meet, given the then-poor level of education among the general Chinese population. But as the locals have become progressively more educated and skilled (in absolute terms, China now has the largest number of university graduates in the world), the positions for which foreigners are truly uniquely qualified have dwindled.

The most common occupation for immigrants today is foreign language teaching. These positions often require applicants to be native speakers of the language taught, which conveniently disqualifies the majority of local-born Chinese citizens. The number of foreign language teachers in 2019 is supposed to have stood at 400,000, which would equal 40% of the approximately 1 million total foreigners in the Mainland (Zou, 2019).

Work permits are issued for the specific sponsoring workplace only. Transferring to a different workplace (in the same industry) requires the permission of the original workplace. Otherwise the entire visa and work permit application procedure has to be repeated (Ministry of Labor, 1996).

Open-ended employment contracts for foreigners are not allowed. They may be hired for at most 5 years at a time, after which a new contract and work permit application must be made (Ministry of Labor, 1996). In practice, most rank-and-file foreigners have contracts (and work permits) for 1 year at a time, with the longer- duration ones being reserved for senior management figures.

Holding a work permit for the Mainland does not confer an automatic right to work in Hong Kong, Macau, or Taiwan; and conversely holding a Hongkongese, Macanese, or Taiwanese work permit does not confer an automatic right to work in the Mainland (Ministry of Labor, 1996).

“Private employment” of foreigners by individual Chinese citizens is not permitted (Ministry of Justice, 1996). This regulation is probably aimed at preventing middle- and upper-class Chinese from keeping of Filipino or Indonesian domestic helpers, which is an extremely common practice in Hong Kong.

Holding a spousal visa does not entitle a foreigner to work in China. This strongly encourages Chinese Male – Foreign Female couples, as Confucianism is accepting of stay-at-home wives but not of stay-at-home husbands. For a Foreign Male – Chinese Female couple to lead a socially acceptable existence in China, the husband would need to separately obtain a work or journalism visa.

Aside from this, foreigners in China also face many forms of subtle structural discrimination. For example, non-permanent residents are not issued a Chinese ID card number, which prevents them from operating many automated services – from opening a bank account to buying a train ticket to joining multiplayer video games. To do any these things, when they are not outright impossible, the foreigner often has to go in person to the bank, train station, or game company to be manually registered. Chinese hotels furthermore require police permission to house foreign guests, which subtly restricts the movements of foreigners to only those areas deemed appropriate for them to visit.

The sum total of these restrictions is to make to the foreigners feel like their existence in Mainland China is always conditional and temporary. At each annual contract re-negotiation, there is the possibility that the employer could choose to not extend the employment and thereby force the foreigner to uproot their life and leave the country.

2.3. Permanent residence

Since 2004, China offers the possibility of permanent residency for seven categories of foreigners. However, especially the first three categories are extremely hard to qualify for:

1. Those who have made investments of between US$0.5 million and US$2 million in China for 3 consecutive years. Exact sum depends on which region of the country the investment took place in – poorer provinces having lower cut-off sums.

2. Those who hold jobs at or above the rank of vice-director, vice-manager, associate professor, or other such “vice-executive” ranks at government agencies, universities, state-owned enterprises, or major foreign corporations, and have resided in China for 4 consecutive years. 10

3. Those who have made “outstanding contributions” to China or are “urgently needed” by the country.

4. Spouses and underage unmarried children of the above three categories.

5. Spouses of Chinese citizens, who have been married and resided in China for 5 consecutive years.

6. The underage unmarried children of mixed Chinese-foreign couples. [If they hold the foreign parent’s citizenship rather than the Chinese parent’s citizenship]

7. Persons over 60 years of age with no family outside China, but with family inside China, who have lived in China for at least 5 consecutive years.

The Chinese “Green Card” has been called the most difficult in the world to get. We can see that permanent residency is only open to “elite” foreigners like millionaires and corporate executives, as well as their families. The only path to permanent residency that does not seem to require the foreigner to be extraordinarily privileged is the path of marrying a Chinese citizen.

Because of the strict criteria for permanent residence, only about 10,000 of them have actually been issued (Tian, 2020), equal to about 1% of all foreigners residing in China. And while there is no overt mention of ethnicity in the text of the regulations, anecdotal evidence suggests that those few who do succeed in obtaining Permanent Residence are disproportionately of Overseas Chinese origin (Pieke, 2011).

Most foreign professionals in China instead live on constantly renewed 1-year work visas, even when they have been in the country for decades (Zuo, 2018). Living under the constant threat of deportation (if, for example, one’s sponsoring workplace goes out of business) is surely the main deterrent against foreigners putting down roots and making a life in Mainland China.

2.4. Citizenship

The Nationality Law of the People’s Republic of China (1980) states that:

A foreigner or stateless person, who agrees to respect the constitution and other laws of China, and who meets one of the below criteria, may apply for Chinese citizenship: 1. Is a close relative of an existing Chinese citizen. 2. Lives permanently in China. 3. Has other compelling reasons.

It goes on to state that a person obtaining Chinese citizenship must renounce all their other citizenships, if any. Chinese who obtain foreign citizenship must likewise renounce their Chinese citizenship. Persons who were formerly Chinese nationals but have emigrated to other countries may apply for restoration of their Chinese citizenship, if they renounce their foreign citizenship.

The major legal roadblock to attaining Chinese citizenship is that “living permanently” is now defined as holding Permanent Residency under the 2004 regulations described above, which for most people are extremely difficult to meet. The 2010 census reported that there were around 1000 naturalized citizens in China, equivalent to 10% of the 10,000 permanent residence permit holders and 0.1% of the around 1 million foreign-born persons in China.

2.5. Communist Party membership

The Communist Party Statutes (last amended 2017) introduce the Party as “the vanguard of the Chinese working class, the Chinese people, and the Chinese nation.” The threefold inclusion of the qualifier “Chinese” suggests, by inversion, that the Party is not the vanguard of any foreign working class, foreign people, or foreign nation.

During the Party’s time in opposition (1921-1949), its statutes explicitly forbade discrimination on the basis of nationality, and there were examples of non-Asian foreigners joining (Brady, 2013). This clause was removed following the 1943 dissolution of the Communist International (Comintern), and after the founding of the People’s Republic (1949-) the statutes were amended to explicitly limit membership to only Chinese citizens.

The inability to join the Party causes certain roadblocks to non-naturalized immigrants, as in a one-party state membership in the ruling party is a prerequisite

for holding any kind of senior managerial position, especially in state-owned enterprises or other organizations of strategic significance.

2.6. The 2020 proposed changes to permanent residence

On February 27, 2020, the Chinese Department of Justice submitted for public commentary a draft Statute on Administration of Permanent Residence for Foreigners (Waiguo Ren Yongjiu Juliu Guanli Tiaoli 外国人永久居留管理条例), which would replace the current statute from 2004.

The document proposes eligibility for permanent residence for foreigners who fit into one of the following seven categories:

1. Those who have made outstanding contributions to China, in fields such as:

◼ Science, education, culture, health, or sport.

◼ Charity.

◼ Promoting friendship between China and other countries.

◼ Developing the Chinese economy.

2. Those who enjoy international recognition in the economic, scientific, educational, cultural, medical, or athletic fields.

3. Those who are necessary for the continued economic development of China, such as:

◼ Talents urgently needed for major national and regional projects.

◼ University staff at the rank of assistant professor or above.

◼ Senior administrators and scientists at innovation-related companies.

◼ Those recommended by existing Permanent Residents who qualified under category #2. 13

4. Those who hold employment in China, and:

◼ Hold a doctoral degree or is otherwise a graduate of a renowned international university, and have worked in China for a minimum of 3 years.

◼ Have worked on a major national or regional project for a minimum of 3 years, with a salary no less than 4 times the average in the concerned area.

◼ Have worked in China for a minimum of 4 years and have a salary no less than 6 times the average in the concerned area.

◼ Have worked in China for a minimum of 8 years and have a salary no less than 3 times the average in the concerned area.

5. Have made investment in China, in the form of:

◼ Any investment over ¥10 million yuan [c. US$1 million]

◼ An investment in particularly needy regions. Exact regions and minimum sums to be determined by the Immigration Administration.

◼ Have established science- or innovation-related businesses in China and been recommended by the local government.

6. Have a family relationship to a Chinese citizen:

◼ Through marriage.

◼ Through being their underage child.

◼ Through being an elderly relative aged over 60 years old with no other family abroad.

◼ (Spouses and children of foreigners granted permanent residency for any of the other reasons are also eligible)

7. Have “other persuasive reasons.”

The new proposal would relax the investment requirement from previously up to US$2 million to now about US$1 million. The investment cap is now also expressed in Chinese yuan rather than U.S. dollars, so that the exact dollar figure might change according to exchange rate fluctuations. This possibly indicates a greater confidence in China’s own currency and less hunger for foreign-currency reserves.

The proposal also lowers the required rank of university teachers and the like from previously “rank 2” (e.g. associate professor) to now “rank 3” (e.g. assistant professor).

It also introduces a general “employment” category where foreigners can gain permanent residency based on their length of stay and salary, without necessarily needing to hold an executive position at their workplace.

The definition of the vague term “outstanding contributions” has been made more concrete than before.

The general impression is that the main purpose is to attract foreign scientists and innovators to China, in line with Xi Jinping’s “Made in China 2025” strategy of turning the country into a technological superpower that is less dependent on outsourced manufacturing.

The proposal drew some media attention for the xenophobic opposition it sparked on Chinese social media (Mai, 2020). It is currently not clear if or when the new rules might go into effect. As of this writing, most foreigners have been temporarily banned from China as a precaution against the COVID-19 pandemic, meaning that any change in immigration policy is unlikely to be announced before the disease has been brought under control.

3. Theoretical framework and literature review

3.1. Immigration to authoritarian regimes

Most comparative politics discourse on immigration centers around developed Western democracies, such as the United States or Germany. The study of immigration to authoritarian regimes is much more neglected.

This is in part due to the “immigration issue” being much more politically explosive in democracies, where established parties have to deal with the electoral threat of far- right xenophobic parties. It also has to do with the fields of “immigration studies” and “authoritarian studies” having developed for separate historical reasons and attracted separate sets of scholars (Shin, 2017).

There is a stereotype that migrants come mainly from impoverished authoritarian regimes and move to wealthy democracies seeking a better life. There is likewise an idea that democracies must, almost axiomatically, have more permissive immigration policies than authoritarian regimes. Both perspectives suggest a moralizing view of democracies as “good” and authoritarian regimes as “evil”, where a rational person must axiomatically want to escape from their “evil” homeland and move to a “good” foreign country, which can likewise be expected to have a “good” (permissive) immigration policy rather than an “evil” (restrictive) migration policy.

However, research during the last decade has shown that such assumptions do not hold water. On closer inspection, authoritarian regimes actually attract more immigrants than democracies, and not only from other authoritarian regimes. A notable example is the large number of people from democratic India working in the oil-rich absolute monarchies around the Persian Gulf (Milovic, 2010; Breuning, 2012; Shin, 2017).

As Natter (2018) argues, it is unhelpful to regard democracies and authoritarian regimes as incommensurable units with no room for comparison. While the political process in authoritarian regimes might take on superficially different forms from those in democracies, such as opposition being organized as an informal faction

within the leadership rather than as an official political party, the same economic and demographic forces actually influence immigration policy making in both regime types.

The benchmark work on immigration to liberal democracies is Freeman (1995), which states that liberal democracies have permissive immigration policies because of “client politics”, where those who benefit from immigration (e.g. employers) have greater resources to lobby decision makers than those who lose from it (e.g. unskilled workers). However, while democratic leaders have two “clients”, the proverbial “Main Street” and “Wall Street”, authoritarians don’t have to worry about the former and can cater entirely to the economic elites and their thirst for cheap labor (Milovic, 2010).

Shin (2017) distinguishes two types of authoritarian regimes, namely those where the regime is mainly funded by natural resource rents (e.g. Qatar) and those where the regime is mainly funded by tax revenue (e.g. Singapore). In his analysis these adopt two opposite immigration doctrines:

Regimes that are powered by resources have nearly “infinite money” and will therefore prefer to give generous handouts to their citizens to keep them complacent, while instead using vulnerable migrant workers (who can be easily deported if they ever start having oppositional ideas) to do all menial and unpleasant jobs. Shin points out that in 2000 the population of the average OECD state was 8.8% foreign-born, whereas that in the average “wealthy authoritarian regime” was a whopping 31.5% foreign-born.

Regimes that are powered by tax revenue, on the other hand, do not have an infinite supply of cash with which to pay the population for “sitting at home doing nothing”, and so must make sure there are sufficient employment opportunities for their own citizens – in part to make sure there are incomes to tax, but primarily to avoid the social unrest that would follow mass unemployment. Such a regime will be wary to admit immigrants that could compete with the locals for a finite pool of job openings.

Common to both types is that authoritarian regimes can be quite liberal in granting entry to foreign workers, but that they are reserved about granting rights like citizenship or family reunification. Milovic (2010) uses the analogy that a country 17

accepting immigrants is in a sense like a company hiring workers – if the company has to pay its workers high benefits and can’t arbitrarily fire them, it will think twice before making hiring decisions. Conversely, if employees have few rights versus the employer and can be easily fired, the company will be more willing to hire. Authoritarians, then, can afford to be completely cynical about wanting immigrants to “get in, work, and get out”. There is not the same need to entertain the pretensions of equality or integration that would be expected in democracies.

In democracies, leaders furthermore have an electoral interest in extending citizenship to immigrants, since it broadens their possible range of voters (Milovic, 2010). For authoritarians, on the other hand, expanding the citizen population is a potential threat to their own power, as immigrants who stay long enough to become fluent in the local language, culture, and legal system are better able to organize themselves, demand their rights, and gain sympathy from the locals. From the ruler’s point of view it is best to “divide and conquer” by constantly replacing the individual guest workers, so that they are only ever “assimilated enough” to understand instructions and obey the law, but not “too assimilated” to the point where they think they can make demands on the host country.

Contrary to what most residents of democracies intuitively imagine, studies show that migrants are not primarily searching for “freedom”, but rather for material prosperity (Shin, 2017). If a wealthy dictatorship like Saudi Arabia is able to provide a relatively higher salary and living standard than an impoverished democracy like India, many people will abide by Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and choose “bread over ballots”. The absence of political rights is probably made more bearable by the mutual understanding that the migration is temporary. A 20-something Indian might work in Saudi Arabia for a couple of years until they have saved up enough riyals to get married, after which they will return to India to settle down and start a family.

Natter (2018) has questioned whether a binary division of countries into “democracies” and authoritarian regimes is even productive, since below surface level there are actually many of the same dynamics present in both; notably that different parts of the government apparatus may have different opinions on immigration. For example, the Department of Justice may want fewer rights for immigrants as a means of more easily fighting crime, whereas the Department of Health wants more rights for immigrants to prevent social misery. That a country does not hold competitive elections does not mean that there is a complete absence 18

of interest pluralism behind closed doors, and even a dictator must choose which advisor to listen to and which advisor to ignore when they give mutually incompatible recommendations.

Applying the above model to our study, China is a tax-powered rather than a resource-powered authoritarian regime, which explains its currently restrictive immigration policy.

3.2. The population question

In order to maintain a stable population, each woman must bear on average 2.1 children, which is called the “replacement level”. In pre-industrial times, reaching this number was not a problem, as a sexually active woman who uses no contraceptives will bear something like 7.0 children during her fertile years. To the extent people thought about the “Population Question” at all, it was in terms of the population possibly growing too large for the resource carrying capacity (the classic work on this topic is Malthus, 1798).

As countries industrialize, fertility appears almost universally to go down. This in part due to easier access to contraceptives and abortions, but mainly due to changing economic incentives. In a rural society, children are mainly an economic asset, as they provide “free” labor to help out on the farm from the moment they’re old enough to hold a shovel. In an urban society, on the other hand, children are mainly an economic liability, as they take the better part of two decades to become economically productive, and during this time they take up space in the parents’ often cramped apartments and incur expenses related to their education and health (Myrdal & Myrdal, 1934). The intangible “happiness” that parents get from raising a child is possibly enough to convince them to take on the expenses for one child, but probably not for six children.

Global fertility has been declining every year since 1964 (when it stood at 5.1), and was in 2018 (the most recent year available) hovering just barely above replacement at 2.4 (World Bank). It appears very likely that those of us reading this paper will live to see the worldwide fertility rate go below-replacement in our lifetimes, setting the stage for the world population eventually beginning to shrink.

The immediate effect of falling fertility is of course a shrinking workforce across the board, which also leads to less tax revenue. Knock-on effects include less staff and money for elder care, even as the proportion of retirees as a share of the total population increases, as well as a crisis for the education industry as it begins to run out of children to educate.

These mechanisms and problems are not caused by regime type, but by level of industrialization, and will hence strike authoritarian regimes just the same as democracies once they reach a certain development level.

There are essentially three possible solutions to the fertility crisis. The first is to incentivize the existing population to have more children. The second is to extract more labor from the existing population by for example raising the retirement age. The third solution is to grow the population via immigration, which is what we are primarily interested in for this paper (Holzmann, 2005).

3.3. Studies on immigration to China

The main work on immigration to China is Anne-Marie Brady’s Making the Foreign Serve China (2003), which describes the history of foreigners in the People’s Republic up to the end of the Jiang Zemin period (1989-2002). The timeline has subsequently been extended by Liu (2009), Pieke (2013), and Bork-Hüffer & Ihle (2013), but there is as far as I can tell no study covering immigration policy during Xi Jinping’s second term (2017-2022), which includes the interesting 2020 proposal for permanent residency reform.

Bruni (2013) has written about the Chinese fertility crisis, but does not regard mass immigration as a desirable solution, proposing instead to (as also suggested by Holzmann) abolish birth restrictions and raise the retirement age. To the extent there must be any immigration, Bruni thinks it should mainly target Overseas Chinese and foreign graduates of Chinese universities.

The consensus of these scholars is that China is open to certain categories of skilled immigrants, but is not pursuing mass immigration as a solution to the lack of construction workers, taxi drivers, hotel cleaners, and other unskilled professions that in resource-powered authoritarian regimes are often staffed by guest workers.

4. Method

This paper will employ a two-step hybrid quantitative and qualitative text analysis on a body of Xi Jinping’s speeches. This method is useful when we want to know both what somebody is saying (qualitative) and how often -if at all- they are saying it (quantitative) (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 231).

The first (quantitative) step consists of identifying which of Xi’s thousands of speeches contain useful information about his immigration policy. This is accomplished by searching a database maintained by the People’s Daily newpaper (introduced below) for a number of immigration-related key words. Unfortunately, the database entries have not been coded with thematic tags, so that a search for the word “immigrant” returns only speeches in which Xi said the exact word “immigrant”, not speeches containing synonyms like “guest worker” or “refugee”.

The second (qualitative) step consists of taking the most relevant speeches and subjecting them to a series of pre-determined questions, which seek to go beyond the mere presence or absence of immigration-related words and instead decode what Xi means when he talks about these issues.

4.1. Quantitative content analysis

Quantitative content analysis is the preferred method for measuring the frequency and volume of some countable unit of meaning – such as words or phrases. It allows us to measure how often somebody says something (e.g. the word “immigrant”), and also how much time/space they spend talking/writing about it when it is mentioned (e.g. is immigration only mentioned in passing, or is it the main subject of the whole speech?). It is assumed that the more frequently and intensely a person talks about a certain subject, the more important they regard the subject as being (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 198).

The statistics thus gathered may serve as either the independent variable or dependent variable. In the former case one is looking to determine how the frequency and/or volume of a certain type of information affects the listeners/readers, whereas in the latter case one seeks to trace what behind-the- scenes factors may be causing certain indicators to be more or less used (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 200-201). Our study will take immigration-related words (or lack thereof) in Xi’s speeches as the dependent variables, as we are trying to get a glimpse of the possible change in immigration policy that might be going on in closed-door Politburo meetings.

A quantitative content analysis requires analysis units, variables, and possible variable values (Esaiasson 2017, 202). In this study our analysis units will be Xi Jinping’s speeches, and the variables will be a set of immigration- and fertility-related key words listed in the table below. As the quantitative step of the study is mainly a prelude to the qualitative step, there will only be two variable values, namely if the word is “mentioned” or “not mentioned”.

4.2. Qualitative text analysis

Qualitative text analysis consists of “extracting the key contents though a thorough reading of the text’s components, whole, and context” (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 211). This method assumes that words do not have an intrinsic meaning in themselves, but rather derive their meaning from the social context in which they are uttered. For example, words like “Chinese” and “foreigner” by themselves have neither an unambiguous reference (e.g. are second-generation ethnic Chinese born abroad

“Chinese” or “foreigners”?) nor an unambiguous value load (is calling somebody a “foreigner” an insult or a compliment?).

Words derive their meaning -are “constructed” - through how they are used in context, especially through social convention (ibid, 212). Consider for example the word “China”. Which territory is actually meant by this term? To many Westerners, “China” refers only to the Socialist Mainland China, whereas to Mainlanders it is obvious that “China” also includes Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. As society changes, social conventions on language also change, and words are liable to have their meanings de- and re-constructed. Even something as innocuous as changing the size or placement of a word might constitute a political act: for example, Taiwan recently (2020) shrunk the font size of the words “Republic of China” on its new passport covers, leaving the all-caps word “TAIWAN” the only text that an inattentive border guard is likely to see. This move was immediately criticized by Beijing as a move towards Taiwan independence from China.

According to philosopher Mats Furberg, qualitative text analysis consists of “reading texts actively, asking the text questions, and seeing whether the text -or oneself- can answer these questions” (unpublished promemoria, quoted in Esaiasson et al 2017, 212). Qualitative text analyses may be divided into systematizing and critically probing analyses. The systematic analysis seeks to highlight the ideological structure of the text by sorting its contents into logical categories, using questions like “is this a conservative or liberal party platform?”, “how are ‘refugees’ represented in this text?”, “what is the masculinity norm in this text?” etc. (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 213- 214). The critically probing analysis, for its part, seeks to also expose the (lack of) persuasiveness of the arguments presented (argument analysis), and/or reveal the power relations implicit in the text (critical analysis). Our present study belongs to the systematizing type.

4.3. Analytical framework for qualitative step

A qualitative text analysis begins by specifying the questions that will be posed to the text. The presence of these pre-determined questions is what makes the analysis “scientific” (repeatable, intersubjective) rather than merely one person’s impressionistic reading of the text (Esaiasson et al. 2017, 216). Without any objective guiding principles, there would be as many subjective readings of a text as there are readers – we can consider the fact that the commentary literature on, for example, 23

the Bible is hundreds or thousands of times longer than the actual text of the Bible itself.

The following questions that will be posed to Xi’s speeches. The first question is essentially a closed yes/no question, whereas the other two are open questions:

1. Is immigration presented as a solution to China’s fertility crisis?

2. What is said about (ethnically non-Chinese) foreigners moving to China?

3. What is said about Overseas Chinese moving to China?

“Immigration” is here defined as “non-Chinese citizens moving to China”, regardless of whether Xi actually refers to this phenomenon as “immigration” or not. It is generally not common for people in China to speak of “immigrants” to their country, and I hence believe that greater validity can be attained by using the broader category “foreigners in China”, by which we mean a person born as a non-Chinese citizen, who is now residing in China.

Previous studies such as Brady (2003) suggest that the Chinese Communist Party does not regard Overseas Chinese as fully “foreign”, and therefore they will be examined separately from foreigners of non-Chinese descent.

4.4. Choice of text producer: Xi Jinping

The choice of studying only Xi Jinping, rather than a large sample of Chinese people, is justified by three factors. First, the limits on free speech in Mainland China make it notoriously difficult to conduct any kind of opinion poll or survey without the consent of the government. Second, even if one were to successfully conduct such a survey, it is likely that respondents would only give what they believe to be the politically correct answer. Third and most importantly, even if it were possibly to learn the true opinions of the average Chinese, the average person does not have direct input on national policy making. If our purpose is to make a realistic prediction of the future direction of Chinese immigration policy, a qualitative study of the Paramount Leader will have greater validity than a quantitative study of people whose opinions do not matter.

Xi Jinping is currently the undisputed leader of China. While the country has never been a democracy, it has not always had a single paramount leader. During the Reform Era (1978-2012), the country was best described as an oligarchy where the Communist Party General Secretary was merely the First Among Equals. However, Xi spent most of first term (2012-2017) waging a high-profile “Anti-Corruption Campaign”, during which it became clear that the only way to reliably escape punishment was to profess undying loyalty to Xi personally, rather than merely to the Party as an organization or Communism as an ideology. My interpretation for why the rest of the Politburo and Central Committee allowed this to happen is that they note in fear how China is approaching the age (74 years) where the Soviet Union collapsed, and are determined to avoid the same fate by doing the exact opposite of what the Gorbachev administration did. That is, China is pursuing a sort of “Anti- Glasnost” (increased censorship) and “Anti-Perestroika” (increased centralization). The key component of the latter is to eliminate any alternative power center inside the Party which could one day give rise to a “Chinese Yeltsin”.

By the Party Congress of 2017, the lionization of Xi had reached the point where he was designated the “core of the fifth generation leadership”, and the Party Statutes were amended to include his name in the Party’s official ideology, which now reads:

Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Important Thought of the ‘Three Represents’, the Scientific View on Development, and Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese

Characteristics for a New Era.

The following National People’s Congress (2018) amended the People’s Republic constitution to include the same ideological formula, in effect making it unconstitutional to disagree with Xi’s “thought”. A separate amendment also removed the two-term limit on the presidency, which could in theory allow Xi (b. 1953) to serve for life.

Today, the ideology and policies of the Communist Party of China have largely become synonymous with the personal opinions of Xi Jinping. As neither the Party Statutes not the Constitution provide any constraining definition of exactly what is meant by “Xi Jinping Thought”, one could argue that anything Xi happens to be “thinking” on a given day instantly becomes part of the Party’s official program.

While it is likely that the ideas Xi expresses in public were in fact arrived at after deliberation with the other members of the Politburo, the official rhetoric is determined to credit everything positive that happens in China to Xi’s personal genius, as part of his growing cult of personality. For example, in premier Li Keqiang’s 李克强 work report to the 2020 National People’s Congress, he stopped to praise “the guidance of Xi Jinping in fighting the COVID-19 outbreak”. Conversely, anything negative that happens in China is always the fault of someone other than Xi.

For these reasons, we can view Xi’s public persona as a personification of the Communist Party, and anything that Xi says or does (in public) as authoritative statements of Communist Party policy.

4.5. Choice of materials

It goes without saying that a foreign political scientist would find it very difficult to contact Xi Jinping directly ask his opinion on immigration. We must therefore infer his thoughts from those records that are publicly available.

Xi Jinping’s preferred medium of expression is the scripted speech. He will generally deliver one every time he attends a summit, meets a foreign leader, visits a workplace, or does anything else that takes him outside the Zhongnanhai 中南海 leadership compound in Beijing. His marathon 3-hour address to the 19th Party Congress (2017) drew comparisons to his late comrade Fidel Castro (1926-2016) of Cuba.

Xi has not been known to write many extended print articles or books, which would have allowed for a more systematic and general statement of his ideas than the situation-specific speeches. While the physical symbol of “Xi Jinping Thought” is the book The Governance of China (Zhiguo Lizheng 治国理政, 3 volumes: 2014, 2017, 2020), this work is in fact just a selection of speeches grouped under thematic headings. It is not a coherent “book” in the sense of “monograph”. As such, virtually the only available analysis units for studying Xi’s “thought” is, in one medium or another, his speeches.

After “Xi Jinping Thought” was made part of the Party’s official ideology, the Communist Party’s official newspaper People’s Daily (Renmin Ribao 人民日报) established a searchable database of Xi’s speeches, which officials could mine for the 26

correct line on whichever topic they were currently grappling with. The database currently (2020-09-20) contains 1460 full-text speeches2, as well as 1244 press releases about Xi’s activities which sometimes also contain quotes or paraphrases of things he said at the occasion. This database has been the main source used in this study.

4.6. Search terms for quantitative step

The People’s Daily database was searched for the following terms. All searches were made in Chinese. The English translations are provided for reference only.

Immigration/Migrant 移民3 Foreigner 外国人

Foreigners in China 在华外国人 Foreign talent 外国人才

Overseas Chinese 华侨 Permanent residence 永久居留

Sino-Foreign marriage 中外婚姻 Mixed-race children 混血

Fertility rate 生育率 Retirement age 退休龄

Since the Mao era, the most common official terms for foreigners in China have been “foreign experts” (waiguo zhuanjia 外国专家), “foreign talents” (waiguo zhuanjia 外国专家), and “foreign friends” (waiguo pengyou 外国朋友) (Brady, 2003).

In an attempt to capture openness to the immigration of foreign women as a solution to the gender imbalance crisis, I have included both “Sino-Foreign Marriage” and “Mixed-Race Children”. Finally, we have included a general “fertility rate” and

2 This would work out to Xi giving on average about 200 speeches per year, or four per week. Some of the database entries are, however, repetitions, where the same speech has been quoted from different media outlets. The exact number of unique speeches is therefore unknown.

3 Chinese lacks distinct words for “immigrant” and “emigrant”. Anybody who moves across a national boundary is called a “migrant” regardless of incoming or outgoing direction. The phenomenon of “migration” as such is also usually referred to by this term. 27

“retirement age” to capture possible other solutions to the fertility crisis which may be proposed instead of immigration.

4.7. Limitations

The People’s Daily database entries are not tagged by topic, meaning that one can only search for words that occur literally in the text. It is not possible to search for synonyms or “implied” contents. The researcher must therefore use his own imagination to think of all the possible words that could signal information relevant to the study. This unfortunately introduces an element of arbitrariness. While I have lived seven years in China and consider myself conversationally familiar with the official rhetoric of the Communist Party, it cannot be ruled out that as a foreigner and non-native speaker of Chinese I may have failed to think of one or two search terms which should have been included.

This paper was written during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. As I was writing this paper, the virus briefly plunged China into its first recession since 1976, causing unemployment to skyrocket. It is still too early to say what long-term effects, if any, this will have on China’s economy and immigration policy.

For want of better alternatives, my interpretation of Xi’s speeches will be based on the premise that China will, sooner or later, return to the same economic, political, and social state it was in prior to the 2019 outbreak of the pandemic. I make this assumption out of sheer necessity and with full knowledge that reality might soon render my findings dated.

5. Results and analysis

5.1. Quantitative step

Searching the People’s Daily database for a number of immigration- and fertility- related key words yielded the following number of hits:

Overseas Chinese 华侨 104

Migrant 移民 82

Foreigner 外国人 36

Permanent residence 永久居留 9

Foreigners in China 在华外国人 3

Foreign talent 外国人才 3

Fertility rate 生育率 2

Sino-Foreign marriage 中外婚姻 0

Mixed-race children 混血 0

Retirement age 退休龄 0

We see that Xi is much more interested in speaking about his “Overseas Chinese Compatriots” (Huaqiao tongbao 华侨同胞) than about any other category of foreigner. This figure is however likely inflated by the fact that the Overseas Chinese are formulaically mentioned in the stock greeting “Hong Kong Compatriots, Macau Compatriots, Taiwan Compatriots, and Overseas Chinese Compatriots” which Xi routinely uses when speaking about topics that concern a non-Mainland audience.

While it initially looks promising to get over 80 hits for the word “migrant” (yimin 移民), a closer inspection of the results shows that this number is inflated by the fact that it can apparently also be used for Chinese moving from one part of China to another part of China. In Xi’s speeches the word is mainly used either for nomadic minority groups, or “domestic refugees” who have been displaced by natural calamities or the construction of large infrastructure projects.

To the extent he uses the word for international migrants, it is mainly in speeches to international organizations where he pledges to fight illegal immigration (which is probably more about preventing Chinese nationals from illegally emigrating than about preventing foreign nationals from illegally immigrating to China). I have not found a single case where the word migrant is used positively. I would speculate that this is due to Chinese news reporting on the migration controversies in Europe and America having lent a negative ring to the word, so that foreigners going to China need to be called something other than “migrants” to not trigger xenophobic reactions like the one that met the 2020 proposal on relaxed permanent residency requirements.

Except for these two words, the term “foreigner” is the only one that appears in more than 1% of Xi’s 1400-odd speeches. We can hence conclude that immigration- related issues are not central to his political message. For example, despite the publicity that the permanent residence reform received, Xi has only uttered the words “permanent residence” nine times.

Neither of the terms used to find an opinion related to Sino-Foreign intermarriage yielded any results. This is however likely the result of me not having found the “right” term to capture this concept, as Xi has talked about an Arab-Chinese couple on at least one occasion (see below).

It must be said that the results contain a significant degree of repetition. The same substantial information might be delivered several times, for example once in the opening address to some conference and then again in the closing address. In such cases I will only quote the most “mature” and detailed statement of a viewpoint, leaving out earlier drafts and subsequent summaries.

5.2. Qualitative step

We will now analyze a selection of speeches based on our analytical framework.

5.2.1. Is immigration presented as a solution to China’s fertility crisis?

Xi Jinping has only commented once4 on China’s falling birth rate, which he did while explaining the main points of the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020). In the speech, Xi makes reference to the relaxation of the One-Child Policy which had occurred in 2015.

Point 9: On implementing the policy of each couple having two children.

At present, our nation has clearly entered a period of structural ageing. The willingness of people of reproductive age to actually have children has dropped markedly, and the average fertility rate among women is far below replacement level.

Currently, the bulk of the reproducing population are the cohorts born in the 1980s and 1990s.Their attitude towards reproduction is markedly different from previous generations. Not only has the cost of raising a child increased, but the social welfare system has also improved, meaning that having children is no longer essential for a comfortable old age. Young people prefer “quality over quantity” when it comes to children.

On the one hand, studies show that since we allowed couples where one party is an only child to have two

children, there have theoretically been over 11 million couples eligible to have a second child, but at the end of August this year [2015], only 1.69 million had actually applied5 to have a second child. That is, a ratio of 15.4%.

On the other hand, our population is noticeably ageing. In 2014, the share of the population aged above 606 had already crossed 15%, which is much higher than the world average. The population aged younger than 14 is also lower than the world average, and the population of working age has indisputably begun shrinking.

4 Included twice in the database from two different sources.

5 Mainland Chinese are supposed to apply for government permission before (deliberately) initiating a pregnancy.

6 The retirement age for Chinese men. The retirement age for women is 55.

Many developments of this kind are constantly happening. These circumstances pose a significant new

challenge to our nation’s population stability and security.

Comprehensively implementing the policy of each couple having two children, will allow us to liberate the reproductive forces, reduce the pressure of the ageing population, ensure the supply of labor, and preserve a stable population development. This is a decisive measure for ensuring the long-term population stability of the Chinese Nation. The National Health Committee and other relevant institutions have produced calculations which reassure us that this policy will be possible to implement successfully. (Xi,2015 – my translation)

We see that Xi is clearly aware of the “fertility crisis”, bringing up many of the same points and concerns that foreign scholars and commentators have. Yet, his one speech on the topic only brings up one of Holzmann’s three possible solutions to it – raising the fertility rate. There is no mention of raising the retirement age or of accepting more immigrants.

It is noteworthy that Xi only saw fit to address the issue (and lift the One-Child Policy) in the same year that China’s working-age population peaked (World Bank). This suggest that, as Natter proposes, there might be different interests pulling in different directions on the subject, so that a decision is only possible once the country reaches a “crisis” that forces action.

Given the prominence of the issue in the international China Studies community, it is surprising that Xi has only sought fit to speak on the fertility issue on one occasion. Perhaps this indicates that the topic is sensitive or potentially disturbing to the population, so that the leadership do not want to draw the people’s attention to it before they have a solution ready.

To answer our question, immigration is not currently presented as a solution to the fertility crisis.

5.2.2. What is said about (ethnically non-Chinese) foreigners moving to China?

Xi has never used the term “migrant” (yimin 移民) to refer to foreigners living in China. Instead he prefers to talk about “foreign talents” (waiguo rencai 外国人才) and “foreign experts” (waiguo zhuanjia 外国专家). This is likely due to the word 32

“migrant” having acquired a negative connotation in Chinese, due to media coverage of the migration controversies in Europe and North America.

The first volume of The Governance of China contains the following anecdote, told by Xi in a speech to the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum:

Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends,

The rapid development of China-Arab relations has created a close link in the destiny of the peoples of both sides. In Zhejiang Province where I used to work, there is a Jordanian businessman named Muhamad who runs a genuine Arabian restaurant in Yiwu City, where a lot of Arab business people gather. Through bringing genuine Arabian cuisine to Yiwu, he has achieved business success in this prosperous Chinese city, and has gone on to marry a Chinese girl and settle down in China. Integrating his own goals with the Chinese dream of happiness, this young Arab man has built a marvelous life for himself through his perseverance – he embodies a perfect combination of the Chinese Dream and the Arab Dream. (Xi, 2014:343)

The inclusion of this story in the book that forms the gospel of Xi Jinping Thought means that Xi is on record saying that:

1. It is good for foreigners for settle in China [permanently] and start businesses there.

2. It is good for foreigners to marry Chinese nationals. [Even for foreign men to marry Chinese women, despite the gender gap]

3. Foreigners can participate in building the Chinese Dream.

It looks like more than a coincidence that Xi’s Arab friend Muhamad should happen to be living in Yiwu 义乌, of all places, as this city is cited by Pieke as an experiment ground for a more liberal immigration policy. For example, Yiwu permits foreigners to participate in the economy on the same terms as Chinese citizens, which allows the running of small businesses such as Muhamad’s restaurant (Pieke, 2011:62-63). As mentioned earlier, in most of China foreigners are only legally allowed to work in “big” workplaces like state-owned enterprises and universities, not in single-location shops or restaurants.

Note that this story did not appear in the search for “Sino-Foreign Marriage”, as Xi uses a more indirect expression to refer to Muhammad’s marriage.

In 2014, Xi held a meeting with 50 “foreign experts” (representing 22 countries) based in Shanghai, primarily from the higher education, technology, and business sectors. He told them that:

The Chinese Nation has a proud tradition of appreciating talent. Today, it is more necessary than ever to smoothen the path for outstanding individuals, and attract Talents from all under heaven.

Implementing a more open talent policy […] consists not only of encouraging those innovating Talents already residing in China, but also of attracting ever-more Foreign Talents to our shores, particularly highly qualified

ones, to warmly welcome foreign experts and outstanding talents to participate in the modernization of China.

We need to create a respectful, caring, supporting environment for foreign innovators and entrepreneurs, where they enjoy our trust and are free to develop their full potential.

[…]

The authorities responsible for Foreign Experts should continue perfecting the systems for their entry into the country, ensuring the protection of intellectual property, the legal rights of the Foreign Talents, the appropriate rewards for Foreign Talents that have made outstanding contributions, so that those who wish to

make their future in China can enjoy ease of entry, security of accommodation, opportunity of advancement, and freedom of movement.

We should simplify the rules for the movement of Foreign Talents, and make it easier for them to work in major companies, universities, research institutes etc. to let them participate more closely in the development of China, as well as attain their own professional goals. (People’s Daily, 2014 – my translation)

Xi speaks here on attracting only “outstanding talents”, rather than foreigners generally. It is also a very specific kind of “talents”, namely those in the technical fields. In the second paragraph quoted we see Xi implicitly listing some of the concerns that are currently discouraging such individuals from settling in China: poor intellectual property protection, poor rule of law, low wages, Byzantine visa rules, insecure living situations, limited career advancement opportunities (e.g. because some senior posts are limited to Party members), and limited mobility (e.g. because of restrictions on what hotels one can stay in, or on freedom to change employer). 34

The appropriate workplaces for foreigners are still “major companies and universities”, i.e. not the corner noodle shop or the hotel front desk.

This speech can be seen as foreshadowing the eventual relaxation of permanent residency regulations, which under the 2020 proposal heavily promotes scientists and innovators. The main purpose of this type of immigration is not to quantitatively replace the hundreds of millions of workers who will retire from the economy, but rather to help transition China from an economy built on outsourced manufacturing to one built on technological innovation. Xi recognizes the common perception that Chinese people are “good at copying but bad at innovating” and therefore does not trust his own people to produce the next Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos.

Xi Jinping is a well-known football fan, so perhaps it is appropriate to call this the “Premier League principle”. English football is infamous for the enormous gap in quality between on the one hand the mediocre national team, and on the other hand the outstanding club teams. The discrepancy is generally attributed to the ubiquitous presence of foreign players. “English football” is therefore not necessarily “football played by Englishmen”, but rather “football played in England” by players of any nationality. Xi is hoping to turn China into a technological great power by redefining “Chinese innovation” as “innovation taking place in China” rather than “innovation made by Chinese people”.

In a 2018 speech marking the 30th anniversary of Hainan province becoming a Special Economic Zone, Xi said:

We must support Hainan universities in entering the top ranks of world technology. We must encourage leading domestic colleges to establish campuses in Hainan, encourage Hainan to import high-quality foreign teaching talent, encourage the participation in high-level academic organizations both at home and abroad. We will support Hainan in becoming a testing ground for a reformed management of foreign talents, where we will permit foreign and Hong Kong-Macau-Taiwan individuals in the fields of science and technology to take up employment and obtain permanent residence. We will permit foreign exchange students with master’s degrees or above to work and innovate in Hainan, to expand the island’s foreign student population. We will

support Hainan in establishing procedures for recruiting highly skilled foreign professionals. (Xi, 2018b – my translation)

Again the theme is about making China a technologically advanced nation. The immigrants are very specifically linked to the university environment, and selection is still very elitist – “Master’s degrees and above only, please”.

The modus operandi of the Communist Party since 1978 has been to test new policies in isolated areas before rolling them out nationwide. For instance, “Socialist market economy” was initially only practiced in the city of Shenzhen, before being gradually rolled out to the rest of the country. Similarly, foreign tourists did not initially have access to all cities and provinces, even though the list kept on growing.

Hainan is an island province located 30 km off the coast of Guangdong, where the only way to reach the rest of China is by boat or airplane. This property makes the island a suitable testing ground for a more liberal immigration policy, as the government can easily control the movements of foreigners by stationing guards at the sea- and airports. In fact, in addition to Xi’s remarks, the island has recently been opened to tourists without the usual need for a tourist visa.

Conducting this kind of experiment could be an indication that a more liberal immigration policy will eventually be rolled out nationwide. Although, we must remember that the Communist Party thinks in 5-year plans, so that each increment of a gradual liberalization is likely to last at least one 5-year cycle, putting “mass immigration” to all provinces decades into the future.

Beyond the story of Xi’s friend Muhamad, I have not seen him say anything about marriage between Chinese and foreigners. This is perhaps due to the fact that “wife buying” from culturally related Vietnam is already a somewhat prevalent, if morally questionable, practice. Perhaps Xi feels that the surplus men have already figured out that they can use this method for obtaining a wife, so it does not require explicit endorsement or attention from Beijing.

5.2.3. What is said about Overseas Chinese moving to China?

There are an estimated 50 million Overseas Chinese (Huaqiao 华侨). That is, persons of Han Chinese7 ethnicity with non-Chinese citizenship. They form a majority of the population in Singapore, and double-digit percentages in Malaysia, Thailand, and Brunei. Chinese communities in excess of one million individuals are further found in the United States, Indonesia, Canada, Myanmar, Australia, the Philippines, and South Korea.

Shortly after the founding of the People’s Republic, Mao made it a priority to get Overseas Chinese to return to the “Motherland”, and according to Liu, the first four years of the new state saw an annual 15-20% growth in the number of returnees. However, the trend soon reversed as persecution of “class enemies”, which would have included many Overseas Chinese businesspeople, intensified in 1957 (Liu, 2009).

In his speeches on overseas affairs, Xi Jinping commonly makes a salutation according to the set formula “compatriots in Hong Kong and Macau, compatriots in Taiwan, and Overseas Chinese compatriots”. This implies that ethnic Chinese who are citizens of some other country are still in some sense considered Chinese nationals.

In a speech to Seventh International Congress of Overseas Chinese, titled “Common Roots, Common Soul, Common Dream – Together we Write a New Chapter in the Development of the Chinese Nation”, Xi said:

Around the world there are tens of millions of Overseas Chinese. All of you are members of the great Chinese family. For many generations, Overseas Chinese have preserved the excellent traditions of China, never forgetting the Motherland, never forgetting their ancestral villages, never forgetting that the blood in their veins is Chinese. They have eagerly participated in the revolution, construction, and reform of China. They have helped make China great, promoted the peaceful reunification of the Motherland8, and made great

7 Minority emigrant communities, such as the Tibetans in India, are generally not regarded as “Overseas Chinese” in the official rhetoric.

8 Viz. Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and other lost territories.

contributions to building friendship between the Chinese people and other nations. The Motherland will

never forget the invaluable efforts of the Overseas Chinese. (Xi, 2014a)

And when commemorating the 140th birthday of the Singaporean investor Chen Jiageng 陈嘉庚 (1874-1961), further:

To realize the Great Restoration of the Chinese Nation is the shared wish of all sons and daughters of China, both at home and abroad. This was also the lifelong ambition of Mr. Chen Jiageng. I hope that all the myriad Overseas Chinese will adopt the “Jiageng spirit” – that they will maintain a heartfelt patriotism, that they will preserve the interests of the country, that they will always struggle together with the Motherland, in our shared dream for the restoration of our nation. (Xi, 2014c)

The word minzu 民族 is conventionally translated “nation”, as I have done above, yet in the last sentence I am very tempted to translate “the restoration of our race”.

While in the ancient past China was once characterized as “culturalist” rather than “racialist”, with sufficiently assimilated “barbarians” being welcome to become Chinese, the definition of Chineseness has become mainly descent-based during the 20th and 21st centuries (Harrison, 2001). Chinese official discourse frequently engages in benign “othering” of non-Asians, regarding all people from other continents as perpetual guests even if they have been in the country since the 1949 revolution (Brady, 2003).

Xi, at the very least, clearly regards people of biological Chinese descent as forming part of the “Chinese Nation” (Zhonghua Minzu 中华民族) even if they do not hold People’s Republic of China citizenship, and they are expected to show loyalty to China even if they have not actually set foot there.

I would hold it as very likely that if Beijing ever opens the door to large-scale immigration as a solution to the fertility problem, their first choice will be to try and make the Overseas Chinese “return” to China, as they are already considered part of the Chinese Nation and therefore “remigrants” rather than “immigrants”.

However, the mathematics do not support this as a stable solution. Even if all 50 million Overseas Chinese were somehow convinced to return to China, this would only represent a one-off population increase of around 4%, which is far from enough. To offset its projected population decline, China would require 121 million 38

immigrants between 2025 and 2050 (Holzmann, 2005), which is more than double the world supply of Overseas Chinese.

To this we may add that the Overseas Chinese have notoriously low fertility rates themselves, often the lowest among all ethnic groups in their respective countries (Wu & Jia, 1992). An infusion of 50 million extra people would therefore not likely create the kind of exponential growth seen in countries where immigrants have higher fertility rates than the locals.

Xi has not spoken about marriage between Chinese and Overseas Chinese, probably because he does not consider this to be an “international” marriage.

5.3. Summary

To summarize, (1) Xi does not currently regard immigration as a solution to the fertility crisis, but (2) he is open to certain highly skilled foreigners relocating permanently to China to lend their scientific expertise to the country. Furthermore, (3) he does not regard Overseas Chinese as being “foreigners” to begin with, and therefore their relocation to China is, we assume, not considered to be “immigration”. While Xi is so far not calling for the Overseas Chinese to “return” to China, his request that they show loyalty to China would seem to imply that they are morally expected to return if the “Motherland” ever calls on them to do so.

6. Conclusions

At present there is no indication from Xi that immigration is being considered as a solution to the fertility crisis in the near future. In fact, there is hardly much acknowledgement that there is a fertility crisis at all. Xi has given only one extended talk about the issue, and then the only solution presented was lifting the One-Child Policy. There was no mention of either raising the retirement age or accepting more immigrants.

China’s immigration policy is currently focused towards foreign academics and other “elites”. Unless one marries a Chinese national, the only path to permanent residency under the current system is to either be a “second-rank” leader at one’s workplace (such as an associate professor) or to invest millions of dollars in China. The changes proposed in 2020 would, if adopted, lower the bar so that one “only” needs to make three times the average salary in one’s area of residence. Still, even this bar excludes the vast majority of potential foreign construction workers, taxi drivers, cleaners etc. There is no clear path for working-class foreigners to settlement in China.

This approach is consistent with that predicted by Shin for non-resource-based autocracies. China does not want the potential resentment that could be caused by foreigners “taking people’s jobs” for as long as there are reasonably many (though not sufficiently many) Chinese to take the jobs. The relaxation of the One-Child Policy seems to have come about only as a result of a sense of crisis, and I believe that it would likewise take a very obvious labor shortage for the common man to accept large-scale blue-collar immigration.

If there is any mass immigration, it is likely that the group first targeted would be the Overseas Chinese, as Xi appears to already regard them as part of the Chinese Nation despite their citizenship. However, there are not enough Overseas Chinese in the whole world to make up for the projected population deficit, so even an Israel-style mass return to the Motherland would only slightly alleviate the problem.

The Communist Party’s modus operandi has generally been to “cross the river by feeling the stones”, so we should not disregard that the immigration experiments

being conducted in Hainan and Yiwu could be the beginnings of something greater. However, mass immigration of non-Chinese foreigners is probably a tool that the Party would resort to only after it has been left with no other choice.

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