Urban Citizenship, Quality Domesticity, and the Queer Precarity of Rural Migrants in Beijing
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Urban citizenship, quality domesticity, and the queer precarity of rural migrants in Beijing Maeve Dwyer A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts University of Washington 2018 Committee: Kam Wing Chan Lawrence Knopp Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Geography ©Copyright 2018 Maeve Dwyer University of Washington Abstract Urban citizenship, quality domesticity, and the queer precarity of rural migrants in Beijing Maeve Dwyer Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Kam Wing Chan Geography Lack of local hukou restricts migrant access to a slate of social services in Beijing, designed to prevent migrants from settling in the city, outsourcing social reproduction of the labor forces back to the countryside. The dual land system acts in tandem with the household registration system to relegate migrants to informal settlements in the city margins then incentivizes demolition of these settlements for profitable development. Through a descriptive, geospatial analysis of the Beijing 2000 and 2010 Census and municipal land transactions, this thesis contributes a systemic understanding of the spatial relationship of large residential developments and migrant settlement patterns. Regional variance along characteristics of education, agricultural, and collective hukou differentiate the primarily young clusters of migrant settlements past the 5th Ring Road. The age structure in and around the sites of large scale redevelopment indicate the outsourcing of social reproduction. This spatial and temporal marginalization through which migrants are denied access to proper urban family, domesticity, and citizenship leaves migrants in a state of queer precarity. Acknowledgements Kam Wing Chan and Larry Knopp, thank you for the patience, grace, and wisdom you have gifted me these past few years. Dad, your profound faith and support has always been a source of strength, inspiration, and comfort. Thank you. Contents LIST OF TABLES ..................................................................................................................................................................... vii LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................................................................................. viii CHAPTER 1: The Dual Urban-Rural System and the Production of Marginal Citizenship ........................ 1 Introduction .......................................................................................................................................................................... 1 Background ........................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Hukou and the Construction of Second Class Citizenship .................................................................................. 6 In the city but not of the city. .................................................................................................................................... 6 Employment ..................................................................................................................................................................... 8 Education .......................................................................................................................................................................... 9 Stigma ............................................................................................................................................................................... 11 “Urbanization with Chinese characteristics” .................................................................................................... 12 Housing ............................................................................................................................................................................ 14 Suzhi. ................................................................................................................................................................................. 15 Queering as a state strategy ......................................................................................................................................... 16 Methods ................................................................................................................................................................................ 19 CHAPTER 2: Housing and the cultivation of quality domesticity in Beijing’s global city narrative .... 22 Shifting land use patterns ............................................................................................................................................. 22 Land classification and transfer.................................................................................................................................. 25 Global City Dreams ........................................................................................................................................................... 26 Housing Inequality ........................................................................................................................................................... 29 Demolitions ......................................................................................................................................................................... 31 CHAPTER 3: Residential Development for Whom: Outsourcing Social Reproduction and the Spatiotemporal Marginalization of Migrants ............................................................................................................. 34 Purpose. ................................................................................................................................................................................ 34 Research Questions ..................................................................................................................................................... 35 Data Assembly and Design ] ......................................................................................................................................... 36 Beijing 2010 subdistrict Census. ........................................................................................................................... 36 Translations. ................................................................................................................................................................... 37 Variables .......................................................................................................................................................................... 37 Comparative 2000-2010 Census data tables and shapefiles ..................................................................... 38 Land Transactions 2003-2013 ............................................................................................................................... 39 Findings ................................................................................................................................................................................ 41 Spatial Distributions ................................................................................................................................................... 42 Relationship between characteristics of subdistrict composition .......................................................... 53 District spatiotemporal shifts ...................................................................................................................................... 56 Population ....................................................................................................................................................................... 57 Migrant ............................................................................................................................................................................. 58 Collective ......................................................................................................................................................................... 59 Agricultural..................................................................................................................................................................... 60 Higher Education ......................................................................................................................................................... 61 Twenties .......................................................................................................................................................................... 62 Summary ......................................................................................................................................................................... 63 Land Transactions and Residential Development Projects............................................................................. 64 Spatial Trends................................................................................................................................................................ 64 CHAPTER 4: Rural migrants in a queer time and place: Queering the migrant worker as a state domestic project 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