We have launched E-mail Alert service,subscribers can receive the latest catalogues free of charge
The anomalous behavior and public management
2014-08-21
By Zhao Shukai, research fellow and vice-director-general of Information Center, DRC
In cities, management of the population that has come from the rural areas has developed from a general social issue into a public issue and given rise to public complaints from various circles. It has become a major element on the public policy agenda of urban governments.
The public issue caused by the flow of the rural population can be divided into two aspects: swell of the aggregate urban population, an issue that has added new pressures to public facilities in the urban areas; and anomalous behavior of some of the rural migrants, an issue that has aroused much concern from the urban society. The former has been reflected in the strain of the supply of housing, traffic facilities, water supply and electricity, while the latter has manifested itself in the deterioration of public order. Between the late 1980s and the early 1990s, social concern focused on the former. Since the 1990s, however, the focus has shifted onto the latter.
As an empirical study of the anomalous behavior and management of the rural- urbem migrants, this article has drawn its conclusion from the research papers and field surveys carried out by this study group in recent years. Although the issue of the a anomalous behavior of rural migrants aroused social attention at a much earlier time, differences have been apparent in the assessment and understanding of this issue. A major defect in our public management of rural migrants at present is over-emphasis on prevention and restriction and lack of services. Substandard management behaviors and irrational policy frameworks in themselves can be an important factor leading rural migrants to anomalous behavior. Facing the massive inflow of the rural population, the key to the integration of the urban society is to take the training of new citizens as the basic guide to all management policies.
1.Assessment of"problem rural migrants" and crime rate of rural migrants
Rural migrants (with a particular reference to nonnative residents who have come to cities mainly to look for jobs) constitute a major part of nonnative residents and a major community targeted by policies on the management ofnonnative residents.
People begun to pay attention to rural migrants staying in a criminal situation, that is, the issue of commission of crimes by rural migrants, at a fairly early time. They have not paid sufficient attention, however, to the stay of an increasing number of rural migrants in another situation. We will call the latter as "problem rural migrants" in our article. "Problem rural migrants" and criminal rural migrants are two different concepts.
The basic background against which we have put forward the concept of "problem rural migrants" is like this: Although there has been no noticeable increase in the total number of the rural population leaving their hometowns in the recent two years, and there has even been a decrease in them in some areas, there has been a fairly fast swell in the number of the rural emigrants who have been leading an abnormal life. Although these people have left their hometowns of residence registration and entered cities or other areas, they have not been properly employed or secured any normal sources of income. Or to put it in another way, they have come across problems of one kind or another in their unstable life. For this reason, we have given them the name "problem rural migrants."
1. Composition of"problem rural migrants". They can be roughly divided into three types: (1). Unemployed rural migrants who have failed in seeking jobs in cities but have not retreated from cities. (2). Birth control evaders who have found normal jobs but have obviously violated birth control regulations. (3). Wanderers who have left their hometowns not to find jobs or who have been extremely abnormal in employment, such as those who have been involved in family rows or who have conflicted with grassroots units in rural areas. Some of these people live mainly by begging or appealing to the higher authorities for help. "Problem rural migrants" have emerged, it can be said, with the rise of the tide of floating employment, just as the mud and sand stirred up in a surging tide. The rapid swell of the size of this community, however, has started only in recent years.
2. The swell of"problem rural migrants". The speed of the swell of the number of "problem rural migrants" has been faster than that of the rural migrants on the move in recent years. According to a survey in Shanghai, the increase in the size of this community has been extremely eye-catching. Public security departments have tried to take in normative residents who have no legal certificates of identification, no legal occupations, or no normal sources of income. They are simply called the "3- haven''ts" In the 1980s, the average number of these migrants taken in was !ess than 10,000 a year. In 1988, for instance, the total number of these people who were taken in and sent back to their hometowns accounted for about one per cent of the total number of people immigrating into the city. Although the number of migrants has increased rapidly since the 1990s, the number of those taken in has grown even faster, In 1994, as many as 40,000 people or 1.4% of the total migrants were taken in and sent back to their hometowns. In 1996, the figures stood at 80,000 and 2.8% respectively. By 1997, the figures further grew to over 100,000 and 3.6 % respectively. A sample survey of the floating population has revealed that 1993 saw the biggest inflow of population from other parts of the country into the city. The number of people taken in the year, however, was less than half of that in 1997. This shows that although the total number of rural migrants has been put under control or has been basically stabilized in recent years, the thorny element involved has increased remarkably. Or to put it further, the stabilization of the total number of rural migrants does not mean a solution of the key issues of government management.
Unfavorable change of the structure of "problem rural migrants". Urban management departments have been of the opinion that of the migrants taken in and sent back to their hometowns, the proportion of those who are old, weak or physically disabled and those who have been forced by disasters to leave their hometowns has not enlarged noticeably. According to rough calculations, the proportion of this type of migrants was basically maintained at about 2% of the total number of migrants taken in and sent back to their hometowns throughout the 1990s. This shows that the governments of the regions from where these migrants have come from have been successful in providing various kinds of relief and no big numbers of refugees have ever been created in the rural areas. What calls for our attention is that among the people taken in and sent back to their hometowns, the number of those who have committed offences of one kind or another has increased remarkably. Of those taken in 1989, 4,600 had committed minor offences. In 1993, the number rose to 8,500. In 1996 and 1997, the figure grew to 14,500 and 21,000 respectively.
The swell of the community of"problem rural migrants" has been a major source of social problems in cities. In order to minimize the negative effects of the flow of rural migrants, top attention must be paid to the solution of the issues relating to this special community rather than to the mere reduction of the total number of rural migrants on the move.
3. Rational assessment of the extent of the crimes committed by rural migrants. It has been generally agreed in many surveys conducted in the past that nonnative criminals would account for halfofthe criminals in urban areas, or even over 60% in some cases. In large cities such as Beijing. and Shanghai and the Zhujiang River Delta that boast a comparatively big concentration of migrants, the proportion would be even bigger. It seems, however, that the number of crimes committed by migrants against the total number of crimes in urban areas should not be taken as the basis for any accurate assessment of the extent of the crimes of migrants. This is because some specific factors behind these figures should be taken into consideration.
First of all, with regard to the concept "crime" which situation should be termed as a crime. What has been generally used is the number of various kinds of criminal suspects arrested by public security departments. Another situation is the number of people who have been adjudicated by people''s courts to be guilty in accordance with law. Taken Zhejiang Province as an example. The figure supplied by courts is about 19.4% smaller than the figure supplied by public security departments. As a matter of fact, these migrants have merely involved in serious cases of violation of public security regulations such as pilfering, prostitution and whoring, drug-taking, and ordinary fighting. They are not criminals as defined in criminal laws.
Secondly, some crimes have not been included in the statistics of crimes compiled by public security departments. These crimes include those registered by investigation by procuratorial organs such as corruption, giving or accepting of bribes, and dereliction of duties. Most of these crimes have been committed by local residents. In 1994, these criminals accounted for about 6.5% of the total number of defendants prosecuted (see p. 1067, China Yearbook of Law, 1995 edition). This means that the crime rate of local residents has been underestimated by social opinion by 6.5 percentage points and that of migrants has been overestimated accordingly.
The third factor concerns the issue of comparison between the crime rate of local residents and that of migrants. In usual cases, the method of heterogeneous comparison has been used. The crime rate of the total local population of a city has been, for instance, compared with that of the total number of migrants. As a matter of fact, this method is not scientific. Totally different in their internal structure, permanent local residents and migrants are communities of different characters. The former is a social community with a roughly balanced structure composed of males, females, the old and the young, while the latter is a social group composed of mainly males and young people.
If these factors as have been mentioned above are taken into full consideration when we analyze the extent of seriousness of criminality on the part of the floating population, the actual crime rate of this population would be much smaller.
Ⅱ.Empirical analysis of criminal rural migrants
When describing the characteristics of the commitment of crimes by rural migrants, some of the studies carried out so far have mainly relied upon indirect investigations conducted by public security organs. To make a direct observation and a detailed analysis of this issue, our study group made a questionnaire investigation of the criminal rural migrants in a prison in a coastal city. This was a prison detaining exclusively adult minor criminal offenders. Detained in this prison were 401 offenders who were not permanent residents of the city where this prison was located. These offenders accounted for 39% of the total inmates of the prison.
1. What is a criminal rural migrant?
It was specified in the questionnaire that all rural residents from outside this city who had been employed in this city or who had come to this city to look for jobs would be defined as rural migrants. Those who had committed crimes within three days after arriving in the city would not be counted as rural migrants because their commitment of crimes immediately after arrival in the city constituted the basic characteristics of vagabond offenders. Those who committed crimes between three days and one month would not be counted as rural migrants if they stayed in hostels and would be counted as rural migrants if they stayed at construction sites. On the basis of this definition, 233 of the 401 immigrant criminals were criminal rural migrants. Viewed from the situation of this prison detaining minor criminal offenders, criminal rural migrants would accounted for 58 per cent of the total number of nonnative criminals.
2. Identification characteristics of criminal rural migrants
The identification characteristics of rural migrants are determined mainly by the valid certificates they were holding. (1). Of the criminal rural migrants, 29.6% had obtained temporary residence permits from public security departments, 58.1% had not, and 12.2% were applying. So the application ratio of these people was much smaller than the normal ratio of between 70 and 80 % among the total number of migrants. This indicated that some of the rural migrants with a criminal tendency had purposely evaded certificate management. (2). As for employment cards and certificates of employment issued by labour departments, only 18.7% had completed the procedures. This percentage was, however, almost the same as that among the total number of rural migrants coming into the city. Of the 600,000 people coming from other parts of the country to work or do businesses in this city in 1996, only one sixth have registered with labour departments for employment cards and certificates of employment, a ratio of about 17%.
Whether or not these criminals had got jobs. Asked whether they had found jobs after coming to the city, 183 or 67% of the total surveyed gave a positive answer. This showed that unemployment had not played any decisive role among these criminal rural migrants.
Whether or not these criminals had any criminal records before coming to the city. The ratio of criminal records was 24.1% among the criminals who were not counted as rural migrants, a ratio fairly big as compared to the 3.1% ratio among the total number of rural migrants.
3. Types of crimes committed by rural migrants
There was a high concentration of crimes of property violation among criminal rural migrants. This differed greatly from the crimes of those who were not counted as rural labourers. Of the total number of criminal cases involving rural migrants, property-related crimes of various types accounted for 93%, while another eight persons (2.8% of the total) had committed crimes of hooliganism and intentional injuries when asking for their wages. Put together, these two types of crimes accounted for 95.8% of the total. Those who had committed crimes that had nothing to do with properties accounted for only 4.2% of the total. In comparison, the ratio of the crimes that did not involve properties was much bigger among local criminals, standing at 25.8%. Among the property-related''crimes, crimes of theft stood at the top, accounting for 65.1% of the total. The crimes of robbery and pillage accounted for 20.8%. The remaining were crimes of fraud and others.
4. Economic situation of the criminal rural migrants before their commitment of crimes
Analysis of the questionnaires revealed that in the early days after their arrival in the city, two thirds of these people carried with them hundreds of yuan or even more money. The money could usually last them for more than 10 days if they could not find jobs in the while. This meant that they would not fall in a situation of starvation due to shortage of money in a very short time. One third of these people carried with them less than 100 yuan when they first arrived in the city, and a small number of people were almost penniless. Unless they could find jobs immediately, they would fall into a true crisis of starvation. Of the typical rural migrants (198 in all) who took up physical labour for wages, more than 40% had carried with them less than 100 yuan of money when they arrived in the city.
When asked "why they were penniless (with less than 10 yuan of money, that is) before they committed crimes?" 108 or 39% of the total answered that they could not find jobs and the money they carried with them had been used up. Those who answered that it costed too much to seek pleasure accounted for 22% of the total. Those who answered that the employers deducted or delayed their payments again and again and those who gave other explanations accounted for 26 and 27.5% of the total respectively.
Our investigation revealed that it is inappropriate to mix up the commitment of crimes by nonnative residents with that by criminal rural migrants. The crimes committed by the "3-haven''ts" made up a certain proportion in the crimes committed by nonnative residents as a whole, and there was a fairly big number of immigrant criminals who had not obtained temporary residence permits. We have not come to the conclusion, however, the "3-haven''ts" had constituted the main stream of the immigrant criminals. Of the numerous factors, the economic factor had played a pivotal role in influencing the commitment of crimes by nonnative residents. Of the causes of crimes, failure to find jobs and protracted embezzlement and delay of wage payments on the part of employers were important factors plunging many normative residents into a difficult situation of life. As the situation stands, attention should be paid during the formulation of public policies on nonnative residents in cities to not only the increase in the number of crimes committed by normative residents, but also the social factors lying behind the increase, especially the influences of the defects of policies themselves.
Ⅲ. Management structure of urban communities
To get a micro understanding of the method adopted by urban government departments (mainly public security departments) to exercise management of normative residents in normal conditions, our study group carried out a field investigation mainly by taking part in and observing the work in a police station in Yantai City. Living in the area under the jurisdiction of this police station were 22,429 people including more than 2,100 normative residents who had obtained temporary residence permits from the station. The nonnative residents accounted for nearly 10% of the total population in this area. There were some other nonnative residents who had not been covered by this police station and who therefore were not included in our statistics. It was difficult to figure out the accurate number of these people. According to estimates by management people, these nonnative residents accounted for about 30% of the total normative residents.
The police station is manned by 18 policemen. It has two staff members in charge of management of temporary residents， one is an official policeman and the other is an accountant seconded from a department store in the area. The procedures taken by this police station in the management of nonnative residents include mainly the following aspects:
1. To get an understanding of the real situation. This means an understanding of the situation of the flow of the temporary residents in this area. Since most of the temporary residents had not taken the initiative to apply for temporary residence permits from the police station, it is a basic precondition for the management of temporary residence permits to get a clear understanding of the temporary residents in the area and to ask them to apply for temporary residence permits. This work is mainly the responsibility of the policemen performing field duties.
2. Issuance of permits. Issuance of temporary residence permits is the responsibility of the Temporary Residence Permit Office. The procedures for issuing temporary residence permits include examination of the identification cards of the temporary residents, establishment of archives for the temporary residents, filling of temporary residence cards and temporary resident registration forms, and printing of 10 fingerprints onto fingerprint cards in the case of males.
3. Investigation by correspondence. Investigation by correspondence is targeted only at males and carried out in a secret way without the knowledge of the nonnative residents. Following the addresses recorded in identification cards, letters are sent to the local public security departments or police stations to get information about the persons concerned including whether the persons truly exist, whether they have any criminal records, and whether they have involved in any law-breaking activities.
4. Examination and withdrawal of permits. This work is done by people specially charged to manage temporary residents. Examination of permits is carried out twice a year. In the middle and at the end of each year, holders of temporary residence permits would go to the police station to have their permits examined one by one.
Management of nonnative residents by urban public security departments has set prevention of crimes as the starting point of their work. This management system was originated in the time of a planned economy when the social structure was comparatively closed and social flow, especially inter-regional flow, was not developed. The system was designed not for the massive flow of the population. For this reason, this kind of management is obviously insufficient for a big floating population at a time of transition. In areas with a big nonnative population, in purticular, the limitations of the traditional mode of management have become all the more apparent. First of all, the function of management is unitary and the management exercised by public security departments is merely a kind of security administration designed mainly to prevent crimes or, to put it in another way, to manage nonnative residents as a potential criminal community in some cases. So far as public security departments are concerned, the work has nothing to blame. Viewed from the angle of government management as a whole, however, the work is far from being sufficient because the problems that the floating population cause in the area of their stay will not just be security problems. Secondly, the force in charge of management is too weak. Public security departments have been staffed according to the number of permanent residents. If the number of nonnative residents in a community hits a certain size or outgrows the number of the permanent residents, the original staff charged with management duties would be too small to perform even their original unitary management functions, let alone the providing of corresponding services.
IV. Structure of management in areas joining urban and rural areas
The mode of management followed in areas joining urban and rural areas with a high concentration of nonnative residents is different from that followed in typical urban communities. Because the number of normative residents is usually bigger than that of permanent residents and policemen have been stationed mainly in proportion to permanent residents, they can hardly shoulder the load of security administration. To cope with the situation, certain non-system public security departments and staff would have to be added. Under such circumstances, the management of nonnative residents in some areas joining urban and rural areas has actually evolved from government management into management by community organizations, and those performing management functions have mainly be some temporary organs and staff members who have not been granted with legal management powers. How is such a community-style management exercised, then? Our study group carried out personal observations in the H town and the HW village in the suburbs of Shanghai for two months.
1. Management in the town
Living in the H town are more than 20,000 nonnative residents, about the same as the permanent residents. About 75% of the nonnative residents have registered their temporary residence. The organ in charge of the nonnative residents in the town is called Nonnative Resident Management Office which is the same and one as the town''s Community Public Security and Comprehensive Law-enforcement Team. That is, this organ operates under two names. According to regulations, the responsibilities of the Nonnative Resident Management Office include coordination of the various functional departments of the town government to provide-guidance to various villages in the management of nonnative residents, and direct management of normative residents in township enterprises, new construction sites and new residential areas. Specifically speaking, its management includes management of temporary residence, housing, business operations, family planning, and epidemic prevention and health care. As an institutional organ of the town government, the Nonnative Resident Management Office has three staff members.
The major work done by the office in 1998 included mainly the following: From January to February, investigation and registration of the nonnative floating population and entry of the data into computers (to be updated), choosing of 30 advanced normative individuals, and visit to nonnative residents who planned to spend the Spring Festival in Shanghai. In March, publicity of comprehensive consolidation of social order and popularization of legal knowledge. From April to May, consolidation of small shops and stalls. From June to August, salute to nonnative residents working at construction sites in spite of high temperatures. From September to October, investigation of renting of private houses, unified issuance of permits for renting private houses and security certificates, and elimination of beauty parlors without licenses.
The nonnative residents here are extremely mobile. At the beginning of the year, the family planning department of the town government kept small white cards for more than 3,200 nonnative child-bearing age women living in the town for more than three months to record detailed information about them. When the management staff went to visit them three months later, however, 40% of these women had moved to other places.
2. Management in the village
The HW village is a vanishing village. Because the foreign-funded enterprises here need a large number of cheap labourers, more than 1,000 nonnative residents are working in these enterprises in the village. There is a "police office" in the village that is in actuality the office of the village security director and the duty room of the village''s joint security team. It does not have any official public security officers. There is a policeman in the police station assigned to take charge of this village. This policeman does not take part in the routine management or patrol of the village. The joint security team used to be the village-protecting team whose task was to protect farmlands. Working in the joint security team are 13 people divided into day and night shifts, with emphasis on the latter. Their tasks include patrol and examination of certificates. These people wear team uniforms and carry police equipment. Issuance of temporary residence permits and collection of fees for temporary residence, work that should be administered by the police station, is now done by the team instead. The operating expenses of the "police office" come from the various kinds of fees paid by nonnative residents. This method of funding is termed as "expenditure of management of nonnative residents paid by nonnative residents ."
In 1996, Shanghai municipality worked out the principle of control of the aggregate number of nonnative residents and control of their inhabitation. One important aspect of this principle is to pull down buildings constructed in violation of rules because these buildings are the major habitations of nonnative residents in areas joining urban and rural areas. According to the village''s security director, a move was taken in 1996 to pull down buildings constructed in violation of rules. In his village alone, 496 rooms were pulled down. One year later, however, more than 600 rooms sprang up again. There was a family letting a total number of 40 rooms. More than 20 of these rooms had been built in violation of rules. It is rare to see a family in this village that had not constructed buildings in violation of rules or a family that had not let houses to nonnative residents. Because of acquisition of large tracts of land for construction, about 60 farmers in this village had to live on a monthly allowance of 324 yuan because they had no other sources of income after their land was taken for construction. These farmers were termed as "people waiting for jobs after acquisition of land." These people had to subsidize their families with rents. It had been estimated that if all the nonnative residents left the village, total annual loss of rents in the village would come to 2 million yuan at least.
In 1997, the village saw a peak number of nonnative residents, 3,500 in ail. The police office of the village handed over as much as 196,000 yuan of nonnative resident management fees to authorities at a higher level and 40,000 yuan to the village management committee.
3. Difficulties in management
So far as management organs are concerned, the town-level organs in charge of management of nonnative residents are merely institutional units without any administrative powers and can not exercise management powers in a strict sense. At the village level, so-called police offices have been set up by village management committees by employing a few young villagers and clothing them with security uniforms that look like police uniforms. Strictly speaking, it is inappropriate to delegate the power of management of nonnative residents to these people.
The management personnel employed by community units often resort to violence of one kind or another when dealing with their objects of management. Such violence in management has become an important method for cracking certain hard nuts, and given rise to some new management issues at the same time, such as the refusal to cooperate or even hostility on the part of nonnative residents. Some nonnative women residents once complained that one evening, four drunken men from a so-called police office attempted to enter their rooms on the pretext of checking residence permits. One of the women refused them, arguing that they should be led by police officers when making residence permit checks. Seizing some of them, the men applied electric prods to the women and gave them boxes on the ear. Such misbehaviors on the part of management personnel have in actuality become important factors leading to more security problems.
