State Workers under the Socialist Market Economy

Abstract

Economic reform initiated in the late 1970s has created an unusual opportunity to study the transition of a state socialist economy to a market-oriented economy. As China enters into its 19th year of reform, the success of its economic policies has been widely recognized.Chinese citizens have generally experienced significantly improved living standards and better life quality after the economic reforms in the late 1970s. What is more significant sociologically is that economic modernization has also changed the social structure, allowing more occupational and social mobility in post-Mao society.This chapter tries to examine how the flourishing of a market economy has affected the livelihood of workers serving in state-owned enterprises since the reform started in the late 1970s. The study of the livelihood of this social group is of particular interest to a better understanding of China’s transitional economy especially when state workers made up almost the total urban workforce in the Mao era.