中国城市“新移民”社会网络与空间分异

Beyond Spatial Segregation: Neo-migrants and Their Social Networks in Chinese Cities

伴随日益加速推进的中国城市化进程,新生代农民工问题备受关注。通过对广州8个城中村的问卷调查与实证研究,本文对中国城市新移民的社会网络进行研究,分析移民聚居区与其社会网络的关系。研究表明,新移民的社会网络表现为成分多样化、关系现代化和空间分散化等3大特征;新移民积极利用聚居区外的社会关系寻求发展机会;移民聚居区的分异度正逐步降低,中国城市内部二元分异的空间格局正逐渐被打破。但是,移民与城市居民的社会隔阂并未完全扭转,新移民并没有融入到本地社区,基于地缘、血缘的"差序格局"仍是他们界定网络成员身份的重要准则。此外,迁移历史和社会经济地位是影响移民社会空间重构的主导因素。未来中国城市新移民的社会空间融合将表现为一个渐进而持续的历史过程。

Against the context of the speed-up urbanization, neo-migrants in China, i.e. those born after the 1980s, emerge as a major actor shaping contemporary urban China. Unlike their predecessors who flooded into cities as Diaspora, neo-migrants become deeply grafted into cities. Being a major concern of Chinese society, such neo-migrants and their social relations have never been systematically explored. Based on a survey of eight migrant villages in Guangzhou, the largest capital of southern China, this study sheds light upon the social network and related issues for neo-migrants. In particular, it tries to examine the impacts of the enclave or accumulation space upon the social networks of migrants. Through a series of quantitative studies, it is found that the social networks of neo-migrants is becoming diversified, modernized and varied across the urban space. In contrast to the old generation migrants, more connections can be found between the neo-migrants and various social strata, especially those beyond the enclaves. As such, it is argued that the social network of neo-migrants is moving beyond the boundary of migrant enclaves or villages, so that a new trend of social integration between migrants and the local society can be found. Moreover, it is argued that new migrant enclave today is by no means as insulated or segregated as in history, as migrant enclaves is gradually reconstructed when neo-migrants establish new types of social ties beyond the spatial boundaries. Nevertheless, sociospatial segregation between migrants and local residents still can be found, and the significance of traditional social networks for migrants, i.e., kinship or laoxiang relations, is still evident, though the extent of which has been largely alleviated. In addition, migration history, social economic status and social cultural characteristics also have significant impacts upon the restructuring of migrant social networks. As such, it is concluded that that the trend of moving beyond the spatial segregation in terms of neo-migrants＇ social networks will be a progressive, piecemeal and time-lasting process.