China's moderate middle class. The case of homeowners' resistance

Asian Survey

Volumn 45, Issue 5, 2005, Pages 777-799

  Cai, Yongshun ^a  

^a HONG KONG UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY   (Hong Kong)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CLASS; HOMEOWNER; SOCIAL JUSTICE;

ASIA; CHINA; EURASIA; FAR EAST;

EID: 31144431589     PISSN: 00044687     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1525/as.2005.45.5.777     Document Type: Article

References (67)

1. Lu Rong, "Yezhu zai xingdong" [Homeowners are taking action], Nanfang Zhoumo [Southern Weekend], August 14, 2003.
2. Ben Dolven, "A Home Revolt at Ground Level," Far Eastern Economic Review, October 23, 2003, pp. 35-37.
3. Barrington Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World (Boston: Beacon Press, 1966).
4. An Chen, "Capitalist Development, Entrepreneurial Class, and Democratization in China," Political Science Quarterly 117:3 (Fall 2002), pp. 410-11.
5. Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy.
6. Dietrich Rueschemeyer, Evelyne Huber Stephens, and John D. Stephens, Capitalist Development and Democracy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 1992).
7. Martin Gainsborough, "Political Change in Vietnam: In Search of the Middle-Class Challenge to the State," Asian Survey 42:5 (September 2002), pp. 694-707
8. Chen, "Capitalist Development, Entrepreneurial Class, and Democratization in China."
9. Hagen Koo, "Middle Class, Democratization, and Class Formation: The Case of South Korea," Theory and Society 20:4 (August 1991), pp. 485-509.
10. David Martin Jones, "Democratization, Civil Society, and Illiberal Middle Class Culture in Pacific Asia," Comparative Politics 30:2 (January 1998), pp. 147-69.
11. Nanfang Zhoumo, May 29, 2003.
12. Yaping Wang and Alan Murie, "Commercial Housing Development in Urban China," Urban Studies 36:9 (1999), pp. 1475-94
13. Min Zhou and John Logan, "Market Transition and the Commodification of Housing in Urban China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 20:3 (1996), pp. 400-21.
14. Gu Du and Qiu Qiu, "Wei Anju er Weiquan Shi Da Zhengzhi" [Protecting housing rights is a big political issue], , accessed August 28, 2003.
15. Shen Hong and Dong Jingsheng, "Weiquan, Gaotouru Dihuibao" [Rights defense: High costs and low benefits], Beijing Qingnian Bao [Beijing Youth], March 15, 2003.
16. Xie Hongling, Jiang Rong, Tan Hongan, and Sun Wei, "Yezhu Weiquan Shouduan Jilie, Guifan Shichang Xuyao Juexin" [Homeowners' resistance escalates and determination is needed to regulate the market], Zhongguo Jingying Bao [China Business News], August 18, 2003.
17. See , accessed October 13, 2003.
18. Tianjian Shi, Political Participation in Beijing (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997).
19. China Law Yearbook 2003, pp. 128-30.
20. Shi, Political Participation in Beijing;
21. Yongshun Cai, "Managed Participation in China," Political Science Quarterly, 119:3 (September 2004), pp. 425-52
22. Laura M. Luehrmann, "Facing Citizen Complaints in China, 1951-1996," Asian Survey 43:5 (September 2003), pp. 845-66
23. Kevin O'Brien and Lianjiang Li, "The Politics of Lodging Complaints in China," China Quarterly 143 (September 1995), pp. 756-83.
24. Kevin O'Brien, "Collective Action in the Chinese Countryside," China Journal 48 (2002), pp. 139-54
25. Yongshun Cai, "The Resistance of Chinese Laid-Off Workers in the Reform Period," China Quarterly 170 (September 2002), pp. 662-80.
26. Benjamin L. Reed, "Democratizing the Neighborhood? New Private Housing and Home-Owner Self-Organization in Urban China," China Journal 49 (January 2003), pp. 31-60.
27. Wang Haikun, "Yezhu Beida Piliang Chanchu Yeweihui Ganga Qiusheng" [More homeowners were beaten and the homeowners' committee was in a dilemma], Zhongguo Jingji Shibao [China Economic Times], June 19, 2002.
28. Xinkuaibao [Fast News], August 23, 2003.
29. This case was reported in many local newspapers in Guangzhou. See, for example, Li Hongping, Fang Shanwen, and Huang Guangming, "Yige Mingxing Shequ de Liyi Boyi" [The struggle of a star community], Nanfang Zhoumo, March 29, 2003. Note: This article is based on published reports in newspapers and the data collected by the author through fieldwork. Between July and August 2003, we had a chance to interview the few major leaders of the collective action. They not only disclosed the process of the events but also provided a set of materials including a compact disc recording of their activities and the handbills that had been distributed.
30. Interview with an activist, Guangzhou, July 2003.
31. In order to have a legal basis, other homeowners were requested to sign an entrustment agreement listing the 15 members of the rights protection group. Interview, China, 2003.
32. A resident videorecorded the confrontation from his balcony. The atmosphere at that time was clearly tense.
33. Other problems, such as residents' disagreement over the hiring of lawyers, also made Hong feel the pressure of being a leader. Li, Fang, and Huang, "Yige Mingxing Shequ de Liyi Boyi."
34. Author interview, Guangzhou, July 2003.
35. Ibid.
36. Unpublished materials were provided by the interviewees.
37. After this agreement with X Company, Hong and other activists decided to sue L Company for violating the contract that did not include plans for the new road. Interview with Hong, Guangzhou, July 2003.
38. Yuan Xiaolu and Chen Jian, "Beijing yi Xiaoqu Shangqian Jumin Weidu Shu Bai Chengguang Gongan Zhefa Renyuan" [More than a thousand residents surrounded hundreds of city management cadres and policemen], Zhongguo Qingnian Bao [Chinese Youth Daily], September 29, 2003.
39. Jiang Xiaoming, "Wangjing Weiquan" [Rights protection in Wangjing], Xinwen Zhoukan [China Newsweek], March 25, 2002, pp. 24-29.
40. Jiang Yihe and Song Yang, "Zhongcan Jieceng Yigu Wenhe er Jianding de Liliang" [The middle class: A modest but firm force], ibid., March 25, 2002, pp. 31-33.
41. Beijing Ribao [Beijing Daily], July 27, 2003.
42. According to an online survey of 907 people, when asked what they would do if there were rights-protection activities in their community, more than 58% reported that they would become activists but not leaders, over 21% reported that they would take on leadership positions, about 19% reported that they would follow the majority, and less than 2% would not participate. See , accessed August 29, 2003.
43. Lu, "Yezhu zai Xingdong."
44. Qing Bin, "Quan Beijing Youcanzhe Lianhe Qilai" [All property owners in Beijing unite], Nanfang Zhoumo, August 14, 2003.
45. Tang Yong, "Neixie Lingdao zhe" [Those leaders], ibid.
46. Ibid.
47. Gu and Qiu, "Wei Anju er Weiquan Shi Da Zhengzhi."
48. Dolven, "A Home Revolt at Ground Level," p. 36.
49. Unpublished materials were provided by the homeowners interviewed.
50. Jiang, "Wangjing Weiquan."
51. Lu Rong, "Qiangyingpai: Women Jiji Shengli" [Hardliners: We often succeed], Nanfang Zhoumo, August 14, 2003.
52. Jiang and Song, "Zhongcan Jieceng Yigu Wenhe er Jianding de Liliang."
53. One of the most influential websites in China, , once hosted an online talk on this case attended by a member of the provincial Political Consultative Conference, two representatives of Lijiang Garden residents, a scholar, and a journalist. See , accessed January 22, 2003.
54. "Women Liulei dan Women bu Houtui" [We are frustrated to tears, but we will not back down], , accessed October 20, 2003.
55. Hong kept all the newspaper reports of the Lijiang Garden case as well as those articles that were published online. The author received a set of the materials, including a compact disc.
56. Guobin Yang, "The Internet and Civil Society in China: A Preliminary Assessment," Journal of Contemporary China 12:36 (2003), pp. 453-75.
57. For how wealth may be translated into political influence in the Chinese context, also see Li Zhang, Strangers in the City: Reconfigurations of Space, Power, and Social Networks within China's Floating Population (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), pp. 106-14.
58. Yu Jianrong, "Nongmin Youzuzhi Kangzheng jiqi Zhengzhi Fengxian" [Peasants' organized resistance and political risks], in Guanli Shijie [Management World] 3 (2003), pp. 1-16.
59. Jiang, "Wangjing Weiquan."
60. Recorded in the compact disc of Lijiang Garden homeowners.
61. Jiang, "Wangjing Weiquan."
62. Ibid.
63. Renmin Ribao [People's Daily], June 8, 2003.
64. Chen, "Capitalist Development, Entrepreneurial Class, and Democratization in China."
65. Hsin-Huang Hsiao, "Emerging Social Movements and the Rise of a Demanding Civil Society in Taiwan," Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs 24 (July 1990), pp. 163-80.
66. Ibid., p. 179.
67. Jones, "Democratization, Civil Society, and Illiberal Middle Class Culture in Pacific Asia," p. 160.