The Impact of Class Labels on Life Chances in China

PWP-CCPR-2018-007

Abstract

As one of its first acts in 1950, the newly established Communist government of China introduced a system of family class labels based on the relationship of the household head to the new regime and the economic position of the household in the years just before “Liberation.” These labels were hereditary until their abolition three decades later. The labels were a bureaucratic mechanism to promote the advancement of households associated with support for the Communist movement before 1949, as well as households that had been economically disadvantaged, and to penalize households associated with the former Nationalist regime, along with those who prospered based on property ownership. Researchers have long suspected that these labels benefited households with connections to the Communist movement more than economically disadvantaged households, and some have seen signs that former middle and upper class households continued to do better than the economically disadvantaged despite the discrimination enforced by these labels. The impact of these labels during the 30 years they were in effect has yet to be firmly established, and their lingering impact in subsequent decades is largely unexplored. We examine the factors affecting the initial assignment of class labels and their subsequent consequences for Communist Party membership and educational and occupational attainment. Using data from a 1996 national probability survey of China, we find that the class labels had a major impact on the life chances of individuals that persisted at least into the mid-1990s, although not always in the ways that were intended.