How has redevelopment of urbanizing villages influenced migrant workers?
城中村改造对外来农民工造成了哪些影响？

Urbanizing villages are a common phenomenon among cities in southern China such as Guangzhou and Shenzhen. These villages have played an important role in China’s city development, offering migrant workers affordable housing and employment opportunities and making it possible for them to accumulate social and economic capital in the city. Nonetheless, the villages have become a unique settlement for temporary residents, contributing to challenges relative to public hygiene, public security, and image of the city. Many municipal governments, therefore, have demolished and upgraded urbanizing villages by means of urban renewal or urban redevelopment.
城中村是华南地区的城市例如广州、深圳普遍存在的现象。城中村在中国的城市发展中发挥了重要作用，不仅为农民工提供了负担得起的住房和大量的就业机会，还使得其能够在城市积累社会资本和人力资本。但是长期以来由于缺乏有效管理，城中村逐渐变成了外来人口聚集的特殊聚落，滋生了包括环境脏乱、治安较差、影响市容市貌等一系列问题。因此近年来，市政府常通过城市更新、城市再开发等手段将城中村进行彻底的拆除与升级。

Given the population of nearly 174 million migrant workers in 2019, integration into the city of their residence will continue to be a challenge for many municipal governments. Based on the research on six urbanizing villages in Guangzhou’s Luogang District (now part of Huangpu District), authors of this article argue that the state-led strategy to redevelop urbanizing villages has created more challenges than those it intended to address with regard to community building and community government. First, migrant workers often find it harder to develop their sense of belonging in the highly formalized space as created by the redevelopment of urban villages, a space different from the former one that was permeated by a spirit of self-governance. Second, redevelopment has widened income disparity not just between migrant workers and indigenous villagers, but also among the villagers. Third, the development of self-governance has been restricted by the state-led community building, a challenge that has led to some very serious unintended consequences in many developing countries.
2019年，中国有近1.74亿人的农民在外地务工。确保农民工与所在的城市社区相融合，是广大地方政府必须面临的挑战。但是基于在广州萝岗区（现黄埔区的一部分）6个城中村的长期跟踪调研，作者认为政府主导的城中村改造策略对社区建设与社区治理带来的问题甚至比解决的问题更多。第一，充满自治空间与活力的城中村曾是农民工融入城市的良好场所，但是城中村改造之后，农民工难以在高度正式化的新空间中培养归属感。第二，不仅是外来农民工与本地居民之间，本地居民内部的贫富差距由于城中村改造而被剧烈拉大。第三，国家主导的社区建设抑制了自治的发展，而这种“正式化”的浪潮曾在多个发展中国家造成了严重的不良后果。

Authors of this article argue that it is high time government leaders changed their existing strategy to redevelop urbanizing villages. They need to emphasize ‘informal’ elements in the villages and leverage villagers’ self-governing capacities. They also need to rethink the function of the countryside. That is, the countryside functions not only as a safety valve for those returnee migrant workers, but more importantly, as a place where young people’s material, social and cultural needs can be met. If this is the case, there is no need for them to leave the countryside to make a living.
作者认为，政府应改变现有的城中村改造策略，更加强调社会中的“非正式”元素，发挥社区自治的诸多优势。我们还应该重新审视农村的作用，农村不仅是外来农民工回乡的“安全阀”，更应该是一个年轻人能够在当地就满足物质、社会和文化需求的地方，年轻人不必为了谋生而必须远走他乡。