Prof Yaojun Li gives talk at MCI Seminar Series

A Professor in Sociology at The University of Manchester, Yaojun Li’s talk focused on the social challenges that 40 years of sustained economic development and internal migration posed to the Chinese population and institutions.

His analysis focused on both absolute and relative mobility rates covering a period of over sixty years between the oldest and the youngest cohorts. Preliminary findings show that people from lower origins, particularly those from rural backgrounds, had greater upward mobility chances due to a much lower starting point but social rigidity has also deepened whether viewed over time or across cohorts. Women experienced significant gender penalties over and above the hukou effects. Growing prosperity and deepening disparity have characterised social mobility in China.