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The Broken Ladder: Why Education Provides No Upward Mobility for Migrant Children in China*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2015

Yihan Xiong
Yihan Xiong*
Affiliation:
Fudan University, China. E-mail: xiongyihan@fudan.edu.cn.
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Abstract

This paper attempts to explain why education fails to facilitate upward mobility for migrant children in China. By comparing a public school and a private migrant school in Shanghai, two mechanisms are found to underpin the reproduction of the class system: the ceiling effect, which is at work in public schools, and the counter-school culture, which prevails in private migrant schools. Both mechanisms might be understood as adaptations to the external circumstances of – and institutional discrimination against – migrants rather than as resistance to the prevailing institutional systems. Thus, the functioning of these mechanisms further strengthens the inequality embodied in the system.

摘要

本文试图解释为什么中国的教育无法为农民工子女提供向上流动的机会。通过比较上海的一所公办学校和农民工子弟学校, 作者发现了两种不同的阶级再生产机制: 一是存在于公办学校的天花板效应, 二是盛行于农民工子弟学校的反学校文化。这两种机制与其说是农民工子女对主流制度体系的反抗, 不如说是对外部环境和制度性歧视的适应。这些机制的存在进一步强化了嵌入在制度体系中不平等。

Keywords

class reproductionsocial mobilityinstitutional discriminationceiling effectmigrant educationChinacounter-school culture阶级再生产社会流动制度性歧视天花板效应反学校文化
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 221 , March 2015 , pp. 161 - 184
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Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2015 

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Footnotes

*

Research for this article is funded by the National Social Science Foundation of China (No.10CZZ005) and a grant (No.A1223) from the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission. The author gratefully acknowledges helpful advice, comments and support from Zhijun Zang, Jane Mansbridge, Lei Guang, Dorothy Solinger, Shiping Tang, Zhiguo Xiao, Yongyan Zheng, Hui Li, Xiaoyan Guo, Adam Tyner, Minhua Ling, Lisa Yiu, Tamara Jacka, June Teufel Dreyer, Pei-Chia Lan, ZhiyuanYu, Keng Shu, Jing Li and Fangsheng Zhu.

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