Land reform, urban development and migrant housing in contemporary China

Abstract

In the past three decades, the world has been impressed by the speed of urbanization in China. The prevailing wisdom, concern over the possible existence of urban development problems in urban China, mainly concentrates on the hukou system and the large scale of urban migrants without entitlement to urban public services. This chapter presents the land reform as an alternative interpretation of China's rapid urban development and migrant housing issues. Through the review of China's land reform, two econometric models were designed to evaluate the different land pricing systems in agricultural land conversion. The results from econometric analysis suggest that Chinese local municipalities have dominated the whole process of farmland conversion and the supply of urban land. The difference between compensation fees for agricultural land conversion and the leasing prices of converted agricultural land on the urban market is the main reason for China's serious local land revenue issue. In the course of land acquisition, urban migrants did not benefit from land conversion or urban housing reform. On the contrary, they must face the risk of losing their housing site land in their hometown after long-term urban residence.