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Society

China's Cities

March 30, 2021

More than 60 percent of China's population of 1.4 billion currently lives in cities. Within a decade, the share of urban dwellers is expected to increase to 75 percent.

https://p.dw.com/p/3rNg1
China Hochhäuser Shijiazhuang Provinz Hebei
Image: Keli/HPIC/dpa/picture alliance

Construction is booming and competition for residential land is fierce.

China Peking Nachtansicht Central Business District
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/Imaginechina/Tian Zhe

But the right to live in a city in China is conditional. Authorities want their modern cities to be peopled with well-educated, highly-qualified or politically well-connected residents. As a result, certain standards have to be met to be eligible for a modern, urban home. Only members of China's political classes and the financially successful have a hope of qualifying.

China Peking | Mond-Neujahr | Wanderarbeiter, Entfernung zur Familie
Image: Tingshu Wang/REUTERS

Yet more than half of the people who live in cities are so-called "migrant workers." They come from rural communities and have no official rights to settle in cities. They are there to work. With no proper rights, they are merely tolerated while they serve as merchants, servants, waitstaff, cleaners, construction workers and tradespeople. But while they are indispensible to daily life in the cities, they are unable to afford their exorbitant rents.

This documentary looks at how and where these workers live, and asks whether middle and working class Chinese even figure in the official vision of shiny, high-tech cities. The filmmakers also look at what happens to those who oppose official plans, or stand in the way of the building boom.

Broadcasting Hours: 

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FRI 28.05.2021 – 01:15 UTC
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