What is the basic structure of our economy?

Since the reform, the most fundamental change in China's social structure has been from a totality society to a differentiation society, and the fundamental driving force of this change is system reform. The influence of reform on social differentiation in China is roughly a process: 1. The reform of rural economic system and the decentralization of state-owned enterprises have produced free-flowing resources in society, that is, labor, capital, products, raw materials and technology, which are not controlled and distributed by the state. With the deepening of reform, these resources are increasing. 2. The emergence and increase of free-flowing resources have led to changes in the way of organization and distribution of social resources, that is, from relying solely on planning system and administrative means to combining planning with market, administrative means with economic means. 3. The development of various stakeholders and power subjects, such as various local and community governments and government departments. Non-governmental organizations, township enterprises, urban and rural individual industrial and commercial households and so on. 4. The emergence and increase of organizations and role groups with specific functions has gradually led to the initial separation of state from society, politics from economy, economy from administration, administration from law and ideology. Since the reform, this structural transformation from a whole society to a divided society, as a historical necessity, marks that the modernization process of China has entered a new historical period.

At present, the most noteworthy points in the process of social structure differentiation in China are:

1. System reform began in rural areas, and its greatest contribution to the change of rural social structure is to promote the rapid rise and vigorous development of rural industrialization. This process of rural industrialization has led to the sharp differentiation of the original homogeneous and equal social structure in rural areas, and a large number of new role groups and organizations have emerged, such as township entrepreneurs, nearly 654.38 billion employees of township enterprises, new cooperative enterprises and private enterprises.

The dual characteristics of the original social structure in urban and rural areas determine that the differentiation process of urban social structure is different from that in rural areas, and urban social differentiation is mainly within and outside the system. After the reform, urban social differentiation first occurred in the most marginal part of the original system, and one of the results was that some social forces on the edge of the system were first differentiated from the system, such as individual businessmen, private enterprises and foreign-funded enterprises. With the continuous advancement of differentiation from the edge of the system to the center of the system, the forces outside the system are also constantly strengthening. They are organized and operated in different rules and ways from those in the system. On the one hand, this process is constantly influenced by social differentiation within the system, on the other hand, it is also constantly influenced by social differentiation in rural areas. Some cross groups and marginal groups across the two major urban and rural systems and social systems began to appear, such as self-employed and migrant workers working in cities. The emergence and increase of these new structural elements have strongly promoted the development of civil society.

2. After the reform, with the expansion of the autonomy of various social subjects (individuals, organizations and governments) and the clarity of interests, the hierarchical social differentiation originally determined by administrative levels and status levels has gradually changed into four divisions determined by generic and unit boundaries. The original hierarchical elements that determine the status and interests of social members, such as ownership type, family background, political identity and administrative level, have greatly weakened their functions, while the units and communities to which individuals belong and the occupational categories to which individuals belong have developed.

3. Compared with before the reform, China's social differentiation has been greatly accelerated and deepened, but there are great differences between different regions, different social systems and different social groups. For example, the coastal areas are faster than the central and western regions, and the eastern Wenzhou region is more divided than the southern Jiangsu region. For example, the differentiation of economic system is faster than that of power structure, the differentiation of farmers is greater than that of urban residents, and the differentiation of narrow social structure is deeper than that of broad social structure. This unbalanced differentiation leads to the diversification of the original similar and isomorphic social structure of the whole society, the dislocation of the original three highly integrated structures, namely, income, power and professional prestige structure, and the degree of integration among various social positions of social members is greatly reduced. The diversification of social structure and the dislocation of various social structures increase the tension of social structure, thus increasing the difficulty of structural integration.

4. In most market countries, social members are divided and combined under the action of the market according to the needs of division of labor, and the differentiation of social structure is mainly reflected in the differentiation of functions. With the deepening of division of labor, the differentiation of functional structure is the condition and inevitable process to realize social modernization. On the one hand, the differentiation of social structure in China after the reform reflects the process of this functional differentiation, such as the differentiation of state and social functions, the differentiation of party and government functions, the simplification of functions and the development of specialized organizations. On the other hand, the social differentiation in China at this stage is mainly the result of the system reform, and one of the core contents of the system reform is the redistribution and adjustment of interests, so the structural differentiation is largely reflected in a kind of interest differentiation, and policy factors have played an important role in it. Therefore, there is a contradiction in the social structure changes in China at this stage, that is, the social structure has undergone drastic and profound differentiation after the reform. However, various social organizations have not made their functions more specialized and single with the deepening of differentiation and the acceleration of speed, but have shown the trend of "economization" or "enterprise" in an all-round way. The influence of functional differentiation on social structure is mainly to increase heterogeneity, and the differentiation of interests is mainly to expand inequality. After the reform, the vertical differentiation of social structure in China is faster than the horizontal differentiation.

Administrative integration and contract integration

Social integration is generally achieved through two levels. One is political integration at the national level, and the other is social integration at the local level. The former aims to ensure the sovereignty of the nation-state, implement administrative control and management, and establish and maintain social order by administrative and legal means; The latter mainly plays a role at the community level through folk and non-political means, thus maintaining the basic order of social activities and establishing harmonious and cooperative relations among roles, organizations and systems that undertake different functions.

In the traditional society of China, a prominent feature of the integration mechanism is that the social integration is strong, but the political integration is weak; There is no organizational connection between the two levels of integration, but mainly relies on the personal relationship of the "gentry-landlords" group to connect the two levels of integration mechanism, and replaces the organizational integration with value integration. On the one hand, this integration system gives the whole society flexibility and solid foundation, enabling it to maintain two jobs for many years, on the other hand, it also creates a fatal weakness of this social system, that is, the integration of people. One of the results is that when it was invaded by western powers in modern times, it could not respond effectively as a whole. Dr. Sun Yat-sen's "fragmentation phenomenon" is the inevitable result of this integration mechanism. Especially under the impact of modernization factors, the social integration mechanism has been weakening, and China has fallen into the dual disintegration of politics and society. The new integration mechanism formed after 1949 was an effort to solve the political and social double crisis in China at that time.

A prominent feature of China's integration model after 1949 is its extremely strong political integration. Even in the grass-roots society, its integration is mainly achieved through administrative integration. In this sense, this integration system is largely manifested as political integration rather than social integration. The reason is not difficult to understand. In the case that the political integration mechanism and social integration mechanism have completely failed, the reconstruction of the political integration mechanism has not only become a top priority, but also is relatively easy from the resources possessed by the state and government at that time. To a great extent, the reconstruction of social integration mechanism is a natural evolution process, which takes a long time. Therefore, it is an inevitable choice to realize the reconstruction of social integration by rebuilding political integration. In this way, by the middle and late 1950s, this model of replacing social integration with political integration had basically taken shape. In rural areas, the typical form is people's commune (the first agricultural production cooperative); In cities, units are the mainstay, supplemented by the street Committee system. Rural people's communes and urban units are general organizations with various functions, among which political and administrative power plays a core role. Specifically, the party's organizational system, administrative power system, workers, young women and other mass organizations are three important forces that play a role in this integration mechanism. An obvious advantage of this integration model is to eliminate the tension between social integration and political integration, make them highly consistent, and make social integration at the local level subordinate to political integration at the national level. In the traditional society of China, the friction between social integration and political integration occurred from time to time. However, it must also be noted that the burden of political integration has greatly increased, because civil society integration does not actually exist. At the same time, this integration model is quite rigid and must be based on the premise of constantly suppressing social differentiation, which is precisely one of the driving forces of social development.

Since the reform and opening up 15 years, this integration model, which has lasted for more than 30 years, has begun to be impacted. Its performance is mainly in two aspects:

First of all, the preconditions for the existence of the original integration model are constantly being lost. The initial integration model was based on two basic conditions. One is the comprehensive monopoly of resources by the state, and the other is the existence and effective operation of the top-down overall component organization system. But in the process of reform and opening up, these two conditions are changing. Due to the development of non-public economy, the state's monopoly on resources has obviously weakened; Due to the disintegration of the people's commune system, the whole rural organization no longer exists; The enterprise reform in the city is also making the enterprise gradually become a pure economic organization, and the characteristics of the overall organization are obviously reduced. In this way, the state realizes the integration of grass-roots society through its overall organization. Second, the new social differentiation and the complexity of social life constantly put forward new requirements for social integration. In rural areas, the decentralized management of agricultural production, the specialization of economic activities in rural areas and the continuous differentiation of occupations and social strata all need to be re-integrated on a new basis. In cities, while the unit system is weakening, so-called activities outside the system appear in large numbers, the original household registration system and personnel system are obviously relaxed, and cross-regional social mobility leads to a large number of immigrants in cities. Not to mention that the original integration mechanism is weakening, even if it can play an effective role, it is not enough to cope with this increasingly complex social life.

Therefore, in a sense, the process of reform and opening up for more than ten years is also a process of constantly seeking a new social integration mechanism, and the basic feature of this new social integration mechanism is that contractual social integration is the leading factor. In other words, China's social integration has undergone a historic transformation from the pre-existing integration of traditional society (based on blood and geography) to the administrative social integration before the reform, and then to the contractual social integration. Be in a leading position in economic activities. Field, this trend has been clearly shown. In addition to macro-control at the national level, the contractual relationship in the market and intermediate organizations such as chambers of commerce and trade associations based on contractual relationship are playing an increasingly important role in integrating economic activities. However, in a wider field of social life, the situation is more complicated and the difference between urban and rural areas is obvious. In rural areas, in quite a few areas, the pre-given form of family integration is reviving. In other areas, the original village-level quasi-administrative organizations (or autonomous organizations) are still playing a powerful role, while in other areas, "capable people" are playing an important role in the integration of grassroots society. In cities, the framework of the new social integration mechanism is even more vague. In addition to market integration, intermediary organizations and community autonomy seem to be playing a role. Generally speaking, although contractual social integration will become the basic direction of social integration in China in the future, we must never overestimate its current role. As far as social integration is concerned, China is still in the transitional stage. At this stage, priority, administration, contract and other forms of integration coexist. During this period, there are three issues that need close attention: first, the current social integration obviously lags behind the process of social differentiation, which will lead to various disorder of social life; Secondly, there are both complementary relationships and contradictions between different forms of social integration; Thirdly, how to combine new forms of social integration with political integration at the national level is still a problem to be discussed.

Organization and unit system

Social organization is the constituent element of modern society, which directly reflects the formation and change of social structure. The reform in recent 15 years has changed the operating mechanism of chinese social organizations, and even changed the nature of social organizations.

In rural areas, with the implementation of the household contract responsibility system and the withdrawal of cooperatives from building villages, the original quasi-administrative organization-production team was cancelled. However, the establishment of the autonomous status of newly-built villagers' committees and the lack of resources in their hands have left many underdeveloped villages in an unorganized state. Rural village-level organizations with developed collective economy operate normally, while a few rural independent interests expand and even compete with the state.

The administrative organization of the original centralized management system center changed slowly and still assumed the function of "component". Members have a strong dependence on the organization, but the personnel system has been loosened, and the impulse of the unit to seek its own welfare has been greatly enhanced. Many units develop their own unplanned resources by setting up "flop companies" and other measures, which makes the nature of these units begin to become complicated.

Private enterprises that have grown up outside the planned system are not favored by the state in terms of resource acquisition, nor are they bound by the state's administration. The personnel relationship of its members is either hung in the talent exchange center or placed in the street office, which does not belong to the original administrative management system. The relationship between enterprises and the state is dominated by market rules, and high wages are used to fight against various risks and make up for the internal deficiencies of enterprises. In organizational structure, they often lack the ubiquitous party-mass organization of state-owned enterprises, thus showing obvious heterogeneity.

Affected by the above factors, enterprises and institutions, as the main body of the original "unit system", are also changing.

First, the function of the unit role. With the shift of the focus of national work to economic construction, the political functions of enterprises and institutions are weakening and the professional functions are strengthening. Enterprises are no longer "components" that undertake the tasks assigned by the state, and institutions are no longer "agents" of the past countries. They become a functional whole to varying degrees.

Second, the interests of the unit are independent. The separation of government and enterprise makes enterprises gradually break away from the supervision and intervention of the government, while independent operation and self-financing make them a relatively independent interest subject. A series of measures, such as the government's refusal to invest in enterprises, taking full responsibility for profits and taxes, and letting enterprises digest the contradictions brought about by the reform themselves, have further made the independent interests of enterprises obvious. Accordingly, the posts, staffing and financial responsibilities of public institutions have to gradually change their excessive dependence on the government, seek self-improvement and make their interests relatively independent.

The third is the concretization and internalization of unit responsibility. With the enterprise becoming the interest subject and establishing a contractual relationship with the state, the social responsibility undertaken by the enterprise is concrete. At the same time, the responsibility of enterprises to improve the income and living standards of their members cannot be shirked, and the state's constraints on enterprises are weakened, which makes enterprises change from extroverted responsibility to inward responsibility, that is, from being fully responsible for the state to being mainly responsible for employees, and even the commitment of inward responsibility is more important than extroverted responsibility. This also makes enterprises become the real interests of workers, and the above characteristics of institutions are becoming more and more obvious.

Fourth, the "parent" role of the unit has been strengthened. The formation of the unity of interests of unit members has strengthened members' awareness of helping each other in the same boat and the awareness of enterprises to protect members. The unshirkable nature of these responsibilities and the social comparison mechanism will generally strengthen the "parent" role of the unit.

In this way, since the reform, the relationship between the state and the organization has gradually changed from the overall survival mode to the independent survival mode. Organization is no longer a "part" of the country, but a "whole" with certain independence. Except in rural areas, the external characteristics of our society with organizations as the unit have not changed, but the functions of organizations are undergoing substantial changes. Although they undertake the function of social management, their central task is to meet the needs of members and seek the self-development of the organization. That is, it is changing from "management unit" to "interest-oriented unit". Therefore, China's social structure system is changing from "management unit system" to "benefit unit system", and the characteristics of "unit system" have not been weakened, but have been strengthened in a certain range. Whether it is the organization's unit consciousness, their concern and struggle for their own interests, or the increase of employees' recognition and concern for the organization (unit), it reflects that they are forming a relatively independent society with close dependence on the outside world. It can even be said that the current organization is becoming a real unit. In the relations among countries, organizations and members, "Mother-loving country" is being replaced by "strict father unit". Different from the countries before the reform, units do not give universal care to organizations and social members who have not contributed, but give more care to their members on the basis of contracts.

Classification of identity and social mobility

Identity refers to the category symbol given to individuals by society, which is associated with occupation and other social roles and shows people's social status.

The reason for the formation of the category of ownership identity is the result of the socialist transformation of ownership form by the state at that time I (the coexistence of ownership by the whole people and collective ownership); At the same time, it is also the inevitable result of "limited resources". By controlling the distribution of living resources, the state controls workers under collective ownership to become workers under ownership by the whole people, thus effectively maintaining this classification of identity. After the category of ownership identity is formed, it reflects and maintains the social stratum in urban society from the economic structure.

With economic construction becoming the center of all work, the political color in social life began to fade. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he took off his hat for the landlords and rich peasants, rehabilitated the wrongly designated Rightists, and implemented policies for the victims of unjust, false and wrongful cases in the Cultural Revolution, which undoubtedly corrected the wrong tendency of expanding class struggle. In connection with this, although the political review system still exists, its scope has been narrowed and it pays more attention to people's realistic performance. This means that the class identity series has lost the conditions on which it depends. The evaluation standard of society has also changed greatly. People judge a person not by his family background, but by his ability and achievements. Therefore, the original class identity series is weakening and tends to disappear in urban and rural areas.

The reform of rural economic system with "all-in-one contract and all-in-one distribution" as the main content has given farmers the autonomy in production and distribution. This first led to the relaxation of national control over biological resources. The development of urban and rural market economy leads to the free flow of resources in urban and rural areas. As a result, the household registration system and ticket system, which are closely related to the distribution of living resources, are becoming more and more relaxed. Since the reform of the economic system, the development of the economy outside the planned system in cities has given a large number of farmers the opportunity to change their status as urban farmers. A large number of rural surplus labor force flows to cities and towns, and a large-scale mobile army appears in different places. The weakening of the preconditions for maintaining the identity series of urban and rural residents will inevitably lead to the existence and development of various economic components in the city and create a large number of new jobs outside the system. These jobs also mean a variety of new professional identities, which cannot be covered by the original two identity series of cadres and workers. The result of cadres and workers in the system flowing to these new jobs outside the system driven by interests is to blur the original identity boundaries of cadres and workers, and develop a trend of accommodating the identity series of cadres and workers in the system with the professional identity series outside the system.

The rapid growth of the economy outside the system, the flexibility of its management and distribution (which puts state-owned enterprises at a disadvantage) and the increasing tendency of people to evaluate the economic benefits of enterprises have gradually blurred the boundaries of the original ownership identity and weakened the significance of the existence of ownership identity.

At present, the social identity classification standard in China is undergoing drastic changes. A new, self-induced and changeable identity series marked by professional identity is gradually replacing the previous urban and rural identity series. In this transitional period, what we see is a complex picture of the coexistence, blending and cross-dislocation of the old and new identity series. The original identity series and evaluation criteria are still working, and people can use the resources obtained from the original identity to find more profitable professional identities in the new professional identity series. The coexistence of political evaluation system and interest evaluation system leads to the versatility of people's identity series and social status, and also determines people's positioning in the new professional identity series. In the urban-rural mobility, the contradiction between the original identity and the new occupation and new residence has led to the emergence of a large number of marginal people and a large number of marginal groups.

With the loosening of these identity series, there are three major trends in social mobility. That is, the diversification of social elite flow; 80 million rural surplus labor force flows to cities, and workers and cadres within the system flow to outside the system. These three trends are changing the elite structure of China society, changing the spatial distribution of social status and population, and changing the proportional relationship between economic and social status inside and outside the system.

Therefore, the biggest influence of the loosening of identity category on the current social structure of China lies in that it loosens the tie for the change of social structure.

Regional pattern and regional relations

Region refers to "a community composed of social relations and organizational principles". In a society, the relationship between regions and its basic regional pattern are an important aspect of social structure. During the period of reform and opening up 15, a series of important changes have taken place in China's regional relations and regional pattern. Analyzing these changes and their processes will help us to deepen our understanding of China's social structure and its changes.

15 in the process of reform and opening up, a series of important changes have taken place in the social and regional pattern of China, which is based on a national chess game, homogeneous and isomorphic among regions and emphasizes local self-survival. Among them, the most obvious performance is:

First, the interests are divided, and the local government has become the main body of interests. As mentioned earlier, in the whole system of national chess game before the reform, local interests were largely suppressed. In the process of reform and opening up, with the continuous decentralization of central power to local governments, the national chess game model began to be broken, and local communities represented by local administrative agencies began to become the main interests, and the trend of financial localization became increasingly obvious. In this case, the relationship between different regions is no longer linked by the central administrative power, and the interest relationship, exchange and contract principles in the market economy have begun to become new ties linking different regions. In the past, the situation of free transfer between regions no longer exists. Driven by local interests, local protectionism is becoming increasingly obvious.

Second, the heterogeneity between regions has increased significantly. Before the reform and opening up, the differences between different regions were only manifested in the differences in development degree. But today, the isomorphism between regions has been broken to a great extent, and the heterogeneity between different regions has been greatly enhanced. The reason is that with the decentralization, the local ability to formulate policies has been strengthened; The central government gives special policies to some areas; Due to the different natural conditions and development levels in different regions, the adaptability of different regions to the market economic system shows obvious differences. Due to the differences in location conditions and historical inheritance, the heterogeneity between regions is manifested in ownership structure, economic structure, economic operation mechanism and economic development degree. As a result, the national unification policy has lost its foundation.

Third, the regional relations dominated by market principles have formed a "dynamic system of widening gap". Due to the deepening of reform and opening up, the differences in economic background and location, the development between regions presents an obvious gradient state. In this gradient pattern, a pattern similar to that of more developed, moderately developed and underdeveloped areas has been formed. A large number of statistical data can show that in the process of 15 reform and opening up, the development gap between these areas has not narrowed, but has widened, and there is a trend of further expansion. At the same time, we can also see that a regional division pattern similar to the international division pattern has begun to take shape, such as Guangdong, Shanghai, Jiangsu and other developed regions, which have begun to become processing zones; Many areas in Chinese mainland, including the old industrial areas like Liaoning, are becoming the suppliers of raw materials and markets for commodity sales.

Fourth, there are differences in development mechanisms in different regions. This difference is manifested in the different development mechanisms between developed areas represented by coastal areas and backward areas in the mainland. Disintegrate the regional pattern of a chess game in China by administrative allocation, initially form a national market, and put the development of various regions in this emerging market environment. However, due to the huge differences in the time and level of development in different regions, their competitiveness in this market shows obvious differences. For example, in developed areas with early development, due to their great advantages in technology and economic strength and strong market expansion ability, their enterprises also have strong development momentum and potential. In a sense, the development of these areas needs more market conditions and free economic policies. However, the situation in backward areas is just the opposite. Its obvious disadvantages in technology and economic strength, lack of funds, immaturity of entrepreneurs and other conditions make it at an obvious disadvantage in the competition with enterprises in developed regions. In such areas, it is difficult to achieve smooth economic development and narrow the gap with developed areas without the intervention of administrative forces that can effectively promote economic development.

To sum up, in a short period of 15 years, the social structure of China has undergone and is still undergoing major changes, which is an essential overall change. This change is cumulative and revolutionary. Although the details of the new structure are still difficult to sketch, its outline is certain: it will continue to deepen and develop in the above direction.