Understanding the Gap Between De Facto and De Jure Urbanization in China: A Perspective from Rural Migrants’ Settlement Intention

This paper tries to analyze the determinants and driving mechanisms of both settlement intention and hukou transfer intention for rural migrants in Chinese cities, which can help to understand the gap between de facto and de jure urbanization in China. Based on China Labor-force Dynamics Survey (CLDS) in 2014, 1145 samples with their settlement intention, hukou transfer intention, individual demographic characteristics, urban working and living conditions, rural resources and attachment, and geographic characteristics were collected. It suggested that compared with settlement intention, the rural migrants’ hukou transfer intention were much weaker. The rural migrants preferred small and medium cities for urban settlement but large and megacities for urban hukou conversion. By logistic regression analysis, a set of complex determinants of settlement intention was identified, including age, education attainment, marital status and spouse living together, as well as the trade-off between urban working and living conditions in the current host cities and rural landholdings and attachment in the hometown. In contrast, the hukou transfer intention was mainly determined by age, personal income, rural landholdings and the size of current host city, which highlighted the personal citizenization capacity and the trade-off between benefits related to urban and rural hukou . Moreover, by examining the characteristics of four sub-types of rural migrants with different settlement intention and hukou transfer intention, it was found that the rural migrants who intended to settle down and convert hukou at the same time usually had high personal citizenization capacity and preferred megacities; those who intended to settle down but rejected hukou conversion usually had high citizenization capacity and low migration cost; those who intended to convert hukou but rejected settling down in the cites preferred megacities instead of small cities; those who did not intend to settle down or convert hukou at all usually had low citizenization capacity and high migration cost. Based on these findings, it is recommended to promote the complete citizenization of rural migrants by improving their livelihood and well-being in the cities through kinds of policy reform about hukou , land, and social insurance.