Les jeunes diplômés chinois à l’épreuve de la précarité. Mobilités, accès à l’emploi et rapport au travail. Le cas des jeunes migrants qualifiés dans les villages-urbains à Pékin

摘要

This thesis is part of the broader issue of the transformation of the labor market in China over the past two decades and the place of young migrant workers in this process. In the context of economic transition, Chine has witnessed many important changes such as the phenomenon of urban labor market segmentation, the rise in unemployment and the massive creation of informal jobs, all leading to increased mobility in the working world, as seen particularly in the phenomenon of mass domestic migration. Migrant working youth – especially university graduates from a rural background (or smaller cities) who move to large cities - are being increasingly relegated to the urban areas of vulnerability (Robert Castel,1995) where different forms of precariousness (especially in terms of employment and housing) overlap and accumulate. China’s strong economic growth has given rise to inequalities that are multiplying and deepening at a dizzying rate. Upward mobility seems broken as feeling of injustice is rising. This migration phenomenon, a simultaneous transformation of the labor market and urban restructuring, is the focus of our study. We shall examine the case of young skilled migrants living in urban villages in Beijing, analytical figures of metamorphosis in progress. This research was conducted between 2011 and 2012 in an urban village in Beijing. The subjects had between 2 and 8 years of professional experience and lived in urban villages in Beijing at the time of the survey. This research is based on empirical data collected and analyzed using various methods. Our fieldwork in China enabled us to distribute180 questionnaires (quantitative data), 60 biographical interviews (qualitative material) as well as an ethnographic observation in an urban village. This study aims to investigate, in terms of careers, the process of professional integration and the experience of migration of graduates by looking at structural factors (employment policy, migration policy, networks, etc.), and the narrative pattern used by young people to relate their journey, in order to highlight the mechanisms that produce inequalities and construct social identities underlying the changes being observed in China. Our study has three objectives. The first is to understand both the different positions and statuses held and the way in which young people interpret their journey from their perspective, the positions they hold and the strategies they adapt. The second objective is to demonstrate how their objective and subjective identities interact and are redefined, as well as how their relationships toward work are formed. Thirdly, the goal is to articulate the issue of professional integration and its relationship to physical space, in a context where mobility is becoming a social norm in both the working world and the management of migration (Hélène Pellerin 2011).