The changing credibility of institutions: how household registration systems (hukou) in Mainland China and Taiwan define immigrants’ social benefits

Abstract The hukou is one of the enduring institutions that defines social citizenship of residents/immigrants in mainland China. Whilst much discussion has focused on the Chinese case, relatively little attention has been paid to the system in Taiwan, to say nothing of a comparison between the two. This article seeks to enrich the discussion of the two hukou systems in terms of their functions in determining the access of cross-strait immigrants to social benefits in the respective host countries. Drawing on the ‘credibility thesis’, the analytical locus is placed on the continuity and change of institutional functions underlying the apparent persistence of institutional forms. When granting/withholding immigrants access to local social benefits, hukou systems fulfil several functions: firstly, a symbolic dimension, in which immigrants from both sides are (artificially) regarded as citizens of a divided nation rather than two separate countries; secondly, a substantial dimension that defines the scope and extent of social benefit entitlements granted to the immigrants in question; and finally, a management dimension that allows room for considerable administrative discretion in terms of adaptation to various circumstances arising from the unsettled state of cross-strait relations. Often times, realisation of these various functions is compounded by conflicts in identity politics, with repercussions for the generosity/rigidity of social inclusion for cross-strait immigrants. Evidence underpinning the theoretical elaboration stems from the analysis of legal documents regulating the social rights of immigrants in mainland China and Taiwan, supplemented by historical traces of the politics of cross-strait migration. The final findings should shed light on the facilitative/restrictive mechanisms of the hukou regulations in mainland China and Taiwan, highlighting the puzzling phenomenon that both hukou systems are gaining increasing significance in steering the cross-strait migration at a time when their functions in regulating domestic migration are changing, if not waning.