How China’s Online Nationalists Constrain Policymaking – the Case of Foreigners’ Permanent Residency Reform

Bibliographic Data

ID8101065
AuthorsTom Speelman (0000-0001-8690-7233, Leiden University, The Netherlands, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume32
Issue144
Pages879-896
Publication date2022-11-23
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Contemporary China (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1067-0564 • E-ISSN: 1469-9400
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10670564.2022.2148458
OpenAlexW4309859702
LanguageEN
Citations received14

Popular nationalism increasingly dominates public debate in mainland China. This article examines the impact of this trend on Chinese policymaking by looking at the public consultation procedure for new regulations on foreigners’ permanent residency in February 2020. Following an unexpectedly large online outcry of anti-immigrant sentiment in response to the draft regulations, government actors shelved the proposal, which constituted a long-delayed step towards a more comprehensive immigration framework. Drawing on textual analysis, expert interviews, and survey data, the article analyzes elite-public interactions before, during, and after the controversy, asking what factors contributed to this miscalculation of public sentiment, and what the P.R. debate can tell us about the role of public opinion in Chinese policymaking today. It argues that popular nationalists can play a bottom-up politicizing role on previously marginal policy issues such as immigration, surprising and constraining the state. Such politicisation further limits both public and elite policy debate, impairing state information gathering and exacerbating the tension between Chinese policy actors’ desire to both control and understand public sentiment. In addition, the permanent residency debate demonstrates the relevance of public opinion to China’s non-democratic immigration policymaking, which displays a trajectory of gradual politicisation similar to other early-stage immigrant-reception contexts

China · Democracy · Elite · Government (linguistics · Immigration · Immigration policy · Mainland China · Nationalism · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Public opinion · Public policy · Sociology · State (computer science · China's Ethnic Minorities and Relations · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · Law · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy · Public Administration

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