Beijing starts gating, locking lower-income migrant villages

[lonestarnot]

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0714/beijing-gating-migrant-villages/

The government calls it "sealed management." China's capital has started gating and locking some of its lower-income neighborhoods overnight, with police or security checking identification papers around the clock, in a throwback to an older style of control.

It's Beijing's latest effort to reduce rising crime often blamed on the millions of rural Chinese migrating to cities for work. The capital's Communist Party secretary wants the approach promoted citywide. But some state media and experts say the move not only looks bad but imposes another layer of control on the already stigmatized, vulnerable migrants.

So far, gates have sealed off 16 villages in the sprawling southern suburbs, where migrants are attracted to cheaper rents and in some villages outnumber permanent residents 10 to one.


Coming to a city near you.

[Hydra]

1. Ya, definitely coming here

I always thought the leaders here looked at China and said "Wow...we can have capitalism without democracy...and it works GREAT!"

[lonestarnot]

2. Fascinating isn't it.

[tjwash]

3. We did have it...before that pesky little civil war thingy made slavery illegal

Believe me...they would love to bring it back too

[Greyhound]

5. No, this way is cheaper.

You have to take care of slaves or when they die you have to buy another and that adds up fast.

In this system, we're imminently replaceable and they only have to pay enough for us to subsist while we're working.

[Hydra]

6. Quite correct

The slaveowners found out something interesting when they were forced to change, both here in the US and in the Caribbean- it's was a lot cheaper to have wageslaves. The former slaves had to pay for their own food, housing, medical care, and as you say, they were infinitely replaceable.

Even beyond that, there was something scarier- the smarter slaves often found ways to slack off, steal things or sabotage the works without getting caught. Now, there was COMPETITION for that same job, and since it was a "choice" to work, it was considered bad form to do such things, rather than fair turnabout.

[Johonny]

4. it's different here

the rich lock themselves up in gated communities. Apparently in China there's more people with money than here so it's cheaper to lock up the poor.

[WinkyDink]

8. I think you're missing the concept of "locked". The wealthy here lock US OUT, not themselves IN.

China hardly has "more people with money than here."

[WinkyDink]

7. Bush DID virtually say that, in fact.

After Election 2000, Bush joked that 'If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier -- so long as I'm the dictator.'

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:hlvxBzLS25oJ:www.democrats.com/preview.cfm%3Fterm%3DBush%2520Dictatorship+bush+china+dictator&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us