On The Action Logic Of Elderly Land-lost Farmers’ Economic Participation

With the speeding of urbanization in our country, more land has been expropriated to the urban land and the number of elderly land-lost farmers has grown and grown. Elderly land-lost farmers are lack of competitiveness for living while the young have. As the old, they can’t enjoy the same pension benefits just like the urban elderly. As a result, elderly land-lost farmers are facing the double dilemma of life and pension. In the survey, I find that the old one are not content with the status quo, but actively make effort to change their situations. In real life they are engaged in different actions such as vegetables-selling, street vendor or temporary labor. And some have found the formal work. By the way they want to get more life guarantees.In this paper the actions they take are called economic participation. Then the question is how the economic participation happens? In the current environment, the economic participation will encounter many limitations, such as old age employment limit, urban management restriction and social exclusion and so on. Facing these limitations, which strategy they will take? And how the economic participation continues in action? These questions are worth considering.Currently the academic researchs related to elderly land-lost farmers are more concentrated in their living conditions, pension security and social networks, but are lack of the investigation of economic participation in the perspective of active aging. The paper believes that the study of economic participation of elderly land-lost farmers’contributes to depth analysis their daily lives and also further enriches the theory of action research in theory. In view of this, the object of the study is the action logic of elderly land-lost farmers. In the paper, Z community in N city is the survey site. Through qualitative research methods, the paper analyzes the action space,action motive, action strategy and action reproduction. Thus we can have the comprehensive analysis of elderly land-lost farmers’action logic.In terms of the action space, there are unfavorable factors of economic participation such as missing elderly employment system and market exclusion. While the diversified labor market demand, management "gap" from inadequate suburban governance and the collective action with same interest demands provide small action opportunities for their action. In terms of the action motive, the direct purpose of elderly land-lost farmers’economic participation is to make their lives better. In addition, some elderly land-lost farmers hope to relieve the embarrassing situation in family relationships, social interactions and identity and so on. In terms of the action strategy, in face of the narrow space, elderly land-lost farmers have their own wisdoms. They choose the suitable way to participate and take maximum action mobilization. On the one hand, they use the plight of suburban governance to get the institutional "acquiescence" for economic participation. On the other hand, they make their weak identity instrumental, using the Chinese "emotion, truth and law" to resolve conflict. There are two type of economic participation that elderly land-lost farmers engage in which are the type of individual vendor and the type of labor employment. The main forms of the former are selling vegetables and mobile stalls. The main forms of the latter are temporary workers and permanent workers. The individual vendor type of economic participation will damage community environment and city appearance. So elderly land-lost farmers use the strategies of win-win cooperation, obtain sympathy, group irregularities so as to obtain action space. In the labor employment type of economic participation, elderly land-lost farmers will face age and technical limitation and they will be affected by the employment exclusion. So they often tend to choose simple work, and at the same time use the alternative methods like "relations", "false age", and "low wages" and so on to "access". It should be noted that no matter which type of economic participation, the actions of elderly land-lost farmers violated the regulations of the country. While the action strategies are the violations and "flexible" behavior in order to improve their life situations. In terms of the action reproduction, the reproduction refers to the repetitive practice of economic participation which is the result of the elderly individual self-reflection and reflections on the social system. Although the actions are illegal, but on the positive sense the economic participation is the response to the trouble after losing land. The economic participation not only provides more security for elderly land-lost farmers, but also provides an important way to spontaneous urbanization for them. Also the economic participation builds an "orderly" order in the new urban space. In this order, elderly land-lost farmers have their own role and mode of production and also have the corresponding social relations and the way of life. This will provide them the "lost territory" restless for a calm in order to effectively promote the stability of their city life. Just from this point of view, we think that at this stage the action reproduction of economic participation is indispensable for elderly land-lost farmers and it needs the double protection of social support network and the national system.Through these researchs, the paper gets three conclusions. First, the instrumental use of "emotion, truth and law". The economic participation of elderly land-lost farmers’is the action in the urban living environment which is spontaneous and non-standard. In the lack of system and social dominant support cases, elderly land-lost farmers use the strategy of "emotion, truth and law" to obtain possible "irregular space". Second, the spontaneous order under "irregular space". The existence of "irregular space" is the results of institution acquiescence under elderly land-lost farmers. The action not only gets a livelihood for elderly land-lost farmers, but also reconstructs an implicit non-standard order which runs counter to the institutional order of the urban space. Third, the action characterization of rurality and urbanism. In the economic participation, there are both rural and urban characteristics. Elderly land-lost famers more choice the individual vendor type of economic participation and use homogeneity of social capital in action. City of action reflects the adaptability in the urban living environment of elderly land-lost farmers. It appears in the choice of the labor employment type of economic participation, communication karmic relationship and heterogeneity of social capital accumulation. Village of action and city of action affect each other. The duality of rural and city is not only contributed to the interpretation of the new mode of production for elderly land-lost farmers in urban environment, and also quietly change their lifestyles, cultural attitudes and social interactions. So we can say the action guide elderly land-lost farmers’urbanization.Finally, the paper put forward a further discussion. From a long-term analysis of the trajectory of urbanization, the future of the economic participation is bound to transformation. In the long run, based on the Chinese situation, our government should actively lead the attitude and learn from the development of social policy and the concept of productive aging, to plan, to regulate and to provide a broader space for the elderly regulatory action.