Explaining social insurance participation: the importance of the social construction of target groups in China

The extension of welfare coverage to immigrants and their participation in welfare programmes has been a subject of concern in many countries. By applying the theory of social construction of target groups and a framework of stakeholder analysis, this article attempts to explain why migrants in the construction sector of China fail to participate despite the urban pension scheme aiming to expand its coverage. By analysing social construction and the interaction among the government, enterprises and migrants, this study suggests that migrants in the construction sector are considered a necessity for urban economic development but most migrants are low-skilled with limited education; thus, the policy is characterized by selectivity and inflexibility, which has feed-forward effects on both enterprises and individuals. On the one hand, enterprises select skilled technicians and management personnel to participate in urban pension schemes while compromising with most other construction workers to avoid contribution to the social insurance pool; on the other hand, most individual migrants also believe the unlikelihood of truly benefiting from the urban pension extension. This article suggests that local governments should change their stereotypes and negative attitudes toward construction workers to ensure that the objective of equity could be realized in policy design and implementation.