Liang, Zai

Dr. Liang’s recent projects and published research focus on two major areas: internal migration in China and international migration from China to the United States. In the area of internal migration, Liang’s work, supported by an NIH/NICHD FIRST Award, explores the changing patterns of migration during China’s transition to a market-oriented economy. In an article on Population and Development Review (with Zhongdong Ma), Liang shows the increasing size of China’s floating population and its unprecedented concentration in the coastal regions. Drawing for the first time on nationally representative data, the 2000 Chinese Census, Liang has revealed the major levels of increasing intra-county migration resulting from China’s housing reform. In another paper published in Economic Development and Cultural Change (with Yiu Por Chen), Liang used the 1990 Chinese Census to demonstrate that women had benefited from the migration process, as reflected in opportunities for non-farm employment, obtaining urban household registration status (hukou), and attainment of relatively high prestigious occupations. Liang is also examining international migration, focusing on that from China’s Fujian province to the United States. Fujian, located on China’s southeast coast, has become a major immigrant-sending province, with New York City as the most desirable destination for its migrants. Grants from NIH, NSF and the Ford Foundation have enabled Liang and his team, which includes Douglas Massey of Princeton, to replicate the data collection of Massey’s Mexican Migration Project for Fujian. Based on these data, Liang has found major changes in the patterns of emigration from China (published in International Migration with Hideki Morooka). For instance, migrant selectivity has changed over this period: migration is increasingly more likely to select individuals with low level of socioeconomic status and with rural origins. In a paper in International Migration Review (with Toni Zhang), Liang reveals the major impacts of international migration on the social stratification system in migrant-sending communities. For instance, households with migrants enjoy the highest quality of housing, something used to be reserved only for local cadres and elites.Funded Research Liang has held multiple research grants in the last three years. An NIH/NICHD FIRST Award supported Liang’s analysis of market transition and internal migration in China, using survey and census data from China. Three recent grants (NIH, NSF, and Ford Foundation) have supported Liang’s work on international migration from China’s Fujian province to the United States. In addition, Liang and a collaborator, ecologist Jianguo (Jack) Liu, have received funding from NSF and NIH/NICHD to study issues related to population and environment in the Giant Panda Natural Reserve in Sichuan province of China Future Plans Work in progress includes additional analyses drawing on the Fujian. In addition, Liang is planning three new major research projects. One, under review at NIH, is to systematically measure return migration and explore its consequences in China. Another, under review at NSF, is to study the impact of migration on social and economic transformation of rural China. The third project, under review at New York State Health Foundation, is a continuation and expansion of an existing project to study health and health care service issues related to new Chinese immigrants in New York City.