Non-discrimination and the Reform of the Chinese Hukou System in a Human Rights Perspective : A case study of farmer workers

The Chinese hukou system has been established since 1950s with the purpose of migration control and resource distribution. The agricultural hukou holding residents’ rights to freedom of movement are strictly limited. The limitation upon the right to freedom of movement should be consistent with other rights and without discrimination. This thesis, by taking farmer workers as the target group, investigates the discrimination issues of the hukou system. The thesis relies on international human rights instruments as the legal framework, focusing on analyzing how farmer worker’s right to work and right to education are violated and discussing why they are directly and indirectly discriminated against compared with urban workers. The overall research objective of this thesis is to explore the Chinese regulatory framework governing farmer workers’ human rights to determine its consistency with non-discrimination, and then make suggestion on how to incorporate those international human right standards into the domestic system at the national level in the hukou reforms