Abstract:
The unprecedented Covid-19 pandemic had severely stuck the globe in many aspects, including economic, political and social scenarios. China, however, had spent three years to get through the pandemic and to endeavor for reviving its economy and social governance with both expected and unexpected outcomes. The 20th National Congress of the CCP (Communist Party of China) in October, 2022 and the 14th National People’s Congress in March, 2023 put the new leadership under the spot of world-wide mass media that would influence country’s future in different ways.

As soon as China ended its zero-Covid policy in late 2022, economic recovery and normal social life had been fully expected as a normality: economy will bounce up and social life will return as it was before the pandemic. However, the world has apparently been changed. Fundamental facts stand solidly: First, global economy has gradually recovered slightly with different outcomes in different countries; Second, China is facing a difficult situation of boosting its fragile economy because of its stuck in exporting industries; Third, the on-going bloody wars and changing political landscapes would cast more unpredictable shadows on future economic growth and social security reform. In this lecture, I will mainly discuss the following issues: First, economic and social scenarios after the pandemic and its impact on China’s social security system; Second, how did China adjust its social policies to respond to the changing international atmosphere and domestic situations? Third, can China’s social security system sustain itself by moving toward socialist modernization in the context of ageing and urban-rural integration? It is meaningful to understand how things change and how these changes may create paramount impact on its future.

Yuegen Xiong is Professor in the Department of Sociology and Director of the Centre for Social Policy Research (CSPR) at Peking University, China. He is the author of Needs, Reciprocity and Shared Function: Policy and Practice of Elderly Care in Urban China (Shanghai Renmin Press, 2008) and Social Policy: Theories and Analytical Approaches (Renmin University Press, 2009). Xiong graduated from the Chinese University of Hong Kong with a PhD in social welfare in 1998 and joined Peking University as a faculty after completing two-year post-doctoral research in the Department of Sociology. He was the British Academy KC Wong Visiting Fellow at the University of Oxford during November 2002-September 2003, the Fellow at the Hanse Institute for Advanced Study (HWK), Delmenhorst, Germany during December 2003-February 2004, the JSPS Fellow at the University of Tokyo in October, 2005 and a visiting professor at Jacobs University Bremen during October-December, 2015 and visiting professor at the Center for Modern East Asian Studies, University of Gottingen, Germany in December, 2017. In the past years, he has published extensively in the field of social policy, comparative welfare regimes, social work, NGOs and civil society. He is the editorial member of Asian Social Work and Policy Review (Wiley), Asian Education and Development Studies (Emerald), the British Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies (UK) and International Journal of Community and Social Development (Sage). Prof. Xiong has been acting as the Co-Director of the Academic Committee, LSE-PKU Summer School Program since 2018.