Shanghai Street View: Empowering Immigrants
My first hint that change was in the air for foreigners working in Shanghai came a couple of weeks ago on a visit to the foreign affairs office at the university where I teach. That was when the young man who handles my visas told me new rules coming out would allow me to apply for work visas good for 2 years or more – a radical change from the current policies that make getting anything longer than 1 year nearly impossible.
I didn’t share his enthusiasm, mostly because I’m quite skeptical of a Chinese system that makes many things possible in theory but quite difficult to achieve in reality. That small signal 2 weeks ago has rapidly evolved into a flood of new reports over the past week, all saying that Shanghai is becoming friendlier to foreigners who want to live and work here over the longer term.
All the reports are certainly intriguing, and I may even apply for a longer-term work visa after my current one expires. But frankly speaking, I’m quite skeptical that anything will change in reality.
More broadly, this particular drive reflects rapidly changing attitudes towards immigration not only in China, but throughout much of Asia over the last century. As an American, I come from a place where immigration is part of a national culture that embraces diversity and differences between people.
That contrasts sharply with many Asian countries, where uniformity is preferred and immigration is often discouraged. The 2 notable exceptions are Hong Kong and Singapore, whose open immigration policies look similar to many western countries. But both of those places were former western colonies, and many of their immigrant-friendly policies were set up to attract permanent residents to these areas that were far less developed 100 years ago.
Since first hearing about the new rules from my university administrator, I’ve heard about them again several times from both other friends and in media reports. Actual details are scarce, but the changes appear aimed at longer-term foreign residents who either earn lots of money or work for universities and big state-owned enterprises.
I don’t fall into the former category, but should theoretically qualify due to my long-term status at a major local university. The new rules say I can now apply for a 5-year work permit, and could even apply for a rare Chinese green card 3 years after that. Other new rules include elimination of the requirement that foreigners coming to work in China must have 2 years of work experience – a major obstacle for many of my foreign students who would like to work here after graduating.
Nothing New Under the Sun
But returning to the immigration issue, my first response was: What’s really new here? Before this week I had been told several times previously that foreigners are technically allowed to get multi-year work visas in China. After learning that, I tried to get such a visa earlier this year, since I had just signed a new 3 year contract with my university. After all, I figured, such a contract proved I had a guaranteed employer for at least the next 3 years.
Of course I quickly learned that things weren’t so simple. It didn’t take long to find out that the foreign expert status necessary to get my visa had to be renewed yearly, and couldn’t be given on a multi-year basis. That meant the immigration department wouldn’t give me a visa for more than a year, since the visa could only be valid as long as the expert certificate was valid. Apparently a multi-year foreign expert certificate did exist, but only Albert Einstein himself and perhaps a few Nobel Prize winners could actually qualify for such status. So it was yet another one-year visa for me.
Of course I’m exaggerating just slightly, but my point is that China often seems quite good at creating rules that look quite good in form, but then never get executed due to excessive bureaucracy. In this case, a historical distrust of foreigners and lack of immigration tradition are also big obstacles, making it easier for officials to simply control foreigners by limiting our visas to a year at a time.
The current system really doesn’t look all that different from what I experienced when I first came to China in the 1980s. Back then work visa applications also required extensive paperwork, and stays were also limited to a year. At some point they did eliminate the little green books that were separate residency cards, and the application offices got more modern and efficient. But nearly everything else stayed the same.
With that history of foot-dragging and wariness of foreigners, it’s hard to believe that anything will actually change this time despite all the fanfare and publicity. I’m certainly still intrigued and even hopeful that something might be different during my next application. But it’s far more likely the current status quo will continue and we’ll have yet some more good-looking rules that are never implemented. Hopefully Shanghai will prove me wrong this time.
