Urban Nomads

Contributor(s): Sharron Lovell | China is a country in superlative transition. Media attention focuses primarily on the economic miracle and burgeoning political power, while the interwoven and critically important story of mass human migration remains a postscript. Driven from crumbling countryside economics, 200 million Chinese have moved to the cities, serving as cogs in an engine powering unprecedented growth. Though they are changing every facet of Chinese life, these internal migrants are, by law and practice, second-class citizens in their own land. They gamble everything - health, safety and family - to grab a piece of the modern Chinese life.