Urbanization must not come at the expense of the family

The family is the basic cell of society and the first school of life. Family harmony is the foundation of social harmony, and family happiness is the embodiment and guarantee of people's happiness in life. In his speech at the 2015 Spring Festival group gathering, President Xi Jinping raised for the first time the value of valuing the family.

The family undertakes three of the most basic social functions: married life, bearing children, and supporting the elderly. Therefore, protecting the family means protecting husband and wife, protecting children, and protecting the elderly, which is to say protecting social harmony and civilization.

Since reform and opening up, our country's economy has developed at high speed and achieved achievements that have attracted worldwide attention. However, it must be said frankly that our country's traditional urbanization development model and economic and social development approach have also caused serious damage to the family: first, damage to farmers' rights; second, damage to rural families; third, damage to the ecological environment. New urbanization is precisely about changing these three damages and achieving three protections, namely the protection of farmers' rights, the protection of rural families, and the protection of the ecological environment. Moving from the “three damages” to the “three protections” is the main marker of the transition from traditional urbanization to new urbanization.

To change the family-destroying urbanization model and take the path of new urbanization that protects the family, breakthroughs and implementation must be made in three aspects: concepts, systems, and action.

At the conceptual level, the value of the family must be deeply understood and highly valued. Sociology holds that the family is humanity's oldest and most basic social institution; the family is both the place of a person's first birth and a person's final harbor and resting place. Whether East or West, whether white, yellow, or black, whether believing in Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism, or Islam, whether developed or developing countries, whether English speakers or Chinese speakers, whether so-called capitalist countries or socialist countries, although there are a thousand differences and even conflicts, people in every country naturally form families. The family is the order and institution that has evolved spontaneously in humanity and most conforms to the way of heaven and nature. The family is the high ground of affection and love, the chamber of racial reproduction, the natural dwelling place of life, and the fortress of security and civilization. Protecting the family is protecting affection and love, protecting our future, and defending human civilization.

At the institutional level, all policies and laws that destroy the family must be changed, and a legal system that protects the family must be established. First, the urban-rural dual system must be resolutely changed, and urban and rural residents must be allowed and encouraged to achieve family-based free migration. Equalization of basic public services between urban and rural areas and the free transfer and continuation of social security nationwide must be realized as quickly as possible, providing an institutional channel and guarantee for farmers' family-based migration. All social systems must embody nationwide unity, openness, equality, and fairness; only in this way can citizens' right to free migration be ensured and the family be prevented from being split apart by institutions. Second, a must be formulated, clearly specifying in law various concrete provisions for protecting the family, and acts that destroy the family must be punished according to law. Third, an inclusive family education and welfare system must be established; family education welfare, childbirth welfare, women's welfare, children's welfare, elderly welfare, and other family education and welfare guarantee systems must be established as quickly as possible. In particular, the major achievements made in “combating the four forms of decadence” must be combined with optimizing the structure of fiscal expenditure, and the public fiscal funds saved from “combating the four forms of decadence” must be used to increase investment in education and the building of the social security system, comprehensively raising the level of family welfare protection. Finally, the childbirth policy must be adjusted and improved in a timely manner to resolve many crises such as severe population aging.

At the action level, it is very crucial that political leaders value the family through their actual words and deeds. Chinese people pay attention to how those above act and how those below follow; each level does things for the level below to see. President Xi Jinping has set a new benchmark for China's contemporary political ecology through his own words and deeds. Chinese people value cultivating oneself, regulating the family, governing the state, and bringing peace to the world. If political leaders do not value the family, or even take the lead in destroying it, then society's moral order will quickly collapse. A common phenomenon discovered after the central authorities' anti-corruption “tiger hunt” is that most corrupt officials have a habit of keeping mistresses or committing adultery. This is important evidence that public political figures destroy families. Organization departments should take maintaining and valuing the family as an important basis for selecting and appointing leading cadres. In addition, we must allow and encourage citizens to establish various social organizations that protect the family according to law, fully stimulate social vitality, and mobilize society's positive function of protecting the family.

Protecting the family is a truly great undertaking leading toward civilization.