Soldiering in the Special Zone - The People’s Liberation Army Engineering Corps in Shenzhen - Research Article

Aug 22, 2026

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Between 1979 and 1982, 20,000 troops from the People’s Liberation Army Engineering Corps moved from inland military-industrial sites to Shenzhen, China’s first Special Economic Zone, becoming early state-sponsored migrants and builders of key urban infrastructure. Using these military workers’ transition and demobilization, the study analyzes how state and market relations evolved during China’s post-socialist transition. It shows that reform leaders redirected disciplined labour to accelerate marketization, while the Engineering Corps’ Mao-era power structure persisted and deepened in Shenzhen, enabling rank-based conversion of political credentials into economic advantage.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages19

Reading Time48 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Third Front and Shenzhen’s SEZ

The PLA Engineering Corps as a connecting group

Migration, Demobilization, and Urban Transformation

Integration into municipal government and SOEs

Shenzhen’s reform-era outcomes and protests

Core Argument: State–Market Relations and Power Persistence

The China Quarterly (2024), 260, 906–924 doi:10.1017/S0305741024000900 RESEARCH ARTICLE Soldiering in the Special Zone: The People’s Liberation Army Engineering Corps in Shenzhen Taomo Zhou 1 and Cuifen Weng2 1National University of Singapore, Singapore, and 2Peking University HSBC Business School, Shenzhen, China Corresponding author: Taomo Zhou; Email: [tmzhou@nus.edu.sg](tmzhou@nus.edu.sg) Abstract Between 1979 and 1982, 20,000 troops from the People’s Liberation Army Engineering Corps travelled from military-industrial sites in the interior to Shenzhen, China’s first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) . They were the first batch of state-sponsored migrants to the SEZ and the pioneer builders of the city’s urban infrastructure. This article uses the case of military workers in the SEZ to examine state–market relations during the early phase of China’s post-socialist transition. On one hand, the Deng administration strategically repurposed a disciplined labour force from Mao’s command economy to jump-start marketization. On the other hand, the Mao-era power structure of the Engineering Corps not only persisted but became even more entrenched in the SEZ at the forefront of China’s reform. The higher one’s military rank was before demobilization, the more easily one could monetize socialist-era political credentials, particularly by taking advantage of the rising value of land in Shenzhen’s urbanization process. Academic credentials served as a moderate booster of status within the public sector and a more powerful ingredient leading to success for private entrepreneurs. The lower the military rank before demobilization, the less meaningful the agency to obtain material rewards commensurate with past contributions. 摘要 1979年到1982年之间，两万中国人民解放军基础建设工程兵从三线各大军工基地南下深圳参加特区建设。他们是来到特区的首批由国家调派的移民群体，也是深圳城市基础设施的拓荒建设者。本文通过研究基建工程兵南下特区并在深圳转业的历程，探讨中国改革开放初期市场与国家的关系。一方面，以邓小平为首的改革派领导人充分利用了基建工程兵纪律性强、劳动效率高等特点，快速地为市场经济的发展铺路；另一方面，在深圳这一改革先锋城市，基建工程兵群体中毛时代形成的权力结构并没有被瓦解，反而变得更加牢固。基建工程兵转业前的军衔越高，转业后就越容易在市场化过程中将自己在毛时代积累下来的政治资本转化为经济利益。深圳的快速城市化发展给很多从事房地产业的工程兵领导干部带来了谋取个人利益的机会。对于转业到政府单位或国有企业的基建工程兵而言，较高的受教育水平只能在有限的程度上推动他们的事业发展。而对于转业后自主创业的基建工程兵而言，较高的受教育水平对于他们事业发展的推动作用比较大。基建工程兵转业前的军衔越低，转业后就越难获得与其过去贡献相匹配的物质奖励。 Keywords: People’s Liberation Army Engineering Corps; Shenzhen; reform and opening; the Third Front 关键词: 中国人民解放军基础建设工程兵; 深圳改革开放; 三线建设 In the mid-1960s, Mao Zedong毛泽东launched the Third Front campaign to strengthen China’s national defence against perceived threats from the Soviet Union and the United States.1 In 1980, as part of China’s reform and opening, Deng Xiaoping邓小平initiated China’s first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Shenzhen深圳to experiment with market-oriented policies.2 The Third Front and 1 Meyskens 2020. 2 Coase and Wang 2012, 59–64. © The Author(s), 2024 . Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of SOAS University of London. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence ([https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)), which permits unre stricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. [https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741024000900](https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305741024000900) Published online by Cambridge University Press The China Quarterly 907 the SEZ represent two very different development strategies in China: semi-autarchy versus an outward-oriented approach, a focus on heavy industry versus consumer goods, and the use of normative versus monetary incentives for labour mobilization.3 One group of migrants connected these two projects: the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Engineering Corps ( jiben jianshe gongcheng bing基本建设工程兵), a military labour force supporting the Third Front construction. Between 1979 and 1982, 20,000 servicemen from the Engineering Corps travelled from military-industrial construction sites in the interior to Shenzhen. They we

FAQs

What role did the PLA Engineering Corps play in Shenzhen’s early SEZ development?

From 1979 to 1982, about 20,000 engineering corps servicemen were sent to Shenzhen as the first batch of state-sponsored migrants, helping build transportation and telecommunication networks, utility systems, and public and commercial buildings.

How did the article explain the relationship between state strategies and marketization?

It argues that reform leaders repurposed a disciplined labour force to jump-start marketization, while the Engineering Corps’ Mao-era power structure persisted and became more entrenched in the SEZ.

How did military rank before demobilization affect post-demobilization outcomes?

Higher pre-demobilization rank made it easier to monetize socialist-era political credentials through Shenzhen’s urbanization and rising land values, whereas lower rank corresponded to fewer material rewards.

Aug 22, 2026

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