ABSTRACT
Han Village is located within the administration territory of Baoding in the middle of Hebei Province in northern China. Among middle-age women who showed a stronger tendency of the "feminization of agriculture", quite some respondents suggested that they willingly "freed" their children from farming tasks. Given the overall decrease in labor investment in farming, peasants mentioned that they only maintained the farms at a level for self-sufficiency. With limited local entrepreneurial dynamics, villagers faced stiffer market competition in the labor market and their businesses were threatened by external capital. Education seemed to provide the most gender-neutral opportunities to realize urban dreams, particularly for the economically better-off families. The disintegrated community and the lack of local economic opportunities had pushed peasants from land to pursue their urban dream mainly through migrant work. As men's engagement in migrant work was contingent on the family's economic needs, women's migrant work was more dependent on family structures.
