If China is the
world factory, then on the 16th of April, there was a great noise
coming from the core component of the factory. In Dongguan, the manufacturing
city in the south of China, around 40,000 workers came out to protest, all from
the footwear factory, Yue Yuen. The strike is a phenomenon not only because of
its size, but on various grounds.
Chinese labour in the global economy
Prof. Andreas Bieler and I have been awarded a grant of £275k by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for a project on ‘Globalisation, national transformation and workers’ rights: an analysis of Chinese labour within the global economy’ (RES-062-23-2777; full project proposal). The project runs from 1 October 2011 to 30 September 2014. On this blog, I will regularly provide a discussion of empirical findings related to this project.
![](http://web.archive.org./web/20140618090437im_/http://img1.blogblog.com/img/icon18_wrench_allbkg.png)
Friday, 23 May 2014
Wednesday, 12 June 2013
China may be far away but Foxconn is on our doorstep
Many thanks for Dr. Andrijasevic and Dr. Sacchetto's kind share of
their article, about Foxconn's operation in Czech Republic. By reading their
article, I am more convinced that it is not about Chinese workers only.
Capitalists function the same way everywhere, they minimize relative labour
cost in order to maximise their profits. Foxconn therefore is a very good
example for us to see, that not only the Chinese labour, but European labour
have to follow their oppressing management style. This paper has already been
blogged on Open
Democracy
Sunday, 12 May 2013
We are on the Same Sea: HK Dock Workers Strike
On
6 May 2013, the 40-day strike by Hong Kong dock workers came
to an end. Despite media
criticism that this was a lose-lose ending for both the employers’ and the workers’
side, I think this long-term industrial action by Hong Kong dock workers was
actually a milestone. It served to demonstrate the power of production, to show
the solidarity of the whole society, and above all to speak out with a claim for
decent working conditions! The purpose of this paper is to connect the recent
Hong Kong dock strike with European dock workers; after all, we are on the same
sea.
Tuesday, 30 April 2013
Can Direct Elections for Trade Unions Really Represent Workers’ Interest?
When
we talk about trade unions in China, specifically the All China Federation of
Trade Unions (ACFTU), we have to say that it is the biggest trade union in the
world judged by the number of members, because all Chinese workers are enrolled
automatically as members. The ACFTU is perhaps also the richest trade union in
the world because of its funding, which comes entirely from the workers’ wages:
2 percent of every worker’s monthly salary is taken as a contribution to the
funds of the ACFTU. Ironically, however, this biggest and richest trade union is
probably the weakest trade union in the world. Many scholars have studied the
impotence of the ACFTU (Walder, 1991;
Chan, 1993; Perry, 1995; Gong, 2002; Howell, 2003)
or the debate over reform of the ACFTU (Pringle, 2011). This paper therefore
doesn’t focus on the ACFTU itself but more on the trade union set-up within
enterprises, and their function.
Monday, 1 April 2013
The Possibility of International Solidarity
This
short blog is dedicated to the small group of researchers interested in Chinese
labour who, led by Ellen Friedman,
had an amazing one-week labour tour in New York. Certainly these are only my
personal reflections drawn from some of the meetings, but the whole group’s
discussions with American workers gave me some ideas for this paper.
Monday, 18 March 2013
To be, or not to be
This
is not only a classic question from Hamlet;
the audit inspectors of the Institute of Contemporary Observation (ICO) often
face this dilemma when they make their factory visits. At the beginning I was
sceptical about these audits, which I assumed were ‘performances’ by the brand-name
companies that ordered them. However after I had a talk with the leading
inspector of the ICO in January 2013, I realised that there existed some real human
struggles under all the paperwork involved in brand-name companies’ audit
reports.
Tuesday, 26 February 2013
Pretty Girls, Working on the Shop-Floor
When
I received the student’s request to give a talk to female workers at their centre
outside a factory in Shenzhen, I was hesitant. I am not an expert in gender studies,
and certainly not familiar with women’s position in the power structure in the
factory. But the student who was in charge of this event was very tenacious. I
couldn’t say no to her in the end, because the student told me how rare it is to
have a female scholar visiting their workers’ centre. Therefore I went, with a
very humble attitude, to see all the young girls from the factory. I planned my
talking points, on being confident at work, or finding channels to relieve
pressure from work. However, those girls are much stronger than I expected. They
actually told me that when they faced unfairness at work, sometimes it was not
because ‘they are not nice enough’, but because they are weaker in power. They
also said that that they did not have the choice of what they would like to do
in life; they have limited resources and limited opportunities to get on with
their lives.
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