Abstract
The twin processes of neoliberalization and globalization have led to an increase in precarious labor around the globe. Just as countries respond differently to these trends, as do the labor relations practices within nations. Chinese Workers in Comparative Perspective provides timely insight into the dynamics of Chinese labor relations through a comparison with nine countries as well as between different sectors in China. Topics the book touches on across its ten chapters include states’ policies, labor laws, regimes of production, workers’ militancy, labor market differentiation, collective bargaining, and the right to strike. The benefit of this type of systematic analysis is that it prevents labor scholars from taking some characteristics of Chinese labor relations for granted and from assuming that reforms, like legitimizing strikes and collective bargaining, will definitely raise labor standards in China.
Taken as a whole, the book provides several important insights. First, workers’ militancy deeply influences states’ policies and trade unions’ activities. Florian Butollo in the chapter, “Industrial Upgrading and Work: The Impact of Industrial Transformation on Labor in Guangdong’s Garment and IT Industries,” notes that it is workers’ struggles that determine whether industrial transformation can result in the rise of labor standards. Katie Quan in her chapter, “One Step Forward: Collective Bargaining Experiments in Vietnam and China,” similarly argues that the Nanhai Honda strike “opened up political space for unions in Guangdong to promote collective bargaining” (p. 185) and that only workers’ collective resistance can prevent collective bargaining from being co-opted. Tim Pringle contribution, “Trade Union Reform in Russia and China: Harmony, Partnership, and Power from Below,” also points out that the increase in labor unrest in China has enhanced pro-labor laws, but the low level of labor unrest in Russia results in the state’s further restriction on labor organizing.
A second important insight across the chapters is the important role of states’ policies in influencing workers’ struggles. Kevin Lin in his chapter on Chinese migrant and state-sector workers demonstrates that after the intense restructuring of the state sector around the turn of the century, the militancy of these workers in the state sector sharply declined. Similarly, Kaxton Siu provides a comparison between China and Vietnam to show how state policies transform workers’ struggles. In China, the government looks to minimize labor discontent and eliminate labor militancy by providing regular minimum wage increases. In Vietnam, by contrast, the wages are set lower and strikes are used to improve the base wages. In their chapter comparing China, India, and Pakistan, Anita Chan et al. notes that the neoliberal state in Pakistan and India leaves informal workers isolated and unprotected by labor laws, so workers’ labor-rights consciousness is lower than factory workers in China where the interventionist state prefers mass production.
A third theme highlighted across the book is that workers’ divisions are universal. Boy Luthje argues that Chinese labor relations are highly fragmented along five major regimes of production, so “the lines of confrontation between workers and management” are segmented. Kevin Lin emphasizes that the division of working conditions, regimes of production, and militancy exists between state-sector workers and rural migrant workers. Florian Butollo notes that the industrial upgrading requires more knowledge-intensive workers, but the “division between knowledge work and unskilled work continues to be built on the segmentation of the workforce between local residents and migrant workers” (p. 101).
A final critical insight of the book is that the benefits of collective bargaining depend on a country’s position in global supply chains. Boy Luthje argues that the success of the West German industrial relations system was mainly based on “the relatively successful restructuring of Germany’s world market-oriented core industries” (p. 28). Mingwei Liu notes that “the bargaining power of unions has been tremendously weakened by international competition and the growing mobility of capital” (p. 54). Katie Quan notes that “[i]f labor costs rise and Vietnamese manufacturers demand higher prices, there is a risk that buyers will take their production elsewhere” (p. 181).
The value of the cross-national comparisons made throughout this collection helps to challenge the “fallacy of exceptionalism” in Chinese labor relations and would make this book of value in a range of labor education settings.