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Local Village Workers, Foreign Factories and Village Politics in Coastal China: A Clientelist Approach*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2014

Wooyeal Paik
Wooyeal Paik*
Affiliation:
Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul. Email: woopaik@skku.edu; wypaik@gmail.com.
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Abstract

In market reform China, contentious and unfair labour relations between vulnerable migrant workers and exploitative foreign factory owners are one of the most critical issues of the political economy. This article analyses another group of workers – non-migrant local village workers – who protect themselves from foreign employers using two political resources: collective land-use rights and local political organizations, such as village governments, affective networks and physical forces, during their suburban village's industrialization. Based on intensive ethnographic fieldwork in Shandong (Qingdao) and other coastal regions in 2007, 2008 and 2011–2013, this article attempts to answer the questions of how local village workers protect their labour rights without reliable trade unions or rigorous governmental protection. How can villagers protect, if not maximize, their interests in their relations with the foreign factories in their villages? It also contrasts local labour relations in Qingdao with migrant labour relations in other coastal regions.

摘要

在改革时代的中国, 脆弱的流动工人和剥削性质的外资企业工厂主之间的抗争性和不公平的劳资关系成为政治经济领域最重要的事件之一。本文则分析了另一类的工人: 非外来人口的农村本地工人。这些工人在城郊村庄的工业化进程中用两种政治资源来保护自己免于外资厂主的剥削: 集体土地使用权和本地的政治组织 (比如村级政府、亲情网络和暴力)。根据我在山东省 (青岛) 和其他沿海地区 2007 、2008 和 2011–2013 年间的田野调查, 本文试图回答本地的农村工人在不依赖可靠的工会组织或者严格的政府保护的前提下如何保护自己的劳工权益。在自己的村庄里, 村民们在和外资企业的关系中如果还没有做到自己的利益最大化, 如何做到至少保护自己的利益? 本文还对比了青岛的本地劳资关系和沿海其他地区流动劳工体现出的劳资关系。

Keywords

Chinasuburban village politicsstate–society relationspolitical economylabour relationsclientelismforeign factories中国城郊乡村政治国家社会关系政治经济劳工关系恩宠关系外资企业
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 220 , December 2014 , pp. 955 - 967
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Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2014 

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Footnotes

*

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea and a grant funded by the Korean Government (NRF-2012S1A3A2033775). The author greatly appreciates his mentor, the late Professor Richard Baum (1940–2012).

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