Description
Book SynopsisOpens a critical perspective on the slow death of socialism and the rebirth of capitalism in the world's most dynamic and populous country. Based on fieldwork and extensive interviews in Chinese textile, apparel, machinery, and household appliance factories, this book finds a rising tide of labor unrest mostly hidden from the world's attention.
Trade Review"An ethnographic and analytic masterpiece... Few sociological studies have combined structural and existential, object and subjective truths so memorably as this one." London Review Of Books "This beautifully written book will catalyse further important debates on the class dimensions of labour protest." Labour History
Table of ContentsPreface PART I: DECENTRALIZED LEGAL AUTHORITARIANISM 1. Chinese Workers' Contentious Transition from State Socialism 2. Stalled Reform: Between Social Contract and Legal Contract PART II: RUSTBELT: PROTESTS OF DESPERATION 3. The Unmaking of Mao's Working Class in the Rustbelt 4. Life after Danwei: Surviving Enterprise Collapse PART III: SUNBELT: PROTESTS AGAINST DISCRIMINATION 5. The Making of New Labor in the Sunbelt 6. Dagong as a Way of Life PART IV: CONCLUSION 7. Chinese Labor Politics in Comparative Perspective Methodological Appendix: Fieldwork in Two Provinces Notes Bibliography Index