Two Articles on Political and Labor Upheaval in China

Jasic Workers Fight for Union Rights JENNY CHAN

N JULY 27, 2018, POLICE arrested thirty Jasic employer and the Chinese government, Oprotesters in Shenzhen, including 29 including the country’s only offi cial trade Jasic Technology workers and a university union organization, the All-China Federation student. Shen Mengyu, the recent graduate of Trade Unions (ACFTU). who stood in solidarity with the protesting Earlier this May, several Jasic workers workers, has since been completely cut off reported to a labor bureau the company’s from communications. More recently, the arbitrary imposition of punitive fi nes and ir- clampdown on Dagongzhe Zhongxin, liter- regular work shifts, as well as underpayment ally translated as Migrant Workers’ Center, of the housing fund.4 Some were advised by whose staff-in-charge was allegedly linked district-level trade union offi cials to safeguard to the Jasic protest, was apparently intended themselves in accordance with the law. Under as a warning to other activists that they have the Chinese Trade Union Law, all types of gone too far in their interventions.1 Accord- enterprises with 25 employees or more are ing to state media, the fundamental confl ict supposed to have “basic-level trade union was caused by the “illegal, violent actions” of committees” on the shop fl oors (Article 10). dismissed Jasic workers2 and the instigation of An enterprise union shall be approved by the an “unregistered illegal organization.”3 Con- next higher level trade union (Article 11). trary to these claims, this article argues that A primary socio-political goal of the the central problem was the blatant violations ACFTU is to pre-empt the development of of workers’ rights and interests by both the independent unions outside the party-state. In spite of the push of the Chinese trade union federation since the 1990s, when labor

JENNY CHAN is an assistant professor of sociology strikes and protests were scattered but grow- at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and vice ing throughout the country, only 33 percent of president of communications at the International the some 480,000 foreign-funded enterprises, Sociological Association’s Research Committee on and less than 30 percent of private enterprises, Labor Movements. She also serves as an academic had set up unions by mid-2005.5 Under advisor of Hong Kong-based Students & Scholars provincial trade union offi cials’ stepped-up Against Corporate Misbehavior. The author thanks New Politics editorial board members Nancy organizing drive, Guangdong aimed to “see Holmstrom and Lois Weiner, along with Richard trade unions in 60 percent of the foreign- Smith, for their warm encouragement and solidar- invested enterprises” by the end of 2006, ity support in the writing process. and “in all fi rms funded by the world’s top

84 . NEW POLITICS Chinese Jasic Workers

500 multinationals” by 2007.6 By December the workers were all excluded from the newly 2009, “unions had been set up in 92 percent formed company union. of the Fortune 500 companies operating in In Jasic and other workplaces, bargaining China,” including such giants as Foxconn and through workers’ direct actions, such as col- Wal-Mart.7 By the end of 2016, there were lective protests and strikes, has always been 2.8 million enterprise-level trade unions with risky and dangerous even when it is a viable more than 302 million registered members way to address workers’ shared grievances throughout the country, making China the under despotic management and inadequate world’s largest unionized workforce.8 legal protection. In this case, workers did not win any concessions over wages and welfare Jasic Workers Struggle benefi ts. Worse, the worker organizers were for Union Organizing accused of “illegally unionizing,” assaulted by company security offi cers and local police, and Jasic Technology Company, founded in 2005 fi red. Yu Juncong, Liu Penghua, Mi Jiuping, and listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange and Li Zhan were charged with the crime of in 2011, is widely known as a specialist in the “gathering a crowd to disturb social order.” welding industry and one of the top 500 en- Their family members, and the lawyer who terprises in Guangdong.9 Less known is that represents them, have been repeatedly ha- Jasic had failed to set up a trade union since rassed and threatened. its opening 13 years ago. Evidence shows Tim Pringle, in assessing the future of that Jasic management has long evaded its Chinese union reforms in light of growing responsibility to facilitate workers to partici- labor unrest, stresses the need not only for pate in collective consultation over work and “more accountable enterprise-level union employment issues such as wages, working chairpersons and committees,” but also hours, health and safety, and welfare benefi ts “more supportive, interactive, and, at times, for both male and female employees. Not directive relationships between the higher until this May did the company claim that it trade unions and their enterprise-level sub- has begun to “establish a union in an orderly ordinates.”10 Conspicuous by his absence, the fashion.” Obviously, the corporate move was Beijing-based ACFTU chairperson, Wang a strategic response to unprecedented labor Dongming, in effect endorsed discrimination challenges from the bottom up. and retaliation by Jasic against its employees, Jasic worker leaders, with trust and confi - particularly those who had fought for setting dence from co-workers, had quickly gathered up a representative union. 89 signatures out of a factory workforce of 1,000 for the union membership application. Contentious Labor Relations At this point, the authorities withdrew their original “verbal support” for workers’ union- Labor struggle for economic and political izing. Instead, they recognized only the efforts rights (for instance, demanding union elec- of management, who likewise submitted tions) has drawn increasing government at- their intent to “set up a union in accordance tention. To maintain government legitimacy, with the law.” The relationship between Jasic the state under President Xi Jinping continues management and the government cannot be to search for mechanisms to resolve labor closer, as revealed in this fi erce worker-led confl icts and manage social discontent. Time struggle for union rights at the factory level. and again, settlement of high-profi le worker By early August, Jasic had taken full protests through direct government mediation control over union organizing by crushing the is undertaken to restore “social harmony.” In- workers’ initiatives. Candidates nominated by deed, offi cials have skillfully developed a wide

Winter 2019 . 85 Chinese Jasic Workers

array of “protest absorption” techniques to cases be fi led individually to fragment and settle labor disputes at the scene. These include isolate the plaintiffs.14 lowering workers’ “realistic” expectation of As China’s offi cials make extensive use claims to compensation, pressuring manage- of their discretionary power to resolve major ment to grant some economic concessions to labor crises rather than enabling workers adversely affected workers, and simultaneously to exercise fundamental rights to freedom manipulating workers’ familial and social rela- of association, it is unclear how long this tions to silence the resistance. Worker solidar- government-led strategy will remain viable, ity has frequently dissipated when leaders were particularly when workers’ basic rights and intimidated, arrested, or bought off.11 interests are routinely violated. Following strikes, offi cials and corporate executives have jointly developed multi- Chinese Students: pronged tools to monitor labor conditions, “We Support Jasic Workers!” if not for outright repression. As a well- During the late nineteenth and early twenti- documented example, at a Honda car-parts eth centuries, students and intellectuals played assembly factory, Kong Xianghong, vice- a critical role in the nascent labor movement chair of the Guangdong Federation of Trade of China’s modern history. Today, in a deeply Unions, presided over the direct election of marketized economy under the auspices of the shop-fl oor union representatives in 2010 and party-state, university students and workers subsequent collective bargaining on wages in involved in the Jasic incident similarly show 2011. Many workers were disappointed, how- a heightened sense of social awareness. ever, that the discredited factory union chair From late July, scholars15 and activists of a was permitted to remain as head of a partially wider coalition of labor rights organizations16 reformed union, and the two “elected” vice- have petitioned online for the Chinese gov- chairs were top-level managers, refl ecting ernment to release the detained Jasic workers continued managerial control. Moreover, and their supporters. Importantly, on the while the company was forced to yield on ground, concerned mainland students from the important issue of wages under pressure more than twenty universities have formed from the provincial trade union, in the name a fast-expanding network to support Jasic of restoring “industrial peace” it was able to workers and their families. The self-identifi ed ignore all other 100-some worker demands, Jasic Worker Support Group has set up an including those for women’s rights and im- email account (jiashishengyuantuan@gmail. proved welfare benefi ts (paid maternity leave com), a social media platform (twitter.com/ja- and a one-hour meal break among them). As sicworkers), and a website (jiashigrsyt.github. a result, the union committee quickly lost the io/) to mobilize public support, while battling confi dence of rank and fi le workers.12 against Internet censorship and surveillance. In “buying stability” by “dishing out In one group photo, 42 young students and cash payments or other material benefi ts in recent graduates wore white T-shirts with the exchange for compliance,” the government slogan in bold red, “Unity is strength.” undercut wider reform and the growth of In service learning and participatory labor mobilization aimed at influencing social research projects, more and more uni- government policy.13 At the same time, sig- versity students have entered the lives of low- nifi cant coercion was involved in state efforts paid campus cleaners and canteen workers, to manage labor disputes and social unrest. construction laborers and coal miners with Top-down intervention in the arbitration and fatal pneumoconiosis, evicted peasants los- litigation system is commonplace. In handling ing their homes and land, and rural migrant collective lawsuits, judges have insisted that

86 . NEW POLITICS Chinese Jasic Workers workers living at the city margins. Some have proclaiming, “Give out heat and light, like a chosen to work on the assembly line to gain a fi refl y lights up in the dark.” better understanding about the transnational Thus far, supporters including Gu Jiayue labor process behind the production of the (Peking University graduate), Zhang Shengye iPhone.17 The others have joined hands to (Peking University graduate), Wu Jiawei launch a #MeToo-style blog to share stories (Renmin University graduate), Xu Zhongli- of sexual harassment and other forms of ang (University of Science and Technology gender violence at the university and in the Beijing graduate), Yang Shaoqiang (Univer- larger society. Despite diverse socio-economic sity of Science and Technology Beijing gradu- backgrounds, the student organizers have ate), and a few unnamed ones, were either come together to rethink the sources of du- detained or placed under house arrest by the rable inequality and injustice. They aspire to “comprehensive social management teams” have equality, love, and freedom. They read directed by the authorities at different levels. and debate the classical works of Karl Marx, Students who were “set free” testifi ed Vladimir Lenin, Mao Zedong, and Lu Xun, that they had been threatened with investi- among many others. gation and disciplinary action if they did not In the wake of the July 27 worker crack- withdraw from the action. Their freedom, down, the multi-university Jasic Worker including the use of the Chinese messaging Support Group addressed the authorities by app WeChat and other communication tools, making an open call, grabbing the headlines was signifi cantly restricted. of local and international news: “Return to us our comrades; return to us our workers!” Taking Aim at Students posted blogs, photos, videos, and Student Organizations big-character letters to mobilize urgent In a new semester starting in September, uni- support for the release of protesting work- versity authorities looked into the registration, ers and fellow classmates. On August 24, in composition, and organizational goals of the Huizhou City adjacent to Shenzhen, the riot Marxist societies and Maoist study groups police raided a rental apartment and arrested at Peking University, University of Science about 50 Jasic-worker supporters, including and Technology Beijing, Renmin University, students and workers. and Nanjing University, to name only a few. Yue Xin, 22, a fresh graduate of Peking Sweeping inspection of these left-leaning University who majored in foreign languages, student associations shows authorities’ in- was forcibly disappeared after the raid. No tolerance of an emergent worker-student news about her whereabouts is available to coalition, a non-negligible force of progressive date. social change.18 Li Tong, a fi nal-year undergraduate and Qimin Xueshe, a six-year-old Marxist a member of the Marxist Society at Nanjing study group at the University of Science and University, has been placed under house Technology Beijing, was on the verge of being arrest. closed permanently on October 12. Student Hu Hongfei, a final-year journalism activists were pressured by the university party undergraduate and member of the Marxist committee to stop making any further efforts Society at Nanjing University, was placed un- at mobilization. The outcome will not be a der house arrest for 46 days until she made a deadly silence, however. A student organizer narrow escape on October 11. She continued pledged that “the body” of his organization to be closely monitored by the police. In the could be crushed by de-registration in the face of great pressure from parents and uni- hands of the university bureaucrats under versity higher-ups, she nevertheless persisted,

Winter 2019 . 87 Chinese Jasic Workers

the newly amended “Student Society Man- trade unions, will inevitably confront a tactical agement Rules.” But “the spirit” of pursuing mix of reconciliation and repression on all social justice will not die. He clenched his fronts, resulting in uncertainty and instability. fi sts, showing great determination to carry on the fi ght. NOTES 1. Dagongzhe Zhongxin, or Migrant Workers’ Rebuilding Labor, Center, has provided free legal services and other support to Chinese migrant workers in Shenzhen Revitalizing Unions industrial towns since 2000. The center has long “Realize the great Chinese Dream, build a collaborated with Worker Empowerment, a Hong harmonious society,” intones a government Kong non-governmental labor rights group. See “Statement from Worker Empowerment,” August banner. The defi nition of that dream and the 27, 2018, www.workerempowerment.org/en/up- determination of who may claim it remain dates/334. Also see the joint statement of Shenzhen contested. The evolving consciousness and Dagongzhe Workers’ Center and Worker Em- praxis of the Chinese workers, with growing powerment entitled “Release Fu Changguo Now!” September 13, 2018. For further discussions, see support of students, academics, and labor Tim Pringle and Anita Chan, “China’s Labour Re- rights activists at home and abroad, is piv- lations Have Entered a Dangerous New Phase, as otal to charting the future of China in the Shown by Attacks on Jasic Workers and Activists,” globalizing economy. South China Morning Post (SCMP), September 19, Jasic workers have stood up against all 2018, www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/ article/2164817/chinas-labour-relations-have- odds to fi ght for their dignity and political entered-dangerous-new-phase#comments; Elaine rights. They have inspired their peers and Hui and Eli Friedman, “The Communist Party vs. youthful students to take concerted actions. China’s Labor Laws,” Jacobin, October 2, 2018, On October 20, Cornell University’s ILR www.jacobinmag.com/2018/10/china-communist- party-labor-law-jasic; a series of articles on “The (Industrial and Labor Relations) School Jasic Workers’ Struggle in China” at Labor Notes suspended a long-term student exchange (starting from November 5, 2018), www.labornotes. program with Beijing-based Renmin Uni- org/jasic. versity to convey profound concern about 2. Xinhua, “Investigation on So-called Worker Inci- the Chinese university’s blatant suppression dents in Shenzhen,” August 25, 2018, www.xinhua- of students’ participation in Jasic-worker sup- net.com/english/2018-08/25/c_137416700.htm. port campaigns (and other labor and social 3. Zhao Yusha, “Chinese Workers Warned Against Foreign-funded Advocacy Groups,” Global Times, struggles) over the summer. The severe pun- August 26, 2018, www.globaltimes.cn/con- ishment of the blacklisted Renmin University tent/1117160.shtml. students by the stability-obsessed state and 4. According to China’s Social Insurance Law, ef- its delegates “represented in sum pretty gross fective July 1, 2011, employees are legally entitled violations of academic freedom,” in the words to five types of insurance (medical insurance, work-injury insurance, old age pensions, maternity of Eli Friedman, director of international insurance, and unemployment insurance) and a 19 programs for the ILR School. housing fund (designed to ensure that workers save Without effective union leadership, to purchase housing). workers from Jasic and other companies are 5. All-China Federation of Trade Unions, “ACFTU impelled to rely overwhelmingly on their Marks 80th Anniversary,” 2005, print edition. own efforts to fi ght for economic compensa- 6. Zhan Lisheng, “Guangzhou: Hotbed for Rise tion and benefi ts, many of them stipulated of Trade Unions,” China Daily, August 29, 2006, www.newsgd.com/business/zones/200608290055. in the law. Discrepancies are huge between htm. the rights promised on the books and those 7. Mingwei Liu, “‘Where There Are Workers, delivered. Labor challenges, including notably There Should Be Trade Unions’: Union Organizing the rebuilding and revitalization of grassroots in the Era of Growing Informal Employment,” in

88 . NEW POLITICS Chinese Jasic Workers

Sarosh Kuruvilla, Ching Kwan Lee, and Mary E. Xuebing Cao, Quan Meng, and Jun Lu, “A Strike Gallagher, eds., From Iron Rice Bowl to Informaliza- of ‘Unorganized’ Workers in a Chinese Car Factory: tion: Markets, Workers, and the State in a Changing The Nanhai Honda Events of 2010,” Industrial China (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2011), Relations Journal (Vol. 46, Issue 2, 2015), 134-52. 157; Jenny Chan, Ngai Pun, and Mark Selden, 13. Ching Kwan Lee and Yonghong Zhang, “The “Chinese Labor Protest and Trade Unions,” in Power of Instability: Unraveling the Microfounda- Richard Maxwell, ed., The Routledge Companion tions of Bargained Authoritarianism in China,” to Labor and Media (Routledge, 2016), 290-302; American Journal of Sociology (Vol. 118, Issue 6, Anita Chan, ed., Walmart in China (Ithaca, NY: 2013), 1486. Cornell University Press, 2011). 14. Feng Chen and Xin Xu, “‘Active Judiciary’: 8. “Number of Grassroots Trade Unions by Region Judicial Dismantling of Workers’ Collective Ac- (2016)” and “Trade Union Members in Grassroots tion in China,” The China Journal (Vol. 67, 2012), Trade Unions by Region (2016),” China Labour 87-107; Mary E. Gallagher, Authoritarian Legality Statistical Yearbook 2017, 410-13. in China: Law, Workers, and the State (New York: 9. “Jasic Technology’s corporate history (2005-pres- Cambridge University Press, 2017). ent),” Jasic Technology, www.jasictech.com/ 15. “Scholars Demand the Shenzhen Government html/en/about-jasic/corporate-profi le/corporate- Release Jasic Workers Arrested for Attempting history/. to Unionize,” RC44 – Research Committee on 10. Tim Pringle, Trade Unions in China: The Chal- Labour Movements, www.rc44labour.org/scholars- lenge of Labour Unrest (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, demand-the-shenzhen-government-release-jasic- 2011), 162. workers-arrested-for-attempting-to-unionize- 11. See, for example, Ching Kwan Lee, Against the 30-july-2018/. Law: Labor Protests in China’s Rustbelt and Sunbelt 16. “Global Call on China to Release Arrested (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007); Workers, Activists, and Students in Jasic Struggle,” Yang Su and Xin He, “Street as Courtroom: State Action Network, September 2018, actionnetwork. Accommodation of Labor Protest in South China,” org/petitions/call-on-china-to-release-arrested- Law and Society Review (Vol. 44, Issue 1, 2010), labour-activists/. 157-84; Xi Chen, Social Protest and Contentious 17. Ngai Pun, Yuan Shen, Yuhua Guo, Huilin Authoritarianism in China (New York: Cambridge Lu, Jenny Chan, and Mark Selden, “Worker- University Press, 2012); Yanhua Deng and Kevin intellectual Unity: Trans-Border Sociological J. O’Brien, “Relational Repression in China: Using Intervention in Foxconn,” Current Sociology (Vol. Social Ties to Demobilize Protesters,” The China 62, Issue 2, 2014), 209-22. Quarterly (Vol. 215, Sept. 2013), 533-52; Benjamin 18. Jenny Chan, “Shenzhen Jasic Technology: The L. Liebman, “Legal Reform: China’s Law-stability Birth of a Worker-student Coalition in China?” Paradox,” Daedalus: The Journal of the American Hong Kong Free Press, September 1, 2018, www. Academy of Arts and Sciences (Vol. 143, Issue 2, hongkongfp.com/2018/09/01/shenzhen-jasic- 2014), 96-109. technology-birth-worker-student-coalition-china/. 12. Chris King-chi Chan and Elaine Sio-ieng 19. Elizabeth Redden, “Cutting Ties,” Inside Higher Hui, “The Development of Collective Bargaining Ed, October 29, 2018, www.insidehighered.com/ in China: From ‘Collective Bargaining by Riot’ news/2018/10/29/cornell-ends-partnership-chi- to ‘Party State-led Wage Bargaining,’” The China nese-university-over-academic-freedom-concerns. Quarterly (Vol. 217, 2014), 221-42; Dave Lyddon,

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