Chinese Workers in Comparative Perspective

As the "world’s factory" China exerts an enormous pressure on workers around the world. Many nations have had to adjust to a new global political and economic reality, and so has China. Its workers and its official trade union federation have had to contend with rapid changes in industrial relations. Anita Chan argues that Chinese labor is too often viewed from a prism of exceptionalism and too rarely examined comparatively, even though valuable insights can be derived by analyzing China’s workforce and labor relations side by side with the systems of other nations.The contributors to Chinese Workers in Comparative Perspective compare labor issues in China with those in the United States, Australia, Japan, India, Pakistan, Germany, Russia, Vietnam, and Taiwan. They also draw contrasts among different types of workplaces within China. The chapters address labor regimes and standards, describe efforts to reshape industrial relations to improve the circumstances of workers, and compare historical and structural developments in China and other industrial relations systems. Contributors: Frederick Scott Bentley, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Florian Butollo, Friedrich-Schiller University, Germany; Anita Chan, University of Technology, Sydney, and Australian National University; Chris King-chi Chan, City University of Hong Kong; Yu-bin Chiu, National Pingtung University of Education, Taiwan; Sean Cooney, University of Melbourne; Mary Huong Thi Evans, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Navjote Khara, Niagara College; Kevin Lin, University of Technology, Sydney; Mingwei Liu, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Peter Lund-Thomsen, Copenhagen Business School and Nottingham Business School; Boy Lüthje, Institute of Social Research, Frankfurt, Germany and Sun Yat-Sen University, China, and the East-West Center, Honolulu; Khalid Nadvi, University of Manchester; Thomas Nice, Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience; Tim Pringle, SOAS, University of London; Katie Quan, University of California–Berkeley and Sun Yat-Sen University, China; Susan J. Schurman, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Kaxton Siu, Chinese University of Hong Kong; Hong Xue, East China Normal University, Shanghai