Labor Protests (China)

Abstract

Since its foundation in 1921, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has insisted on its privileged relationship with Chinese workers. Although over the past century China has gone through momentous sociopolitical changes, this claim remains so central to party legitimacy that to this day the party's constitution still opens with the categorical statement that the CCP is “the vanguard of the Chinese working class, the Chinese people, and the Chinese nation.” While such an assertion is dismissed by most people as empty propaganda, this rhetorical identification between ruling party and workers has had very practical implications for labor politics in China, especially after the foundation of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949 and, even more, after the nationalization of Chinese industry in 1956. As they came to be governed by a party‐state that claimed to speak for them and represent their interests, Chinese workers suddenly found themselves deprived of their own voice and agency. This, however, did not mean that contradictions in the workplace came to an end, nor did this signal an end to labor unrest in China.