Labour theatre against neoliberalism: WE 2s (2019) and migrant worker theatre in China

ABSTRACTThe suffering, struggling status and controversial political identity of Chinese internal migrant workers have put them in the academic spotlight for decades. An abundance of literature has analysed the problems faced by Chinese migrant workers from mainly three theoretical perspectives. However, not enough attention has been paid to migrant workers’ subjective understandings and feelings about their work and lives. The current article tries to illuminate the ambivalent feelings of migrant workers of the service sector in Shanghai, based on a brief comparison between migrant workers of three Asian countries, and the interviews with 16 Chinese migrant workers, two government officers and two local citizens in Yan community attached to Po district of Shanghai. It is argued that the migrant workers share an unsettled “structure of feeling” in everyday practices. They simultaneously feel bewildered and sanguine, depressed in a sombre mood and happy, passionate and indifferent. The unsettlement of the structure of feeling constitutes a political passivity for migrant workers. It is urgent to find ways to break up such a stalemate of consciousness.

Depression and associated factors in internal migrant workers in China.

The issue of illegal migrant workers is not a new phenomenon in developed countries, such as European countries, known as destination countries for migrants to seek better life. In the Netherlands, in particular, we find a big number of Indonesian migrants who stay and work without proper documents. These workers exist since the 18th century up to nowadays, especially since the establishment of the European Union (EU) which opens up European countries’ internal borders, specifically known as the ‘schengen countries’. They come mostly to European countries such as France and Germany as a tourist and thereafter go to the Netherlands to stay and work illegally. For developing countries such as Indonesia, the issue of illegal migrant workers is not really common. The existence of Chinese Illegal migrant workers has become a great issue in Indonesia at the end of the year 2016. Unlike the Indonesian workers in the Netherlands, the Chinese workers are invited by the company to come and work in Indonesia ‘temporarily.’ because of a contract between Chinese investors and the Indonesia government to transfer their knowledge and technology to the locals. A problem comes when these Chinese migrant workers stay even after their visa is expired and keep working in Indonesia. This paper will describe the background that drive migrants to stay and work illegally in another country and compare the law on migrant/ foreign workers and immigration law in EU, in particular in the Netherlands as well as the free movement regulation and its impact.

Diabetes-related metabolic risk factors in internal migrant workers in China: a national surveillance study

In this chapter, I first focus on the work conditions and the perspectives of Chinese migrant industrial workers in the early 1990s through a careful examination of 76 private letters and show how state, capital, and patriarchal powers dominated workers’ everyday lives. The bulk of the chapter focuses on the current situation. I show how, two decades later, by the early years of the 2010s, Chinese migrant workers’ lives had changed significantly compared to the early 1990s. Workers’ social and material lives as well as their social values had altered, shifting toward increased urbanism, individualism, and a keen awareness of consumerism. All these changes are captured in my ethnography of workers’ everyday life practices.

As urban builders, migrant workers (rural residents working in cities) should fairly enjoy urban educational resources. However, due to their social status, they face numerous educational challenges. This study explores how Chinese migrant workers' attitudes towards Internet usage influence educational equity, particularly in an environment where the Internet has become indispensable for learning, work, and daily life among Chinese residents. Using ANOVA and correlation analysis, the study investigates the relationship and influencing factors between migrant workers' attitudes towards Internet usage and educational equity. The research data were obtained from a 2020 survey conducted by the Peking University Chinese Social Sciences Survey Center, focusing primarily on Chinese migrant workers. The findings reveal that migrant workers' attitudes towards Internet usage significantly impact educational equity; groups that place greater emphasis on Internet usage exhibit better educational equity than others. Although the statistical differences in Internet usage attitudes among different regions are not significant, educational equity disparities among regions remain statistically significant. Based on these findings, recommendations are provided at the family, school, and government levels, aiming to address the digital divide, establish remote open education platforms, and improve the household registration system to enhance educational equity for migrant workers.

Background: In China, betel nut users were initially concentrated in specific regions and ethnic groups. However, in recent years, public health concerns have been raised because betel nuts, addictive substances, have become largely used by Chinese migrant workers. Methods: This study adopts an anthropological fieldwork research methodology to investigate the rise in betel nut consumption among Chinese migrant workers. We observe the everyday lives of migrant workers in the rural-urban area of Wuhan. We use in-depth interviews to understand their psychology and behaviors toward betel nut consumption. Discussion: The study’s results indicate that the observed increase in betel nut consumption among migrant workers is not only the result of the spread of betel nuts across regions and groups, but more importantly, it is related to the working and living conditions, social interaction, consumption culture, and masculinity image of migrant workers. The consumption of betel nuts reflects the political-economic structure and socio-cultural background to which Chinese migrant workers belong. Conclusion: The increasing consumption of betel nuts is a social issue that requires thorough research and government engagement. We contend that anthropology research may help identify the social mechanisms incentivizing betel nut consumption and solve the related public health issues among Chinese migrant workers from public policy and social governance perspectives.

Presently, the pace of transformation within traditional sectors of the Chinese economy is accelerating, resulting in the gradual demise of traditional occupations. Consequently, the emerging cohort of Chinese migrant workers confronts unprecedented challenges pertaining to their professional prospects and assimilation into urban society. In order to examine the impact of perceived unemployment risk on the inclination of new-generation migrant workers to embrace urban citizenship, we introduce the notions of environmental dynamism and active skill development as moderating variables. Employing multiple regression analysis, we construct a dual moderating model. The results of our study indicate that the perception of unemployment risk positively predicts the willingness of new-generation migrant workers to embrace urban citizenship. Moreover, we observe that environmental dynamism exerts a positive moderating influence on the relationship between unemployment risk perception and citizenship inclination. Additionally, active skill development serves to positively moderate the moderating effect of environmental dynamism. This study not only reveals the unique influence of subjective unemployment risk perception on the inclination towards urban citizenship but also sheds light on the role played by environmental dynamism and active skill development in this context. The findings of this research further enhance the theoretical framework pertaining to the study of urban citizenship inclination among new-generation Chinese migrant workers.

The influx of Chinese migrant workers in Indonesia has become a contentious debate and is perceived publicly as a threat. Chinese migrant workers are accused of seizing local occupational employment amidst high local unemployment. The government has repeatedly told people that Chinese workers are not a threat. In fact, several issues involving Chinese workers have arisen, for example, related to residence permits, involvement in smuggling, involvement in crime, even suspicion that Chinese workers were members of security forces. This article examines two competing representations of Chinese migrant workers in Indonesia. First, a public representation which is negative and strongly attempts to securitize Chinese migrant workers. Second, the government representation that views Chinese migrant workers in a more positive light and that acts as a form of counter-securitization. The paper argues that the failure of securitization of Chinese migrant workers by the public is due to staunch counter-securitization carried out on a massive scale by the government through political apparatus, mainstream media and social media influencers.

A web-based safety management platform to enhance safety for Chinese migrant construction workers

Online social networking services are hot in the recent years, but most of theses services in China aimed at the college students and business people, ignoring that Chinese migrant workers could be one of the biggest potential user groups of mobile social networking services in the future. This paper presents an ethnographic user study on Chinese rural-urban migrant workers' social networks in daily life and proposes a new mobile social networking service concept design for helping them to improve their social networks in daily life.

Self-harm and suicidality represent critical public health issues, particularly among migrant workers in China, who often confront adverse living and working conditions. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and characteristics of self-harm and suicidality, explore the risk factors associated with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and adverse adulthood experiences (AAEs), and elucidate the relationship models between cumulative risk factors and self-harm and suicidality among Chinese migrant workers. We conducted a cross-sectional survey involving 2,739 rural-to-urban migrant workers across China. Participants completed a structured questionnaire assessing self-harm, suicidality, ACEs, AAEs, and sociodemographic characteristics. Data analysis involved descriptive statistics, cross-tabulation, independent samples t-tests, logistic regression, and stepwise regression. Among the participants, the prevalence of self-harm and suicidality was 12.6 and 10.4%, respectively. Both ACEs and AAEs showed significant associations with self-harm and suicidality. Individuals reporting ACEs, such as parental divorce, childhood exposure to community violence, and school dropout, as well as AAEs including adult poverty, divorce intention, parent-child conflict, work burnout, and workplace discrimination, exhibited increased tendencies toward self-harm and suicidality. Moreover, a significant positive correlation was found between the cumulative risk index and self-harm and suicidality among Chinese migrant workers, with a critical threshold identified at 4-5 risk factors, indicating an exacerbation model. This study underscores the high prevalence of self-harm and suicidality among Chinese migrant workers, highlighting the significant impact of cumulative ACEs and AAEs on these outcomes. The findings emphasize the necessity for targeted interventions that address the identified risk factors to enhance the mental health and well-being of this vulnerable population.

Rural-to-urban migrant workers are a large marginalised population in urban China. Prevalence estimates of common mental health problems (CMHPs) in previous studies varied widely and very few studies have investigated migration-related factors of CMHPs in migrant workers. The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence and risk factors of CMHPs among Chinese migrant workers. A random sample of 3031 migrant workers of ten manufacturing factories in Shenzhen, China, completed a standardised questionnaire containing socio-demographic and migration-related variables and the Chinese 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). A GHQ-12 score of three or higher was used to denote the presence of CMHPs. The prevalence of CMHPs was 34.4% in Chinese migrant workers. In multiple logistic regression, risk factors for CMHPs included being 16-25 years old (odd ratio [OR] 1.65, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.28, 2.12), being 26-35 years old (OR 1.36, 95% CI: 1.05, 1.75), low monthly income (OR 1.42, 95% CI 1.04, 1.92), poor living condition (OR: 1.76, 95% CI: 1.22, 2.54), physical illness in the past 2 weeks (OR 1.72, 95% CI 1.43, 2.05), having worked in many cities (OR 1.34, 95% CI 1.03, 1.74), infrequently visiting hometown (OR 1.56, 95% CI 1.22, 1.99), poor Mandarin proficiency (OR 1.51, 95%CI 1.13, 2.01), a low level of perceived benefits of migration (OR 1.33, 95% CI 1.14, 1.55) and working more than 8 h/day (OR 1.39, 95% CI 1.14, 1.70). CMHPs are very prevalent among Chinese migrant workers. Given the large number of Chinese migrant workers, there is an urgent need to address the mental health burden of China's migrant worker population.

Many scholars claim that recent changes to Chinese society since economic reform have challenged longstanding forms of informal social care, such as filial piety. For instance there is a societal tension at work in contemporary Chinese society today. On the one hand decreasing co-residence in multi-generational households caused by rural-urban migration, population ageing, the fall in fertility and 'One-Child Policy', and women's increasing participation in the labour market, emphasises an individualised, wage earning centred society. On the other hand, the Chinese government has sought to enforce a form of institutionalised filial piety through policies that legally require younger generations fulfil the full responsibility of care as there is no institutionalised equivalent of the welfare state to provide e.g. home help or personal care to the elderly whose relatives live and work at some distance. This places many younger generations in the contradiction of having to comply with neo-liberal labour market demands while also fulfilling state enforced filial piety. This research is to look at how Chinese migrant worker experience perceived filial responsibilities in relation to End-of-Life care for parents diagnosed with cancer in the current Chinese context. My PhD, based on interviews with migrant peasant workers caught in this dilemma by the demands of having a terminally ill parent, examines how Chinese migrant peasant workers negotiate and conduct their filial practices. The preliminary analysis of the interviews suggests that 'Filial Piety' is getting reconstructed in multifaceted ways as they negotiate the care dilemmas they face. The way they engage with the concept of filial piety enables and constrains how they can think about and practically organise their parents' care. The result would shed a light on evaluation of and suggestions for governmental policy-makings, such as the newly implemented Parent-Visiting law in China, in terms of better reinforcing familial value and equipping end-of-life care, as well as taking into account of the specificity of peasant migrant workers' socio-economic status quo.

This study explores how the push factor of job demands and the pull factor of entrepreneurial resources influence the intention of Chinese migrant workers to return to their hometown and engage in entrepreneurial activities. Data were collected from 302 Chinese migrant workers. The main findings are as follows: a) job demands can increase the return-home entrepreneurial intention of migrant workers through the mediation of job burnout; b) entrepreneurial resources can positively influence the return-home entrepreneurial intention of migrant workers through the mediation of entrepreneurial conviction; c) generation positively moderates the job demands – job burnout – entrepreneurial intention relationship and negatively moderates the entrepreneurial resources – entrepreneurial conviction – entrepreneurial intention relationship. This study reveals the importance of examining push and pull factors concurrently, and emphasizes the intergenerational differences in explaining the return-home entrepreneurial intention of Chinese migrant workers.