Luddism and Labor Protest Among Silk Artisans and Workers in Jiangnan and Guangdong, 1860-1930

Abstract

Did the development of modern industry during the late Qing and early Republic threaten the livelihood of traditional artisans, and if so, how did the artisans respond? Was the formation of a working class with a social consciousness and propensity to rebel against capitalist exploitation a necessary consequence of modern industrialization in China? This paper seeks to throw light on the above questions through an examination of the impact of the growth of silk-reeling, China's leading export industry, on traditional artisans and on the formation of a new class of workers, and on the extent and nature of their protests. As we shall see, regional differences in industrial location, the function of silk in the local economy, and economic and social organization shaped and conditioned different reactive patterns of artisans and workers to industrialism in Jiangnan and Guangdong, the two leading centers of the modern silk-reeling industry. Curiously, despite their higher level of militarization and politicization, Guangdong male weavers engaged only sporadically in isolated acts of protest while their Jiangnan colleagues erupted violently far more frequently and regularly. Paradoxically, the more radical marriage strategies pursued by Guangdong women workers-delayed transfer marriage and sworn spinterhood1-made them more pliable to factory discipline and less prone to labor disputes than their Shanghai sisters, who practiced the major form of marriage.