Workers’ motile subjectivities and the socio-spatial formations of Chinese state-owned enterprises

Abstract

This paper explores the interplay between labor agency and the socio-spatial structure of Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the context of globalization. Drawing on Coe & Jordhus-Lier’s theorization of constrained labor agency with insights from new mobilities paradigm, we develop the concept of motile subjectivity to explain the multiplicity of constrained agency and workers’ different employment practices intervened in SOE socio-spatial formations. Based on field research conducted in SOEs in the Northeastern provinces of China, our analysis unfolds that workers’ motile subjectivities mainly drive three threads of employment practices, namely demission, positional promotion, and part-time work, which involve workers’ variegated mobile and immobile experiences. These (im)mobilities affect workers’ ongoing social and spatial practices and further conjoin with the reproduction of SOE socio-spaces with both manifestations of stable danwei and multi-scalar modern enterprises. Our study contributes to labor geography scholarship by theorizing the actualization of workers’ motile subjectivities in SOE socio-spatial formations. It also provides insights for future SOE studies to seriously consider workers’ motile subjectivities.