Chinese Workers and Peasants

Mao’s Legacies

• Industrial development in 1950s– Modeled after the Soviet Union– Produced enlarged proletariat– Workers overwhelmingly concentrated in cities

• Promotion of rural industrialization– Employees in rural factories not strictly ``workers”

Industrialization in 1950s

Pre-Reform Workers

• Contrasts with workers in capitalist states during early stage of industrialization– More numerous and more spatially concentrated– Work units directly distributed goods and services

to employees– ``Iron rice bowl”: security of employment– Propaganda image of ``leading class”

Pre-Reform Workers

• Contrasts with workers in former socialist countries in East Europe– Very difficult to move from farmer to worker

status– Very difficult to move from one unit to another– Elimination of material incentive systems– Highly accentuated work unit system

Changes during Economic Reforms

• Altered the nature of working-class organization and experiences within traditional state and collective industrial firms

• Produced new (or revived from the pre-socialist era) segments of the working class outside of traditional sectors

Township and Village Enterprises

• A most dynamic sector of the economy• Owned or supervised by townships or villages

(not state-owned)• Can be collective, private firms, joint ventures,

or even foreign-owned• Workers are proletarians, not cultivators• Working conditions vary widely

Urban New Enterprises

• Self-employed individuals or households• Private firms• Bulk of urban private enterprise activity is

concentrated in commerce and services• Firms established with Asian capital• Firms established with Western capital

Reforming State Firms

• 1978 - 1984: eliminated Cultural Revolution practices

• 1984 - 1992: required state and collective firms increasingly to operate in a marketized environment

• 1992 - present: major changes in the internal labor practices

Stage I: 1978 - 1984

• Repudiate the Cultural Revolution legacy in state and collective firms

• Remuneration issues– removed the ban on material incentives– implemented bonus and piece-rate schemes– rescinded the post-1957 wage freeze– eased shortages of housing, food, and consumer

goods

Stage II: 1984 - 1992

• Subject state and collective firms to a more fully marketized environment

• New system of employment based upon limited term contracts in 1986, but ``Iron rice bowl” remained largely intact

• Urban workers’ hostility toward reforms• Bankruptcy Law in 1987

Stage III: 1992 - present

• Dismantle job security and benefits• Give management broad autonomy to hire

and fire workers and to decide wages and bonus payments

• Make it easier for individuals to obtain, quit, and change jobs on their own initiative

• Employment of rural contract workers

Decline of Workers’ Status

• Explosive growth of new (or revived) types of factories in which workers are compensated and treated quite poorly

• Erosion of the privileged treatment of workers in state firms

Worker Protests

• Rising complaints, petitions, slow-downs, strikes, sabotage, physical violence, etc.

• Labor dispute mediation committees• Labor Law was passed in 1994

Farmers As a Social Group

• Interests of farmers– Prices of agricultural commodities– Prices of industrial inputs– State support for rural development– Taxes and assessments– accountability of local officials– stability of regime policies, especially the

maintenance of household farming

Interest Articulation

• Public articulation of agrarian interests:– At the grassroots by farmers themselves– At higher or elite levels of the political hierarchy

by ``advocates”

Elite Advocates

• Rural deputies to the NPC• Agrarian research community of State Council

and Central Committee institutes• Agrarian research community of academies

and universities• Officials in ministries such as Agriculture• Editors and journalists in mass media

Grassroots Articulation

• Villagers express grievances and demands– legal system– village elections– appeal to officials at higher levels– letters to central agencies– letters to newspapers– protest

• Farmers do not have a mass organization

Regime Receptiveness

• 1978-83: high responsiveness– allocated new resources to agricultural sector• raised procurement prices

– abolished the commune system (collective farming)

– implemented ``Household Responsibility System” (family contract farming)• peasant demand and elite advocacy

Regime Receptiveness

• 1984-90: low responsiveness– accumulating problems in agriculture• grain output stagnated until 1989• rural real per capita income stagnated• agricultural investment from all sources lagged• state lowered procurement prices• farmer protests, violence, and riots

– intense advocacy of agrarian interests

Since the 1990s

• Rural protests, demonstrations, and riots• Regime attention to agriculture increased

significantly– pressure on local officials • to increase investment in agriculture• to decrease farmers’ financial burdens

– extension of family land contracts– passage of a ``Law on Agriculture”