The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus Volume 12 | Issue 11 | Number 3 | Mar 14, 2014

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Worker-Intellectual Unity: Suicide, trans-border sociologicalintervention, and the Foxconn-Apple connection 労働者、インテリゲンチャ共闘　国境を越える社会学的介入と富士康・アップル社の連携

Pun Ngai, Jenny Chan, Mark Selden, Lu Huilin, Guo Yuhua, Shen Yuan

Abstract

What are the implications for global publicsociology and labor studies when more than ascore of Foxconn workers jump to their deathand when a wave of protests, riots and strikesoccur in their wake? This article documents theformation of a cross-border sociologicalintervention project and illustrates howsociological research fueled regionalcampaigns that gradually developed into aglobal campaign. This experience confirms theimportant political contribution that socialscience can make when linked with grassrootspolitics. The authors shed light on how socialand economic injustice was creativelychallenged by combining the strengths ofworkers, researchers and transnationalmovement activists. The study uses bothquantitative (semi-structured questionnaires)and qualitative (in-depth interviews andparticipation observation) methods to gaininsights concerning the experiences, worldviews and collective agency of Chinese workerswho are struggling to make sense of the globalproduction regime they inhabit and to contestthe forces that shape their working and sociallives.

Keywords

China, Apple, Foxconn workers, suicide, publicsociology, labor studies, global production,transnational movements

Introduction

At about 8 a.m. on 17 March 2010, a 17-year-old worker, Tian Yu, went to the window of herfourth story dorm room at the Foxconn factoryin Shenzhen and jumped. Tian Yu survived.Many more would follow Tian Yu in attemptingto end their lives even as global consumersraced to consume new generation electronicproducts as if there was no tomorrow. Within12 months, 18 young rural migrant workersattempted suicide at Foxconn facilities. Theworkers who attempted suicide ranged in agebetween 17 and 25 – the prime of youth. Theresponsibility for this tragedy and the largertragedy of China's workers is not Foxconn'salone, although, as the manufacturer of morethan 50% of the world's electronic products, itis an enormous player. The problems extend farbeyond the factory floor to the profit squeezethat Foxconn and other multinationalproducers have to face from the world's leadinggiants such as Apple, Samsung and Microsoft.This article introduces a three-year experimentin public sociology in China involvingresearchers and activists from China, HongKong and Taiwan that was sparked by the spateof suicides of Foxconn workers in 2010 andsubsequent worker s t rugg les . Th isexperimental project attempted to understandthe lives and struggles of China's new workingclass comprised overwhelmingly of young ruralmigrants through the lens of Foxconn and itsrelationship to Apple and the Chinese state.

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Foxconn workers flood in and out of theLonghua factory in Shenzhen, Guangdong.Hon Hai Precision Industry Company,known by its trade name Foxconn, isheadquartered in Taipei. (Photo credit:University Research Group)

It is useful to cast contemporary struggles inlight of the linkages forged between workersand intellectuals in the course of China'srevolution. China has a modern history ofworker and peasant bonds to organicintellectuals. In the May Fourth era of1919–1927, students and teachers playedactive roles in the worker, peasant and anti-imperialist upsurge that led to a surge ofstrikes and boycotts that coincided with therapid growth of Communist and Nationalistmovements. In 1921, revolutionary studentsincluding Deng Zhongxia, a student of PekingUniversity, and his classmates set up aworkers' evening school in Changxindian, asuburban area of Beijing that was near aFrench-owned railway company where workerssuffered from extreme exploitation. Half a yearlater, the students joined a historic strike atChangxindian (Kwan, 1997). At that time, manyprogressive students became workers, playingkey roles in the formation of trade unions

throughout the 1920s and 1930s.

Students and intellectuals played importantroles in conducting labor surveys, collectingworker's oral histories, providing educationprograms for workers and participating inorganizing strikes and protests. The newlyformed sociology department at ShanghaiUniversity in 1922 focused on labor studies andthe labor movement in China's great industrialcity. At that time, there was no room for'politics' divorced from 'science,' as Burawoyargues in his article, 'Making public sociology:Its pitfalls and its possibilities' (Burawoy,2011).

Chinese sociologists in Beijing, Tianjin,Shanghai, Guangzhou and other citiesconducted detailed surveys on workers'incomes, work hours, daily expenditures, rentalcosts, family consumption, children's educationand other subjects of importance to the nascentlabor movement. Factors including theworkers' industrial sector, place of origin, placeof work, gender, age and household memberswere all documented and analyzed, resulting indetailed labor studies and surveys on theconditions of Chinese workers in the 1920s and1930s. They are classics of Chinese laborsociology (Li, Xia and Huang, 2005).

The era in which Chinese intellectuals andworkers lived and worked closely together haslong past. Sociology as a discipline wasofficial ly abolished in China in 1952,condemned as a 'bourgeois' social science.Despite an abortive effort to revive it in 1957,its resurrection on new foundations did notbegin until 1979 – this time in the service ofreform and international ization, thefoundations for a 'harmonious' modern societyas envisaged by Deng Xiaoping (Cheng and So,1983; Yan, 2004). Under the banner ofm o d e r n i z a t i o n , g l o b a l i z a t i o n a n dprofessionalism, Fei Xiaotong, the renownedChinese sociologist, led sociology on a newtrajectory in the 1980s. In mainland China,

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within these parameters, sociological voicestoday are more visible in media and in publicdebates than their counterparts in the West. Inthis light, sociology in China is inherentlyimbued with a public nature – but not always ina progressive direction, due to its close linkagewith the state.

In light of modernization and globalization andthe shift from revolution to reform in the post-Mao era, most Chinese sociologists, in waysfamiliar to contemporary American sociology,have prioritized 'science' over 'politics,'promoted the discipline as 'value-neutral,' andreplaced Marx's class analysis with Weber'sstratification lens. Michael Burawoy has drawnattention to the global commodification ofeducation and knowledge within whichsociology as a social 'science' prioritizesquantitative research over qualitative studies,claiming the former are more 'scientific' andmarketable. Indeed, many quantitative studiesare offered to corporations in the form ofmarket surveys. In China, this type of sociologyis known as 'professional sociology.' Trainingelites, providing corporations with marketsurveys and providing the state with data onincome, consumption and stratificationcharacterize the discipline of sociology in Chinaas elsewhere. Within contemporary Chinesestate capitalism – with deepening links betweenprivate and international capital and the state –scant space remains for practicing reflexiveand critical sociology.

Could global public sociology find a place andcontribute to a progressive rebirth, placing theinterests of Chinese workers and farmers at thecenter of the discipline? What is certain is thatChina, like others, will not escape theimplacable logic of capital accumulation,commodification and the subordination of laborto capital and the state. China, now arguablythe workshop of the world with an economyheavily dependent on international trade, willnot be spared the impact of the contemporaryglobal crisis. Disruptive power, as described by

Frances Fox Piven (2014) could emerge whenthe time is ripe. In mainland China, due to thelink between sociology and state, it is impera-tive that public sociology be reborn as criticalsociology or critical sociological intervention,as a few Chinese sociologists at TsinghuaUniversity and elsewhere advocate. If that is tohappen, the links to state and capital have to belessened and those to workers, farmers andgrassroots groups strengthened. Autonomous,reflexive and critical approaches have to bedeveloped. These pose huge challenges, ofcourse. Will it require a social crisis for thesedevelopments, or can we discern thepossibilities of a public sociology in embryonicform? Consider the case of Foxconn, Apple andChina's rural migrant workers.

The public statement on worker suicides

When 'the ninth Foxconn worker' committedsuicide on 11 May 2010 (the number ofattempted suicides at two major facilities ofFoxconn in Shenzhen had apparently increasedsince January) , a number of Chinesesociologists and students called a meeting todiscuss possible actions. In response to thetragedy, some of us suggested immediateaction. For years we had been talking aboutcritical sociological interventions. But when,and how? We made two decisions: first, weissued a public letter calling on Foxconn andthe Chinese government to act decisively toend this series of tragedies and to protect therights and lives of the younger generation ofmigrant workers. Second, we prepared toconduct thorough research on Foxconn invarious regions in order to understand the rootcauses of worker suicides and their relation tothe global supply chain and production system.In mid-May, the semester had not yet endedand students were busy taking examinations orwriting theses. Nine sociologists decided toissue a preliminary statement, and once thesemester ended this would immediately befollowed up with a sociological survey and fieldstudies. On 18 May 2010 the statement was

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released. It reads, painfully:

From the moment they [the new generation ofmigrant workers] step beyond the doors oftheir houses, they never think of going back tofarming like their parents. In this sense, theysee no other option when they enter the city towork. The moment they see there is littlepossibility of building a home in the citythrough hard work, the very meaning of theirwork collapses. The path ahead is blocked, andthe road to retreat is closed. Trapped in thissituation, the new generation of migrantworkers faces a serious identity crisis and, ineffect, this magnifies psychological andemotional problems. Digging into this deeperlevel of our societal and structural conditions,we come closer to understanding the 'no wayback' mentality of these Foxconn employees.

The sociologists had many considerations indrafting the statement, but among them twowere particularly significant. The first waswhether the statement could be reported andquoted by mainland Chinese media andwhether it could navigate through the controland censorship of the press and electronicmedia by the Chinese government. Thisconcern affected the wording and thepresentation of the statement. The otherconsideration was how to effectively react toFoxconn, whose public responses to workers'suicides were uniform: the nine young workerswho attempted suicides (seven had passedaway by mid-May) suffered from individualpsychological problems such as poor mentalhealth, depression, distress over heavy debts orfamily and other personal problems. Foxconnhired western and Chinese psychologists andpsychiatrists to defend it in the wake of theplague of worker suicides at the company. Theychose statistics as their first line of defense:nine jumps or attempted suicides in five monthsamong a population of more than 500,000 wasstill far lower than the national suicide rate,they responded, ignoring the fact that thesuicides took place at a single company in a

single city, and the victims were in the prime ofyouth.

The statement was a first reaction to Foxconn,in hopes of bring structural – rather thanpersonal or psychological – factors to theforefront of the public agenda. Many of thenine petitioners had previously conductedresearch on migrant labor issues in China in anattempt to highlight the social injusticesexperienced by migrant workers. We arguedthat wi th the process o f incompleteproletarianization that shaped the migrantlabor force that had become the core of China'snew working class, the root of the workersuicides lay in the combination of exploitationin a global production system and an uncaringsociety which denies rural migrants urbancitizenship rights and bars them fromorganizing. Many among the estimated 260million rural migrant workers, including theFoxconn employees, are being thrown into astate of deep contradiction. They reject theregimented hardships their predecessorssilently endured as cheap laborers and second-class citizens. They rebel against theirmarginalized status and meaningless life.Hence, we argued that 'throwing bodiesthrough the dormitory building' is an act offrustration – and of defiance. In their defiantdeaths, the workers call on the Chinese nation– and international society – to wake up beforemore lives are sacrificed. We argued:

In the absence of effective channels ofexpression and association, the suicide jumperschose to sacrifice their lives as a means ofaccusation. Neither in China nor internationallyshould anyone have to make sacrifices of thiskind. Was it suicide or murder?

At the time of this open letter, students andlabor non-governmental organizations createdblogs dedicated to the Foxconn worker victimsand their families, with the theme song 'Grief'spreading quickly through the web. Across thestraits, more than 300 Taiwanese issued

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another open statement and on 13 June 2010they held a press conference in Taipei tocondemn Foxconn management and itsbrutality toward mainland workers. A fewTaiwanese sociologists pointed out that thiswas the first time that Taiwanese scholars fromtwo different political camps, the pro-unification and independence forces, joinedtogether to issue a public statement. Benefitingfrom a more open and democratic society,Taiwan scholars issued a set of demands toFoxconn, Apple, and the Chinese government:

To Foxconn [its Taiwanese-owned parentcompany, Hon Hai Precision IndustryCompany], we ask for an end to militarydiscipline in the factory as well as thedormitory, the improvement of working andliving conditions of the workers and theestablishment of a humane production lineprocess.

Multinational companies especially Appleshould take responsibility for the tragedies thathave occurred at Foxconn. Poor conditions, lowwage levels and the inhumane mode of labordiscipline of Taiwanese companies have muchto do with the price competition of globalbrands such as Apple, HP and Dell.

We urge the Chinese government to raise thestatutory minimum wage to a level that meetsthe basic needs of urban living, to abolish thehousehold registration system under whichpeople are segregated into 'the local' and the'the outsiders.' We also ask for a labor unionreform which could guarantee shop floor laborrepresentation and the establishment of arational mechanism for collective bargaining.

On the basis of these two open statementslinking scholars and students from mainlandChina, Hong Kong and Taiwan, a large-scalecollective investigation of Foxconn was set upin the summer of 2010.

Taiwanese researchers' press conferenceon 13 June 2010 called on Foxconn: "Endto sweatshop" and "Defend labor andhuman rights." (Photo credit: UniversityResearch Group)

This ongoing sociological research on Appleand Foxconn is a trans-border project. Themeteoric rise of Foxconn as the world's largestelectronics manufacturer has been hailed as amodel of East Asian manufacturing prowessthat is illustrative of China's dynamic export-oriented industry. Foxconn indeed stands outas a new form of global industrial capitalbecause of its speed of capital accumulationand its scale of expansion to all regions ofChina. Today, Foxconn has a workforce of morethan 1.4 million, and at its biggest productionfacility at Shenzhen Longhua in south China, ithas more than 400,000 young workers assignedto day and night shifts on the assembly lines. Itis a key node in the global production networkwhere assembly and shipment of finished prod-ucts to global consumers continues around theclock, 365 days a year.

The tragic suicides – emblematic of myriadlabor problems at the workplaces that producethe world's most sought after products, as wellas the strength of a survivor like Tian Yu –prompt us to dip into the Chinese and globalcontext of international electronic capital(Chan, 2010; Chan and Pun, 2010). The focus ofour attention is a new generation of Chinese

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workers, their lives, their struggles, their hopesand dreams. It is also the American and globalelectronic giants who design and market theproducts we cherish and their responsibility toprotect the workers who produce them.

The political context

At the peak of the suicide cluster in the springof 2010, Chinese governments at provincial andlower levels communicated their concerns. On26 May 2010, after the '12th jump,' a Shenzhenmunicipal government spokespersonannounced that the government would takesteps to 'improve laborers' living conditions andenterprise management,' and, soon after onemore attempted suicide on 27 May, Guangdongprovincial party secretary Wang Yang statedthat 'the Party, government organizations andFoxconn must work together and take effectivemeasures to prevent similar tragedies fromhappening again' (quoted in Li, 2010).However, the specifics of the joint measures – ifany – were never disclosed.

Our research reveals that rather than analyzingand taking actions to overcome the root causesof suicides, Chinese officials moved to ban'negative' reporting about Foxconn in the pressas well as online (China Digital Times, 30 May2010):

28 May 2010: 'About the Foxconn incident, onthe Internet, other than Xinhua's domesticgeneral information, there should be no otherreporting. … All related content before the 12th

jump should be locked up. … All websites mustcomplete the cleanup task tonight. Do not haveany dead corners.'

29 May 2010: 'For the front pages of newswebsites and news center pages, blogs, micro-blogs, there should be no news related to"Foxconn" except from official sources.'

While sociologists in Hong Kong and Taiwanface few constraints in exposing the issuesrelated to the Foxconn suicides, mainland

Chinese sociologists and students facecensorship and media control. The banning ofnews about the suicides by the Chinesegovernment created intense anxiety amongChinese sociologists and students. The need toconduct field research on Foxconn workers'conditions was pressing. Despite the risks,sociologists and students launched a large-scale investigation in the summer of 2010.

A collective investigation

In June 2010, faculty and students from 20universities in mainland China, Taiwan andHong Kong set up a University Research Groupon Foxconn. The universities include PekingUniversity, Tsinghua University, RenminUniversity, Sun Yat-sen University, TaiwanNational University, Taiwan TsinghuaUniversity, Tunghai University, ChineseUniversity of Hong Kong, Hong KongPolytechnic University and others. Togetherwith SACOM (Students and Scholars againstCorporate Misbehavior), a Hong Kong-basedlabor group formed by students and scholarsconcerned about labor rights issues in main-land China, researchers joined forces toconduct independent investigations ofFoxconn's labor practices and productionsystem. This is the first time that sociologistsand students from the three Chinese societieshave come together to conduct joint research,sharing common concerns over labor rightsissues driven by Apple and Foxconn (Pun andChan, 2012, 2013; Pun et al., 2012, 2013a,2013b; Chan 2013; Chan, Pun and Selden2013).

We were worried about the political sensitivityand the risks involving mainland researchers.When 40 of us arrived at Shenzhen Longhuafrom different parts of the country and abroad,after basic training on the company profile,interview skills, research ethics and personalsafety, we divided into smaller teams, settlingat different hostels and carrying out interviewsand surveys in the Longhua and Guanlan

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industrial communities, where the two megafactories of Foxconn are based.

40 students and scholars from Hong Kong,China, and Taiwan take part in researchskills training preparatory to conductingfieldwork in Foxconn factories, workerdormitories, and public spaces. (Photocredit: University Research Group).

The research was mainly done as Foxconnworkers – easily identified by their uniformsand staff cards – left their workplaces for lunchand dinner and during their rest days. Duringmeal times, tens of thousands of workerspoured out to the streetside food stalls. We alsotargeted workers changing shifts from day tonight or night to day, the gap hours betweenshifts providing time to conduct in-depthinterviews. And, we visited nearby clinics andhospitals to interview injured workers, who toldus about how they had been injured and theirgrievances. Every day for two consecutiveweeks, our study started around 11 a.m. andlasted until 10 p.m. Group meetings anddiscussions on the findings of the investigationbegan at 10:30 p.m. With heated debates, thesemeetings, conducted separately amongTaiwanese, Hong Kong and mainland Chinesegroups, lasted until midnight or early morning.In addition, we had two general meetings to

discuss the progress and difficulties we faced,in which the scholars and students from allthree areas came together.

Surprisingly, throughout the summer weencountered no direct intervention fromFoxconn or the local state. To supplementsurveys and in-depth interviews, 14 mainlandChinese students entered Foxconn for onemonth to work as frontline workers and collectfirst-hand information about conditions in theplants and workers' lives. Altogether, in thefirst phase between June and December 2010we interviewed and surveyed workers andmanagers at major Foxconn factory complexesin nine coastal and inland cities where thecompany's factories were then concentrated:Shenzhen, Shanghai, Kunshan, Hangzhou,Nanjing, Tianjin, Langfang, Taiyuan and Wuhan(see Map 1). This resulted in a research reporton Foxconn, released in a press conference atPeking University on 9–10 October 2010. Acopy of the report was sent to Foxconn, Apple,the State Council of the People's Republic ofChina, and the All-China Federation of TradeUnions. In the second phase of our research,beginning from March 2011 to the present, weinterviewed workers, student interns, teachers(in charge of internship programs), managers,and local government officials at three newFoxconn factories in Chongqing, Chengdu, andZhengzhou, and revisited our interviewees inthe nine cities.

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Map 1. Foxconn's Locations in GreaterChina

Sources: Foxconn Technology Groupcompany websites.

Note: Foxconn has more than 30 factoriesacross the Chinese mainland.

In all, the University Research Group collected2,409 questionnaires through snowballsampling and conducted 500 interviewsbetween 2010 and 2013. The second reporttargeted the use of student interns as a new,cheap and expendable form of labor in Foxconnin the process of rapid expansion and called forthe legally mandated protection of studentlaborers.

Apple's corporate image: 'Care andcommitment'

How has Apple responded to the Foxconnworkers' suicides and subsequent workeractions including protests and strikes? CanApple contribute toward a global labormovement supportive of workers' rights?

In February 2011, Apple released its Supplier

Responsibility Progress Report to show theremedial measures taken by Foxconn, itslargest supplier, in the aftermath of thesuicides. Apple's (2011: 19) auditing team wasquick to applaud Foxconn's emergencyresponses:

The team commended Foxconn for taking quickaction on several fronts simultaneously,inc lud ing h i r ing a l a rge number o fpsychological counselors, establishing a 24-hour care center and even attaching large netsto the factory buildings to prevent impulsivesuicides.

Apple and other corporate leaders of the globalelectronics industry association moved swiftlyto resolve the public relations crisis, seeking aquick fix while ignoring the structural problemsof labor relations and the fundamentalproduction conditions that gave rise to theepidemic of worker suicides. None of the'remedial measures' mentioned such coreissues as speedup, compulsory overtime work,dangerous conditions in Foxconn factories,humiliation of workers and illegal practicesassociated with the use of student interns asworkers. In this self-policing – or moreaccurately public relations – mode of corporatesocial responsibility, most importantly, Applefailed to address issues that arose from its ownhigh pressure ordering practices, whichcontributed directly to blatant rights violationsby Foxconn and other supplier factories.

Indeed, the fundamental problems haveremained intractable not least because Apple'spublic calls for reform have been accompaniedby continued pressure from Apple on Foxconnto meet high production quotas and to acceptlower payments for its products.

Apple's success is predicated on its ability toprovide innovative products to meet ever-changing consumer demand. Tracking demandworldwide, Apple adjusts its productionforecasts daily. As Apple CEO Tim Cook puts it,'Nobody wants to buy sour milk' (quoted in

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Satariano and Burrows, 2011). Streamliningand controlling the global supply chain on theprinciple of 'competition against time' isApple's supply-chain management's goal. Ourstudies show that compressed delivery time ofnew products has repeatedly taken precedenceover protecting workers' health, safety andrights, at times with tragic consequences. As aresult, simultaneous with stepped-up audits,tremendous pressure for suppliers such asFoxconn to cut corners continued andintensified.

Foxconn's promise

In the more than three years since the suicidewave, have Foxconn managers taken mean-ingful actions to assure the welfare of workers?The 2010 company report touted highcorporate ideals framed in terms of a 'people-oriented leadership style that promotessustainability, stability, development,technology, internationality and responsibilityfor the advancement of social welfare and thehuman good' (Foxconn Technology Group,2011: 6). The statement of the Foxconn GlobalSocial and Environmental ResponsibilityCommittee reads (Foxconn Technology Group,2011: 1):

Foxconn renewed its commitment to 'respectemployees, ensure continuous improvement,contribute to the well-being of society andachieve sustainabi l i ty . ' In pursuingtransformation of its management style,Foxconn has raised its standards in employeefr inge benef i ts , provided addit ionalrecreational activities and assisted employeesin coping with workplace stress.

From July 2010, facing dual pressures from theinternational criticism following the suicidesand the tight labor market in Shenzhen,Foxconn raised the basic wage of its productionoperators in Shenzhen to 1,200 yuan (US$190)a month, that is, 9% above the statutory localminimum wage. This still meant that if aFoxconn worker wished to buy Apple's lowest-

priced iPad at US$499, it would cost about twomonths' total income, including overtimepremiums.

As of mid-2011, the basic monthly wage ofassembly-line workers was 1,350 yuan(US$213) in Chengdu and 1,550 yuan (US$245)in Shenzhen, the other surveyed Foxconnfactories falling within this range. The regionalvariations reflect differences in China'sminimum wage by locality. In December 2013,as Foxconn's entry-level workers' wage wasincreased to 1,800 yuan a month (US$285) inShenzhen, Foxconn accelerated to relocate tonew plants in Zhengzhou and Chengdu wherethe minimum wage was lower.

Foxconn also declared that it would reduceexcessive overtime from some 100 hours permonth, close to three times the 36-hour legallimit for overtime, to 80 extra hours a month; inother words, close to a 60-hour work week (i.e.,a normal 40-hour work week plus 20 hours ofovertime).

In March 2012, following the release of theApple-funded Fair Labor Association (FLA)investigation report based on survey dataprovided by more than 35,000 workers at threeFoxconn facilities (in Longhua, Guanlan, andChengdu), Foxconn stated that it would rectifythe most serious abuses noted. Specifically, itpledged to cut excessive compulsory overtime,and promised to move toward full compliancewith Chinese labor law, which stipulates thatno worker will labor for more than 49 hours perweek (i.e., a 40-hour week plus nine hours ofovertime, or 36 hours per month of overtime).This is an important benchmark. But will itreally be honored in the face of pressures fromApple and other electronic giants to meetquotas on demand?

Trans-border practice and the globalcampaign

Given the work and study pressures that mostsociology faculty and students face during the

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semester, a trans-border campaign – whichgradually evolved into a global one – theinvolvement of SACOM was critical. SACOMsuggests that Foxconn is not the only companythat must be held accountable for the violationof labor rights. The dire plight of the workers atFoxconn was equally the product of pressuresfrom its major client, Apple. From May 2010 toDecember 2013, SACOM released sixinvestigative reports on Apple and Foxconn.

In response to the spate of suicides at Foxconn,S A C O M o r g a n i z e d a G l o b a l D a y o fRemembrance for Victims of Foxconn on 8 June2010, the date of Foxconn InternationalHoldings' (a wholly-owned subsidiary ofFoxconn Technology Group) shareholdermeeting in Hong Kong. The Netherlands-basedGoodElectronics and makeITfair joined thecampaign to mobilize their partners in theEuropean network to protest against Foxconn.Labor groups and trade unions in Mexico,India, and other developing countriesorganized actions to demand that Foxconnreform its military-style management method.SACOM's partners in the United States alsoheld protests in San Francisco, Boston and NewYork to demand justice for the Foxconn victims.In addition, the US-based United StudentsAgainst Sweatshops, Labour Start, ChineseProgressive Association, China Labor Watch,and other groups launched petitions calling onApple and Foxconn to end the abuses atFoxconn. Thousands of people supported theseactions.

SACOM (Students and Scholars AgainstCorporate Misbehavior) unfurls a 6-metertall banner from the third floor of theH o n g K o n g A p p l e S t o r e i n t h eInternational Finance Center on OpeningDay, 24 September 2011. (Photo credit:SACOM)

The media coverage of the poor workingconditions at Foxconn was remarkable. Theplight of Foxconn workers was reported by TheSouth China Morning Post, AFP, The Guardian,The Independent, The New York Times, AlJazeera, Daily Mail, The Age, Spiegel Online,The Huf f ing ton Pos t and dozens o finternational media outlets.

The 2011 aluminum dust explosions that took

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worker lives at Foxconn (Chengdu) andPegatron (Shanghai), the abuse of studentinterns as operators, the excessive workinghours during peak seasons, and above all, theproliferation of workers' protests, strikes andriots have fuel led the campaign on atransnational scale. A comprehensive report byThe New York Times in January 2012 triggereda movement by consumers in the United States(Duhigg and Barboza, 2012). Online petitiongroups such as Change.org and SumOfUsinitiated petitions targeting Apple's unethicallabor practices. In addition to online petitions,the groups called on supporters to present the250,000 signatures to Apple stores in differentcities in early 2012. A civil society network inthe United States was built to promote theconsumer campaign targeting Apple.

Concluding remarks

What are the implications for global publicsociology and labor studies when more than ascore of Foxconn workers jump to their deathand when a wave of protests, riots and strikesoccur in their wake? This article documents theformation of a cross-border sociologicalintervention project and illustrates how,through the mobilization of SACOM and others,sociological research could fuel regionalcampaigns that gradually developed into aglobal campaign. This experience confirms thesocial and political contribution that socialscience can make even under authoritarianconditions.

We challenge the conventional idea that socialstudies can or should be divorced from theresearchers' core values and political vision.We attempt to bring about new understandingof the relationship between global productionand worker resistance in China, aboutuniversity education and about the goals ofresearchers. We also shed light on how socialand economic injustice can be creatively chal-lenged by combining the strengths of workers,researchers and transnational movement

activists.

We use both quantitative (semi-structuredquestionnaires) and qualitative (in-depthinterviews and participation observation)methods to gain insights concerning theexperiences, world views and collective agencyof Chinese workers, who are struggling tomake sense of the global production regimethey inhabit and to contest the forces thatshape their working and social lives. In thecourse of our research, we documented laborstrikes, protests and riots in various Foxconnfacilities and dormitories. These collectiveactions as well as legal challenges are nowconfront ing the Foxconn and Applemanagements.

The labor struggles staged by Foxconnworkers, while thus far dispersed and short-lived, have spread across China. With newfactory operations in west and central China, asubstantial portion of rural workers are beingrecruited from within their home provinces andeven their home towns or prefectures. Weanticipate that the forms of labor resistance forrural migrants will change as they work closerto their native places and have the opportunityto draw on local social networks. Thesociocultural politics of place can be important.There is potential for Chinese worker activismto grow to a regional or national level.

At the time of this writing, the movement iscontinuing. Workers go out on strike, SACOMand other labor groups build solidaritynetworks to support the workers' struggle, andsociologists are writing a book for the generalpublic as well as carrying out comparativeresearch across regions in China. Reignitingthe tradition of intellectual–worker unity, moremainland Chinese university students areworking on production lines during theirsummer vacations to understand and documentthe life-world of workers' hardships andstruggles. A number of young graduates havemoved to live in local industrial communities,

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offering education programs and organizingcultural activities for Foxconn and otherworkers. These engagements on the groundaim to facilitate the formation of an emergentworker community organization. A criticalapproach to public sociology is slowly takingroot in China. If it flourishes, its implicationswill extend far beyond China to the world.

This is a revised version of an article that waspublished in Current Sociology online 7 January2014 under the title "Worker-intellectual unity:Trans-border sociological intervention inFoxconn."

Recommended Citation: Pun Ngai, Shen Yuan,Guo Yuhua, Lu Huilin, Jenny Chan and MarkSelden, "Worker-Intellectual Unity: Suicide,trans-border sociological intervention, and theFoxconn-Apple connection," The Asia-PacificJournal, Vol. 12, Issue 11, No. 3, March 17,2014.

Author biographies

Pun Ngai is Professor in the Department ofApplied Social Sciences, Polytechnic Universityof Hong Kong and Deputy Director of thePeking University branch of the Hong KongPolytechnic University's Social Work ResearchCenter.

Shen Yuan and Guo Yuhua are Professors inthe Department of Sociology, TsinghuaUniversity.

Lu Huilin is Associate Professor in theDepartment of Sociology, Peking University.

Jenny Chan is a PhD candidate in Sociologyand Chinese Labor Studies at University ofLondon, where she is a Great Britain-ChinaEducational Trust Awardee and Reid ResearchScholar.

Mark Selden is Senior Research Associate in

the East Asia Program at Cornell Universityand Coordinator of The Asia-Pacific Journal.

Résumé

Plus d'une vingtaine de travailleurs de Foxconnont mis fin à leurs jours en sautant du haut deleur logement, entraînant une vague deprotestations, d'émeutes et de grèves. Quellessont les implications de tels événements pour lasociologie publique globale et les études sur lesressources humaines? Ce chapitre décrit lacréation d'un projet d'intervention sociologiquetransfrontalier et illustre comment la recherchesociologique a attisé les campagnes régionalese t condu i t p rogress i vement à l eurtransformation en une campagne mondiale.Cette expérience confirme le principe selonlequel la 'science sociale' ne devrait jamais êtreséparée de la 'politique'. Nous mettonségalement en lumière comment l'injusticesociale et économique a été mise au défi d'unemanière créative par une combinaison de laforce des travailleurs, des chercheurs et desactivistes d'un mouvement transnational. Nousutilisons à la fois des méthodes quantitatives(questionnaires semi-structurés) et qualitatives(entretiens en profondeur et observation de laparticipation) pour obtenir un aperçu desexpériences, des opinions mondiales et dusystème d'organisation collective destravailleurs chinois, qui ont du mal à donnersens au régime de production mondiale danslequel ils vivent et contestent les forces quifaçonnent leurs vies professionnelle et sociale.

Mots-clés

Chine, études sur les ressources humaines,mouvement transnational, sociologie publiqueglobale, travailleurs de Foxconn

Resumen

Cuáles son las implicancias para la sociologíapública mundial y los estudios laborales cuandomás de una veintena de trabajadores deFoxconn salta hacia su muerte, dejando una ola

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de protestas, disturbios y huelgas a su paso?Este capítulo documenta la formación de unproyecto de intervención sociológicatransfronteriza e ilustra cómo la investigaciónsociológica impulsó las campañas regionalesque se transformaron gradualmente en unacampaña global. Esta experiencia confirma lapremisa que 'las ciencias sociales' nunca debensepararse de la 'política'. Asimismo, aclaramoscómo se desafió con creatividad a la injusticiasocial y económica al combinar las fuerzas delos trabajadores, los investigadores y losactivistas de movimientos transnacionales.Empleamos métodos cuant i t a t i vos(cuestionarios semi-estructurados) ycualitativos (entrevistas exhaustivas yobservación de la participación) para obtenerpercepciones respecto de las experiencias, lasvisiones del mundo y la capacidad para actuaren forma colectiva de los trabajadores chinos,quienes luchan para encontrar el sentido alrégimen de producción global en el que habitany para responder a las fuerzas que dan forma asus vidas laborales y sociales.

Palabras clave

China, estudios laborales, movimientotransnacional, sociología pública global,trabajadores de Foxconn

Notes

1. The nine signatories of the open statementdated 18 May 2010 are: Shen Yuan (TsinghuaUniversity), Guo Yuhua (Tsinghua University),Lu Huilin (Peking University), Pun Ngai (HongKong Polytechnic University), Dai Jianzhong(Beijing Academy of Social Sciences), Tan Shen(China Academy of Social Sciences), ShenHong (China Academy of Social Sciences), RenYan (Sun Yat-sen University) and Zhang Dunfu(Shangha i Un ivers i t y ) . In Ch inese(http://tech.sina.com.cn/it/2010-05-19/13214206671.shtml) ; t rans lat ion in Engl ish(http://sacom.hk/dying-young-suicide-china%E2

%80%99s-booming-economy/) in 'Dying Young'(23 May 2010)and 'Appeal by Sociologists(http://sacom.hk/appeal-by-sociologists-address-to-the-problems-of-new-generations-of-chinese-migrant-workers/)' (26 May 2010).

2. The petition dated 13 June 2010 wasinitiated by Thung-Hong Lin (Institute ofSociology, Academia Sinica) and You-ren Yang(Department of Sociology, Tunghai University).I n C h i n e s e(https://sites.google.com/site/laborgogo2010/;I n E n g l i s h :https://sites.google.com/site/laborgogo2010eng/).

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