In China, a vast working class has been assembled with startling rapidity, most visibly in the three great regions of industrialisation: the Pearl River delta (Guangdong), the Yangtze River delta (Shanghai region), and the Yellow River valley (Beijing–Tianjin). There has been a feminisation of the workforce; female labour plays a leading, even dominant, role in the new proletariat, forming 60 to 70% of factory workers, many of whom are housed in on-site company dormitories. These women are better educated than their mothers and grandmothers. They are more aware of their rights and in the labour-intensive factories of the SEZs, stereotypes of female passivity are breaking down.
China’s cities are growing at an unprecedented rate. In 2013 it was estimated that for the first time, over half of China’s 1.4 billion people lived in towns and cities.[2] By 2030 it is estimated that there could be as many as 1 billion urban dwellers; over 200 cities with populations of more than 1 million, compared with 35 such cities in Europe. To meet this projected growth there are 40,000,000 construction workers.
This degree of urbanisation is unprecedented and it has brought into existence the largest and most powerful proletariat in history. With the massive development of the productive forces comes an enormous strengthening of the working class. The economic development raised living standards for many, incoming peasants were prepared to do the worst jobs and live in terrible conditions because they received an income of at least twice what they would be paid working the land, and were able to remit some money to their dependents. This improvement in living standards for hundreds of millions of people was the major factor in the easy victory of the pro-capitalist wing in the CCP.[3]
We are witnessing the creation of millions of the ‘gravediggers’ of capitalism, a new mass proletariat. What has been happening in China has some striking similarities with the early development of capitalism in Russia over one hundred years ago, but on a much larger scale. Then, the growth of industry brought into being a fresh proletariat made up of peasants who had abandoned the land. Although a terrible price was paid, a mass proletariat was created that would lead the October Revolution. Today the conditions are being created in China for future class conflicts that will inevitably lead to a revolutionary upheaval.
The storm clouds are gathering. China faces serious and inter-linked problems. Firstly, as a UK Government report[4] on the Chinese economy points out, the total number of migrant workers may be at its highest level ever, about 274 million, but the rate of growth has been declining such that today it is virtually zero. There has been a marked change in the destinations of these migrants, more and more are looking for work in smaller cities closer to home because of the discrimination they experience in the larger cities under the infamous hukou system (see Section 16.3 below). It is to overcome this problem and tap into new sources of labour power that huge investment is now being poured into creating factories in inland China.
Secondly, China’s economic growth for 2014 was 7.4%, and the IMF projects a growth rate of 6.8% for 2015 and 6.5% in 2016.[5] This is serious because to successfully maintain present standards of living and employment levels, to sustain social stability, a continued economic growth of 7-10% for the next decade or two is a necessity.[6] Thirdly, this decline is taking place when global economic growth for 2015 will be the lowest since the recession year of 2009, and prospects for 2016 do not appear much better – due to China’s own slowdown.
The first generation of migrant workers moved from the countryside to work in the new SEZs of south China in the 1980s and 1990s. These were mostly female workers who came to work in electronic and toy factories in the first SEZ, the Shekou Industrial Zone of Shenzhen. The second generation of peasants arrived in the late 1990s and 2000s. These included children of the first generation who, benefitting from the experience gained by their parents, were much more prepared to take collective action to improve job safety and increase pay rates.
Now the first of the third generation are entering the production process and bring with them a much greater awareness of workers’ rights and ways to protest. They have a sense of self-worth and are beginning to demand respect with a consequent dramatic increase in the number of actions by shop-floor workers. A constant theme throughout the history of capitalism is that self-awareness by the working class usually takes place in the second and third generations who come to work in industrial centres.[7]
The Chinese government does not publish statistics on strikes (officially strikes do not exist, strikes and accompanying activities such as go-slows, street demonstrations, etc., are designated ‘collective actions’) but all available evidence shows they are on the increase. Workers whose parents emigrated to one employer are returning to work for another but they bring with them the knowledge that short, sharp strikes are an effective way of redressing grievances. As the confidence of the workers grows, strikes and picket lines are becoming normalised.[8]
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The World Bank, http://data.worldbank.org.
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Li Shi, Rising Income and Wealth Inequality in China, Beijing University, 2011.
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Foreign and Commonwealth Office, China: Labour Relations in Guangdong, 30 Jan. 2015, www.gov.uk.
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Reuters, IMF sees China slowdown risks, 7 Oct. 2015.
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Guardian, 20 January 2015.
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Thompson, E. The Making of the English Working Class, Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1963.
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Pringle, T. Trade Unions in China, Routledge, 2013.