This volume is a collection of ten studies of mass unemployment and layoffs as a result of the restructuring of state-owned enterprises (SOEs). The key term is xiagang, a new word coined in China during the 1990s to mean “leaving one's post,” as opposed to jiegu (being laid-off) and shiye (being unemployed).
Drawing on the existing literature on xiagang in Chinese and English, fourteen international scholars from universities in the United States, China, Hong Kong, Macau, South Korea, Singapore, and Switzerland explore the extremely complex and intricate relationships between laid-off workers and the state by revealing the politics of xiagang, its effects on workers, and their diverse political and psychological responses to this displacement in their lives.
The first edited volume in English on this subject, Laid-Off Workers fills several gaps in the existing xiagang research. The introduction places this book in the context of current scholarly debates on xiagang by reviewing the existing literature on this topic in Chinese and English. The Chinese studies view xiagang as a normative step in enterprise reform, examine existing or new government measures to ameliorate or solve related problems, explore the management of the political and social consequences of xiagang, and consider the impact of unemployment on workers' lives and their reemployment. The significantly smaller English-language literature on xiagang has emphasized interview-based research, which highlights workers' dislocation, analyzes laid-off workers' contentious collective action, and examines laid-off workers' coping methods and their pathways to reemployment in China's market-oriented, privatized, and globalized economy.
Building on the existing literature, the essays in this volume focus on areas that have been relatively overlooked to date. The ten essays are divided into four parts, including class politics, frames and framing, workers' welfare and reemployment, and their lack of contention.
The first three chapters examine the class politics of xiagang by critically reviewing the changed status of the Chinese working class and the relationships between laid-off workers, SOE managers, and the state. The next two chapters scrutinize, to a greater extent than the existing literature, the conceptual frameworks through which xiagang workers perceive their situation and the relationships between their perceptions and their structural positions. The subsequent two chapters use theories on law, society, and human capital to analyze xiagang workers' material situation and reemployment. The last three chapters tackle the issue of laid-off workers' contention, usual quiescence, and occasional activism, explaining why they protest, why their protests are limited to their own enterprises, and why they quite often do not protest.
Collectively, the essays in this volume provide a wealth of analyses and interpretations of the fate, conditions, and perceptions of the estimated 30 million laid-off state workers who were once the “masters” of the socialist country. Some of them also provide cautious accounts of the laid-off workers' desires and demands in response to the material and psychological impact of xiagang, which caused unprecedented sudden economic and social losses in their and their families' lives.
This book represents an insightful, current, comprehensive, and well-documented study of the laid-off workers in the aftermath of unprecedented enterprise restructuring and privatization in China's economic reforms. It is a valuable addition to the existing literature on social conditions among Chinese working people. Each chapter is furnished with a concluding section and endnotes. Some chapters are supported with tables and figures. There is no dedicated reference section at the end of each chapter or at the end of the volume. Instead, reference information is incorporated into the notes at the end of each chapter.
Although the editors do not specify the intended readership of this volume, Laid-Off Workers in a Workers' State would be an informative read for college courses in political science, Chinese politics, and public policy, as well as labor and social law and policies. Scholars, policy makers, and professionals specializing in these areas will also find this book a valuable read for their scholarly and professional work. To everyone who is interested in contemporary China, this volume offers rich and lively materials on how China's economic reforms, marketization, privatization, and globalization have transformed Chinese society and how the working class is coping with the related dramatic and traumatic changes.
