We really needed a solid sociological study of working class formation in Taiwan and this excellent book more than meets that need. The title echoes E. P. Thompson's 1963 classic The Making of the English Working Class, but Ming-sho Ho criticizes what he calls Thompson's “culturalist approach” (itself an advance over structuralist/determinist approaches) on two grounds: it ignores internal divisions within the working class and how these generate possibly unconventional forms of contention and resistance. The body of the book examines two major axes of internal division probably unique to Taiwan: mainlanders and Taiwanese, and members and non-members of the Kuomintang (KMT). Ho adopts a historical institutionalist approach which means that he searches for the evolution of the rules that pattern relations within the working class and between it and other actors. The major institutions he focuses on are mainlander or Taiwanese ethnicity, party membership, the internal labour market within corporations, and labour unions. His cases are two major state-owned enterprises (SOEs): Taiwan Sugar Corporation (TSC) and China Petroleum Corporation (CPC).

Taiwan is noted for the predominance of small- and medium-sized enterprises, so until recent years there really haven't been the sort of large-scale corporations studied in other societies, hence the selection of two SOEs to examine working class formation and organization. TSC and CPC were both established in 1946 largely on the basis of industrial properties confiscated from the departing Japanese colonial administration.

The book provides a very useful and well-researched history of the companies and their workforces. Ho utilized a wealth of primary company archives to tell the story, as well as in-depth interviews and a stint as a campaign staffer for a CPC union election. The historical chapters demonstrate the way in which the mainlander KMT installed mainlander party members in key positions in the corporations to capture the resources and control and mobilize labour to support the party's agenda. Mainlanders replaced often better-qualified Taiwanese, and party members (themselves overwhelmingly mainlanders) discriminated against non-members when it came time for promotions, especially to leadership positions. Ho is justified in referring to this as a neo-colonialist regime. I also agree with his characterization of the system as Leninist, in that the KMT installed party cells in the corporations and unions to ensure hierarchical and centralized control and to mobilize workers behind its ideological commitment to anti-communism and nation-building.

Ho's real theoretical inspiration comes from James Scott's work on “everyday resistance” and “weapons of the weak.” He devotes three very insightful chapters to a discussion of examples of how workers in the SOEs utilized often non-obvious means to resist, in however minor-seeming a fashion, KMT mainlander control. One technique was “ritualism,” that is, going through the motions of demonstrating commitment to KMT goals. Another was “moonlighting,” or engaging in economic activity outside the enterprise. This reduced workers' dependency on the unit as well as enhancing their income. As political change took hold, workers utilized the party branches and labour unions for their own ends as opposed to being controlled by them. Ho refers to this form of resistance as “petty bargaining.”

My personal favourite strategy was the use of guanxi as a way around the mainlander-KMT dominated distributive structure, especially as regards promotions. Bribery and providing favours were common techniques to establish and manipulate guanxi. This is the most sustained and illuminating discussion of the role of guanxi in Taiwan society that I know of since Bruce Jacobs's studies of political connections in the 1970s.

Ho frequently compares Taiwan with societies such as China (especially as regards Andrew Walder's discussion of workers' organized dependence on their units, and the use of guanxi) and Hungary (moonlighting). I would have liked more comparison with South Korea, which did develop a strong worker movement.

I appreciated Ho's use on many occasions of stories by the worker-writer Yang Qingchu who worked at CPC and personally embodied many of the themes of the book. Yang's often autobiographical stories captured many of the experiences of Taiwan's SOE working class.

The historical institutionalist approach allows the author to demonstrate “layering,” that is, how structures build on and evolve from what came before. Although the book is theoretically sophisticated and stimulating, I was surprised to see no references to Gramsci, whose work on “war of position” and “war of manoeuvre” seems relevant to discussions of different strategies employed in different circumstances.

This book is a very welcome contribution not only to Taiwan studies but to the sociological study of class formation and social movements. Strongly recommended.