A New Deal For China's Workers?

Synopsis

This Book Takes A Comparative Look At China's Labor Pains And The Reforms Taking Shape In Their Wake. Some Recent Developments In China - Rising Strike Levels, A Surge Of Union Organizing, And A Raft Of Reforms - Seem To Echo The American New Deal Experience. But Even As China's Leaders Hope To Replicate The Prosperity And Stability That Flowed From The New Deal Labor Reforms, They Are Irrevocably Opposed To The Independent Trade Unions That Were The Central Actors In Both Spurring And Carrying Out Those Reforms. In China The Specter Of An Independent Labor Movement Both Drives And Constrains Every Facet Of China's Labor Policy, Both Its Reforms And Its Use Of Repression. If China's Workers Get Their New Deal, It Will Be A New Deal With Chinese Characteristics, Very Unlike What Workers In The West Achieved In The Mid-20th Century.-- Introduction -- The Rise Of China, And Of Labor Protest, In The Reform Era -- Who Speaks For China's Workers? : The Acftu And Labor Ngos -- How Did The New Deal Resolve The American Labor Question? : Bringing A Comparative Lens In Focus -- Can China Regulate Its Way Out Of Labor Unrest? : Rising Labor Standards And The Enforcement Gap -- Can China Secure Labor Peace Without Real Unions? : Strikes And Collective Bargaining With Chinese Characteristics -- What Does Democracy Look Like In China? : Reforming Grassroots Union Elections -- Will Workers Have A Voice In The Socialist Market Economy? : The Curious Revival Of The Worker Congress System -- Conclusion. Cynthia Estlund. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.