IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/ilrrev/v71y2018i5p1053-1077.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Taming Labor: Workers’ Struggles, Workplace Unionism, and Collective Bargaining on a Chinese Waterfront

Author

Listed:
  • Tim Pringle
  • Quan Meng

Abstract

This article examines the case of the Yantian International Container Terminal (YICT) to consider under what conditions unions can provide effective workplace representation in China. The authors draw on semi-structured interviews to analyze how and why the union was effective, despite rigid prohibitions against organizing outside of the Party-led All-China Federation of Trade Unions. The authors argue that the YICT union developed a system of annual collective bargaining that tamed the power of militant dockworkers and helped prevent strikes. This outcome required an effective enterprise-level trade union that was nevertheless able to influence and manage members’ somewhat ambiguous acceptance of its role. Ultimately, workers’ interests were partially represented and their acquisition of associational power—in the form of trade unions—increased.

Suggested Citation

  • Tim Pringle & Quan Meng, 2018. "Taming Labor: Workers’ Struggles, Workplace Unionism, and Collective Bargaining on a Chinese Waterfront," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 71(5), pages 1053-1077, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:71:y:2018:i:5:p:1053-1077
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://ilr.sagepub.com/content/71/5/1053.abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Li, Chunyun, 2021. "From insurgency to movement: an embryonic labor movement undermining hegemony in South China," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 101456, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Manfred Elfstrom, 2019. "A Tale of Two Deltas: Labour Politics in Jiangsu and Guangdong," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 57(2), pages 247-274, June.
    3. Jude Howell & Tim Pringle, 2019. "Shades of Authoritarianism and State–Labour Relations in China," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 57(2), pages 223-246, June.
    4. Elaine Sio‐ieng Hui, 2022. "Bottom‐Up Unionization in China: A Power Resources Analysis," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 60(1), pages 99-123, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:71:y:2018:i:5:p:1053-1077. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.