The Political Economy of Reforms and the Remaking of the Proletarian Class in China, 1980s–2010s: Demystifying China's Society and Social Classes in Post-Mao Era

284 Pages·2023·6.383 MB·English

by  Shan Shanne Huang

PALGRAVE STUDIES IN ECONOMIC HISTORY
The Political Economy of Reforms
and the Remaking of the Proletarian
Class in China, 1980s–2010s
Demystifying China’s Society and
Social Classes in the Post-Mao Era
Shan Shanne Huang
Palgrave Studies in Economic History
Series Editor
Kent Deng, London School of Economics, London, UK
Palgrave Studies in Economic History is designed to illuminate and enrich
our understanding of economies and economic phenomena of the past.
The series covers a vast range of topics including financial history, labour
history, development economics, commercialisation, urbanisation, indus-
trialisation, modernisation, globalisation, and changes in world economic
orders.
Shan Shanne Huang
The Political
Economy of Reforms
and the Remaking
of the Proletarian
Class in China,
1980s–2010s
Demystifying China’s Society and Social Classes in
the Post-Mao Era
Shan Shanne Huang
United Nations Development
Programme
New York, NY, USA
ISSN 2662-6497 ISSN 2662-6500 (electronic)
Palgrave Studies in Economic History
ISBN 978-3-031-20454-8 ISBN 978-3-031-20455-5 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20455-5
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Dedicated to my grandfather- Li Qidong 李启东
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my parents who have been consistently supporting
me throughout my research and writing. I missed many major events with
family. Thanks to their tolerance and love.
I would like to thank Professor Kent Deng’s kind invitation on
publishing this book. Many thanks to my three referees, Dr. Jeff Hass,
Professor Shouhui Zhao and Professor Jinghan Zeng, for their recogni-
tion of my research and their valuable support for this book’s proposal and
comments on the draft. The same thanks also go to my Ph.D. supervisors,
Professor Kerry Brown and Dr. Jan Knoerich. This book’s manuscript is
based on my Ph.D. dissertation. Thanks for their guidance during my
Ph.D. research.
I also want to thank all the respondents of this research for sharing with
me their history, life and work experiences, and to help and support me
during the fieldwork research. This empirical study relies on their histories
and memories to analyse the changes and differences of this specific state-
owned enterprise before and after the Reform and Opening Up, and to
tease out their varying sense of status.
I was born in Sichuan Province. In order to get higher education, I
moved to Beijing and then relocated to Bristol and London. This book is
for my hometown, my family and me. Almost a decade of living abroad
let me have a deeply emotional connection with where I grew up and the
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
people there. Wherever I will be in the future, this book will remind me
of where I come from and who I am.
New York, USA Shan Shanne Huang
September 2022
Contents
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Research Background 3
1.2 The Working Class in China 12
1.3 Research Question 26
References 28
2 Theories and Methodology Applied 39
2.1 Theories 39
2.2 Methodology 58
References 70
3 The Case of E Group Corporation—an SOE
in Sichuan, Post-1949 79
3.1 Sichuan: Artificial Establishment of SOEs
in a Farming Province 79
3.2 E Group Company: Privileged SOE–cum–Financial
Burden 86
3.3 E Group Company Workers 96
3.4 Summary on E Group Company 104
References 106
4 Workers’ Returning to a Proletariat Position
in Post-1978 111
4.1 Research into SOEs Before Economic Reforms 111
4.2 Iron Rice Bowl and Workers’ Privilege Under the Work
Unit System 115
ix
x CONTENTS
4.3 Research into SOEs and Economic Reforms 123
4.4 Workers’ Status in E Group Company After SOE
Reforms 133
4.5 Changes in the Composition of the Working Class
in EGC 144
References 153
5 “Nostalgia” and “Protests”: Class Consciousness
and Class-For-Itself 161
5.1 Nostalgia: The Socio-Political Condition
of Working-Class Protest 163
5.2 Explicit Protest: Labour Activism in EGC 168
5.3 Implicit Protests and Practices of “Relationship” 179
References 192
6 The Reconstruction of Classes and a Class Society
in China 197
6.1 Relative Deprivation, Multiple Exploitation, and Class
Consciousness 200
6.2 Analysis on Transformation of China’s Social Structure 202
6.3 Classes and the Perception of a Class Society 205
6.4 State Capitalism and the Working Class 218
References 224
7 Final Conclusions 231
References 235
Appendix A: The Summary of the Basic Information
of Interviewees 237
Appendix B: List of Internal Documents (Chronological
Order) 243
Appendix C: Interview Question Guide 247
Appendix D: Memos in NVivo 253
Appendix E: Annotations in NVivo 261
Appendix F: Photos Collected from Fieldwork Research 265
Index 267