Eli Friedman
Biographic Data
| ID | 3696780 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Eli Friedman |
| GIVEN NAMES | Eli |
| FAMILY NAME | Friedman |
| SIGNATURE | FRIEDMAN E |
| AFFILIATIONS | Cornell University |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 84 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 15 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
The Urbanisation of People: A Conversation with Eli Friedman
Regimes, Resistance and Reforms: Comparing Workers' Politics in the Automobile Industry in China and India
The automobile industry in China was shaken by an unprecedented upsurge of labour unrest in 2010, beginning with the much-discussed wildcat strike at the Nanhai Honda transmission plant in Guangdong province. While worker activism in auto plants in India was not as concentrated as in China’s 2010 strike wave, the period 2009–2017 witnessed twenty-seven strikes nationwide, indicating a significant uptick after the global recession. The optimism th…
Une harmonisation imparfaite: Conflits et relations professionnelles dans les secteurs des taxis et de l'assainissement en Chine
Dans les années 1990, les villes chinoises ont ouvert les services municipaux au marché, une décision à l'origine de nombreux conflits sociaux. Les autorités locales ont alors cherché à harmoniser et à reréglementer les conditions d'emploi des travailleurs concernés. À partir de plusieurs études de cas sur les secteurs des taxis et de l'assainissement, à Wenzhou et Guangzhou, les auteurs constatent que celles‐ci ont mobilisé trois stratégies à ce…
Resistance under the Radar: Organization of Work and Collective Action in China’s Food Delivery Industry
As services have come to account for an ever growing portion of employment in China, platform-based delivery work has grown exponentially, incorporating millions of workers. Based on a study of food-delivery company Ele.me, we first provide a detailed account of the structure of the platform-based food delivery industry, as well as worker grievances and resistance. While Ele.me workers are subjected to algorithmic control and intensive evaluation…
Just-in-Time Urbanization? Managing Migration, Citizenship, and Schooling in the Chinese City
In this article I argue that the Chinese state is responding to tensions wrought by high-speed growth by attempting to develop a form of technocratic biopolitics I refer to as 'just-in-time (JIT) urbanization'. Mirroring techniques of the Toyota Production System (of which JIT is a constituent element), large Chinese cities have sought to avoid the costs associated with the production and warehousing of surplus populations. Under this system, mig…
Teachers’ Work in China’s Migrant Schools
In recent years, scholars have begun to document the emergence of private migrant schools in urban China. However, neither education nor labor scholars have empirically investigated teachers’ work. Because it is precisely those with the fewest economic resources that have been restricted to privatized education in the city, migrant schools are dependent on a highly exploitative form of employment. Based on a study of Guangzhou and Beijing, we see…
Experimentation and decentralization in China’s labor relations
In this introduction to the special issue ‘Changing work, labour and employment relations in China’, we argue that China is taking an experimental and decentralized approach to the development of new labor relations frameworks. Particular political constraints in China prevent interest aggregation among workers, as the central state sees this as posing a risk to social stability. Firms and local governments have been given a degree of space to ex…
Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China
During the first decade of the twenty-first century, worker resistance in China increased rapidly despite the fact that certain segments of the state began moving in a pro-labor direction. In explaining this, Eli Friedman argues that the Chinese state has become hemmed in by an "insurgency trap" of its own devising and is thus unable to tame expansive worker unrest. Labor conflict in the process of capitalist industrialization is certainly not un…
Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China
"During the first decade of the twenty-first century, worker resistance in China increased rapidly despite the fact that certain segments of the state began moving in a pro-labor direction. In explaining this, Eli Friedman argues that the Chinese state has become hemmed in by an “insurgency trap” of its own devising and is thus unable to tame expansive worker unrest. Labor conflict in the process of capitalist industrialization is certainly not u…
Alienated Politics: Labour Insurgency and the Paternalistic State in China
Is there a labour movement in China? This contribution argues that China does not have a labour movement, but that contestation between workers, state and capital is best characterized as a form of 'alienated politics'. Widespread worker resistance is highly effective at the level of the firm because of its ability to inflict losses on capital and disrupt public order. But authoritarian politics in China prevent workers from formulating political…
Economic Development and Sectoral Unions in China
Drawing on qualitative fieldwork in China's Guangdong and Zhejiang Provinces, the author asks how post-socialist unions respond to worker unrest and why the development of sectoral-level bargaining has been uneven in different regions of China. While Zhejiang has had relative success in establishing the organizational infrastructure for sectoral bargaining, Guangdong has had little success despite ongoing attempts by unions. The author explains v…
Insurgency and institutionalization: The Polanyian countermovement and Chinese labor politics
Remaking the World of Chinese Labour: A 30‐Year Retrospective
Over the past 30 years, labour relations, and, indeed, the entirety of working‐class politics in China, have been dramatically altered by economic reforms. In this review, we focus on the two key processes of commodification and casualization and their implications for workers. On the one hand, these processes have resulted in the destruction of the old social contract and the emergence of marketized employment relations. This has implied a loss …
External Pressure and Local Mobilization: Transnational Activism and The Emergence of the Chinese Labor Movement
This article elucidates connections between two strategies of transnational social movements-external pressure and local mobilization-and two potential outcomes-paternalism and psychological empowerment. Application of this theoretical framework to the nascent Chinese labor movement indicates that an overreliance on an external-pressure approach results in paternalism, thereby precluding psychological empowerment for aggrieved actors and potentia…
China Since Tiananmen: The Labor Movement
The twenty years since 1989 have brought two major developments in worker activism. First, whereas workers were part of the mass uprising in the Tiananmen Movement, there is today hardly any sign of mobilization that transcends class or regional lines. Second, a long-term decline in worker power at the point of production is going on even as workers gain more power (at least on paper) outside the workplace. New labor laws have broadened workers' …
External Pressure and Local Mobilization: Transnational Activism and The Emergence of the Chinese Labor Movement
This article elucidates connections between two strategies of transnational social movements-external pressure and local mobilization-and two potential outcomes-paternalism and psychological empowerment. Application of this theoretical framework to the nascent Chinese labor movement indicates that an overreliance on an external-pressure approach results in paternalism, thereby precluding psychological empowerment for aggrieved actors and potentia…
Insurgency and institutionalization: The Polanyian countermovement and Chinese labor politics
Alienated Politics: Labour Insurgency and the Paternalistic State in China
Is there a labour movement in China? This contribution argues that China does not have a labour movement, but that contestation between workers, state and capital is best characterized as a form of 'alienated politics'. Widespread worker resistance is highly effective at the level of the firm because of its ability to inflict losses on capital and disrupt public order. But authoritarian politics in China prevent workers from formulating political…
Resistance under the Radar: Organization of Work and Collective Action in China’s Food Delivery Industry
As services have come to account for an ever growing portion of employment in China, platform-based delivery work has grown exponentially, incorporating millions of workers. Based on a study of food-delivery company Ele.me, we first provide a detailed account of the structure of the platform-based food delivery industry, as well as worker grievances and resistance. While Ele.me workers are subjected to algorithmic control and intensive evaluation…
Experimentation and decentralization in China’s labor relations
In this introduction to the special issue ‘Changing work, labour and employment relations in China’, we argue that China is taking an experimental and decentralized approach to the development of new labor relations frameworks. Particular political constraints in China prevent interest aggregation among workers, as the central state sees this as posing a risk to social stability. Firms and local governments have been given a degree of space to ex…
China Since Tiananmen: The Labor Movement
The twenty years since 1989 have brought two major developments in worker activism. First, whereas workers were part of the mass uprising in the Tiananmen Movement, there is today hardly any sign of mobilization that transcends class or regional lines. Second, a long-term decline in worker power at the point of production is going on even as workers gain more power (at least on paper) outside the workplace. New labor laws have broadened workers' …
Just-in-Time Urbanization? Managing Migration, Citizenship, and Schooling in the Chinese City
In this article I argue that the Chinese state is responding to tensions wrought by high-speed growth by attempting to develop a form of technocratic biopolitics I refer to as 'just-in-time (JIT) urbanization'. Mirroring techniques of the Toyota Production System (of which JIT is a constituent element), large Chinese cities have sought to avoid the costs associated with the production and warehousing of surplus populations. Under this system, mig…
Teachers’ Work in China’s Migrant Schools
In recent years, scholars have begun to document the emergence of private migrant schools in urban China. However, neither education nor labor scholars have empirically investigated teachers’ work. Because it is precisely those with the fewest economic resources that have been restricted to privatized education in the city, migrant schools are dependent on a highly exploitative form of employment. Based on a study of Guangzhou and Beijing, we see…
Economic Development and Sectoral Unions in China
Drawing on qualitative fieldwork in China's Guangdong and Zhejiang Provinces, the author asks how post-socialist unions respond to worker unrest and why the development of sectoral-level bargaining has been uneven in different regions of China. While Zhejiang has had relative success in establishing the organizational infrastructure for sectoral bargaining, Guangdong has had little success despite ongoing attempts by unions. The author explains v…
External Pressure and Local Mobilization: Transnational Activism and The Emergence of the Chinese Labor Movement
This article elucidates connections between two strategies of transnational social movements-external pressure and local mobilization-and two potential outcomes-paternalism and psychological empowerment. Application of this theoretical framework to the nascent Chinese labor movement indicates that an overreliance on an external-pressure approach results in paternalism, thereby precluding psychological empowerment for aggrieved actors and potentia…
China Since Tiananmen: The Labor Movement
The twenty years since 1989 have brought two major developments in worker activism. First, whereas workers were part of the mass uprising in the Tiananmen Movement, there is today hardly any sign of mobilization that transcends class or regional lines. Second, a long-term decline in worker power at the point of production is going on even as workers gain more power (at least on paper) outside the workplace. New labor laws have broadened workers' …
Remaking the World of Chinese Labour: A 30‐Year Retrospective
Over the past 30 years, labour relations, and, indeed, the entirety of working‐class politics in China, have been dramatically altered by economic reforms. In this review, we focus on the two key processes of commodification and casualization and their implications for workers. On the one hand, these processes have resulted in the destruction of the old social contract and the emergence of marketized employment relations. This has implied a loss …
Insurgency and institutionalization: The Polanyian countermovement and Chinese labor politics
Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China
During the first decade of the twenty-first century, worker resistance in China increased rapidly despite the fact that certain segments of the state began moving in a pro-labor direction. In explaining this, Eli Friedman argues that the Chinese state has become hemmed in by an "insurgency trap" of its own devising and is thus unable to tame expansive worker unrest. Labor conflict in the process of capitalist industrialization is certainly not un…
Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China
"During the first decade of the twenty-first century, worker resistance in China increased rapidly despite the fact that certain segments of the state began moving in a pro-labor direction. In explaining this, Eli Friedman argues that the Chinese state has become hemmed in by an “insurgency trap” of its own devising and is thus unable to tame expansive worker unrest. Labor conflict in the process of capitalist industrialization is certainly not u…
Alienated Politics: Labour Insurgency and the Paternalistic State in China
Is there a labour movement in China? This contribution argues that China does not have a labour movement, but that contestation between workers, state and capital is best characterized as a form of 'alienated politics'. Widespread worker resistance is highly effective at the level of the firm because of its ability to inflict losses on capital and disrupt public order. But authoritarian politics in China prevent workers from formulating political…
Economic Development and Sectoral Unions in China
Drawing on qualitative fieldwork in China's Guangdong and Zhejiang Provinces, the author asks how post-socialist unions respond to worker unrest and why the development of sectoral-level bargaining has been uneven in different regions of China. While Zhejiang has had relative success in establishing the organizational infrastructure for sectoral bargaining, Guangdong has had little success despite ongoing attempts by unions. The author explains v…
Experimentation and decentralization in China’s labor relations
In this introduction to the special issue ‘Changing work, labour and employment relations in China’, we argue that China is taking an experimental and decentralized approach to the development of new labor relations frameworks. Particular political constraints in China prevent interest aggregation among workers, as the central state sees this as posing a risk to social stability. Firms and local governments have been given a degree of space to ex…
Teachers’ Work in China’s Migrant Schools
In recent years, scholars have begun to document the emergence of private migrant schools in urban China. However, neither education nor labor scholars have empirically investigated teachers’ work. Because it is precisely those with the fewest economic resources that have been restricted to privatized education in the city, migrant schools are dependent on a highly exploitative form of employment. Based on a study of Guangzhou and Beijing, we see…
Just-in-Time Urbanization? Managing Migration, Citizenship, and Schooling in the Chinese City
In this article I argue that the Chinese state is responding to tensions wrought by high-speed growth by attempting to develop a form of technocratic biopolitics I refer to as 'just-in-time (JIT) urbanization'. Mirroring techniques of the Toyota Production System (of which JIT is a constituent element), large Chinese cities have sought to avoid the costs associated with the production and warehousing of surplus populations. Under this system, mig…
Regimes, Resistance and Reforms: Comparing Workers' Politics in the Automobile Industry in China and India
The automobile industry in China was shaken by an unprecedented upsurge of labour unrest in 2010, beginning with the much-discussed wildcat strike at the Nanhai Honda transmission plant in Guangdong province. While worker activism in auto plants in India was not as concentrated as in China’s 2010 strike wave, the period 2009–2017 witnessed twenty-seven strikes nationwide, indicating a significant uptick after the global recession. The optimism th…
Une harmonisation imparfaite: Conflits et relations professionnelles dans les secteurs des taxis et de l'assainissement en Chine
Dans les années 1990, les villes chinoises ont ouvert les services municipaux au marché, une décision à l'origine de nombreux conflits sociaux. Les autorités locales ont alors cherché à harmoniser et à reréglementer les conditions d'emploi des travailleurs concernés. À partir de plusieurs études de cas sur les secteurs des taxis et de l'assainissement, à Wenzhou et Guangzhou, les auteurs constatent que celles‐ci ont mobilisé trois stratégies à ce…
Resistance under the Radar: Organization of Work and Collective Action in China’s Food Delivery Industry
As services have come to account for an ever growing portion of employment in China, platform-based delivery work has grown exponentially, incorporating millions of workers. Based on a study of food-delivery company Ele.me, we first provide a detailed account of the structure of the platform-based food delivery industry, as well as worker grievances and resistance. While Ele.me workers are subjected to algorithmic control and intensive evaluation…
The Urbanisation of People: A Conversation with Eli Friedman
Political science (14 works) · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance (12 works) · Law (12 works) · China (11 works) · Economics (11 works) · Politics (11 works) · Political economy (9 works) · Labor Movements and Unions (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Economic system (6 works)