Overcoming Collective Action Problems Facing Chinese Workers
Lessons from Four Protests against Walmart
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3350193 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Chunyun Li (0000-0001-5909-0889, Rutgers Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, corresponding author), Mingwei Liu (0000-0003-0882-2319, Chunyun Li is an Assistant Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Mingwei Liu is an Associate Professor at Rutgers University) |
| Year | 2018 |
| Volume | 71 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 1078-1105 |
| Publication date | 2018-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Industrial and Labor Relations Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0019-7939 • E-ISSN: 2162-271X |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0019793918784516 |
| OpenAlex | W2808817063 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 12 |
| References cited | 34 |
In contrast to various structural accounts of collective inaction or short-lived contention of Chinese workers, the authors take an agency-centered approach to explain how the few sustained labor protests during closure bargaining develop against all odds. They suggest that workers' capacity to resolve collective action problems is essential to understanding why a few contending workers are able to sustain protests whereas many others fail to do so. They argue that workplace representatives and external labor activists are crucial for helping Chinese workers resolve the collective action problems that prevent the formation of sustained labor protests. Their comparative analysis of four protests against Walmart store closures-including one unusually long, one relatively sustained, and two short-lived-shows how presence and strategic capacity of workplace representatives and external labor activists shape protest duration. The authors conclude by discussing lessons learned from these cases of closure bargaining for future development of labor contention in China
Action (physics) · Agency (philosophy) · China · Closure (psychology) · Collective action · Collective bargaining · Odds · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Social science · Sociology · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · Law · Medicine
From production to reproduction
State and labor in China, 1978-2018
Resistance under the Radar
Temporary Workers and Collective-Action Preferences in China
Movement-oriented labor organizations in an authoritarian regime
What Determines the Duration of Protest Events? Evidence from Africa
The Rise and Fall of Student Labour Activism in Authoritarian China
Repression, backlash, and the duration of protests in Africa
Workplace Artificial Intelligence Regulation in China
From Insurgency to Movement
Voice without Representation
Labor-related civil society actors in China
Against the Law
Authoritarian Legality in China
The Resistance of Chinese Laid-off Workers in the Reform Period
Disaggregating the State
Hegemony and Workers' Politics in China
Building Theories from Case Study Research
Local Governments and the Suppression of Popular Resistance in China
The Oxford Handbook of Conflict Management in Organizations
Social Ties, Resources, and Migrant Labor Contention in Contemporary China
Urban Mobilizations and New Media in Contemporary China
The Logic of Collective Action
Collective Action and the Civil Rights Movement
Dispersive Containment
Coordinating Demands for Social Change
Labor Conflicts in China
A Theory of the Critical Mass. I. Interdependence, Group Heterogeneity, and the Production of Collective Action
Disguised Collective Action in China
Elitism and Exclusion in Mass Protest
Individual rights and collective rights
The Labor Politics of Market Socialism
Movement-oriented labour NGOs in South China
The Changing Nature of Labor Unrest in China
Union Organizing in China
The `Revenge of History
China's road to the construction of labor rights
China
Resources and Resourcefulness
| Unique citing works | 12 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,71 |
| Citation span | 2019 - 2025 (7) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 12 |