Leveraging Geopolitics for the Vertical Diffusion of Social Movements

Hong Kong and the Brokerage of Labour Politics in Mainland China

Bibliographic Data

ID4870652
AuthorsVincent G Huang (0000-0002-7257-1166, Zhejiang University, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume30
Issue3
Pages1417-1447
Publication date2025-05-27
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueGeopolitics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1465-0045 • E-ISSN: 1557-3028
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14650045.2024.2440524
OpenAlexW4406000319
LanguageEN
References cited65

By investigating Hong Kong labour organisations’ brokerage practices, this study highlights a mode of vertical diffusion conditioned by geopolitics. Hong Kong is a global city located at the dual peripheries of the West and mainland China. Activists leverage Hong Kong’s location shaped by geopolitics to shift the scale of labour movements in mainland China. Downwards, they use the geographical, historical, cultural, and linguistic proximities of Hong Kong and mainland China to build solidarity in translocal networks, and adapt global action tactics to local contexts. Upwards, activists also connect China’s labour movement with global solidarity networks by engaging in trans-border witnessing and advocacy, and diffusing the action tactic of collective bargaining developed in mainland China to labour politics in other Global South countries. However, the vertical diffusion of social movements is conditioned by geopolitical dynamics, which result in an asymmetrical scale shift of labour politics

China · Collective action · Economic geography · Economics · Economy · Geography · Geopolitics · Mainland China · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Social movement · Sociology · Solidarity · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · Hong Kong and Taiwan Politics · Labor Movements and Unions · Law

Tools

Open DOI