Working life in China
Christian Caryl offers a new perspective on China for Foreign Policy magazine. It's a view from the grassroots not the highest levels of the economy or politics.Beijing's Labor Pains
Western media coverage of China tends to be dominated by two competing narratives. The first is all about economics…
The second focuses on politics...
But it turns out that there's another way of comprehending the reality of modern-day China -- one that captures the contradictions of the place and allows them to co-exist...
The picture that comes through... looks something like this: Today's Chinese workplace is a mess, as one might expect. Safety conditions are terrible. Work-related illnesses are rife. Employers often hire workers without issuing formal contracts, making it near-impossible for wronged employees to fight back...
Yet China also has a full-fledged body of labor law, a comprehensive court system, and a growing army of private lawyers…
It all adds up to a powerful case for the virtues of incremental change…
The problem is that China's pervasive corruption is eroding people's trust in the law.
Popular frustration about the issue is one of the driving forces behind the rising signs of civil unrest around China. By one estimate, there were 127,467 "mass incidents" in China in 2008. In one government poll last year, 75 percent of respondents cited corruption as the number one problem facing the country. It's easy to see how the resulting cynicism could poison the country's future...
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Labels: China, corruption, economics, rule-of-law
posted by Ken Wedding @ 6:24 AM
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