Govern The Work By Law

Since the late 1990s, with the acceleration of economic reforms and aggravating social conflict, researches on the Chinese labor market and the relationships between workers, employers and state have been multiplied.But little studies are focused to create a link between the tolerance and the protesting of workers in the grassroots, the intervention of local authority in the middle level and the promulgation of politics and laws from the macroscopic view.To fill this gap, firstly we start from participant observation in a local union at the district level.Then we extend our research to administrative departments, official unions at lower level, those in private companies and with mixed capital,managers and skilled or unskilled workers. Then, the rich empirical materials let us arrive to two main issues:on one hand, since the economic reform, what changes have taken place in action space of workers and what role has trade union played with the establishment of the Chinese legal system;On the other hand, it is necessary to clarify the reasons which contributed to these changes and at the same time, the two conflicting results of institutional constructions which have helped and hindered the expansion of action space of workers.This means that this thesis not only seeks to describe the changes in industrial relations which took place in China through the field work in a district of Shanghai,but also we propose to study the transitions which the system of industrial relations is facing from 4 angles:1)We must analyze the transformation from the legal and economic reforms implemented since 1978, which bring major changes to the system industrial relations in China.2)And since then the transition of the role that the ACFTU played also took place. What relationship the ACFTU and its local branches have created with their union branches in enterprises? Can they represent the interests of workers, and how? 3) Under the context of economic and legal reform, the workers' action space is also extended compared to the period of planed economy without respect to rules. How do they defend their rights? We will show this by workers'democratic participation in enterprises, workers'protests against employers'infringement, activities of trade union branches in enterprises and NGOs which help workers outside enterprises to demand their legal rights.4) The interaction between the state and society must be considered.The state is not as almighty as before. It retreats from some social areas, establishes rules and governs society indirectly with them;however the promulgation of rules is not enough. Good laws are still anticipated and the application of laws is still a big problem. With more and more manifestations, how the government responds to the social crisis? What strategies do workers use against violations of labor rights by employers?With these analyses, the framework of the system of industrial relations in China progressively come out, which frames individual or collective actors, every unique enterprises and regions with familiar arrangements.