Chinese government taking on international capital

[martingale]

By Jim HIGHTOWER, Lowdown June 2007

The corporate chorus is that all countries must rewrite their laws to let the benefits of globalization flow to everyone.

But suddenly, the Chinese government is singing a different tune: Responding to public demand, China is proposing new laws that would lift the wages of workers and extend basic democratic rights to the workplace.

Oh, good gracious, no! - Wal-Mart, Google, GE and Microsoft are screaming. Globalization is supposed to protect our investments and profits, not people!

So the sweatshop lobby has descended on China like a plague of locusts, demanding that the new labor law be repudiated.

These global giants moved factories there specifically to slash their labor costs.

This relocation meant that these businesses could offer poverty wages in China and then use the deplorable pay and conditions there as a sledge-hammer to knock down workers everywhere.

China which now constitutes about 25% of the global work force, has become the global standard for low wages and poor working conditions in industry after industry.

If China were to lift its living standards, this could have a ripple effect on conditions for people around the world - an ironic reverse benefit of globalization.

This has led to major corporate heart palpitations and an unseemly, embarrassing, self-serving lobbying blitz in China by brand-name corporations to stop true globalization in its tracks.

They've had some success, but now there's a growing global backlash against their greed.

www.laborstrategies.org

[BobKKKindle$]

Fascinating stuff. I would be interested to know what is actually meant by 'basic democratic rights' - would this mean that workers are able to overturn the decisions of managers appointed by multinational companies, or is this simply a superficial measure that will not actually change the structure of the workplace?

For those interested, there if a 'follow-up' article here at : http://www.laborstrategies.org//index.php?...task=view&id=11 (http://www.laborstrategies.org//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=11)

This additional article suggests that pressure groups have been able to modify some of the most important terms of the law:


....U.S.-based global corporations have forced significant changes in contract, collective bargaining, severance, and other rights guaranteed for Chinese workers under a law to be voted on later this year by the Chinese National People's Congress

I think this is an excellent example of how unequal economic relationships allow developed countries to exercise political power and change the policies of sovereign governments. To tell the truth I am somewhat surprised that the official state trade union organisation has 'taken a strong stand against corporate pressure' and that the Chinese government has challenged the power of multi-national corporations - does this warrant a re-assessement of the position of the Chinese Govenrment? In the past I have always dismissed the PRC as an example of state-capitalism but I shall pay great attention to further developments in China in the future.

On a similar note, the Chinese government has also challenged the use of slave labour in many provinces across the country which could also be indicative of progressive change:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6761217.stm


Police in northern China say they have now arrested more than 160 people accused of involvement in slave labour in illegal mines and brick factories.

[bolshevik butcher]

Well with an increasing number of wild cat strikes and illegal unions this is an attempt to quell the ever increasing class consciousness and emerging new left in China. This will at best act as a small temporary stop gap however. As the chinese working class gets ever bigger the contradictions of captialism widen. Eventually the most powerful class force in the world, a working class of 800million could emerge, truely unstopable if organised and class consciousness.

[RedStarOverChina]

Has it been passed yet?

The only reason China could possibly purpose this law is because that the ruling class is not yet under the total control of large corporations and their lobby groups.

But fear not, that day will come as we are seeing the emergence of exactly this kind of lobby groups. :(



On a similar note, the Chinese government has also challenged the use of slave labour in many provinces across the country which could also be indicative of progressive change:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6761217.stm

I don’t know how that can be considered "progressive"...Even the most fervently bourgeoisie ruling classes oppose slave labor (or claim to oppose it).

The fact that there are slave labors in China itself is appalling.

[bolshevik butcher]

The only reason China could possibly purpose this law is because that the ruling class is not yet under the total control of large corporations and their lobby groups.

Well it might just be the ruling class making what they see as a necessary concession to the working class in order that capitalism can provail.

[RedStarOverChina]

Of course it is.

But I'll bet the big corporations will do everything in their power to stop something like that from happening, or delay it for as much as possible---If they had the power to do so.

[Dimentio]

China is just doing what Europe started to do in the beginning of the 20th century, creating a more corporative model. That is due to the fact that the People's Congress has notified the central committee that the militancy of industrial workers has reached the level "red", and that if they are not doing something, the growth may deteriorate in class struggle. Remember, CCP mostly wants to keep it's own supremacy.

[Janus]

would this mean that workers are able to overturn the decisions of managers appointed by multinational companies, or is this simply a superficial measure that will not actually change the structure of the workplace?
The latter, the government hasn't yet standardized working conditions (most cities don't have basic wages, working hours, breaks,etc.) and as a result of the recent slave labor uproar, it's planning to do so in order to lift its domestic and global image.