Marx’s Theories and Beyond: Understanding Working-Class Solidarity in China

Abstract

Derived from post-industrial society experiences, current social theorists often argue that the working class no longer plays an active role in transforming society, thereby making the issue of working-class solidarity obsolete. This paper critically revisits Marx’s theories on solidarity and re-engages the debates by intersecting macro structural analysis with micro-foundation of working-class solidarity. The article formulates the concept of working-class solidarity in two layers of analysis: the first is a macro structural approach driven by class conflict, social grievance, and economic crisis directly connected to the social transformation of the neoliberal market economy; and the second looks at micro process of cooperation and mutual support at the level of everyday practice, that is, a collective-emotional environment that creates agency and a soft solidarity base for building bonds among working-class youth. The logic of solidarity is rescued through a multiplicity of working-class youth’s behaviors discovered in school and the workplace.

Locating labour conflict and its organising forms in contemporary times: between class and the reproduction of capitalism

“…Global labour historians widened labour history's perspectives, shedding light on how workers' experiences emerged not only from workplaces but also from everyday life to shape class consciousness (van der Linden, 2008). Revisiting theories of working class solidarity, Pun (2022) argues that it is important to consider how macro-structural approaches and micro processes of a collective-emotional environment are interconnected and interdependent in explaining the formation of worker identities and solidarity actions. Based on research on vocational school in China, she stresses how working-class youth develop everyday practices that rearticulate solidarity behaviour at school and in the workplace.…”

Affording worker solidarity in motion: Theorising the intersection between social media and agential practices in the platform economy

“…Solidarity exists in manifold social contexts, including labour relations (Beck and Brook, 2020). Worker solidarity has its foundations in workers' shared experience at work (Pun, 2022). Atzeni (2010) developed a labour process approach to understand this experience, arguing that the inherent contradiction of the labour process makes it a fertile ground for worker solidarity.…”

“…Solidarity exists in manifold social contexts, including labour relations (Beck and Brook, 2020). Worker solidarity has its foundations in workers’ shared experience at work (Pun, 2022).…”