Chinese Workers Foxconned

Abstract

The suicide nets are still there. Foxconn, the giant electronics manufacturing subcontractor, installed them in 2010, a year when fourteen workers died after jumping from the ledges and windows of crowded dormitories. In addition to the wide mesh nets, stretched low over the streets of Foxconn's company towns, the corporation has twenty-four-hour "care centers," "no suicide agreements," and a psychological test to screen out potentially suicidal workers, charged to the job applicant. It has raised wages signifi cantly, but only in the face of runaway inflation, steep hikes in the minimum wage, and mounting worker unrest. Media attention and pressure from Apple, one of its main customers, backed up by a program of regular factory audits, seem to be driving incremental improvements in working conditions.

Precarization or Empowerment? Reflections on Recent Labor Unrest in China

“…Chan, Pun, and Selden 2015;Su 2010-11). Ross Perlin (2013) reported one particularly dramatic instance, noting:…”

Managing Migrant Contestation. Land appropriation, intermediate agency, and regulated space in Shenzhen

“…First, complimentary dormitories were allocated and served as housing stipends to extract marginal labour productivity and control the factors of production, particularly in response to the fluctuation between peak and low seasons. (27) Training, surveillance, and overtime work were more manageable when the migrant workers were accommodated next to the factory. Second, once the migrant workers resided inside a factory complex in an industrial zone, their mobility and interaction with other social actors were effectively restricted.…”

What do Computer Scientists Know About Conflict Minerals?

“…Hardware manufacturing raises a number of ethical, social and environmental justice issues [44]. Examples of such issues include, but are not limited to: the mining of rare-earth minerals for the components of consumer electronics [31,42], the poor health and safety conditions of workers in hardware manufacturers [26,37], the international trade of toxic e-waste [36], or the increasing energy costs required to produce and power such devices.…”