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Union as a Social Regulator of Market Risk?
--Empirical Evidence from Professional Union Leader Program in B City
Youqing Fan 1 * , Peter Gahan 1
* Presenter
1. Work and Employment Rights Research Centre, Department of Management, Monash
University, Caulfield East Victoria 3145, Australia
Polanyi and his followers summarized a ‘double movement’ theory to understand the
interaction of marketization and social protectionism during England’s transformation in 18th
century. In the recent 30 years, China is also experiencing a similar marketization expansion,
according to Polanyi; it is supposed to be a social protectionism developed as a
countermovement.
Despite Chinese unions’ influence and membership has been seriously undermined
during the SOE reform, there has been an attempt by some regional offices of the All-China
Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) to recruit professional leaders, and establish unions
independently from management. This attempt does have its potential to make Chinese union
a social regulator in the rising private sector.
This paper draws empirical evidence from professional union leader program in B city to
examine the question that ‘to what extent does this professional union leader program has
made union as a social regulator to protect workers from market risks?’
1. Introduction
Writing near the mid-point of the last century, Karl Polanyi wrote his seminal work, The Great
Transformation (1944[1957]), which sought to provide an understanding of England’s transformation.
Central to his analysis was the Polanyi’s analysis of these processes have proved enduring,
particularly over the last decade, as a useful approach to examining processes of globalisation (e.g.,
Munck, 2002; Standing, 2007) and rise of new transnational social movements seeking to reverse or
ameliorate the new risks associated with globalisation (Edelman, 2005; Evans, 2008).
To what extent have Chinese unions developed an effective countermovement to the expansion of
market? There are, of course, stark differences between China’s economic transformation and
England’s industrial revolution. But we would suggest that Polanyi’s conceptual framework for
understanding the economic processes associated with industrialisation and subsequent responses to it
– notably the idea of the double movement and social embeddedness of economic institutions –
provide a useful approach for thinking about China’s economic transformation and the social
responses to this transformation. Here, we do not provide any attempt to analyse the transition from a
Polanyian perspective (for an early attempt to incorporate Polanyi ideas into such an analysis, see Nee,
1992; 1996; and more recently Deyo and Ağarton, 2007). Our aim is to sketch briefly Polanyi’s key
ideas and examine the role of professional union leader program in protecting workers against market
risks in China’s new economy.
Thus, the paper will: firstly, introduce Polanyi’s ‘Double Movement’ theory; secondly, briefly
summarize China’s economic transition and changing role of Chinese trade union; thirdly, discuss the
role of professional union leader program in protecting workers against market risks in China’s new
economy; and finally make some concluding comments.
2. Polanyi and the Concept of “Double Movement”
In his book, The Great Transformation (1944), Karl Polanyi described the impact of
industrialisation on established institutions that had regulated production and labour markets.
Industrialisation brought with it an extension of market-based regulation to new areas of economic and
social relations, including the labour market. Consequently, the regulation of labour through the
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