Chinese Labor in a Korean Factory: Class, Ethnicity, and Productivity on the Shop Floor in Globalizing China - Tapa dura

"In recent years there has been steady growth in the literature on global supply chains and labour in China. In Chinese Labor in a Korean Factory, Jaesok Kim adds to this scholarship with an ethnography that is sensitive to managerial strategy, ethnicity, and local embeddedness . . . There is much to recommend Chinese Labor in a Korean Factory. First, it takes the issue of ethnicity seriously . . . Kim's study is an important first foray into this field, and provides insights on the relationship between ethnicity and identity in globalizing China." -- Eli Friedman * Pacific Affairs * "Kim's contribution lies not only in his detailed and thorough description of the ways in which the factory management controls labor, but also in his sophisticated treatment of the concept of factory regime as an evolving construct . . . In chronicling the evolution of the factory's regime of labor management, Kim makes an important contribution to our understanding of the broader processes of localization and globalization of capitalist practices . . . It should be of interest not only to students and scholars of China, but also to those of labor, industry, and global capitalism." -- Jianhua Zhao "A pleasing study of how cultural assumptions influence the organization of work in a Chinese factory. The research is solid, insightful and memorable." -- William Jankowiak, University of Nevada "This illuminating book, an ethnographic study of a Korean garment factory in North China, is an excellent example of a locally embedded globalization case, in which the author studies global production, the Chinese state and cultural negotiations of nationhood, ethnicity, culture and identity of the workers at the workplace." -- Pun Ngai * author of Made in China: Factory Women Workers in a Global Workplace *

This ethnographic account invites readers to consider a fascinating case of globalized labor - a Korean-owned and managed factory in China, operated by Chinese laborers, where the clash of cultures, traditions, and classes threatens both productivity and peace on the factory floor.