Workers’ grassroots collective action in China. Playing with visibility and the politics of recognition in an authoritarian context

As part of a series of lectures organized by the Paris Graduate Schoool of East Asian Studies, Université Paris Cité is inviting Professor Eric Florence will give an online talk on January 28th at 6 pm (Paris time), Chris Chan (CUHK) as a discussant.

Summary: Based on surveys of migrant workers in Beijing and Shenzhen, Eric Florence shows how worker collectives implement hybrid mediation arrangements. These produce a variety of forms and levels of association, interaction and engagement. To varying degrees, they make their actions, claims and identities visible (Bleil 2005). The question of visibility is central to a complex politics of recognition.

Eric Florence is professor at the University of Liège, former director of the French Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies (CEFC) in Hong Kong (from 2015 to 2019). He has a PhD in political and social sciences from the University of Liège, graduated in Chinese studies (Inalco) and in political sciences and international relations (UCL). His work is in the field of political sociology and focuses on the processes of identification, legitimization and representations of rural workers in China.

Recent publications :

With Qian Junxi, “Migrant worker museums in China: public cultures of migrant labour in state and grassroots initiatives » Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 47, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2020.1739373

With Chris King-chi Chan and Jack Linchuan Qiu, “Editorial – Precarity, Platforms, and Agency: The Multiplication of Chinese Labour”, China Perspectives, 2021/1, https://doi.org/10.4000/chinaperspectives.11268