The Problem of Foxconn

The factory name is Foxconn. They produce all the iGadgets for Apple, as well as the Xbox and products for Dell, HP, Motorola, Nintendo, Sony and Nokia. I don’t pretend to know the exact nature of the worker issues, but for whatever reason this factory, which is actually a complex of multiple buildings employing thousands of workers has a history of labor disputes being solved with suicide.  The stories I have read have mentioned compensation, pensions, worker conditions, really almost anything one could imagine in a large manufacturing environment. When I saw all the glowing obits for Steve Jobs and his genius, and then saw those on both left and right claiming his legacy for the mantle of their ideology I often thought of the workers at Foxconn. In this latest incident which happened while I was in China these past few weeks, dozens of workers threatened to commit mass suicide by jumping from the factory roof. The protest lasted for days. It was in local English language press, which is censored and so shows the conundrum of modern China.

In 2010, there were fourteen suicides. In 2011, there were 4. The latest incident I believe was precipitated by new worker rules which would require some workers to relocate to factories further into the interior of the country. This is a growing trend as the cost of labor in the highly developed and in many ways—especially environmentally-- overdeveloped eastern third of the country has risen. The threatened mass suicide was averted after the intervention of the local mayor, but we can be certain that the conditions that led to the incident have not been resolved. As I said there is history here.

Foxconn has hired therapists, doctors, etc., and has a hotline staffed 24-hour with trained specialists. None of the big electronics firms involved want their name soiled by these tragedies, but reconciliation is to my eye not near. Not unlike my local school district, I suspect there is now a troubling perception, an understanding even, which is at the heart of the challenge. Suicide is a way out. This is a vile conclusion that once reached by a handful, becomes more accessible to others. It is a slippery slope, not only in China, but also at epidemic proportion in US schools.

The circumstances in this factory which led to the worker suicides are not unlike those in other factories. China’s industrial machine is populated  by millions of  workers from the country’s interior. Virtually all of these workers have traded the life of a peasant for an opportunity to make a better life first for themselves, and also for their families. They are young, and in most all cases thousands of miles from home and family connections.  The factories they populate-- and the engine they drive which has lifted millions from starvation and want-- is essentially in a foreign country.

The migration and the transformative effect on the country have been amazing. Worker holidays and vacation are not well enforced, but one rest and family reconnection that comes each year is The Lunar New Year Holiday. I saw estimates that up to one half of the population is on the move, and this is happening right now.  500 Million souls looking for the proverbial trains, planes and automobiles. Oh, and throw in buses. Imagine if the US instead of having vacation policies--largely attributed to the strength of the now defunct labor union movement-- had instead a government enforced regulation that everyone will have time way for two weeks over the 4th of July. Imagine half the country all headed for the airport or train stations all within a few day window. Keep in mind that these people have to migrate home and then travel back to work a week or two later. I read stories and saw video on CCTV news of people camping out for four and five days trying to get a train ticket home. All of the workers seem to be 25, and so what one sees is the image of the entire college age population of a nation sleeping in every available space in every train station in the eastern part of China.

Then, once they reach the interior, often the buses and trains don’t go there. Foot travel for miles or tens of miles is not uncommon, often in the case of young urban families with little ones in tow. Hours and hours on a train packed so every available space is occupied. It is not hard to understand why the government is so alarmed by and attentive to the concerns of the mass migration of illness. In every major transit center, everywhere one goes, laser thermometers are pointed at you. I got sick on the plane on the way home and was so grateful it was after I left China. Those with fever are not allowed to pass.

I saw one story of a young man and his toddler boy travelling home for the holiday. After hours on the train, there is a long bus ride, then miles of trekking over snowy mountainous roads with the little boy and his dad. Once they arrive there are toothless smiles from the peasant parents, a really joyous reunion. And then, they retire to the… shack. It is amazing the things stands through the brutal winters. This is housing that you can spot everywhere once you leave the cities. Inside there is neither light nor running water. Both heat and light are provided by a fire pit at the center of the single room. The family wears their heaviest coats as they gather communally to reconnect their lives and tell their stories. There is much to talk about, they will not see each other after this two-week visit until the same time next year. The smiles, even on the little boy, are beatific.  Food is shared, treats from the developed  East are distributed.  The Holiday extends for roughly two weeks and then the migration happens in reverse.

So this is the backdrop to the mass suicides a t Texconn. This migration has transformed Chinese society in ways both good and bad. As with the US there is one picture of the country one captures through the gleaming, truly amazing, cities of Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Yiwu City, and so forth, and another one sees in the undeveloped rural environments an hour or two away. In China to travel four or five or ten hours is to travel across decades of development.  

The attachment to family, particular the cross generational ties are deep and strong. And millions of been uprooted from this existence. At the factories they live in dorms with hundreds or thousands of other strangers. Food is provided, and in the most progressive circumstances rudimentary medical care. The labor market is increasingly regulated in terms of overtime, and worker safety. This is nothing at the level of the US environment, but by land large it is good for workers, but has also meant a flight of manufacturing capital further into the interior, where 1) the Government is glad to have the investment, and 2) they are more willing to accept lesser worker conditions.

When one glimpses the other China it is not hard to see why the country has been transformed or why it had to be. Hundreds of millions have been lifted from abject poverty, and tens of millions now have essentially a middle class existence in those gleaming cities, complete with modern apartments, automobiles, appliances, etc. There can be no doubt that serious and extreme environmental damage has been and is being done, but here also there are changes afoot. As people worry less and less about daily sustenance they focus more and more on the sustainability of their environments, and the legality of their circumstances.  This is the natural way of things and not unlike what happens in all societies.  The government though is making gigantic investments in high speed rail, green energy, and infrastructure of the type the US should be, but is not making. The China as are indeed planning and investing in the post-industrial era that will follow this one.

And so we arrive back to try to understand the workers at Texconn. The fact that Apple is a primary customer has brought a lot of light to their circumstances, but that light has not penetrated the veil of worker issues. The actions are reported in the English language press, and often people I travel with seem to be aware of the circumstances so I assume that the Chinese press at least some level also reports. The awakening is near. I have seen thousands of workers, in my years of travel, seen the rudimentary housing, visited the kitchens were meals are prepared.

The Chinese, at least among themselves, are physically affectionate. Girls who are friends can be seen walking hand in hand, and guy friends can be seen head on each other’s shoulder laughing and gesturing. There can be no doubt there is friendship there and if not happiness, at least satisfaction. To be out and about during the midday break for meals is to witness hives of activity, pool playing, basketball, and the ubiquitous cigarettes, which to me view has the potential to have more long term negative health effects than even the pollution challenge. There are people everywhere, many, many smiles.

I know that there are those that will say that the conditions for the workers are slave-like. That environmental and worker safety rules are non-existent or not enforced. There can be no doubt that that is true in some factories. I still recall a p[particularly memorable visit to a metal factory called black widow. They will argue that millions of American jobs were lost down the black hole of the Chinese worker gulag. I suppose it matters what side of the onion one peals. To me it is a terribly complex place, and simple demagoguery on neither right nor left does not pass the reality smell test. I feel privileged to have witnessed the transformation of this society over these past thirty years. I have been travelling to China since right after the opening initiated by Deng Xiao Ping in the late 1970’s. It is neither as horrific as it has been made to seem, but it is also worse than you can imagine, but in general change at a quickening pace is inevitable.  

As China wakes from its environmental and worker neglect, there are stories everywhere of manufacturing capital moving to less regulated locations, whether Vietnam, Cambodia, The Philippines, Thailand, Burma-- just opening from decades of injustice-- or wherever. And as these things develop, by the time the American government enacts legislation to stiffen requirements for better conditions the Chinese will have already dealt with much of it, and what can’t be dealt with in terms of low tech high labor work will have emigrated elsewhere. And so it goes…