Belabored: Labor Solidarity in China, with Tobita Chow and Kevin Lin

Belabored: Labor Solidarity in China, with Tobita Chow and Kevin Lin

A conversation about what rising U.S.-China tensions mean for workers and the labor movement in both countries.

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Over the course of the Trump era, China became a favorite target of the right, on issues ranging from trade policy to human rights to COVID-19, with some dangerous implications in terms of anti-Asian violence and xenophobia in the United States. But what does this mean for workers and for the labor movement both here and in China? In addition to being a massive authoritarian capitalist state, China is also home to arguably the world’s biggest working class. And for all the talk about so-called American jobs being offshored to China, where do the plights of workers in both countries intersect? Is global labor solidarity possible? To figure out how labor and the left should be thinking about China, we talked to Tobita Chow, director of Justice is Global, and Kevin Lin, a Hong Kong based labor activist and researcher.

In other news, we spoke with Harvard Law Professor Benjamin Sachs on a recent Supreme Court ruling that puts property rights above farmworkers’ rights and Elizabeth Lalasz about the Chicago nurses strike last week. And we discuss Black TikTok withholding their labor and a bill to protect workers from ageism, with recommended reading on a radical union on the high seas and socialism at Buffalo’s grassroots.

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