Position and Analysis

What is your first thought when you think of "labour movement Scenes of workers in strike, organizations holding banners in front of corporates or government headquarters? News of workers leaders being attacked, detained and prosecuted? We know indeed very little about labour movement, workers organizers life and daily challenges, apart from some short scenes of their struggles and demands broadcast in the news. “We the Workers”, a documentary documents labour activists in China, their living and working conditions between 2009 and 2015, to tell us more about
labour movement in China.

On 3 December 2015, seven leaders of labour NGOs in Guangzhou were detained and four of them faced subsequent criminal prosecutions. Most of the affected NGOs were prominently active in assisting workers' collective struggles, pushing for collective bargaining between 2012 and 2015. Labour lawyers and some academics called this new type of NGOs as “movement-oriented NGOs”, in order to distinguish them from the social service-oriented NGOs and legal right-oriented NGOs.

Occupational safety and health (OSH) of migrant workers has been a concern in the past years. In January 2017, a Chinese organization “Cocultivation Social Work Service Centre” released a research report, based on 1,410 visit reports of injured / sick workers compiled in 2016. Researchers visited victims of occupational hazards in 28 hospitals in Dongguan City over a span of 130 days in 2016, and revisited 80% of the workers to look into their background, labour conditions, rehabilitation and other aspects. The findings of this research are then put into this report.

Dongguan City has become a manufacturing powerhouse since China launched its economic reform. In the past two decades, the demographic dividend brought by the migrant workers has supported China's crown of “world's factory” and Dongguan City played an irreplaceable role in the process.