Behind China’s biggest strike in decades last month was a new player in Chinese labour activism: management. A previously unpublished account from inside the strike at Taiwanese shoe manufacturer Yue Yuen obtained by Reuters shows that supervisors were the first to challenge senior plant leaders about the social insurance contributions that became the focus of the dispute. Yue Yuen Industrial Holdings declined to comment. The involvement of managers underscores the growing complexity and unpredictability of labour relations in China. A generation of long-serving migrant factory employees is starting to retire just as the economy slows and the spread of social media makes strikes easier to organise. Yue Yuen’s strike wasn’t the first time in recent years managers, rather than front-line workers, helped orchestrate industrial action in China. Managers were also involved in leading a strike at IBM’s facility in Shenzhen in March, according to a worker and another person briefed on the strike. IBM declined to comment. Supervisors and other low- and mid-level managers also helped corral workers during a March strike at Shanmukang Technology, which supplies mobile phone cases to Samsung Electronics, a former employee said. Managers have been orchestrating strikes during international deals for years, lawyers said. “It happens all the time” that managers encourage workers to strike during an international transaction that affects a company’s Chinese operations, said Jonathan Isaacs, special counsel with responsibility for Chinese employment and labour issues at law firm Baker & McKenzie in Hong Kong.

In China, managers are the new labour activists

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