Alternatives to the Ideal Path: Precarious Labor for Chinese Migrants
When I refer to the ideal path to economic success, I refer to the general notion of a child attending primary school, moving on to higher levels of education, and then finding job stability with an acceptable standard of living. Since this path is clearly not attainable for every child and thus an ideal, youth on the periphery of this path, those unable to obtain education or those negatively affected by the system, must find alternative courses for development. The key here is then to see how youth on this periphery also influence the ways youth inhabit new spaces and redefine the standard course of youth development and success.
For example, precarious work, or the idea of economic instability in what may be high-risk jobs, is seen as an alternative to the ideal success story. Precarious work takes on multiple forms over various East Asian countries, from enjo kosai sex labor in Japan and South Korea to “gold farmers” and the sale of virtual goods by gamers in China. In some cases, such as in the case of prostitution, precarious labor can be seen both as degrading and as liberating (Ho 2010). However, to stay in direct relation to alternatives to higher education, I note the example of rural migrant youth in China, as they present a very particular circumstance where, from the absence of education, precarious and oftentimes physical labor becomes one of the only modes of financial survival left for migrant youth.
One instance is Cao, one of the students at Maotanchang’s strict facilities. Unable to pass his one chance at the gaokao and unable to afford another year the instructional institution, Cao was left to “end up on a construction site, just like his father” (Larmer 2014: 14). Cao represents one of hundreds of millions of Chinese migrant laborers unable to obtain the education needed to escape the trap of precarious labor. As Chinese migrant worker Wu Dexing describes, he felt an “aimlessness” that was “both a kind of self-loathing and cowardice” when he worked in a low-wage sweatshop (Hansen 2012, 423). For some of these migrants, higher education is never even seen as a viable option, and the inability to access any path to better living seems to instill a feeling of loss among precarious workers.
References
Hansen, A. S. "Learning the Knacks of Actually Existing Capitalism: Young Beijing Migrants and the Problem of Value." Critique of Anthropology 32, no. 4 (2012): 415-34. Accessed March 28, 2015.
Ho, Josephine. "From Spice Girls to Enjo Kosai : Formations of Teenage Girls' Sexualities in Taiwan 1." Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 4, no. 2 (2003): 325-36.
Larmer, Brook. "Inside a Chinese Test-Prep Factory." The New York Times Magazine, December 31, 2014, 1-15.
For example, precarious work, or the idea of economic instability in what may be high-risk jobs, is seen as an alternative to the ideal success story. Precarious work takes on multiple forms over various East Asian countries, from enjo kosai sex labor in Japan and South Korea to “gold farmers” and the sale of virtual goods by gamers in China. In some cases, such as in the case of prostitution, precarious labor can be seen both as degrading and as liberating (Ho 2010). However, to stay in direct relation to alternatives to higher education, I note the example of rural migrant youth in China, as they present a very particular circumstance where, from the absence of education, precarious and oftentimes physical labor becomes one of the only modes of financial survival left for migrant youth.
One instance is Cao, one of the students at Maotanchang’s strict facilities. Unable to pass his one chance at the gaokao and unable to afford another year the instructional institution, Cao was left to “end up on a construction site, just like his father” (Larmer 2014: 14). Cao represents one of hundreds of millions of Chinese migrant laborers unable to obtain the education needed to escape the trap of precarious labor. As Chinese migrant worker Wu Dexing describes, he felt an “aimlessness” that was “both a kind of self-loathing and cowardice” when he worked in a low-wage sweatshop (Hansen 2012, 423). For some of these migrants, higher education is never even seen as a viable option, and the inability to access any path to better living seems to instill a feeling of loss among precarious workers.
References
Hansen, A. S. "Learning the Knacks of Actually Existing Capitalism: Young Beijing Migrants and the Problem of Value." Critique of Anthropology 32, no. 4 (2012): 415-34. Accessed March 28, 2015.
Ho, Josephine. "From Spice Girls to Enjo Kosai : Formations of Teenage Girls' Sexualities in Taiwan 1." Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 4, no. 2 (2003): 325-36.
Larmer, Brook. "Inside a Chinese Test-Prep Factory." The New York Times Magazine, December 31, 2014, 1-15.
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