ching kwan lee, 'chambishi rising'

chinese as 'new imperialists' -- only rhetorical impotance, analytically thin

'chambishi is of strategic importance for the Chinese

---

the reason colonialism is not the most productive way to look at China-Africa, she's arguing, has to do with where it focuses our attention (trade statistics, investment, etc.)

these statistics are true--they are true, but they don't suggest a real question

capital is not investment/trade numbers. it is a 'social relation', a process (not 'figures'). so to understand this we need to ask what kind of capitalism are the chinese implementing (both at home and abroad). it is the peculiarity of chinese capitalism that is interesting.

---

we want to think in terms of mechanisms and limits of domination. (the question is not 'capitalism'/socialism; but how we embed the market in social relations-hmph).

we need to understand what the limits are to the kind of capitalism the chinese are pursuing.

---

if you want to make profit, then, the first question is how you control/manage labor? but the chinese encounter distinct additional questions, in this attempt--they cannot simply repeat what the brits were doing, we live in a postcolonial age. but we also live in a post-fordist era, meaning they can't 'buy off' their working class [but what are the parameters of this position?]. they can also not lay claim to hegemony on the basis of universal values, due to the insistence on chinese uniqueness.

the question, in sum, is what is distinctly chinese about this investment?

---

in fieldwork: the number one problem for chinese investors self-reported as labor.

---

why zambia? not because it represents africa; but because, for two reasons, it's a critical case: (1) one of china's closest allies in the continent (independence in '63; '68 -'72, china built railroad that helped it escape white dependence for export of copper). if china has problems here, then, they'll have more problems everywhere else. (2) chambishi is supposed to be the heart of a cross-africa railroad; and, more generally, very central strategically (first of five chinese-owned special economic zone, on a 99-year lease with the promise to bring manufacture--including the value-added part of the copper process)

---

burawoy--writing about the problem of 'zambianization', which was the question of replacing white managers with zambians (british multinationals).

(1) today, however, the problem is not the question of who owns the mine (as perceived by whom? by miners)--zambians have gone through failed nationalization, without improvement of life. followed by IMF-led privatization.

today you have 7 major companies -- the nationality of capital doesn't really matter. what we want is decent pay and decent welfare. they are very aware of class question; national question is no longer the issue. [how strong is the old claim, though?]

less, here, a race to the bottom. competition amongst the seven firms have forced the chinese to lift up the wage levels and welfare benefits. internationalization has produced its own effect.

---

(2) another thing that separates this from Burawoy's work from 40 yrs ago is 'casualization' --liberalization of labor law, no mandate on welfare provision. this has a very profound influence on labor politics; you have to go outside the domain of production to understand labor politics (chinese are not afraid of labor unions; but, rather, wildcat strikes and protests by those who are unemployed/casualized/informal). de-institutionalization of labor politics.

---

against current media presentation, chinese interest in Africa has a lot to do with what is going on inside China. first, the danger of enormous reserves and overcapacity; hyperinflation is looming, real estate prices have gone through the roof. an intense need to find new outlets for chinese capital. Africa allows a release of surplus; 'export of capital'. secondly, of course, there is a real need to guarantee the source of raw materials, particularly in a place where the West has not been as dominant. (and let's not forget, Chinese presence in Africa is not new; an anticolonial bond; China and the Bandung Conference. China is looked at as an alternative; this is particularly how china pitches itself, as a 'model'. this is part, she's arguing, of the hegemonic influence on workers, as well).

---

chinese regime of production

1. creating a chinese-owned economic space: aiming at 60 firms; 6,000 zambian workers, 1,000 chinese. chinese have a 25-year tax holiday, from when they first declare profit. the zambian government is concentrating on this as a source of employment for their voters. they care more about votes, than taxation. also, residential segregation--the 'china houses' are highly regimented/regulated; they have very long work schedules, are controlled as if they were workers. the local Zambian bourgeoisie also like having chinese there--attendant benefits. (crux of her argument is that this is not just a 'space of domination'.

2. zambian time, chinese time: q. of working hard like the chinese.

3. race and 'multi-national capital': after the failure of 'zambianization', race understood differently.

4. collective bargaining and wildcat strikes: 'casualization' is on the table--over the past ten years, the chinese have tremendously improved the conditions of service (in the beginning, they had the largest number of casualized workers; now they have been compelled to change this. conceded on company medical insurance, too). the union's strategy is to encourage wildcat strikes, which are joined by the wives of miners. a very important strategy.

5. managers of state capitalism: most resistant to fieldwork; who are they? many of these have gone through the reform period at home; having rejected state-owned enterprise of the maoist sort, they are totally committed to the mission of capitalism. these managers are effective conduits of chinese capitalism. one vulnerability, though, is that they are responsible for the image of the Chinese gov't. not just tasked with making profit. there is a logic, perhaps, beyond profit-making.

---

chambishi story, in sum

(1) diachronic--chinese concession and expansion
(2) synchronic--elements of a chinese regime fo production
(3) inadequacy of Marxian theory of production (?) -- polanyi's counter-movement; perhaps Bourdieu and notion of 'symbolic capital', perhaps post-colonial notion of difference?