Session Name: Governing the Working Subject: Ethics of the Individual in the Market Socialist Economy of Vietnam and China II
1 - The Ethics of Lump Sum: The Preference over Short-term Work Contracts and Early Social Insurance Withdrawal among Factory Workers in China and Vietnam
Wednesday, July 31, 2024
11:15 – 13:00 (GMT+7)
Presentation Abstract Both Vietnam and China have experienced significant economic transformations in recent decades, resulting in shifting labor market dynamics and welfare restructuring in which individuals are increasingly encouraged to be self-responsible for their working and welfare conditions. Such a situation has given rise to a prevalent trend of factory workers taking up lump sum through short-term work in China, and early withdrawal from the social insurance system in Vietnam. Using data from in-depth interviews with factory workers in China and Vietnam, this paper explores workers’ preference of taking up lump sum via short-term work or early social insurance withdrawal, even though such acts might jeopardize their long-term welfare and securities. It also examines the intricate interplay of social norms, economic pressure, and policy incentives that shapes these decisions. We argue that it is the urge to take personal welfare into one’s own hands and the lack of trust in the local labor and insurance systems that attract low-waged workers to take up lump sum. In addition, the negotiations around lump sum, thus, not only represent and symbolize workers' (false) sense of self-autonomy in contingent welfare and labor landscapes but also reveal the entanglement between the ethics of individuals, the ethics of being good workers and citizens, and the ethics of being good family members in post-socialist China and Vietnam. This paper, thus, contributes to the understanding of the ramifications of the ethics of the individual in market socialist economies and the emerging forms of labor and welfare reconfiguration.
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