Afterword

It is a great pleasure for us to see that the notion of a “multiplication of labour,” originally elaborated in our book Border as Method (2013), is spurring research on labour in China. The notion emerged from a critical engagement with theories of the international division of labour and a related attempt to develop a critique of the political economy of borders in the current global conjuncture. China plays quite an important role in the analysis we pursue in the book. On the one hand, we look at the way in which internal migration has deeply transformed the composition of the labour force over the last decades, particularly focusing on the management of mobility predicated upon the hukou system. On the other hand, we carefully investigate the proliferation of special economic zones in the country, emphasising the ensuing multiplication and heterogenisation of economic, legal, and even cultural conditions of labour and life. Following the lead of such scholars as Pun Ngai and Wang Hui, we attempt to shed light on the specificity of the bordering processes resulting from such a situation and at the same time to map the multifarious practices of workers’ resistance and struggle.