As a Chinese myself, it is really “touching” to see that the imperialist West “cares” a lot about workers in China.
If one tries to point out the fact that “China is a socialist country”, immediately some Western Marxists will respond, “but how about labour rights in China?”
If one searches “labour rights in China” on Western search engines, one will get countless cases of labour rights violations by the Chinese “authoritarian regime” from various NGOs like Amnesty International, especially in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
If one reads articles from Western mainstream media about “labour rights in China”, one will encounter stories of several famous Chinese labour activists like Han Dongfang and Li Qiang and learn the “hidden secret” of the “ccp” that “the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (中华全国总工会) works with companies and the employees have little power.”, as claimed by The New York Times.
It is indeed “fascinating” to see that the owners and funders of Western tech giants, NGOs and mainstream media outlets, namely the bourgeois ruling class in the imperialist West, are deeply “concerned” about workers’ rights in China, while directly or indirectly slaughtering black and brown workers in other third-world countries without feeling guilty at all.
Does the “baby-eating” Epstein class really care about us, Chinese working-class people? Are their anti-China narratives backed by facts?
As many Western sources about labour rights in China are written from a Eurocentric lens, I would like to share my views on this matter from a Chinese Marxist perspective by focusing on the following three questions:
Are workers oppressed in China?
Will Western-style “independent” labour unions help advance the socialist cause in China?
Whose interests are Chinese Trade Unions representing?
Are workers oppressed in China?
This is probably the number one question many Westerners will raise when it comes to labour rights in China.
In the strictest sense, as almost no country in our current world (the DPRK is probably the only exception) has completely abolished wage labour and entered the higher stage of socialism, labour exploitation exists in almost all countries to varying degrees, including in socialist countries. But this is certainly not why many Westerners ask the question, as from this viewpoint, the question itself “are workers IN CHINA oppressed?” becomes meaningless.
(Some Western Marxists will probably say that no, China, Vietnam, and Cuba are not socialist countries because labour exploitation has not been completely abolished in these countries. This is an extremely erroneous view out of naivety and a lack of real revolutionary practices. Nothing can be more arrogant and messianic than Western Marxists denouncing socialist countries because they have not entered a higher stage of socialism within a few decades due to constant threat and encirclement of the imperialist West, while doing nothing at home to fight against one’s own ruling class, the global imperialist class, the root of all evils. Regarding the question “why China is socialist”, it has been answered clearly in the following sources: the collection of unlearn capital: ‘is China capitalist?’, and the recent article of comrade Yaretzi “Messianic First Worldist Marxism”.)
So, what do Westerners really mean when they ask, “Are workers in China oppressed?” In most cases, they mean “are workers in China more oppressed compared to workers in the West?”.
If one compares figures about working conditions in China and the West, such as wage levels, working hours, and annual leave, one will quickly conclude that workers in China are more oppressed compared to workers in the West. However, this analysis is erroneous in two ways.
Firstly, this comparison is deeply Eurocentric, completely ignoring China’s class position in the globe and unequal exchange.
Workers in China are not living in Disneyland, but rather in a world dominated by the imperialist West. Our world is divided into two classes: the global imperialist class in the cores, and the imperialised popular class in the peripheries. Starting from the first opium war, China has been forcibly put into the latter class, the dominated and dispossessed class. Although Chinese people have overthrown the comprador bourgeois class represented by the Kuomintang (KMT) government, and built a socialist country led by the popular class, China’s class position remains unchanged until today.
As explained clearly by unequal exchange scholars like Samir Amin, Torkil Lauesen and Ali Kadri (more sources in the following two collections of unlearn capitalism: Unequal exchange, multipolarity and the new mood; De-development and imperialism: how can we fight back?), a country’s class position determines a country’s wage level, and correspondingly the overall working conditions of its workers. The differences in wage levels caused by class positions play a fundamental role in unequal exchange, helping the imperial cores collect imperial rents with value created by the imperialised peripheries.
As a country in the semi-peripheries, China has not completely escaped the curse of unequal exchange, and hence workers in China are still forced by the genocidal imperialist world order to accept worse working conditions than their white peers in the imperialist West.
Thus, such a comparison between a country in the peripheries and the imperialist West is as biased as when one compares the grade of a student from an immigrant workers’ family and that of a student from a white upper-class academic family.
Instead, a more just comparison can be made between China and India, as India is also a third world country that has gone through (semi-)colonialism and gained political independence around the same time as China.
According to the World Bank, the gross domestic product (GDP) per person in current international dollars converted by purchasing power parities (PPPs) amounts to 29,333$ in China in 2025, almost three times of that in India, being 11,748$. In addition, the minimum wage level in China ranges from 2070 – 2740 RMB (307 – 406 USD) depending on the provinces, while that in India is much lower, varying from 5280 – 23376 INR (55 – 245 USD), despite the fact that workers have similarly long working hours in both countries, 46,1 hours/week in China and 45,5 hours/week in India.
Furthermore, workers in China enjoy much better social welfare than workers in India. Taking healthcare as an example. In China, the state-led healthcare system provides coverage for over 95% of the 1,4 billion Chinese people, while in India, the largely privatised and decentralised healthcare system leaves around 70 percent of women and 67 percent of men aged between 15 and 49 uninsured and vulnerable to high financial burdens in case of serious illnesses.
Based on these figures, it is crystal clear that workers in China enjoy much better working and living conditions than in other major third-world countries like India. This is not because of some peculiar strengths of Chinese culture, but a result of the socialist economic and redistribution system in China. If the popular class led by the Communist Party of China (CPC) had not seized power and built a socialist state, workers in China would have the same level of poor working and living conditions as workers in India.
Moreover, if one checks the changes of GDP per person in current international dollars over time in China, India, the U.S, and Sweden between 1990 and 2025, one will notice a significant fact that the purchasing power of Chinese people is rising rapidly since 1990s, and even more quickly since 2020s, while the increase in the purchasing power of people in the West is gradually slowing down.
In other words, the gap between the living quality of workers in China and that of white workers in the West is gradually diminishing. This further implies that China is now demolishing the “unequal exchange” prison brick by brick and very soon it will break out of the prison on behalf of the imperialised peripheries for the first time in more than two centuries.
Here comes the second mistake with the analysis above. To conclude that “workers in China are more oppressed than their peers in the West” based on situations at the current time point reflects the Western static way of thinking void of dialectical materialism, rejecting the reality that everything is constantly changing and improving, including the working conditions in China.
Just because China has not completely break free from the “core-periphery” trap now does NOT mean that China will not escape from the curse of the global imperialist class in the foreseeable future, especially when many indicators show that the labour rights in China are constantly improving (more information regarding this on the article by Friends of Socialist China “China marks May Day with tangible gains for working people”.).
Therefore, instead of asking whether workers in China are more oppressed than in Western countries, it is more meaningful to ask whether living quality of workers in China will be improved to a similar level as in the West in the near future. With faith in the superiority of socialism, I have full confidence to say that, absolutely YES.
Will Western-style “independent” labour unions help advance the socialist cause?
Even being given concrete facts about how the lives of ordinary workers in China have been remarkably improved, many Western Marxists will still point out this or that case of labour rights violations and criticise the Chinese “authoritarian” government for not allowing workers in China to form Western style “independent” labour unions.
Yes, it is a matter of fact that in China, all labour unions (Trade Unions) are affiliated with the All-China Federation of Trade Unions. This is, however, not, as many Westerners believe, due to the “authoritarian” nature of the Chinese government, but rather because Western-style “independent” labour unions are simply neither suitable nor beneficial for China. It will not help China advance its socialist cause and may even deter China from achieving its ultimate goal, realizing socialism/communism.
Why are Western-style “independent” labour unions not suitable for China?
Many Western Marxists refuse to recognise the real nature of the current “independent” labour unions in the West. Certainly, such labour unions had their roots in revolutionary movements before WWII. However, after WWII, “independent” labour unions in the imperialist West have become nothing but a circus of domesticated “radical” tigers fed by the ruling class with imperial rents. As long as these white tigers are bribed with the meat of black and brown people in the periphery, they will sit tamely beside their ruling class and never think about revolution anymore, not even in their wildest dreams.
In other words, Western-style labour unions are in reality tools of the global imperialist class to bribe its white labour aristocrats and buy their class betrayal against their black and brown peers in the peripheries. Hence the idea that non-white workers in the imperialised peripheries like China should form such unions is as crazy as suggesting people in the Arctic plant palm trees.
Instead of accusing China for not having “independent” labour unions, Western Marxists should probably ask themselves, “Are our labour unions really independent of the control of the ruling class? Can we take over the state power and smash the genocidal imperialist machine by organising within labour unions?” If they are honest enough with themselves, they will find out that the answer is “NO”.
Why are Western-style “independent” labour unions not beneficial for China?
There are two main reasons.
Firstly, the “independent” labour unions, or “independent” organisations for labour rights, are in reality perfect tools for the imperialist West to infiltrate and carry out regime change attempts in China. This is why many Western mainstream media, despite being anti-labour-union themselves, advocate for “independent” labour unions in China.
Most, if not all, of these “independent” organisations for labour rights formed by “Chinese” workers are funded by associations affiliated with governments in the imperialist West. The “rights defense” incident of workers at Shenzhen Jasic Company in 2018, for example, was organized by “workers’ centre” (打工者中心), an “independent” organisation for labour rights entirely funded by Western government-funded NGOs. The China Labor Watch, with its base in New York, the U.S, receives funds directly from the U.S. Department of State. The recently dissolved China Labour Bulletin was also funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a U.S government-funded foundation that has spread “freedom and democracy” in many non-aligned countries and ruined countless people’s futures. So, the word “independent” seems to have a rather opposite meaning in the imperialist West.
One may wonder, what would happen if the Chinese government allowed “Chinese” workers to form such “independent” labour unions? Would workers in China get better working conditions? Rather unlikely.
Instead, if the infiltration attempts were carried out successfully, it might lead China to chaos and eventually balkanise China into several small states under the iron boots of the imperialist West. This would significantly devastate the lives of ordinary workers in China. The only Chinese workers who would benefit from this are those traitors bought by the imperialist West who can flee immediately to the imperialist cores with a political asylum visa.
Secondly, it will harm the interests of workers in China if they listen to some Western Marxists and carry out Western-style class struggles through independent labour unions. Why is this the case?
In capitalist countries, it is undoubtedly helpful and important for working class people to carry out class struggles through independent labour unions, to disrupt and damage the industrial production as much as possible (although, as explained above, many labour unions in the imperialist West, especially in Northern Europe, are rather circus controlled by the ruling class and will not carry out such struggles any time soon). This is a correct strategy because in capitalist countries the purpose of industrial production is to help the bourgeois class with capital accumulation, while working class people get almost nothing from their own labour (except labour aristocrats in the West who get imperial rents from their ruling class).
However, the logic that works perfectly in capitalist countries can NOT be applied to socialist countries like China. In China, although there are still private companies and capitalists, the political power is controlled tightly in the hands of the popular class. As a result, the main goal of industrial production is not to accumulate capital for the capitalists, but to improve the living quality of the people. The surplus value created by working class people is eventually transferred to the hands of the socialist government in the form of taxes and payments by the capitalists and used to build infrastructures and expand social welfare program for the interests of people. Thus, it will be counterproductive if workers resort to ways that will interrupt or even damage industrial production to voice their dissatisfactions.
But this does not mean that workers in China have no ways to defend their rights. Apart from letters and visits (信访), there are many other online and offline channels for workers to express their legitimate grievances and demand justice, just to list a few:
through calling 12333, the national public service hotline for social security and labour rights, or 12351, the trade union hotline,
through reporting unpaid wage issues to the government via the “State Council Client” app (国务院客户端), or under the “Eradicating Wage Arrears (根治欠薪)” section on the Official Website of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (人力资源和社会保障部官网),
through directly visiting local labor inspection departments (劳动监察机构) or other relevant departments like department for work safety supervision and administration (安全生产监督管理部门) to file complaints or reports (all governments in all levels are open to the public in China),
through getting free public legal advisory services online (12348 中国法网), or getting legal assistance from the local labor union in the case of labour arbitration.
Whose interests are Chinese Trade Unions representing?
Following the Western “either-or” way of thinking, Westerners, especially those on the left, view all state-led organisations as “authoritarian” and “bad”, just like they call all cops bastards (ACAB). However, the reality can seldom be comprehended by such a linear logic.
While state-led organisations do NOT represent or serve the interests of the masses in capitalist states, i.e, the dictatorship of the bourgeois class, state-led organisations represent and serve the interests of the popular class in socialist states, i.e, the dictatorship of the proletariat.
In socialist China, Trade Unions under the leadership of the CPC represents and serves the interests of working class people in China, as stated clearly in the Constitution of the Trade Unions of China (中国工会章程),
“Chinese trade unions are mass organizations of the working class—formed through the voluntary association of workers and led by the Communist Party of China—that serve as a bridge and link connecting the Party with the workforce, act as important social pillars of state power, and represent the interests of their members and the workers… The fundamental function of Chinese trade unions is to safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of workers.”
Although many Westerners are still denying the important role Chinese Trade Unions play in improving working conditions for workers in China, the reality proves the opposite.
In the past year, Chinese Trade Unions have launched “concentrated collective bargaining initiatives (集中要约行动)” and issued guidelines to regulate labour rules and algorithms in online platform-based companies to protect the rights of workers in new forms of employment (also known as gig workers in the West) who are exposed to higher risks of exploitation.
In addition, the Trade Unions have helped 12,900 rural workers to recover unpaid wages amounting to 402 million RMB. Furthermore, besides providing services such as health check-ups and “meals of care”, the Trade Unions are continuously optimizing the facilities for workers like “Union Service Stations (工会驿站)” and Rest and Nursing Room for Female Employees.
The importance of Trade Unions has also been proven in various studies in the Past by Chinese scholars. For example, according to Liu Aiyu and Fu Chunhui, once unionized, rural workers in China will earn 23% more in annual labour income and exhibit participation rates in pension insurance and medical insurance that are 3.4 times and 2.9 times higher, respectively. Based on studies carried out by Li Ming and Xu Jianwei, Chinese Trade Unions can raise workers’ wage levels by around 12.75% and reduce working hours by 4.11%.
However, this does not mean that Chinese Trade Unions are void of problems. As pointed out by Wu Jianping in the paper “Forty Years of Trade Union Research in China: A Review of the Basic Trajectory and Characteristics of Domestic Research”, since the current Chinese Trade Unions are a continuation of the trade unions under the planned economy before the Reform and Opening-up, it has inherited the “top-down” style from the old era, functioning as an extension of the government department rather than a bottom-up organization for the masses.
To democratize the Chinese Trade Unions and enhance bottom-up grassroots participation, the current Chinese government under the leadership of Xi Jinping is sparing no effort in reforming the Trade Unions based on the six principles of adherence (六个坚持):
“Adhere to the Party’s overall leadership over the workers’ movement and trade union work; adhere to the fundamental principle of relying wholeheartedly on the working class; adhere to serving the Party’s central tasks; adhere to the political nature, advanced character, and mass orientation of trade union organizations; adhere to serving the workforce as the lifeline of the work; and adhere to the law and the union’s constitution”.
Regarding how to reform and improve the Chinese Trade Unions, Xi Jinping has explained clearly in a collective talk with the new leadership of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions,
“Efforts must be made to strengthen democratic management within enterprises and public institutions, ensure smooth channels for workers to voice their concerns, and guide workers in safeguarding their rights in accordance with the law.
Reform must focus on work at the grassroots level to consolidate the grassroots foundation, stimulate grassroots vitality, and continuously enhance the capacity of grassroots Trade Unions to provide guidance, organization, and services.
Existing organizational foundations must be strengthened, and the coverage of trade union organizations expanded. Innovative working methods should be adopted to provide workers with precise and attentive services.
Trade union officials must practice the Party’s mass line, conduct in-depth research to stay informed of workers’ thoughts and expectations, continuously improve their ability to serve the workforce, and sincerely speak and act on behalf of the workers”.
With the continuous reform and improvement of Chinese Trade Unions, with the further enhancement of the public sector in the Chinese economy, we have all the reasons to believe that the labour rights in China will get better protections in the near future.
Conclusion
Rome was not built in one day; a higher stage of socialism will not be achieved within a few decades, and problems with labour rights in the imperialised peripheries will not be solved completely within a second. However, we, people in the peripheries, especially in socialist countries, are solving these problems and building socialism every day with hard work and hard struggles. If Westerners, especially Western Marxists, really care about us, workers in the peripheries, they should probably stop criticising socialist and non-aligned countries for not being perfect, and start waging class struggles against their own ruling class, the origin of all evils.
Thank you Amy, for covering this topic. I have friends in the US who love to talk about how oppressive China is, and how workers in china have no rights. So I respond with some questions...
Can you give me any specific examples?
Have you seen or experienced this yourself?
Have you studied this topic through research papers or journals?
The answer is always no.
It's all based on a feeling. Which is actually decades of effective and often invisible western imperialist propaganda.
Probably the best comparison is with China itself. If labour conditions keep improving, that’s a great achievement. Not sure that India is a relevant comparison.