Patriarchy, power and protest: gendering China’s construction workers

This article examines the role of gender and patriarchy in shaping collective power and protest among male migrant construction workers in China. It shows how construction workers are discursively gendered as ‘single male’ workers, despite the reality that most are married men (and there is a fast-growing contingent of women). This reduces the men’s power in relation to their employers and results in ‘justified’ violent repression of protests. Two outlier cases of protests among construction workers are presented. In these cases, workers intentionally target the employer, not the state or public, and the protests themselves include wives and children. The claims are framed as patriarchal rights, highlighting how wage arrears prevent men from fulfilling their duties as husbands, fathers and sons. In this way, the men draw power from patriarchy, making it nearly impossible for employers to use suppression, which in turn leads to negotiation.