Precariousness in High-Growth Economies: Comparing Labor in Contemporary China and in Postwar Japan and France

This book is the culmination of advanced historical and sociological fieldwork in China, Japan, and France. It explores the evolution of working and living conditions in industrialized societies that have reached a certain level of wealth in a few decades, seeking to offer a more nuanced view on the profound changes experienced by the population in their daily lives. While high growth is generally associated with an increase in workers’ standard of living, the high growth seen in China over the last 30 years has also produced situations of precariousness among the working class. This book questions the link between rapid growth and the generalized securitization of the salaried population, which has been assumed in contemporary sociological works, focusing not only on the evolution of labor and life conditions but also on how labor-relation actors and experts perceive the precariousness experienced in the context of high growth.

Gilles Guiheux is Professor at Université Paris Cité (France). A China specialist, he works on economic sociology and the sociology of labor. His most recent research focuses on Chinese garment workers. His publications include Contemporary China: 1919 to the Present (2023) and, with Eric Florence, a special issue of Le Mouvementsocial on ＂Labour Regimes in China＂ (2023/24).

Bernard Thomann is Professor at Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales (Inalco, Paris), Director of the Institut français de recherches sur l’Asie de l’Est, where he conducts research on the history of labor and social policies in contemporary Japan. He is the author of La Naissance de l’Etat social japonais. Biopolitique, travail et citoyenneté dans le Japon impérial(1868-1945) (2015), Le Salarié et l’entreprise dans le Japon contemporain.Formes, genèse et mutations d’une relation de dépendance, 1868-1999 (2008).