In response to a series of strikes in south China in 2010, a new model of collective bargaining has emerged, featuring what this article describes as “moderated mobilization.” Distinct from what is typically known as China's quadripartite industrial relations system, whereby workers are separated from the party-state, official trade unions and employers, this model shows workers and enterprise-level trade unions in collaboration with one another. According to our observations from 2012 to 2017, some enterprise unions have successfully mobilized workers throughout the collective bargaining process. These unions are democratically elected by workers and are relatively independent from the official authorities. At the same time, they have “moderated” such mobilization particularly to reduce labour militancy, given the political and institutional constraints within which they must work. The implication of this new model is significant. Although it might be far from solving the quadripartite dilemma, it has signalled an increase in local initiatives among enterprise unions – a previously neglected but pragmatically favourable channel for workers.

Scholars of Chinese society have predominantly regarded the region's money to represent an unusually “social” artefact. The dramatic proliferation of “digital money” services within Chinese social media platforms in the last decade would seem to further confirm the social character of Chinese money. I present a comparison of the diverse views held by migrant factory workers in Shenzhen towards different digital payment platforms which, however, suggests that rather than digital money necessarily being more or less social, different platforms instead extend the possibilities of sociality in varying ways. I argue that acknowledging the production of such novel working-class subjectivities through digital money ought to be central to efforts to assess the potential of these technologies for addressing the social, institutional and economic exclusions faced by Chinese migrant labourers. This in turn can enrich our understanding of the emergence of a new “digital working-class” in China by revealing how such contemporary working-class subjectivities are shifting, contextual and processual in nature.

Chinese national identity has long been considered to have been an obstacle to Singapore's nation-building efforts. This is mainly because China was suspected of using its ethnic links to encourage Singapore's communist rebellions during the 1950s and 1960s as Lee Kuan Yew was working towards establishing the city state. This study reviews Lee's exchanges with Beijing and argues that he gave China the impression that he was building an anticolonial, pro-China nation. Beijing therefore responded positively to Lee's requests for support. Reiterating its overseas Chinese policy to Lee, Beijing sided with him against his political rivals and even acquiesced in his suppression of Chinese-speaking “communists.” In addition, China boosted Lee's position against Tunku Abdul Rahman, supported Singapore's independence and lobbied Indonesia to recognize the territory as a separate state. China thus actually played a helpful role in Singapore's nation building.

To what degree are Chinese citizens concerned about the seriousness of global warming and climate change (GWCC) and what are the key factors that shape their concern? Drawing theoretical insights from extant literature and using recent data from a national representative public survey (N = 3,748) and provincial environmental and economic statistics, this study, the first of its kind, examines the variations and determinants of Chinese GWCC concern. Our data show that in China, compared to other countries, average public concern about GWCC is relatively low, and concern varies greatly among Chinese citizens, across different provinces and between coastal and inland areas. Statistical analyses reveal that the levels of Chinese GWCC concern are significantly influenced by individual sociodemographic characteristics, personal post-materialist values, and regional economic dependency on carbon-intensive industries. Specifically, women and younger Chinese with greater post-materialist values are more concerned about GWCC than their counterparts, and citizens from provinces with higher economic dependency on carbon-intensive industries tend to be less concerned about GWCC than people from provinces with lower carbon dependency. We discuss key policy implications and make suggestions for future research in the conclusion.

This article examines the so-called “grid governance” scheme, a widely used grassroots governance strategy implemented in urban China in recent years. Drawing on data collected in multiple cities from 2011 to 2016, it analyses in what ways, and to what extent, the state employs the grid governance scheme to resolve neighbourhood conflicts and reinforce governance in Chinese urban middle-class neighbourhoods. The findings highlight complex interactions under the scheme among the residents, the state and market actors in neighbourhood governance, including the resident volunteers, residents’ social groups, residents’ committees and property management companies. By coopting middle-class resident volunteers, maximizing the existing political influence of the retired urban elites, and establishing Party organizations in middle-class residential communities, the grid governance scheme has become a major vehicle for resident mobilization and conflict resolution, and a key governance mechanism to reinforce the Party's leadership in middle-class neighbourhoods.

China's urbanization has revitalized grassroots governance under which millions of villagers have become increasingly keen to participate in grassroots elections and influence decision making in their village affairs. To maintain its political legitimacy over a rapidly transforming society, the authoritarian party-state has progressively promoted open, competitive grassroots elections in response to the increasing demand by villagers for more public participation. Based on in-depth field research in urbanizing villages in southern China, this article provides an empirical analysis of how the local state has adopted different interventionist strategies in elections to support villagers’ active participation while sustaining its direct leadership over daily village governance. Our findings explain why the recent development of open and transparent grassroots elections is reinforcing the ruling capacity of the socialist state rather than enhancing self-governance and grassroots democracy, although villagers now have more opportunities to defend their economic and social rights through elections.