Honig, Emily, “The Contract Labor System and Women Workers: Pre-Liberation Cotton Mills of Shanghai” (1983)

Title : “The Contract Labor System and Women Workers: Pre-Liberation Cotton Mills of Shanghai”

Author(s) : Honig, Emily

Year : 1983

Type : Journal article

Subject : History

Keywords : labor;women;social

Journal : Modern China

Volume : 9

Number : 4

Start page : 421

End page : 454

Language:Name : English

Support : Print

Abstract : Labor demand for Shanghai, China cotton mills in the 1930's was in large part filled by contract workers. Many of these workers were teenage girls recruited by contractors, who paid their parents for the girls' services for a specified term (usually three years). The contractors found them work in the mills, collected their pay, and provided their food and shelter. Those who were not hired by the mills were put to work at other types of mills, as servants, or as prostitutes. Although the contractors made good profits in this system, it was not beneficial to mill owners. They were pressured into participating by the involvement of the Green Gang. In the late 1930's, the system was officially ended, although it may have persisted into the 1940's.