Return to Foxconn, Part 2

Last week I discussed my skepticism over some more optimistic reports on the conditions at Foxconn, the plant that produces many electronics, most notably many Apple products. I still have some questions about that, and am considering doing a third post looking at the original Nightline program, but for now I want to return to the article "What Camera's Inside Foxconn Found" and discuss another aspect of the article. Even if you believe that the conditions are far worse than those the article depicted, there is something that is difficult to ignore: that Nightline's footage included "3,000 young Chinese workers lining up at the gates for Foxconn’s Monday morning recruiting session." These people know about the salaries, the suicides, the hours, and the dorms. And yet they are clamoring to work at Foxconn. Why is this? Because, the article says, the alternative is "backbreaking rural farm work that doesn’t prepare them to move up the work force food chain." This is an important thing to note about factories in countries like China - many of those toiling away in Foxconn would previously have been working just as hard if not harder on farms. And farming provides little socio-economic mobility, even when compared to factory work.

Women working at Foxconn. Source

The article also prints a letter that the author received from a young man who was born in China and now attends a university in the United States. The article is mainly personal, talking about the circumstances of his aunt and how they were improved by Foxconn. Personal anecdotes are poor evidence for any wider trend, but he does bring up a more general point - that in rural areas like the one his aunt lived in, most jobs were agricultural and "most of the jobs were held by men." It is hard to think about a place like Foxconn being liberating or empowering, but factory work assembling electronics may provide an opportunity for a level of economic freedom for women that is impossible in an agricultural town.

Is Foxconn a positive force? I have trouble thinking so, but it is always important to remember how complex such issues are. Foxconn may be better than the alternative for many people. What do you think?