Paper short abstract:

My paper studies the temporal dynamics of labor subjectivity and capital accumulation within informal micro-factories, or jiagongchang, in Guangzhou, China. Here, migrants view entrepreneurship as a condition of departure, rather than as a means of arrival or as an end in itself.

Paper long abstract:

My paper studies the temporal dynamics of labor subjectivity and capital accumulation within informal micro-factories, or jiagongchang, in Guangzhou, China. Standing in the shadows of formal Fordist-style factories, jiagongchang are small-scale assembly workshops that are connected to transnational supply chains via the labor of migrant factory bosses and temporary workers. Situated in makeshift garages, dens, and abandoned temples, jiagongchang are owned operated by rural migrants who have served as the first generations of wage workers employed in larger export factories in Shenzhen, Dongguan, and Guangzhou. Collectively, they struggle to break away from the constraints of poverty and immobility by forming profit-driven and cross-cultural links with West African and South Korean intermediaries. As these domestic and transnational migrants work to craft the global supply chains for low-cost, "just in time" fashion, they seek gaps between multiple temporal scales in their efforts to accumulate capital. These timely gaps, which I call, rhythms of anticipation, challenge the conceptual overemphasis on space in the processes of capitalist accumulation via spatial "fixes" or the creative destruction of space and place. Rather, I emphasize the temporal and contingent dynamics of capital accumulation and commodity exchange, whereby post-socialist notions of land, labor, and personhood in Guangzhou are transformed to synchronize with the rhythms of global capital. For the domestic and transnational migrant entrepreneurs, "freedom" via low-wage labor offers a prospect of fulfillment and opening of possibility. Migrants view labor as a condition of departure, rather than as a means of arrival or as an end in itself.