Chinese Investment and European Labor: Should (and Do) Workers Fear Chinese FDI?

Abstract
The rapid increase in Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) into Europe raises important questions about the implications of such for workers and organized labor in Europe: (1) does Chinese FDI flow more or less to regulated labor markets than do other investment sources?; (2) what are the strategies of works-councilors and union representatives in dealing with real or expected investment from China?; and (3) how do individual workers view the propriety of Chinese FDI given China’s low-wage, labor-unfriendly profile in the global economy? Quantitative and qualitative data on Chinese FDI, individual opinions about China and globalization, and on strategies of labor representatives provide some leverage to preliminarily answer these questions. First, Chinese FDI does not seem to be more (or less) focused on investing in the least regulated labor markets than other sources of FDI. Second, interviews with works councilors and union representatives in Germany, France and the Netherlands affirm a cautiously optimistic view of Chinese investors as no more or less threatening to organized labor than other investors. And third, analysis of attitudes about Chinese and European interests in managing globalization suggest that less-skilled, more vulnerable, pro-labor-union workers in Europe tend to be more rather than less enthusiastic about Chinese management than their fellow citizens.  These patterns suggest a surprising, if tentative, embrace by workers and their representatives in Europe of that investment.

Biography of the Speaker
Damian Raess is a lecturer in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Geneva. He obtained his PhD from the University of Amsterdam in 2006. He specialises in international and comparative political economy, with a primary focus on economic globalisation and labour relations. He has published articles in journals such as the Annual Review of Political Science, European Journal of Industrial Relations, Politics and Society, the Review of International Political Economy and Socio-Economic Review. Raess currently co-chairs the social policy and political economy network of the Swiss Political Science Association.