Margaret makes a number of apt comparisons here (Chinese vs. Mexican land reform, etc.). The Land Reform movement sought to correct inequities in China's social and economic structure, and in so doing, helped to begin the transformation of labor within the country so that a far greater number of citizens was working in industrial manufacturing and the like.

More broadly, it would also be valuable for students to observe the cyclical nature of the re-distribution of resources vis-a-vis revolutionary movements, and how, in many ways, the oppressor and the oppressed trade hats, perhaps numerous times over the course of a nation's history. For example, Albert Memmi, in his book The Colonizer and the Colonized, attempts to get at the heart of the relationships between those who wield power, and those who are subject to it.

Margaret's final point regarding the economic climate in China that helped to spurn the transition in labor, is particularly aprpos as it relates to high school students employment prospects today, and how the gig economy is a representation of a transition occurring within the United States. Opening this line of discussion with students will help them see the real causes and effects of social and economic changes in their own lives.

California dreaming? Shenzhen’s success has seen it start to draw comparisons with Silicon Valley. The city is home to Tencent, whose WeChat messaging app is used by hundreds of millions of people. 

Above is a quote from the HSBC "Week in China" on the Pearl River Delta report.  This is a perfect type of document or chunked up document  that I can use in AP World classes.  One of the skills students must develop in the course is how to source a document.  POV, typically its called.  Point of View.  Who is saying the information and why, what is the purpose and audience this information or source is given to or for?

In this case, this definitely would bring interest to students about China's silicon valley model as well as how teenage students all over the world are interested in tech, and in most cases this is a strong personal interest.  Teens are keen on tech and typically get excited in discussing and researching it... SO good attention grabber here, plus the format of this document makes it easy to chunck up and give to students as part of a lesson or an entire lesson.  Depending on the reading level and historical knowledge of the students.

So there is a wealth of topics in this article alone but in addition, getting students to research what it is saying and why and who?  I am going to use this one, especially as a document for sourcing exercises.  We do go over the start up of Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation HSBC and of course the incursion of the Western powers into China, but this is a great article to have students look at the past to the present.  Why is HSBC still there?  What is their role now in China and internationally?  Why would they be publishing such a document?  What is its purpose?  Who is it written for? 

Excellent source for class.

Also, the section of that report where they talk about the Pearl River Delta cities that remained open and functional world traders, even during Mao's cultural revolution are still growing and open for business.  

"In the years after Mao’s rise to power, Guangzhou regained its historic role as the commercial contact point between China and the rest of the world, playing host to the China Import and Export Fair, or the Canton Fair as it is better known. Launched in 1957, the Fair soon became a crucial source of foreign exchange earnings for the Chinese government and was important enough to be kept running through the tensest moments of the Cultural Revolution in the late 1960s"

While trade and outside contact was small in the 1950s it began to grow and word got out to foreign banks and investors that a large market was available, perhaps risky, but definitely available for the right business and marketing strategies.  It seems everyone around the world likes "stuff" and perhaps may be willing to trade.

This again is a great document series to use in World History class.  The Ming dynasty relation and comparison would be a great place to insert this into a class read and discussion, and a great outside source for an AP DBQ essay!  The early Ming sent out Zheng He on his famous Indian Ocean trade expedtitions only to come back and say that the world had little to offer and then following this Ming Emperor Hongwu shuts down most all foreign trade and establishes specific trade ports like Macau to be the contact point to western traders.  Whether that was a prudent decision or not, it certainly did not contain the desire to trade for the western traders or Chinese merchants.  It does not look like much changed, and interestingly, things went on even during what is usually portrayed as the closing off of China during the Cultural Revolution.  Yet trade continued.  I think this would be quite helpful for students to see how blurry political and national lines get when it comes to trade and business.  People like their stuff, no matter what period of history we are looking at, or things going on right now.

Hi Margaret, 

I like the way you thought about other world cultures that have had to grapple with the use(s) of land and for the reasons associated with those changes. China, as pointed out in the Dr. Dube's video went through a land grab by the state during the Communist Revolution (1947) from those well-off to make communes and then again under Deng Xiaoping in the 1970s that also led to a redistribution and the ability of the farmers to work the land and keep a percent of the crops after the state quota was met. It also reminded me of what became of the freed serfs of Russia after their emancipation. What right or use of the land did they have? How was the land distributed? Did these rural peasants play a part in the revolutionary uprisings of 1917? If so, how? After digging, I found this article that shows that land was a factor https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/08/1917-peasant-revolutions-russia-serfs-bolsheviks. In addition, these questions also made me think about the end of slavery in the US and how land was used as a method of control as sharecropping and tenant farming for black and white Americans http://mshistorynow.mdah.state.ms.us/articles/228/farmers-without-land-the-plight-of-white-tenant-farmers-and-sharecroppers. Student can do a compare/contrast of China, Russia and the US in relation to the use of land. 

I was fascinated by the studies about the Chinese skilled labor imbalances, and about the economic trends. I do a lot of research and writing on fair trade policies and ethical labor practices, and I know that Patagonia and at least one other fair trade company have ethical factories in China. I am curious about how foreign investors get into production in China--I know there are plenty--and about whether they are held to any kind of fair treatment standards. 

Also, in my district we have a lot of students who come to the US in high school and live in homes purchased by their parents with a "caretaker." The motivation behind this is to apply to American universities through their American high schools. After watching the video about how the government places you in whatever job they see fit, this makes more sense. I am also now wondering how difficult it is to get into college in China, and how much it costs. What are the pros and cons when families (upperclass families, of course) are deciding whether to send their teenagers to the US by themselves for school? 

Lastly, I was thinking about the labor shortage discussions from last week and how that will impact the growing elderly population in China. Is it common for China to seek laborers from other countries to fill any labor voids? One of this week's videos mentioned migrant workers, but I am assuming they are just rural Chinese workers moving to another area and not laborers from other countries. 

In another life (1987-1998), I was a customs and international trade lawyer in private practice.  During this time, I worked at a small boutique law firm that catered to big players in the U.S. garment industry.  Back then, at least among my colleagues, China was still very much seen as the “world’s factory for low-end products.”  Our clients were drawn to the low production costs to be had in China--so much so that my colleagues and I had a lively side-line in representing both Chinese and American companies in criminal and quasi-criminal contexts.  On the criminal side, for example, a number of our clients would intentionally mislabel the country of origin of Chinese garments as being from the Philippines in order to avoid Chinese import quotas. (If you’re curious, this practice is called either “transshipment” or “submarining.”)  On the civil side, we did a lot of work trying to obtain favorable tariff classifications for garments in order to side-step import quotas. But In the mid ‘90’s, Kathie Lee Gifford gave our business a big boost when she was “outed” for using sweatshop/child labor in Latin America. What followed was a burst of corporate investigation, introspection, and confession.  Many U.S. companies were guilty of contracting with Latin American and East Asian manufacturers whose labor practices would curl your toes. Corporations hired lawyers like me to set up compliance programs that would improve the working conditions of foreign labor, assuage American consumer guilt, and, eventually, raise the prices of our clients’ imports.

Reading about China’s economic trends for this week’s class made me wonder about these kinds of workers and China’s gap between supply and demand for more skilled labor.  How has the Chinese economic “boom” since 2001 affected this labor pool? Back in the ‘80’s and ‘90’s, the most “skilled” and highly-paid aborers in Chinese garment factories were the fabric cutters (the better a cutter you are, the less material you waste).  How have robotics and mechanization changed their lives? Have their working conditions improved, and if so, how? Have these workers moved on, up, and away to other professions and locations? For my special education students, I would consider preparing a unit comparing the “before” and “after” of these questions using the year 2001 as a benchmark.  I would also want to examine any change in the U.S.’s posture vis-a-vis Chinese apparel imports.

For more on Kathie Lee Gifford, see:  “A Sweetheart Becomes Suspect; Looking Behind Those Kathie Lee Labels” at:  https://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/27/business/a-sweetheart-becomes-suspect-looking-behind-those-kathie-lee-labels.html .

I loved the Reuter's article!  I'm teaching Health this year in addition to my usual social studies load and could definitely see using this article as a bridge to discussing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal from both the health and policy perspectives.