In the past 30 years, China's economic reforms have forced many state-owned factories (SOEs) to collapse, and both men and women workers were dismissed. In urban Northeast China many laid-off women were able to find employment in the service industry and small-scale private businesses, while their husbands had difficulty finding a satisfactory job. As such, the wives became breadwinners of the families. Based on fieldwork data collected through face-to-face interviews, focus group interviews and participant observation, this study examines resultant spousal relationships in the aspects of family finance, domestic division of labor, power relations, and foundation of marriage, as the husband and wife swapped their economic roles at home. This study finds that when women control more economic capital than men in the nuclear family, domestic division of labor, power relations and affection between couples all tend to be more egalitarian. However, the concept of a male-breadwinner family and the gender segregation of space are still popular on material and social levels. Thus without corresponding changes on the ideological level regarding gender, patriarchy will remain dominant on the community and national levels. Analysis on spousal relationships shows that the economic, political and emotional aspects of marriage are interconnected and interactive, and they work together to decide how spousal relationships may be altered in times of rapid social transformation. In the era of market economy, family and marriage values are diversified, and marriage tends to be less stable. However, this study finds that the integrity of family and marriage has been kept in the laid-off workers' families even when spousal relationships face serious challenges caused by unemployment. The reason is that these laid-off workers have formed their gender identities during the socialist era which emphasized the integrity of family and marriage. In the market era, laid off workers have maintained these values and upheld the integrity of marriage and family as the fundamental standard for being a good man or good woman. In this process, spousal relationship becomes a mechanism of governance by making individuals gendered subjects. / Lu, Ming. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2012. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 161-176). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgements --- p.iii / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Background --- p.1 / Literature review --- p.11 / Methodology --- p.25 / Structure of thesis --- p.28 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- Family & Marriage in China --- p.31 / The patricentric Chinese family as ideology and praxis --- p.31 / The family and marriage under state feminism --- p.39 / The family in Post-Mao China --- p.47 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- Dealing with Financial Crisis at Home --- p.56 / Xiagang as a gradual process --- p.56 / The genderedness of re-employment & wives as breadwinners --- p.69 / Besieged masculinity --- p.75 / Women’s success in small-scale private businesses --- p.79 / Chapter Chapter 4 --- Whose Work Is It? --- p.86 / State feminism vs. housework --- p.86 / Childcare: work and authority --- p.96 / The praxis of family authority --- p.100 / Chapter Chapter 5 --- Changing Foundation of marriage --- p.113 / Obliged freedom: Match-making and marriage in the 1970-80s --- p.114 / Marriage and unemployment --- p.122 / Companionship in marriage vs. obliged couples --- p.136 / Chapter Chapter 6 --- Conclusion --- p.144 / References Cited --- p.161