This study examines the changing state-society relations in mainland China by exploring the relationships between NGOs and the state during the period of transition to a market economy. The NGOs discussed in this study are primarily concerned with migrant workers, because the issue of migrant workers is one of the toughest issues confronted by the Chinese government. Three different types of NGOs are examined: government-owned NGOs (GONGOs), such as trade associations and county NGOs; grass roots NGOs in the Pearl River Delta and Beijing; and the international NGOs that initiate various programs relevant to migrant workers in China. The author¡¦s analysis is that the Chinese government, influenced by the political context, tends to be suspicious of NGOs and subjects them to restrictive regulations. Given the asymmetric power between the government and the NGOs, state-society relations have developed into a form of state corporatism. It is noteworthy that features of a primary mode of civil society as identified by Charles Taylor have emerged, even though this civil society is far from being capable to counter the power of the state. Moreover, empirical evidence suggests that external factors such as international NGOs and transnational networks are involved in the shaping of state-society relations.

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Exploring one of the intricacies of China’s internationally renowned rapid rates of economic growth and development, this research aims to tackle the issue of migrant marginalization and social exclusion, through the exploration of access to education for migrant children. While vast literature on access to education for migrant children in urban settings currently exists, the existing literature largely lacks a gendered understanding and/or analysis. This research thus, aims to initiate discussion, and provide for a preliminary attempt at understanding the manifold relationships, and contemporary realities of deeply rooted ‘son preference’ across Chinese culture, and the socially exclusionary functions of the hukou citizenship system, through a historical institutionalist lens, within the context of one of the greatest mass migrations “possibly, in the history of the world,” (Nielsen, Smyth & Vicziany, 2007, 1). The research presented is rooted in a case study, conducted in Dongguan, Guangzhou, China in the summer of 2013, which involved surveying and speaking to migrant parents in the region. The primary data collected allowed for a preliminary analysis and thus, insight into a gendered evaluation of access to education for migrant children, highlighting trends and changes in gendered values across the migratory process. Additionally, this research further ignited a theoretical and conceptual discussion on the hukou citizenship system in the framing of hukou status as “inherited property,” a concept derived from the work of Shachar and Hirschl (2007), and further analyzed alongside North’s work on Institutions (1989, 1991), lending to a comprehensive and contemporary understanding of the hukou citizenship system and the barriers it causes in the upward social mobility of migrant workers.

In 2015, Thailand implemented a comprehensive fisheries reform to address allegations of forced labour, trafficking, and illegal fishing. This paper conducts an institutional landscape review of the actors involved in the reform and their responses, mapping out the successes and gaps using a Social Protection Framework. The impact the reform has had on social protection for migrant workers is then examined through interviews with port workers and trafficked fishers. Close attention is paid to Burmese migrants who were trafficked onto Thai vessels to highlight the varying degrees of social protection (or lack thereof) for workers in the fishing sector. The paper argues that the policies of the Thai fisheries reform impact workers unevenly, and that vulnerability often depends on where the migrants work and where they are from. Not enough is being done to assist trafficked victims, particularly past the rescue stage.

Migrant workers' inequality generates many social issues like Why Migrant workers' children spend more tuition in cities than urban workers' ones since they are all Chinese? As workers in cities shared with the same workload and hours, why migrant workers can only obtain low wages, less job offers and exclusion from social security? In the circumstance of financial crisis, why migrant workers are the first to be unemployed? These long-standing issues always cause social concern and accordingly become motives for the study. The article not only describes migrant workers' livelihood, but also aims at the comparative study between them and urban workers. The finding demonstrated migrant workers are relatively weak upon wages, employment opportunity, their children 's education level and social welfare. Such unfair treatment could be attributed to migrant workers' identity problems¡Bhighly variable labor market and incomplete policy implementation. China 's economy and related policy changes yearly since its reform and opening-up policy, however, they are not fully consider migrant workers factor. Besides, limited with its self-interest, local government's policy implementation shows discrepancy from central counterpart's intention. With vicious circle potential which might affect society in many aspects, government should focus on migrant workers' unfair treatment improvement. The research finding could benefit reader's comprehensive understanding upon migrant workers' core issues. Furthermore, China government's solution could be meaningful references for the improvement of Taiwanese business's migrant workers treatment and Taiwan government's foreign-labor policy.

As increased mobility of workers challenges the ability of the traditional labour movement to protect workers’ rights, global union federations such as Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI) attempt to organize migrant workers across borders. The construction sector in Malaysia is one example of a domestic industry reliant upon the labour of migrant workers. Through surveys with migrant construction workers and interviews conducted at BWI’s Asia-Pacific office, the exploitation of migrant construction workers and the effectiveness of BWI’s advocacy work are examined. Factors identified as facilitating the exploitation of migrant workers include the historic legacy of colonialism and post-colonial transformation, and the obstructive impact of Malaysia’s contemporary laws and policies. As a global actor, BWI’s strategies for incorporating migrant workers within transnational advocacy initiatives include the development of migrant support groups, SMS helplines, and local capacity building for migrant workers. / Graduate

The research conducted for this thesis is an exploratory study of migrant workers' experiences in UK food supply chains. This thesis provides an original contribution to criminology by discussing how some food supply chain dynamics result in various exploitative and harmful labour practices against migrant workers. Data consisted of semi-structured interviews conducted with migrant workers in the UK, as well as individual and group interviews with food supply chain stakeholders, including representatives from industry, regulation, and labour movements. This research conceptualises labour exploitation as a continuum, with severe practices including modern slavery on one extreme and 'decent work' on the other. There are a range of practices in-between these two extremes that risk being overlooked, whereby 'routine', banal exploitation is embedded and normalised within legitimate supply chain processes. The argument developed in this thesis is that a stronger emphasis is needed on the harmful consequences of routine, mundane, everyday labour exploitation in order to understand how they can result from legitimate supply chain dynamics. The key contributions of this thesis can be summarised under four themes: developing a more rigorous analysis of 'routine' labour exploitation and harm against migrant workers; understanding how legitimate food supply chain dynamics can facilitate exploitation and harm; explaining how the regulatory framework may unwittingly result in further exploitation and harm to migrant workers; and recognising the complexity of the relationship between migration and labour exploitation. The thesis findings contribute to predominant discussions of labour exploitation that typically focus on severe exploitation such as modern slavery and emphasise rogue individuals or criminal networks as the main perpetrators. The research findings demonstrate that a significant amount of routine labour exploitation and harm remains 'under the radar' in the context of legitimate supply chain practices. Police action and supply chain regulation typically focuses on the most severe labour exploitation, which results in routine exploitation being largely unaddressed. Therefore, labour exploitation has implications for the nature, organisation, and control of harms facilitated by businesses and supply chains. It is important for criminology and society to not disregard routine labour exploitation, as these practices can result in numerous harmful consequences for workers. Since the public profile of labour exploitation continues to grow, a stronger focus is needed on the routine and banal aspects, not just the most severe practices.

At the top of the hierarchy, construction project managers emphasise that safety is a key priority; and at its bottom, front-­line workers do not turn up to work to get hurt. Yet, somewhere within the organisation it goes wrong, as accidents still occur. Research has suggested that unsafe acts contribute to over 80% of accidents, and hence reducing or eliminating unsafe acts should take a significant step forward to improving construction safety. While it has been recognised that the vast majority of accidents are still caused by unsafe behaviour, research has shown that organisational and cultural factors considerably affect unsafe work behaviour. This study aims to provide insights on unsafe acts that were committed by construction mangers and operatives; as well as providing insights on the effects a multinational workforce has on unsafe behaviours. Hence, the content within this thesis has purely focused on ‘unsafety’ rather than safe practices, and there were many good safety practices on the QC (Queensferry Crossing). It is the premise that by concentrating on ‘unsafety’, theoretical and practical insights can be gathered for safety improvements in the construction industry. This investigation explores this problem on a large multinational construction project in the UK, the QC. The contractors of the QC, Dragados of Spain, Hochtief of Germany, Morrison of the UK and American Bridge, represent Forth Crossing Bridge Constructors (FCBC). Adopting an interpretive paradigm, this study used a qualitative approach through ethnographic methods. A moderate participant observer approach was implemented; where the researcher adopted a role as a member of the H&S department and frequented the research setting between one and three times a week for almost three years. The contribution of this research is the in-­depth ethnographic insights into the complexity of unsafe acts. The insights revealed that: there was a blame culture, creating an environment that was very difficult to learn from; that some cost-­saving strategies appeared to increase safety risks; some H&S rules were viewed as excessive and inflexible by construction workers, and therefore their were times when workers used their own judgement about when to follow the rules; there were communication barriers with migrant workers, and the one in six translator policy used in an attempt to overcome this was far from ideal; and that the different ways of working that foreign subcontractors had meant they were difficult to manage, monitor and adjust. The findings revealed that there were two main underlying themes that were influential in the undertaking of unsafe acts: firstly, the perceived compensation culture and secondly, tight financial budgets. The fear of compensation claims appeared to prompt the H&S rules that were viewed as excessive, and took away ‘common sense’ from some procedures. The operatives desired more of a common sense approach, and felt at times they needed to break the rules in order to complete the job. The fear of claims also appeared to lead to the unconscious adoption of a ‘Person approach’ perspective, which concentrates on individual error and blame, and as far as possible uncouples organisational responsibility from an individual’s unsafe acts. This approach is inextricably linked to a blame culture, where accidents were under-­reported, misreported and reported late. The second theme was tight financial budgets. Previous research has explained that the competitive tendering process in the industry can discourage contractors from factoring into bids the cost of performing the work safely. In this research study, there appeared to be additional risks taken for schedule or cost reasons. Directors and senior managers acknowledged there was significant pressure for production, construction site managers believed the budget they were working with was too tight, and construction operatives explained that a phrase used on site was ‘just get it done’. To cope with production pressure construction site managers used undercover and informal reward schemes, referred to as ‘Vegas Time’ in this study. These schemes strongly incentivise production, potentially at the cost of safety. Ethnographic insights also revealed the areas where cost saving strategies appeared to increase safety risks, such as temporary designs, labour shortages, machinery and equipment. One of the most obvious cost-­saving strategies was to employ a cheap multinational workforce. However this led to many challenges with communication and different work practices, which was also perceived as an additional safety risk. The theoretical implications of this research work is that to avoid additional safety risks from occurring due to cost-­saving strategies, occupational health and safety considerations should be planned and priced for in more detail during the tender stage. Also, the eradication or reduction of the perceived compensation culture would increase the likelihood of adopting the System perspective to unsafe acts, rather than a Person approach, which is inextricably linked to a blame culture.

Burmese migrant workers leave Myanmar and come to Thailand because of the ongoing economic and political discrimination at home. Drawn to the greater work opportunities available in Thailand, these migrant workers are actively working and looking for jobs in Thailand’s menial job sectors such as agriculture, domestic work, fisheries, construction and manufacturing. They suffer from low-paid, difficult and dangerous work conditions which are largely unprotected by labor laws. Taking into account Thailand’s new minimum wage, the Thai economy’s labor shortage problem and the coming of the ASEAN Economic Community in 2015, the Thai government should coordinate the efforts of its own various agencies, employers, migrant associations, civil society, the Thai public, ASEAN and the international community to improve Burmese migrant workers’ rights. Beyond the process of clarifying the rights of migrants in the workplace to Thai employers and labor unions, as well as enforcing existing laws, the Thai government should provide migrants with health care services, education, and the option of citizenship, so that the migrants can live a quality life in their adopted country.

The research is aimed at investigating how the common EU social and economic strategies, namely the 'Lisbon strategy' and the 'EU 2020', have been influential as a 'EU incentive' in European social partners having drawn the matter of employment of migrant workers both at Member state level and at European level by looking into their respective changes in responses towards the matter in the course of the two strategies. The research has found that there have been changes made in the European social partners' responses regarding the problematic matter of migrant workers' employment, namely precarious working conditions and lower employment rates than native workers, at all levels. To be specific, the trade unions have begun to emphasize more proactive protection of migrants at workplace than before. However, there is little evidence that it was the result of either the Lisbon or the EU2020. It was rather much more because of the evolving European economic market circumstance that has been getting liberalized more actively as the single market goes on, featured by the problematic side of the increase of posted workers and agency workers. Especially, the research is also aimed at shedding a light on how the Lisbon and the EU2020 have been articulated in the two different economic, social and employment models, namely the Nordic model and the Western model by investigating the Swedish case and the UK case in the study of Member state level social partners.