Chinese Workers at IBM Factory on Strike Amid Company Sale
March 07, 2014
IBM深圳工廠千名工人罷工
2014年03月07日
HONG KONG — More
than 1,000 workers have gone on strike this week at an IBM factory in
southeastern China in the latest sign of labor activism as companies’
acute shortage of blue-collar workers makes employees increasingly
willing to take to the streets.
香港——中國東南部一家IBM工廠的1000多名工人本周罷工。由於公司藍領工人短缺問題嚴重，工廠員工愈發願意走上街頭，此次罷工反映出的正是這種新跡象。
IBM is selling to
Lenovo its x86 computer server business, which includes the factory in
the southeastern city of Shenzhen, where the strike is unfolding. Lenovo
agreed in January to pay $2.3 billion for the business in a transaction that is still subject to regulatory approval.
IBM正在向聯想出售其x86計算機服務器業務，其中包括這家位於東南部城市深圳的工廠，罷工就發生在這家工廠。聯想曾在1月份同意為購買這項業務支付23億美元（約合140億元人民幣），這筆交易仍有待監管部門的批准。
A video posted on
Chinese social media shows hundreds of workers in blue factory smocks
standing on Tuesday in front of an IBM building in Shenzhen, a sprawling
electronics industry hub adjacent to Hong Kong with more than 10
million permanent residents and migrant workers. “Workers are not a
commodity,” read one homemade banner; another said, “Give us back our
respect.”
發到中國社交媒體上的一段視頻顯示，幾百名身穿藍色工裝的工人，周二站在深圳的一幢IBM建筑前。深圳緊鄰香港，是一個佔地面積不斷擴大的電子工業中心，有1000多萬長住人口和外來打工者。一條自製的旗幟上寫着，「工人不是商品」；「我們是有尊嚴和人權的」。
IBM said in a news
release that it hoped workers for the wholly owned subsidiary being
sold, International Systems Technology Company in Shenzhen, would be
willing to continue working for Lenovo but that it would offer them
compensation if they did not accept the new employer.
IBM在一份新聞發佈中說，希望這家名為「長城國際系統科技（深圳）」的待售全資子公司的工人，會願意繼續為聯想工作，但如果工人不接受新僱主的話，會為他們提供補償。
“Employees
currently involved in x86 operations in Shenzhen have a personal choice
of remaining with I.S.T.C. under terms and conditions comparable in
aggregate to what they currently are receiving, or they can voluntarily
choose what we believe is an equitable severance package and resign from
I.S.T.C.,” the IBM statement said.
IBM公司在這份聲明中表示，「目前深圳x86服務器業務的員工可以自行選擇，是加盟聯想，並接受與目前相當的薪酬條款，或是自願選擇我們認為合理的離職補償。」
Strikes are especially common in China when factories are sold to new owners, a result of fears of layoffs among workers.
在中國，工廠被出售給新主人時，出現罷工的事情很常見，這是由於工人對裁員的擔心。
Geoffrey Crothall,
the communications director at the China Labor Bulletin, a nonprofit
group in Hong Kong that advocates for independent collective bargaining
and other legal protections for workers in mainland China, said that the
latest strike was reminiscent of one by thousands of Nokia workers in
November in Dongguan, next to Shenzhen. In that case, Nokia shareholders
had approved the sale of their employer, Nokia’s handset division, to Microsoft.
郭展睿(Geoffrey
Crothall)是位於香港的「中國勞工通訊(China Labor
Bulletin)"的宣傳總監，這是一家倡導中國大陸勞工獨立地參與勞資談判和獲得其他法律保護權益的非營利性組織，郭展睿說，最近的這次罷工，讓人想
起去年11月在與深圳不遠的東莞發生的幾千名諾基亞(Nokia)工人的罷工。那次罷工的起因是，諾基亞的股東批准了將諾基亞手機部門出售給微軟公司
(Microsoft)，被出售的部門是那些工人的僱主。
“We’ve seen so many
similar cases over the last two to three years,” Mr. Crothall said,
adding that the IBM strike began on Monday and appeared on Thursday to
be still underway.
「過去兩、三年間，我們看到了很多起類似的事件，」郭展睿說，他補充道，IBM的這次罷工是周一開始的，似乎周四仍在繼續。
A quadrupling of
college enrollments over the past decade, together with the beginnings
of a decline in the number of young Chinese as a result of the country’s
one-child policy, has left a dearth of young people willing to take
factory jobs. Age discrimination is also widespread in China, with
factories seldom hiring anyone older than 40.
過去十年中，中國大學的入學人數增加了4倍，再加上國家計劃生育政策導致中國年輕人數量開始下降，使願意去工廠打工的年輕人匱乏。年齡歧視在中國也很普遍，工廠很少會僱傭40歲以上的工人。
Demographic issues
have affected the Chinese workplace faster and to a greater extent than
almost any experts expected. Wages for blue-collar workers have
increased about fivefold over the past decade before adjusting for
inflation and at least threefold after adjusting for inflation.
人口結構給中國職場帶來影響的速度之快、範圍之廣幾乎超出了所有專家的預期。過去十年中藍領工人的工資，如果不考慮通貨膨脹因素的話，增長了約4倍，如果將通貨膨脹考慮進去，則增長了至少2倍。
Workers have also become quicker to object if they think their legal rights are being abused.
工人們也變得更願意起來反抗，如果他們認為自己的合法權益遭到踐踏的話。
“Over the last five years, there has been a noticeable upswing in worker activism across China,” Mr. Crothall said.
「過去5年中，工人的主動行為在全中國範圍內明顯增多，」郭展睿說。
A report
on Feb. 20 from the China Labor Bulletin said that the group had
recorded 1,171 strikes and worker protests from mid-2011 until the end
of 2013.
中國勞工通訊在2月10日發佈的一份報告中稱，從2011年中到2013年底這段時間內，該組織記錄到的罷工和工人抗議事件達1171起。
The report added
that the police had intervened in a fifth of the documented protests,
sometimes with beatings and arrests. Videos on social media showed a few
Shenzhen police officers watching the IBM protests while making no
attempt to interfere.
這篇報告還說，在這些有記錄的工人行動中，警方出面干預的佔五分之一，有時還發生了打人和逮捕的現象。社交媒體上的視頻顯示，有幾名深圳警察站在附近觀察IBM工人的抗議活動，但沒有試圖進行干預。
Although the
Chinese authorities often delete from social media platforms images of
the frequent protests against the labor policies of Chinese-owned
companies, they have been more willing to tolerate activism against
multinationals and less prone to censor it online. In a sign of the
increasingly virulent anti-foreign sentiment in China in the past
several years, the workers chanted “running dog” when a local manager
emerged from the factory to speak, drowning out his words.
雖然中國當局通常會刪除社交媒體平台上出
現的、針對中國公司勞工政策的頻繁抗議活動的圖片，但他們更能容忍針對跨國公司的行動，不常在網上刪除這類行動的消息。近幾年來，中國的排外情緒越來越嚴
重，這也表現在此次罷工中，當一位當地的經理從工廠內走出來講話時，工人們大聲喊着「走狗」，淹沒了他的聲音。
The choice of the
term was particularly unusual because the workers were striking over
their refusal to be transferred from an American company to a Chinese
company.
工人選擇這個詞尤為奇怪，因為他們罷工的原因是拒絕被一家美國公司轉交給一家中國公司。
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