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This book focuses on how the All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) is reforming under current conditions, and demonstrates that labour unrest is the principal driving force behind trade union reform in China.

Although the literature on labour NGOs (LNGOs) in China has significantly expanded, few scholars have attempted to subject the work of these organizations to a Marxist perspective. This article draws on a recently developed Marxian theoretical framework on social movements to analyse the pioneering work of Hong Kong LNGOs and their partners in the province of Guangdong, China. Over the past 15 years, the Hong Kong groups, as they are known collectively, have been ideally placed to develop specific interventions in response to migrant workers' pursuance of wage claims and improved working conditions during a time of increased rights awareness and widespread labour shortages. While consistently careful to remain the right side of China's restrictive laws on freedom of association and demonstrations, the Hong Kong LNGOs were able to contribute to a narrative of class-based collective solidarity that has yielded significant gains for workers.

The integration of the former state-socialist countries into the global capitalist economy has eroded the privileges of the traditional working class and confronted a new generation of workers with low pay and poor working conditions. This book explores the extent to which the trade unions in Russia, China and Vietnam have risen to the challenge of representing the rights and interests of workers displaced from state enterprises and workers employed in the new global factories. Pringle and Clarke argue that the driving force of reform has been the challenge of labour unrest. They demonstrate that the extent of reform has been constrained by the political subordination of the trade unions in all three countries, and that the key to further reform is the achievement of freedom of association.