Author: Irene Pang
The Legal Construction of Precarity: Lessons from the Construction Sector in Beijing and Delhi
Even as labor is increasingly characterized by precarity in the 21st century, the ambiguities of conceptual tools and analytical vocabularies sometimes hinders the study of precarious labor. This paper seeks to disentangle the concepts of “precarity”, usually associated with the Global North, and “informality”, typically associated with the Global South, to better understand the historical and empirical nuances in the different genealogies and varieties of precarity, and importantly, to examine the role of the state in its construction and reproduction. Using comparative ethnographic data on two cases of labor disputes within the construction sectors in Beijing and Delhi, in which precarious labor conditions are rampant, this paper traces the ways through which precarity is structured and reproduced by the Chinese and Indian states through the law, and reflects on the implications for worker resistance and claim-making.