In the late 1960s, as movements for decolonization and revolutionary socialism swept through Asia and Latin America, the ruling parties of Mexico and Taiwan took decisive steps to open their borders ever wider to foreign capitalist investment. In a shift away from earlier nationalist economic strategies and to stimulate rapid industrialization, Taiwan and Mexico created new statutes allowing foreign investment in cordoned-off economic zones.
In 1966, under the supervision of its Chief Economic Minister K.T. Li (李國鼎, Lǐ Guódǐng), Taiwan established its first Export Processing Zone in the southern port city of Kaohsiung, inviting foreign firms and overseas Chinese businessmen to establish export-assembly plants within its walls. Meanwhile, in 1968, Antonio J. Bermúdez completed the transformation of his family’s cotton fields in Ciudad Juárez into a massive industrial park welcoming international (but mostly U.S.-based) firms to establish the first large-scale maquiladoras in the city. Although Mexico and Taiwan’s experiment with export-led industrialization drew from distinct economic conditions, their early embrace of a “zone”-based export manufacturing model not only transformed their regional economies, but also represented a new chapter in the history of what some have termed “the global factory.”
Entangled Assembly seeks to examine the history of the global factory by looking at the unique historical experience of export-manufacturing in Ciudad Juárez and in Taiwan, and the expansion of these models around the world from the 1970s onwards during the global restructuring of capitalism later referred to as “neoliberalism.” Rather than examining the maquiladora and export-processing plants in East Asia and Mexican border cities in isolation, this exhibit suggests that these histories ought to be viewed together.
The exhibition is composed of two sections, one historical and one rooted in transpacific artistic dialogue. The first section of the exhibit provides an immersive documentary history of the global factory in East Asia and the U.S.-Mexico Border, with a focus on Ciudad Juárez and Taiwan. Much of this historical material is based on Gabriel Antonio Solís’ research on the simultaneous growth of export-manufacturing in both regions and draws on archival research, published oral testimonies, and transpacific scholarly engagement. The second section highlights 12 contemporary, transpacific and multidisciplinary artists and collectives, whose work respond to the dynamics and entangled thematics related to the history of the global factory in their regions.
The history of the global factory in Taiwan and the U.S.-Mexico Border offers an important site of comparison for understanding the evolution of capitalism during the 20th Century. With this in mind, we hope to generate a deeper transpacific conversation between the communities that have shouldered the burden of hosting these factories over the past 60 years, with the hope that these conversations might offer insights into how we might abandon that system altogether.
Artists: Cassandra Adame, Mara Cardona Walls, Colectivo Versiones, Anairam, Huang Li Hui, Lee Peiyu Annie, Luis Roacho, Jorge Scobell, National Sun Yat-sen University Taiwan - Sociology Department, Print and Carve Dept., Wang Yi Ting, Jess Tolbert.
Curators: Gabriel Antonio Solís y Edgar Picazo Merino
A finales de la década de 1960, mientras movimientos de descolonización y socialismo revolucionario se extendían por Asia y Latinoamérica, los partidos en el poder de México y Taiwán tomaron medidas decisivas para abrir incrementalmente sus fronteras a la inversión capitalista extranjera. Alejándose de previas estrategias económicas –fundamentalmente nacionalistas– Taiwán y México crearon nuevas leyes que permitían la inversión extranjera en zonas económicas demarcadas para estimular una rápida industrialización.
En 1966, bajo la supervisión del Secretario de Economía K.T. Li, Taiwán estableció en la ciudad sureña y portuaria de Kaohsiung su primera Zona de Procesamiento de Exportaciones (ZPE), invitando a negocios extranjeros y empresarios Chinos en el extranjero, a establecer plantas de ensamblaje y exportación dentro de sus límites. Mientras tanto, en 1968, Antonio J. Bermúdez finalizó en Ciudad Juárez la transformación de los campos algodoneros de su familia en un enorme parque industrial que acogía a empresas internacionales, en su mayoría con sede en EE. UU., para establecer las primeras maquiladoras a gran escala en la ciudad. Aunque el experimento de industrialización liderado por las exportaciones de México y Taiwán se basó en condiciones económicas distintas, su temprana adopción de un modelo de fabricación de exportación basado en "zonas" no solo transformó sus economías regionales, sino que también representó un nuevo capítulo en la historia de lo que algunos han llamado "la fábrica global".
Ensamblaje Enzarzado busca examinar la historia de la fábrica global, revisando las peculiares experiencias de la maquiladora en Ciudad Juárez y Taiwán, así como la expansión de estos modelos por todo el mundo a partir de la década de 1970, en lo que eventualmente se conooció como “neoliberalismo”. En lugar de analizar estos acontecimientos de manera aislada, sugerimos que las historias deben ser vistas juntas.
La exposición se compone de dos secciones. Primero, una historia documental inmersiva de la fábrica global en Asia Oriental y la frontera entre EE. UU. y México, con un enfoque en Ciudad Juárez y Taiwán, basada en la investigación del historiador Gabriel Antonio Solís y respaldada por archivos, testimonios orales, y trabajo académico. Adicionalmente, las obras de 12 artistas y colectivos contemporáneos, transpacíficos y multidisciplinarios en respuesta a dichas dinámicas se muestran en el espacio, entrelazadas por las diferentes temáticas que se desarrollan a partir de la producción global.
La historia de la fábrica global en Taiwán y la frontera mexicoamericana ofrece un importante marco de comparación para comprender la evolución del capitalismo durante el siglo XX. Con esta puesta, esperamos generar una conversación transpacífica más profunda sobre cómo las comunidades han enfrentado el fenómeno en los últimos 60 años, con el fin de, potencialmente, ofrecer perspicacia sobre cómo se podría abandonar por completo este sistema.
SECCIÓNES
( 食，衣，住，行， 育，樂 )
(Alimentación, Vestimenta, Vivienda, Educación, Recreación)
( 食，衣，住，行， 育，樂 )
(Alimentación, Vestimenta, Vivienda, Educación, Recreación)
( 食，衣，住，行， 育，樂 )
(Alimentación, Vestimenta, Vivienda, Educación, Recreación)
Maquila
加工區
Maquila
加工區
El Paso Times, November 27, 1968.
El Paso Times, November 27, 1968.
In the 1960s, Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez became laboratories for the global factory. In the late 1960s, Taiwan and Mexico designated both cities as pilot areas for a new experiment in export-led industrialization. Their decision was informed by a chorus of U.S. industrial consultants, including officials from US AID, the Sino-American Fund, Richard Bolin of Arthur D. Little Inc. (who went on to become one of the loudest advocates for maquila growth), and ambitious firms like General Instruments. With hopes that foreign investment would lead to rapid industrialization, Mexico and the Republic of China (Taiwan) established specially designated zones, where foreign firms or subcontractors could import basic materials to be assembled and re-exported duty free. Within these zones, investors were promised access to large numbers of well-behaved, unmarried, young women and girl workers.
Although we use the term “global factory,” this entity was experienced through distinct linguistic formulations. In Mexico, export-assembly plants became known as “maquiladoras” or “maquilas,” and were limited to cities within direct range of the northern border (although this restriction was lifted in 1971). Meanwhile in Taiwan, aside from a few small industrial parks outside of Taipei, export assembly plants were allowed in a specially cordoned off industrial zone known as an Export Processing Zone, or EPZ, (Jiāgōng chūkǒu qū, 加工出口區，sometimes also referred in shorthand as a 加工區/Jiāgōng qū). The first EPZ was established in Kaohsiung in 1966, but more were later established in Nanzi and Taichung. By the 1970s, export-industries expanded beyond these designated zones however, as Taiwan became a regional leader in export-manufacturing. The EPZ model eventually proved more popular than Mexico’s looser industrialization program, and EPZs were established around the world in places like South Korea, the Philippines, Haiti, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and even South Vietnam (although the latter was dismantled after the collapse of the South Vietnamese government in 1975). In 1980, the People’s Republic of China also began its pivot to capitalist development in earnest, creating a Special Economic Zone in Shenzhen that was heavily based on Taiwan’s EPZs.
In the early 1970s, Kaohsiung had more factories and more workers than Ciudad Juárez, due largely to its lower wages and its higher level of state repression. Until the 1980s, the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone (KEPZ) experienced virtually no strikes or significant labor actions, whereas dozens of strikes erupted in Ciudad Juárez in the early 1970s. U.S. and Japanese investors were also worried by the rise of Chicana/o organizing across the border in El Paso and the bountiful number of left-wing political formations demanding radical change throughout Mexico. Yet despite early discrepancies, both Juárez’ maquiladora industry and the KEPZ were organized around gendered labor regimes, with roughly 80-90% of its workforce composed of women ages 16 to 25 until the 1980s.
In the 1960s, Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez became laboratories for the global factory. In the late 1960s, Taiwan and Mexico designated both cities as pilot areas for a new experiment in export-led industrialization. Their decision was informed by a chorus of U.S. industrial consultants, including officials from US AID, the Sino-American Fund, Richard Bolin of Arthur D. Little Inc. (who went on to become one of the loudest advocates for maquila growth), and ambitious firms like General Instruments. With hopes that foreign investment would lead to rapid industrialization, Mexico and the Republic of China (Taiwan) established specially designated zones, where foreign firms or subcontractors could import basic materials to be assembled and re-exported duty free. Within these zones, investors were promised access to large numbers of well-behaved, unmarried, young women and girl workers.
Although we use the term “global factory,” this entity was experienced through distinct linguistic formulations. In Mexico, export-assembly plants became known as “maquiladoras” or “maquilas,” and were limited to cities within direct range of the northern border (although this restriction was lifted in 1971). Meanwhile in Taiwan, aside from a few small industrial parks outside of Taipei, export assembly plants were allowed in a specially cordoned off industrial zone known as an Export Processing Zone, or EPZ, (Jiāgōng chūkǒu qū, 加工出口區，sometimes also referred in shorthand as a 加工區/Jiāgōng qū). The first EPZ was established in Kaohsiung in 1966, but more were later established in Nanzi and Taichung. By the 1970s, export-industries expanded beyond these designated zones however, as Taiwan became a regional leader in export-manufacturing. The EPZ model eventually proved more popular than Mexico’s looser industrialization program, and EPZs were established around the world in places like South Korea, the Philippines, Haiti, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and even South Vietnam (although the latter was dismantled after the collapse of the South Vietnamese government in 1975). In 1980, the People’s Republic of China also began its pivot to capitalist development in earnest, creating a Special Economic Zone in Shenzhen that was heavily based on Taiwan’s EPZs.
In the early 1970s, Kaohsiung had more factories and more workers than Ciudad Juárez, due largely to its lower wages and its higher level of state repression. Until the 1980s, the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone (KEPZ) experienced virtually no strikes or significant labor actions, whereas dozens of strikes erupted in Ciudad Juárez in the early 1970s. U.S. and Japanese investors were also worried by the rise of Chicana/o organizing across the border in El Paso and the bountiful number of left-wing political formations demanding radical change throughout Mexico. Yet despite early discrepancies, both Juárez’ maquiladora industry and the KEPZ were organized around gendered labor regimes, with roughly 80-90% of its workforce composed of women ages 16 to 25 until the 1980s.
(Workers occupy the maquiladora Vestamex during a work stoppage in September, 1987. From El Fronterizo, September 22, 1987.)
(Workers occupy the maquiladora Vestamex during a work stoppage in September, 1987. From El Fronterizo, September 22, 1987.)
Yet, while maquiladora growth in Mexico’s border cities entered a period of long-term growth following the peso devaluation of 1982, Taiwan’s EPZs and industrial zones contracted beginning in the late 1980s. Instead, as wages in Taiwan grew, foreign investors and Taiwanese capitalists looked to cheaper places like Mainland China, Vietnam, and Mexico. For example, an electronics subcontractor company called Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd., which was first established in Taiwan in 1974, began expanding its operations to Shenzhen, China in 1989. Today, that company is also known as Foxconn, and currently employs thousands of workers in Ciudad Juárez.
Yet, while maquiladora growth in Mexico’s border cities entered a period of long-term growth following the peso devaluation of 1982, Taiwan’s EPZs and industrial zones contracted beginning in the late 1980s. Instead, as wages in Taiwan grew, foreign investors and Taiwanese capitalists looked to cheaper places like Mainland China, Vietnam, and Mexico. For example, an electronics subcontractor company called Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd., which was first established in Taiwan in 1974, began expanding its operations to Shenzhen, China in 1989. Today, that company is also known as Foxconn, and currently employs thousands of workers in Ciudad Juárez.
Female Workers
女工
Female Workers
女工
(“Demostración de Alto Civismo el Desfile,” El Fronterizo, May 3, 1971)
(“Demostración de Alto Civismo el Desfile,” El Fronterizo, May 3, 1971)
In popular imagination in both Ciudad Juárez and Taiwan, the EPZ and the maquiladora are commonly associated with young women and girl workers. This is no accident: from the 1960s until the early 1980s, women aged 16-24 (and of course, some child workers who entered factories illegally) constituted between 70-90% of assembly line workers in both locations. In both Ciudad Juárez and Kaohsiung, by the mid-1970s, women workers commuting to work became common features in the urban landscape–with women waiting for their early morning ruteras in Juárez and thousands of young girls in blue uniforms cycling to the EPZ. The high composition of women workers directly impacted production policies as women were subject to frequent sexual harassment, alternately/simultaneously sexualized and infantilized, and sometimes subject to mandatory pregnancy tests.
Women’s employment in industrial jobs is not new–in earlier phases of industrialization in New England and Western Europe, women workers were also employed en masse, citing their “docility,” “nimble fingers,” and willingness to work at lower rates. Yet the percentage of women employed in export-industrial zones far surpassed these prior numbers. Until the mid 1980s, the vast majority of EPZs across the world primarily employed young women, as transnational capital scanned the world to relocate assembly lines in countries with low tariffs, authoritarian governments, and ample access to “cheap labor.”
In popular imagination in both Ciudad Juárez and Taiwan, the EPZ and the maquiladora are commonly associated with young women and girl workers. This is no accident: from the 1960s until the early 1980s, women aged 16-24 (and of course, some child workers who entered factories illegally) constituted between 70-90% of assembly line workers in both locations. In both Ciudad Juárez and Kaohsiung, by the mid-1970s, women workers commuting to work became common features in the urban landscape–with women waiting for their early morning ruteras in Juárez and thousands of young girls in blue uniforms cycling to the EPZ. The high composition of women workers directly impacted production policies as women were subject to frequent sexual harassment, alternately/simultaneously sexualized and infantilized, and sometimes subject to mandatory pregnancy tests.
Women’s employment in industrial jobs is not new–in earlier phases of industrialization in New England and Western Europe, women workers were also employed en masse, citing their “docility,” “nimble fingers,” and willingness to work at lower rates. Yet the percentage of women employed in export-industrial zones far surpassed these prior numbers. Until the mid 1980s, the vast majority of EPZs across the world primarily employed young women, as transnational capital scanned the world to relocate assembly lines in countries with low tariffs, authoritarian governments, and ample access to “cheap labor.”
(Women working at Jianyuan Co.’s KEPZ factory in 1970, Source: Export Processing Zone Newsletter, Vol 5, No. 9, September 1970. Courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Labor)
(Women working at Jianyuan Co.’s KEPZ factory in 1970, Source: Export Processing Zone Newsletter, Vol 5, No. 9, September 1970. Courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Labor)
Throughout the 1970s, women workers constituted the demographic majority on Taiwan’s assembly lines and statistical increases in female employment were overwhelmingly located in industrial jobs. From 1972 to 1976 —apart from the 1974 oil crisis, which led to nearly 10,000 layoffs in the export sector— women outnumbered men in manufacturing’s blue-collar positions across the island. Yet, within the country’s first export-processing zones, this demographic imbalance was much more extreme. From 1971- 1975, women workers constituted between 85-90% of assembly line workers, with workers aged 16-19 encompassing the largest age demographic. Women became so commonplace in industrial zones that public opinion began feminizing industrial labor in peculiar ways, suggesting that the simple and repetitive work of the assembly line was so easy that it particularly suited women, who were seen as unskilled and less hard-working than their male peers. Throughout the 1970s, local newspapers generally characterized women workers as uneducated, lacking work ethic (“缺乏勤勞意識”), and generally uncommitted to their workplace. Today, far fewer Taiwanese women work in EPZs, as most factories went abroad, but EPZs still maintain a high number of immigrant women workers from Southeast Asia, many of whom still live in factory-adjacent dormitories and remain subject to long working hours, weak unions and precarious visa situations.
The feminization of industrial labor has also had a long-term impact on Ciudad Juárez. Although women constituted the majority of assembly line workers in the 1970s, the devaluation and economic crisis of 1982-1983 changed maquiladora demographics. Taking advantage of widespread economic desperation, capital began flooding border cities in the 1980s, but found that there were simply not enough young women workers to fill their assembly lines. Maquiladoras then began a process of hiring far more women over 30 and men of various ages; a shift that has continued to the present. Yet while today demographics have shifted, scholars like Alejandro Lugo, Leslie Salzinger, and Cirila Quintero Ramírez have argued assembly lines remain gendered spaces. As Cirila Quintero Ramírez has argued, “women [workers] were used as a factor to devalue the productive activity of these companies”, leading to long-term stabilization of low wages and exploitative conditions. Likewise, harassment and forms of paternalism designed to control young women workers have persisted in factories, despite a more diverse demographic of workers.
The death of women workers –via industrial accidents or femicides– is also, unfortunately, a serious problem in grappling with the history of the global factory. In Ciudad Juárez, with the beginning of femicides in the early 1990s (although some now argue this began in the late 1980s), women workers were amongst some of the earliest victims of gendered killings. Although today maquiladora workers do not constitute the largest demographic of women killed, the devaluation of women’s lives and labor in foreign owned assembly plants has arguably impacted contemporary histories of gender-based violence. In Taiwan, although there is not a similar history of femicide, early industrial accidents disproportionately impacted women. In 1972, at least 6 women died and dozens more were seriously poisoned after being exposed to the extremely harmful chemical trichloroethylene (TCE) in their factories. One year later on Sept. 3, 1973, 25 women workers –many of whom were teenagers– died after their commuter boat sank while carrying women to the KEPZ for an early morning shift.
In sum, the history of the global factory is also necessarily a history of women workers and a history of capitalism’s entanglement with gendered forms of exploitation. In Taiwan, Mexico, South Korea, and Mainland China –to name a few places– women workers have shouldered the burden of capitalist development, working long hours and earning little pay, while governments celebrate rapid industrialization and capitalists enrich themselves.
Throughout the 1970s, women workers constituted the demographic majority on Taiwan’s assembly lines and statistical increases in female employment were overwhelmingly located in industrial jobs. From 1972 to 1976 —apart from the 1974 oil crisis, which led to nearly 10,000 layoffs in the export sector— women outnumbered men in manufacturing’s blue-collar positions across the island. Yet, within the country’s first export-processing zones, this demographic imbalance was much more extreme. From 1971- 1975, women workers constituted between 85-90% of assembly line workers, with workers aged 16-19 encompassing the largest age demographic. Women became so commonplace in industrial zones that public opinion began feminizing industrial labor in peculiar ways, suggesting that the simple and repetitive work of the assembly line was so easy that it particularly suited women, who were seen as unskilled and less hard-working than their male peers. Throughout the 1970s, local newspapers generally characterized women workers as uneducated, lacking work ethic (“缺乏勤勞意識”), and generally uncommitted to their workplace. Today, far fewer Taiwanese women work in EPZs, as most factories went abroad, but EPZs still maintain a high number of immigrant women workers from Southeast Asia, many of whom still live in factory-adjacent dormitories and remain subject to long working hours, weak unions and precarious visa situations.
The feminization of industrial labor has also had a long-term impact on Ciudad Juárez. Although women constituted the majority of assembly line workers in the 1970s, the devaluation and economic crisis of 1982-1983 changed maquiladora demographics. Taking advantage of widespread economic desperation, capital began flooding border cities in the 1980s, but found that there were simply not enough young women workers to fill their assembly lines. Maquiladoras then began a process of hiring far more women over 30 and men of various ages; a shift that has continued to the present. Yet while today demographics have shifted, scholars like Alejandro Lugo, Leslie Salzinger, and Cirila Quintero Ramírez have argued assembly lines remain gendered spaces. As Cirila Quintero Ramírez has argued, “women [workers] were used as a factor to devalue the productive activity of these companies”, leading to long-term stabilization of low wages and exploitative conditions. Likewise, harassment and forms of paternalism designed to control young women workers have persisted in factories, despite a more diverse demographic of workers.
The death of women workers –via industrial accidents or femicides– is also, unfortunately, a serious problem in grappling with the history of the global factory. In Ciudad Juárez, with the beginning of femicides in the early 1990s (although some now argue this began in the late 1980s), women workers were amongst some of the earliest victims of gendered killings. Although today maquiladora workers do not constitute the largest demographic of women killed, the devaluation of women’s lives and labor in foreign owned assembly plants has arguably impacted contemporary histories of gender-based violence. In Taiwan, although there is not a similar history of femicide, early industrial accidents disproportionately impacted women. In 1972, at least 6 women died and dozens more were seriously poisoned after being exposed to the extremely harmful chemical trichloroethylene (TCE) in their factories. One year later on Sept. 3, 1973, 25 women workers –many of whom were teenagers– died after their commuter boat sank while carrying women to the KEPZ for an early morning shift.
In sum, the history of the global factory is also necessarily a history of women workers and a history of capitalism’s entanglement with gendered forms of exploitation. In Taiwan, Mexico, South Korea, and Mainland China –to name a few places– women workers have shouldered the burden of capitalist development, working long hours and earning little pay, while governments celebrate rapid industrialization and capitalists enrich themselves.
Borderlands
邊境
Borderlands
邊境
Borders, war and capitalism mix well. Thinkers like Karl Marx, Rosa Luxemburg, David Harvey, and Alicia Castellanos wrote plenty on how capitalism relies on conquest and colonization to continuously reproduce itself on a world scale. Through this process, frontiers and borderlands become the physical vanguard for new forms of capitalist accumulation. We should not be surprised when we learn that export-manufacturing zones first appeared in militarized port cities and border regions around the world. Mexico and Taiwan’s borderlands are no exception.
The shape of Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez’ political boundaries were established through two wars fought roughly 100 years apart. In 1846, the U.S. invaded Mexico, and following two years of brutal warfare, established the contemporary U.S.-Mexico border in 1848 following the annexation of Mexico’s northern territory and the forced incorporation of hundreds of indigenous nations. Militarization began soon after, first to destroy indigenous nations in the late 19th century and later, in the early 20th Century, to stop Chinese migrants, control flows of contraband and police the border by installing fencing and establishing the U.S. Border Patrol.
The fencing and militarization of the border never seemed to stop, and always seemed to make capitalists happy. In the early 1970s, U.S. manufacturers complained of safety concerns on the border, but as border militarization rose and the peso’s value fell in the 1980s, they tended to build more factories. In 1993, Silvestre Reyes launched an unprecedented blockade of the U.S.-Mexico border called “Operation Blockade,” and regional industry boosters cheered on the plan. El Paso’s Hispanic Chamber of Commerce promised that more border policing would “help NAFTA” and bring security and investment to the region. Today, the border is witnessing both unprecedented militarization and record levels of maquila growth.
One hundred years after the U.S. invaded Mexico, the leadership of China’s Nationalist Party (國民黨, KMT) fled to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese Civil War. In 1949, the Communist Party of China claimed victory, renaming the country as the People’s Republic of China. Taiwan became the last living remnant of the Republic of China. Taiwanese people were not given a choice in this new political transformation and rebellions swept the island in the late 1940s. The KMT swiftly decimated resistance, killing tens of thousands of Taiwanese activists, and incarcerating and torturing many more. With the hope of one day reclaiming the Chinese mainland, the KMT made sure Taiwan was kept in a constant state of war-readiness. The KMT government declared martial law on the island in 1949, prohibiting freedom of speech and political assembly – a political status that lasted until 1987.
Alongside the political repression of the martial law period, the KMT also fortified its coastal border with China. From 1949 until 1987, beaches were not open to surfing, swimming, hobby fishing or any cute coastal activities – instead they were littered with concrete barricades, fencing and military outposts. Normal people were largely excluded from beaches and Taiwan’s coast became hyper militarized borderlands. Yet, just as Taiwan became an anti-communist fortress, the KMT also christened the island an “investor’s paradise” and invited foreign capitalists to set up shop in its new Export Processing Zone in the redesigned Kaohsiung Harbor. Promising a “strike free” country, low-wage workers, and a militarized coastline, the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone made its foreign investors feel comfortable and grew at an astonishing rate.
Today, martial law is over, and Taiwanese people get to hang out at beaches. People have even started surfing. Yet while the coastline is far less militarized, regional conflict with China continues, and a U.S.-backed effort to remilitarize the coasts again. Today the KEPZ has fewer workers since the capitalists moved most of their assembly lines to places like Mexico, China and Vietnam. Yet, maybe with more militarization, capitalists will find new ways of making money along Taiwan’s borderlands. They usually do.
Borders, war and capitalism mix well. Thinkers like Karl Marx, Rosa Luxemburg, David Harvey, and Alicia Castellanos wrote plenty on how capitalism relies on conquest and colonization to continuously reproduce itself on a world scale. Through this process, frontiers and borderlands become the physical vanguard for new forms of capitalist accumulation. We should not be surprised when we learn that export-manufacturing zones first appeared in militarized port cities and border regions around the world. Mexico and Taiwan’s borderlands are no exception.
The shape of Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez’ political boundaries were established through two wars fought roughly 100 years apart. In 1846, the U.S. invaded Mexico, and following two years of brutal warfare, established the contemporary U.S.-Mexico border in 1848 following the annexation of Mexico’s northern territory and the forced incorporation of hundreds of indigenous nations. Militarization began soon after, first to destroy indigenous nations in the late 19th century and later, in the early 20th Century, to stop Chinese migrants, control flows of contraband and police the border by installing fencing and establishing the U.S. Border Patrol.
The fencing and militarization of the border never seemed to stop, and always seemed to make capitalists happy. In the early 1970s, U.S. manufacturers complained of safety concerns on the border, but as border militarization rose and the peso’s value fell in the 1980s, they tended to build more factories. In 1993, Silvestre Reyes launched an unprecedented blockade of the U.S.-Mexico border called “Operation Blockade,” and regional industry boosters cheered on the plan. El Paso’s Hispanic Chamber of Commerce promised that more border policing would “help NAFTA” and bring security and investment to the region. Today, the border is witnessing both unprecedented militarization and record levels of maquila growth.
One hundred years after the U.S. invaded Mexico, the leadership of China’s Nationalist Party (國民黨, KMT) fled to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese Civil War. In 1949, the Communist Party of China claimed victory, renaming the country as the People’s Republic of China. Taiwan became the last living remnant of the Republic of China. Taiwanese people were not given a choice in this new political transformation and rebellions swept the island in the late 1940s. The KMT swiftly decimated resistance, killing tens of thousands of Taiwanese activists, and incarcerating and torturing many more. With the hope of one day reclaiming the Chinese mainland, the KMT made sure Taiwan was kept in a constant state of war-readiness. The KMT government declared martial law on the island in 1949, prohibiting freedom of speech and political assembly – a political status that lasted until 1987.
Alongside the political repression of the martial law period, the KMT also fortified its coastal border with China. From 1949 until 1987, beaches were not open to surfing, swimming, hobby fishing or any cute coastal activities – instead they were littered with concrete barricades, fencing and military outposts. Normal people were largely excluded from beaches and Taiwan’s coast became hyper militarized borderlands. Yet, just as Taiwan became an anti-communist fortress, the KMT also christened the island an “investor’s paradise” and invited foreign capitalists to set up shop in its new Export Processing Zone in the redesigned Kaohsiung Harbor. Promising a “strike free” country, low-wage workers, and a militarized coastline, the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone made its foreign investors feel comfortable and grew at an astonishing rate.
Today, martial law is over, and Taiwanese people get to hang out at beaches. People have even started surfing. Yet while the coastline is far less militarized, regional conflict with China continues, and a U.S.-backed effort to remilitarize the coasts again. Today the KEPZ has fewer workers since the capitalists moved most of their assembly lines to places like Mexico, China and Vietnam. Yet, maybe with more militarization, capitalists will find new ways of making money along Taiwan’s borderlands. They usually do.
Cold War
冷戰
Cold War
冷戰
(An explicitly anti-communist Labor Day Celebration, featuring a song and photography contest for workers, as well as anti-communist lectures, at the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone in southern Taiwan, May 1, 1971. Source: Export Processing Zone Newsletter, Volume 6, No. 4, April 1971. Courtesy of the Kaohsiung Museum of Labor).
Although the growth of maquiladoras in the borderlands is sometimes associated with the rise of neoliberalism, the global factory is arguably a living artifact of the Cold War. Maquiladoras, export assembly plants and EPZs were first established in countries that were explicitly allied with the U.S. and the capitalist camp during the Cold War, like Taiwan, Mexico, South Korea, South Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia, as well as in the colonies of imperialist powers like Hong Kong and Puerto Rico.
In Taiwan, the Cold War directly impacted everyday life. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the KMT massacred tens of thousands of Taiwanese activists, directly targeting those seeking independence or those involved in left-wing political organizing. Today, the period from 1949 to 1992 is commemorated as the “White Terror” (白色恐怖), and marks the period after the 228 Massacre and the KMT’s establishment of Martial Law. Aside from mass killings and mass arrests, Cold War ideology seeped into public life. In public education, students were immersed in an anti-communist reinterpretation of Sun Yat-Sen’s political philosophy called “Three People’s Principles” (三民主義), which were said to organize political life. Dissent, especially left-wing, was crushed, and left-wing activists were detained in prisons for political activities.
In the factories, KMT party officials used state-controlled unions and women’s organizations to mobilize women workers and pressure them to attend anti-communist speeches and rallies. International Workers’ Day and International Women’s Day were stripped of their internationalist and socialist histories, and celebrated with anti-communist undertones. Likewise, the KMT used the KEPZ to create international political links with other right wing regimes in countries like South Africa, South Vietnam, South Korea, Israel, Guatemala, Argentina, and Chile. For example, Mario Sandoval Alarcón, founder of Guatemala’s far-right Movimiento de Liberación Nacional and architect of the country’s death squads, frequently visited Kaohsiung’s Export Processing Zone in the 1970s.
Just as the rise of EPZs in Taiwan corresponded with the fervent anti-communism and political repression of the White Terror, the rise of the maquiladora also aligns with the history of the Guerra Sucia in Mexico. Just four months after Octaviano Campos Salas announced the beginning of the Border Industrialization Program (known in Spanish as the Programa de aprovechamiento de la Mano de Obra sobrante a lo largo de la Frontera con Estados Unidos and later as el Programa de Industrialización Fronteriza) in Ciudad Juárez, an armed socialist rebellion broke out in Madera, Chihuahua. On September 23, 1965, a dozen teachers, students and peasants known as the Grupo Popular Guerrillera (GPG) led an armed assault on the military barracks in the small Chihuahuan city. Their rationale was outlined in a series of manifestos published months prior, which argued that Mexico ought to follow the example of other “Third World'' struggles and begin an armed revolution for land redistribution, liberation from U.S. imperialism and the dissolution of capitalism. By the end of the day, most of the aspiring guerrillas had been captured, summarily executed and buried in a mass grave at the behest of state governor Giner Durán, who famously remarked: “They were fighting for land, right? We’ll give them land until they’re full of it!” (“Puesto que era tierra lo que peleaban, denles tierra hasta que se harten”).
In the event’s immediate aftermath, the federal government implemented a vast militarization of Chihuahua’s countryside, but radical student movements and armed leftist insurgency continued into the ensuing decade. The Mexican government met these movements with violence, including the massacre at Tlatelolco in 1968 and the Halconazo of 1971. While most radical students did not take up arms, some did, and throughout the 1970s, the Mexican government swiftly aimed to crush armed marxist groups.
Marxist guerrilla activity in Ciudad Juárez, while not as numerous as in other cities, did directly impact the maquiladora industry and disrupted everyday life in the city. In April of 1974, members of the Liga Comunista 23 de Septiembre exchanged fire with municipal police officers, leading to general panic concerning the arrival of “guerrilleros” in the city. Later in June, a string of assassinations targeting police officers led to the discovery of a guerrilla cell belonging to the Liga Comunista 23 de Septiembre in Chihuahua City, that included two students from the Regional Technology Institute of Ciudad Juárez (Instituto Tecnológico Regional de Ciudad Juárez). More shocking perhaps was the capture of a party cell in Ciudad Juárez in October of 1974, which included other local students, and two former maquiladora employees: Ernesto Guerrero Arriesta (22 years old) who had worked at General Instruments, and Elizabeth Sanchez Ramírez (19 years old), who had worked at the A.C. Nielsen.
More broadly, borderlands capitalists blamed the maquiladoras’ slower growth rate in the 1970s on Marxist militancy. In 1973, the Union de Empresarios de Cd. Juárez composed an open letter to the city’s workers, bemoaning Marxist influence on workers and students, and decrying frequent strikes. They wrote that “the working sector constantly threatens us with crazy and unjust strikes for the entire Mexican people. The same thing happens in our schools, leaders who call themselves students, with socialist and Marxist ideas, always blame the employer for the ineptitude and deficiency caused by themselves in our institutions.”
Although the growth of maquiladoras in the borderlands is sometimes associated with the rise of neoliberalism, the global factory is arguably a living artifact of the Cold War. Maquiladoras, export assembly plants and EPZs were first established in countries that were explicitly allied with the U.S. and the capitalist camp during the Cold War, like Taiwan, Mexico, South Korea, South Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia, as well as in the colonies of imperialist powers like Hong Kong and Puerto Rico.
In Taiwan, the Cold War directly impacted everyday life. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the KMT massacred tens of thousands of Taiwanese activists, directly targeting those seeking independence or those involved in left-wing political organizing. Today, the period from 1949 to 1992 is commemorated as the “White Terror” (白色恐怖), and marks the period after the 228 Massacre and the KMT’s establishment of Martial Law. Aside from mass killings and mass arrests, Cold War ideology seeped into public life. In public education, students were immersed in an anti-communist reinterpretation of Sun Yat-Sen’s political philosophy called “Three People’s Principles” (三民主義), which were said to organize political life. Dissent, especially left-wing, was crushed, and left-wing activists were detained in prisons for political activities.
In the factories, KMT party officials used state-controlled unions and women’s organizations to mobilize women workers and pressure them to attend anti-communist speeches and rallies. International Workers’ Day and International Women’s Day were stripped of their internationalist and socialist histories, and celebrated with anti-communist undertones. Likewise, the KMT used the KEPZ to create international political links with other right wing regimes in countries like South Africa, South Vietnam, South Korea, Israel, Guatemala, Argentina, and Chile. For example, Mario Sandoval Alarcón, founder of Guatemala’s far-right Movimiento de Liberación Nacional and architect of the country’s death squads, frequently visited Kaohsiung’s Export Processing Zone in the 1970s.
Just as the rise of EPZs in Taiwan corresponded with the fervent anti-communism and political repression of the White Terror, the rise of the maquiladora also aligns with the history of the Guerra Sucia in Mexico. Just four months after Octaviano Campos Salas announced the beginning of the Border Industrialization Program (known in Spanish as the Programa de aprovechamiento de la Mano de Obra sobrante a lo largo de la Frontera con Estados Unidos and later as el Programa de Industrialización Fronteriza) in Ciudad Juárez, an armed socialist rebellion broke out in Madera, Chihuahua. On September 23, 1965, a dozen teachers, students and peasants known as the Grupo Popular Guerrillera (GPG) led an armed assault on the military barracks in the small Chihuahuan city. Their rationale was outlined in a series of manifestos published months prior, which argued that Mexico ought to follow the example of other “Third World'' struggles and begin an armed revolution for land redistribution, liberation from U.S. imperialism and the dissolution of capitalism. By the end of the day, most of the aspiring guerrillas had been captured, summarily executed and buried in a mass grave at the behest of state governor Giner Durán, who famously remarked: “They were fighting for land, right? We’ll give them land until they’re full of it!” (“Puesto que era tierra lo que peleaban, denles tierra hasta que se harten”).
In the event’s immediate aftermath, the federal government implemented a vast militarization of Chihuahua’s countryside, but radical student movements and armed leftist insurgency continued into the ensuing decade. The Mexican government met these movements with violence, including the massacre at Tlatelolco in 1968 and the Halconazo of 1971. While most radical students did not take up arms, some did, and throughout the 1970s, the Mexican government swiftly aimed to crush armed marxist groups.
Marxist guerrilla activity in Ciudad Juárez, while not as numerous as in other cities, did directly impact the maquiladora industry and disrupted everyday life in the city. In April of 1974, members of the Liga Comunista 23 de Septiembre exchanged fire with municipal police officers, leading to general panic concerning the arrival of “guerrilleros” in the city. Later in June, a string of assassinations targeting police officers led to the discovery of a guerrilla cell belonging to the Liga Comunista 23 de Septiembre in Chihuahua City, that included two students from the Regional Technology Institute of Ciudad Juárez (Instituto Tecnológico Regional de Ciudad Juárez). More shocking perhaps was the capture of a party cell in Ciudad Juárez in October of 1974, which included other local students, and two former maquiladora employees: Ernesto Guerrero Arriesta (22 years old) who had worked at General Instruments, and Elizabeth Sanchez Ramírez (19 years old), who had worked at the A.C. Nielsen.
More broadly, borderlands capitalists blamed the maquiladoras’ slower growth rate in the 1970s on Marxist militancy. In 1973, the Union de Empresarios de Cd. Juárez composed an open letter to the city’s workers, bemoaning Marxist influence on workers and students, and decrying frequent strikes. They wrote that “the working sector constantly threatens us with crazy and unjust strikes for the entire Mexican people. The same thing happens in our schools, leaders who call themselves students, with socialist and Marxist ideas, always blame the employer for the ineptitude and deficiency caused by themselves in our institutions.”
Environment
環境
Environment
環境
(El Paso Times, May 21, 1989 "Twin plant toxics may reach water table" By Guadalupe Silva)
One of the consequences of rapid export-industrialization has been massive contamination. The industrialization of Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez had significant environmental costs on the local landscape, and physical impact on workers’ bodies. In the late 1970s, writers like Sandra Arenal and Patricia Fernández-Kelly collected dozens of testimonies from workers recalling the factory regime’s toll on their bodies and illnesses that developed after working in factories. These reports continued into the 1990s, as the effects of rapid industrialization aggravated the collapse of the local ecosystem–a process that the mass transport of goods and the militarization of the border have only accelerated.
A few cases stand out in the history of environmental contamination in Taiwan and the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands. In Ciudad Juárez, the maquiladora Fluorex was found to be dumping industrial waste in nearby residential neighborhoods throughout the 1980s, with two major outbreaks of illness amongst local families in 1982 and 1986. In 1972, dozens of workers were poisoned after handling trichloroethylene (TCE), a toxic solvent used for production and cleaning
En el marco del Proyecto de Responsabilidad Social Universitaria de la Universidad Nacional Sun Yat-sen (Taiwán), en 2024, la profesora Wang Mei-Hsiang y Lee I-Chih coordinaron un curso intensivo sobre la historia de la Zona de Procesamiento de Exportación de Kaohsiung y las maquiladoras de Ciudad Juárez en el contexto de la Guerra Fría. El curso también presta especial atención al papel histórico de las trabajadoras en ambos lugares, regímenes laborales de género en ambos lugares, y al "Incidente Kao-Chong No. 6" de 1973, cuando un barco de pasajeros en Kaohsiung, Taiwán, volcó y mató a 25 trabajadoras, en su mayoría adolescentes. Titulado "La práctica de la globalización de la ciudad como co-museo", el curso fue diseñado para introducir a los estudiantes a esta historia y brindarles una plataforma para participar en la curaduría de una exhibición internacional. La profesora Wang Mei-Hsiang y Lee I-Chih colaboraron con Azul Arena durante todo el verano y otoño de 2023 para planificar el curso y llevar las obras artísticas de los estudiantes a nuestra exposición. En septiembre de 2024, los estudiantes exhibirán su trabajo en el Museo del Trabajo de Kaohsiung, y actualmente hay planes para traer artistas fronterizos a Taiwán para continuar las conversaciones que comenzaron con esta exhibición.
Los estudiantes desarrollaron tres contribuciones principales para nuestra exposición. Trabajando en grupos, los estudiantes desarrollaron tres películas artísticas que reflexionan sobre la historia de la Zona de Procesamiento de Exportación de Kaohsiung, así como un documental sobre la colaboración entre su universidad y Azul Arena. Los estudiantes también proporcionaron una réplica de un uniforme estándar para las trabajadoras de Taiwán y un folleto titulado "Juventud en la línea de ensamblaje" diseñado para replicar tarjetas checadoras de las obreras Taiwanesas en la década de 1970.
La pieza final del estudiante reflexiona sobre la deificación de las víctimas del Incidente Kao-Chong No. 6. Tras la muerte de las jóvenes trabajadoras, las familias de las víctimas experimentaron experiencias sobrenaturales que indicaban que sus hijas se habían convertido en espíritus poderosos capaces de conceder deseos y ayudar a las personas vivas a predecir el futuro. Ansiosas por abrazar este fenómeno y aliviadas de que las almas de sus hijas no se hubieran convertido en fantasmas hambrientos, las familias construyeron un gran templo para que los visitantes rezaran a los poderosos espíritus de sus hijas. Los estudiantes incluyeron una imagen de la Bodhisattva de la Compasión Guanyin y piedras tradicionales de adivinación llamadas "Jiaobei" (筊杯) que los visitantes pueden usar libremente., in the U.S.-owned Philco-Ford Factory near Taipei and the Japanese-owned Sanmei Factory in Kaohsiung; incidents which took the lives of a handful of women workers. The event caused mass panic in Taiwan’s export-assembly factories, and forced the government to prohibit the use of TCE. Nevertheless, RCA in Taoyuan continued to use TCE alongside other dangerous chemicals, poisoning thousands of its workers. In recent years, RCA workers have launched a movement to demand reparations from RCA and recognition of the harm the company did to its workers, including dozens of deaths and hundreds of illnesses related to workplace contamination.
One of the consequences of rapid export-industrialization has been massive contamination. The industrialization of Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez had significant environmental costs on the local landscape, and physical impact on workers’ bodies. In the late 1970s, writers like Sandra Arenal and Patricia Fernández-Kelly collected dozens of testimonies from workers recalling the factory regime’s toll on their bodies and illnesses that developed after working in factories. These reports continued into the 1990s, as the effects of rapid industrialization aggravated the collapse of the local ecosystem–a process that the mass transport of goods and the militarization of the border have only accelerated.
A few cases stand out in the history of environmental contamination in Taiwan and the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands. In Ciudad Juárez, the maquiladora Fluorex was found to be dumping industrial waste in nearby residential neighborhoods throughout the 1980s, with two major outbreaks of illness amongst local families in 1982 and 1986. In 1972, dozens of workers were poisoned after handling trichloroethylene (TCE), a toxic solvent used for production and cleaning
En el marco del Proyecto de Responsabilidad Social Universitaria de la Universidad Nacional Sun Yat-sen (Taiwán), en 2024, la profesora Wang Mei-Hsiang y Lee I-Chih coordinaron un curso intensivo sobre la historia de la Zona de Procesamiento de Exportación de Kaohsiung y las maquiladoras de Ciudad Juárez en el contexto de la Guerra Fría. El curso también presta especial atención al papel histórico de las trabajadoras en ambos lugares, regímenes laborales de género en ambos lugares, y al "Incidente Kao-Chong No. 6" de 1973, cuando un barco de pasajeros en Kaohsiung, Taiwán, volcó y mató a 25 trabajadoras, en su mayoría adolescentes. Titulado "La práctica de la globalización de la ciudad como co-museo", el curso fue diseñado para introducir a los estudiantes a esta historia y brindarles una plataforma para participar en la curaduría de una exhibición internacional. La profesora Wang Mei-Hsiang y Lee I-Chih colaboraron con Azul Arena durante todo el verano y otoño de 2023 para planificar el curso y llevar las obras artísticas de los estudiantes a nuestra exposición. En septiembre de 2024, los estudiantes exhibirán su trabajo en el Museo del Trabajo de Kaohsiung, y actualmente hay planes para traer artistas fronterizos a Taiwán para continuar las conversaciones que comenzaron con esta exhibición.
Los estudiantes desarrollaron tres contribuciones principales para nuestra exposición. Trabajando en grupos, los estudiantes desarrollaron tres películas artísticas que reflexionan sobre la historia de la Zona de Procesamiento de Exportación de Kaohsiung, así como un documental sobre la colaboración entre su universidad y Azul Arena. Los estudiantes también proporcionaron una réplica de un uniforme estándar para las trabajadoras de Taiwán y un folleto titulado "Juventud en la línea de ensamblaje" diseñado para replicar tarjetas checadoras de las obreras Taiwanesas en la década de 1970.
La pieza final del estudiante reflexiona sobre la deificación de las víctimas del Incidente Kao-Chong No. 6. Tras la muerte de las jóvenes trabajadoras, las familias de las víctimas experimentaron experiencias sobrenaturales que indicaban que sus hijas se habían convertido en espíritus poderosos capaces de conceder deseos y ayudar a las personas vivas a predecir el futuro. Ansiosas por abrazar este fenómeno y aliviadas de que las almas de sus hijas no se hubieran convertido en fantasmas hambrientos, las familias construyeron un gran templo para que los visitantes rezaran a los poderosos espíritus de sus hijas. Los estudiantes incluyeron una imagen de la Bodhisattva de la Compasión Guanyin y piedras tradicionales de adivinación llamadas "Jiaobei" (筊杯) que los visitantes pueden usar libremente., in the U.S.-owned Philco-Ford Factory near Taipei and the Japanese-owned Sanmei Factory in Kaohsiung; incidents which took the lives of a handful of women workers. The event caused mass panic in Taiwan’s export-assembly factories, and forced the government to prohibit the use of TCE. Nevertheless, RCA in Taoyuan continued to use TCE alongside other dangerous chemicals, poisoning thousands of its workers. In recent years, RCA workers have launched a movement to demand reparations from RCA and recognition of the harm the company did to its workers, including dozens of deaths and hundreds of illnesses related to workplace contamination.
One of the consequences of rapid export-industrialization has been massive contamination. The industrialization of Kaohsiung and Ciudad Juárez had significant environmental costs on the local landscape, and physical impact on workers’ bodies. In the late 1970s, writers like Sandra Arenal and Patricia Fernández-Kelly collected dozens of testimonies from workers recalling the factory regime’s toll on their bodies and illnesses that developed after working in factories. These reports continued into the 1990s, as the effects of rapid industrialization aggravated the collapse of the local ecosystem–a process that the mass transport of goods and the militarization of the border have only accelerated.
A few cases stand out in the history of environmental contamination in Taiwan and the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands. In Ciudad Juárez, the maquiladora Fluorex was found to be dumping industrial waste in nearby residential neighborhoods throughout the 1980s, with two major outbreaks of illness amongst local families in 1982 and 1986. In 1972, dozens of workers were poisoned after handling trichloroethylene (TCE), a toxic solvent used for production and cleaning
People's Basic Necessities
( 食，衣，住，行， 育，樂 )
(Food, Clothing, Housing, Transportation, Education, and Recreation)
People's Basic Necessities
( 食，衣，住，行， 育，樂 )
(Food, Clothing, Housing, Transportation, Education, and Recreation)
(Inspection of the KEPZ Women’s Dormitory before its opening, January 1970. Source: Export Processing Zone Newsletter, Vol. 5, No. 1, January 1970. Courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Labor).
Although the KMT had sworn communism as its enemy, the party nevertheless maintained commitment to its own vision of social equity, expressed through its ongoing reinterpretation of the Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen’s “Three Principles of the People” ( 三民主義). In Taiwan, economic planners like K.T. Li envisioned new industrialization projects as contributing to fulfilling the KMT’s promise of People’s Livelihood (民生主義) and quelling dissatisfaction amongst Taiwanese people with the ruling party. In his presentation to the KMT Central Committee in 1967, K.T. Li argued that the relationship between economic development (and especially the rapid expansion of EPZs) and its impact on citizens livelihood could be determined by measuring the four great necessities of Food, Clothing, Housing and Transportation (食，衣，住，行) , but also needed to be expanded by improving citizen’s access to educational and recreational opportunities (育，樂). The success of new economic strategies like Export Processing Zones therefore depended on measurable improvements to workers’ lives in these areas. Demonstrating that young women workers had access to food, clothing, housing, transportation, education, and recreation thereby took precedence in KEPZ policy and featured prominently in promotional materials.
In 1970, to ensure that young women workers (sometimes referred to as child workers or 童工女工 ) were cared for, the KEPZ Administration established a women’s dormitory to house women workers and provide them with “moral” guidance. In its first years the dormitory offered a wide array of recreational options, including swimming lessons, volunteer opportunities, and educational exchange programs. Later policymakers reflected that the KEPZ had promoted these activities early on as a means of boosting morale and creating labor harmony within factories. Throughout the 1970s, these activities were given prominence in promotional materials, and promised to “cultivate the whole person” of the woman worker and improve her “moral, intellectual, physical and social development.” Alongside dormitory programming, the KEPZ authority also organized intra-factory sports and mass concerts to consume workers' time. Cumulatively, by the KEPZ Administration’s own estimate, from 1970 to 1980, the Women’s Dormitory housed over 20,000 workers and enrolled approximately 8,000 students in its educational programming.
Although the KMT had sworn communism as its enemy, the party nevertheless maintained commitment to its own vision of social equity, expressed through its ongoing reinterpretation of the Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen’s “Three Principles of the People” ( 三民主義). In Taiwan, economic planners like K.T. Li envisioned new industrialization projects as contributing to fulfilling the KMT’s promise of People’s Livelihood (民生主義) and quelling dissatisfaction amongst Taiwanese people with the ruling party. In his presentation to the KMT Central Committee in 1967, K.T. Li argued that the relationship between economic development (and especially the rapid expansion of EPZs) and its impact on citizens livelihood could be determined by measuring the four great necessities of Food, Clothing, Housing and Transportation (食，衣，住，行) , but also needed to be expanded by improving citizen’s access to educational and recreational opportunities (育，樂). The success of new economic strategies like Export Processing Zones therefore depended on measurable improvements to workers’ lives in these areas. Demonstrating that young women workers had access to food, clothing, housing, transportation, education, and recreation thereby took precedence in KEPZ policy and featured prominently in promotional materials.
In 1970, to ensure that young women workers (sometimes referred to as child workers or 童工女工 ) were cared for, the KEPZ Administration established a women’s dormitory to house women workers and provide them with “moral” guidance. In its first years the dormitory offered a wide array of recreational options, including swimming lessons, volunteer opportunities, and educational exchange programs. Later policymakers reflected that the KEPZ had promoted these activities early on as a means of boosting morale and creating labor harmony within factories. Throughout the 1970s, these activities were given prominence in promotional materials, and promised to “cultivate the whole person” of the woman worker and improve her “moral, intellectual, physical and social development.” Alongside dormitory programming, the KEPZ authority also organized intra-factory sports and mass concerts to consume workers' time. Cumulatively, by the KEPZ Administration’s own estimate, from 1970 to 1980, the Women’s Dormitory housed over 20,000 workers and enrolled approximately 8,000 students in its educational programming.
(July 1984 coverage in El Fronterizo of a Volleyball match between women workers from a maquiladora called “Coupon Redemption” (CRM) and the Radio Company of America (RCA). Source: “CRM Sorprendió a la RCA y le Ganó en el Volibol,” El Fronterizo, June 8, 1984.
Workers playing basketball in the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone, Source: Export Processing Zone Newsletter, Vol. 5, No. 9, Sept 1970. Courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Labor.
Yet, as scholars like Pun Ngai have argued, dormitory labor regimes ultimately serve to exert deeper levels of control over workers, and extend capital’s control over labor beyond the hours of the working day. Although many women workers utilized dormitory services and after-work activities, many complained that entering the dormitory was like “entering a nunnery” (住進了宿舍就等於進入了尼姑庵”), and generally felt that by living in the dorm and working in factories in the prime of their life, young women workers were cheaply selling away their youth (“把青春廉價的賣給了工廠”).
In Mexico, although Ciudad Juárez’ maquiladora owners did not establish dormitories, preferring that workers find their own way to work from the colonias populares (working class neighborhoods), the maquiladora association created a huge array of after-work activities, ranging from sporting leagues, Valentine’s Day parties, and beauty pageants. Yet, much like the dormitory labor regime in Taiwan and Mainland China, these were also arguably created to further tie workers to their factory and keep them away from organizing activities. As the Juarense writer Alicia Castellanos wrote, such off-time activities served to disempower militancy: "The annual beauty contests encourage competition and individualism, and moreover, they absorb the attention of the workers. Similarly, the promotion of sports activities, whose practices take place after eight or nine hours of intense work, contributes to channeling energies into sports and to passivity and disinterest in union and political struggle. All this in a 'harmonious' environment in which managers, on Valentine's Day, give red carnations to their exploited workers, or give away miserable [cake treats] when the worker exceeds production standards."
Yet, as scholars like Pun Ngai have argued, dormitory labor regimes ultimately serve to exert deeper levels of control over workers, and extend capital’s control over labor beyond the hours of the working day. Although many women workers utilized dormitory services and after-work activities, many complained that entering the dormitory was like “entering a nunnery” (住進了宿舍就等於進入了尼姑庵”), and generally felt that by living in the dorm and working in factories in the prime of their life, young women workers were cheaply selling away their youth (“把青春廉價的賣給了工廠”).
In Mexico, although Ciudad Juárez’ maquiladora owners did not establish dormitories, preferring that workers find their own way to work from the colonias populares (working class neighborhoods), the maquiladora association created a huge array of after-work activities, ranging from sporting leagues, Valentine’s Day parties, and beauty pageants. Yet, much like the dormitory labor regime in Taiwan and Mainland China, these were also arguably created to further tie workers to their factory and keep them away from organizing activities. As the Juarense writer Alicia Castellanos wrote, such off-time activities served to disempower militancy: "The annual beauty contests encourage competition and individualism, and moreover, they absorb the attention of the workers. Similarly, the promotion of sports activities, whose practices take place after eight or nine hours of intense work, contributes to channeling energies into sports and to passivity and disinterest in union and political struggle. All this in a 'harmonious' environment in which managers, on Valentine's Day, give red carnations to their exploited workers, or give away miserable [cake treats] when the worker exceeds production standards."