Self-employed Work in Northeast China County Regions: From Traditional Workers to Store Owners

Abstract

Northeast China has experienced economic and industrial transformation, especially in the county regions. More and more self-employers are arising in the Northeast County regions. After the reform and marketization, the stable working space once constructed by the national capital quickly lost its advantage and disappeared. Now there is nearly no industry in most counties of Northeast China, so laid-off workers who stay there are widely forced to employ themselves in self-owned businesses. They are using small family capital to create new working spaces in the store, and at the same time create new ways of working and social relationships. The new working and living spaces are highly embedded into each other, which means an integration of store and family. Their daily life, family, and social relations are all closely connected with working. They are also continuously reproducing a stable structure of working and living by intergenerational succession.