The challenge of informality: Perspectives on China's changing labour market

Informal employment has not been part of the discourse on labour market transition in China. Nonetheless, reforms have given rise to a process of informalisation, casualisation and flexibilisation of employment, with a greater diversity of contract and employment types, and reduced social and labour protections for previously protected urban workers. The scale and nature of informal employment in this context of radical restructuring is not well understood. Reasons for this include inadequate theoretical models of labour market transition, the nature of the data available, as well as the political risks in publicly acknowledging the fundamental erosion of worker entitlements.