Financial Times: China Faces Spectre of Widespread Civil Unrest, Violence

More than 20m rural migrant workers in China have lost their jobs and

returned home as a result of the global economic crisis according to

government figures, raising the spectre of widespread unrest in the

authoritarian country. By the start of the Chinese New Year Spring Festival

on 25 January, 15.3 per cent of China’s 130m migrant workers had lost

their jobs and returned from manufacturing centres in the south and east

of the country to their home villages or towns, according to Chen Xiwen,

Director of the Office of Central Rural Work Leading Group. Mr Chen said

these job losses were a direct result of the global economic crisis and its

impact on the country’s export-oriented manufacturing sector and he

warned that the mass of unemployed migrants would pose new challenges

to social stability in the countryside. The figure of 20 million unemployed

migrants is double the previous official figure released by the Ministry of

Human Resources and Social Security at the end of December 2008 . . .