84
EUGENE COOPER
(Sowerby, 1926:2). The full blossoming of manufacture as a mode of production of carved furniture, however, did not have a chance to occur until the industry relocated to Hong Kong after the 1949 revolution.
In this setting, the traditional pattern of craft organization, which had been manifest in the existence of separate guilds for distinct craftsmen of differing native place, working in different woods, persisted in the structure of the labor force of the post-revolution art-carved furniture industry. In a period of "manufacture" which emerged in the 1950s, a variety of trade unions came into existence. Traditional craft boundaries between carpenter, carver, and painter, between rosewood and teak/camphorwood workers, and between craftsmen of different places of origin were all manifest in separate organizations of craft practitioners and remained strong throughout the period of "manufacture". Five unions thrived in this period, three among teak/camphorwood workers and two among rosewood workers. The separate crafts out of which the industry developed gave social expression to the synthetic nature of the industry in the form of separate unions.
The post-World War II development of trade unionism in the Hong Kong-based carved furniture industry is a study of how, in the context of the transformation from labor-intensive craft manufacture to capital-intensive, fully proletarianized industrial production, this traditional craft parochialism became manifest in a politically based polarization of the industry along Communist/Nationalist lines; and how, in this latter context, the Communist Hong Kong-Kowloon Woodwork Carvers' Union emerged as the dominant group in the labor force. It did so by adapting its proletarian message in various ways to the local conditions of its existence, while the conditions of that existence themselves underwent change, giving greater cogency to that message.
The first union in the carved wood furniture industry was located in the Canton-based rosewood industry in 1922, in a period when Sun Yat-sen and his Kuomintang party, still in alliance with the Chinese Communist Party, were actively engaged in organizing trade unions of a modern type among craftsmen and industrial workers on the heels of the demise of traditional guilds. The Chun Wah Rosewood Workers Union, organized in this context, is still active in contemporary Hong Kong. It followed Chiang Kai-shek
84
EUGENE COOPER
(Sowerby, 1926:2). The full blossoming of manufacture as a mode of production of carved furniture however, did not have a chance to occur until the industry relocated to Hong Kong after the 1949 revolution.
In this setting, the traditional pattern of craft organization which had been manifest in the existence of separate guilds for distinct craftsmen of differing native place, working in different woods, persisted in the structure of the labor force of the post revolution art-carved furniture industry. In a period of "manufacture" which emerged in the 1950's, a variety of trade unions came into existence. Traditional craft boundaries between carpenter, carver and painter, between rosewood and teak/camphorwood workers, and between craftsmen of different places of origin were all manifest in separate organizations of craft practitioners and remained strong throughout the period of "manufacture". Five unions thrived in this period, three among teak/camphorwood workers and two among rosewood workers. The separate crafts out of which the industry developed gave social expression to the synthetic nature of the industry in the form of separate unions.
The post World War II development of trade unionism in the Hong Kong based carved furniture industry is a study of how, in the context of the transformation from labor intensive craft manu- facture to capital intensive, fully proletarianized industrial produc- tion, this traditional craft parochialism became manifest in a politically based polarization of the industry along Communist/ Nationalist lines; and how in this latter context, the Communist Hong Kong-Kowloon Woodwork Carvers' Union emerged as the dominant group in the labor force. It did so by adapting its pro- letarian message in various ways to the local conditions of its existence, while the conditions of that existence themselves under- went change, giving greater cogency to that message.
The first union in the carved wood furniture industry was located in the Canton based rosewood industry in 1922 in a period when Sun Yat-sen and his Kuomintang party, still in alliance with the Chinese Communist Party, were actively engaged in organizing trade unions of a modern type among craftsmen and industrial workers on the heels of the demise of traditional guilds. The Chun Wah Rosewood Workers Union, organized in this context is still active in contemporary Hong Kong. It followed Chiang Kai-shek
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